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Updated: June 3, 2025
Cronje was in communication with Ferreira; he had sent to Bloemfontein for help; and De Wet was known to be on his way from Koffyfontein. But instead of making an effort to save himself he fatally trusted to relief from outside.
Our little caravan set forth by moonlight, taking the road travelled by the left-hand column of the three parallel columns that had advanced on Bloemfontein, and somewhat to the north of that taken by Lord Roberts and the central column, with which we had gone in.
So the army corps, which was to have marched irresistibly to Bloemfontein and Pretoria, had to be hurled into the country each unit as it arrived wherever the need was greatest where all were great. Sir Redvers Buller, thus assailed by the unforeseen and pressed on every side, had to make up his mind quickly. He looked to Natal.
Till that is done there is no possibility of a general advance; and indeed there will have to be a great accumulation of stores here, as this will then become our base instead of Chieveley. "No doubt a great deal will depend on how things are going on the other side. Now that Roberts has as good as captured Cronje and his force he will of course advance to Bloemfontein and occupy it.
For certain reasons the late Commandant-General P. Joubert had evacuated the positions round Ladysmith and retreated to the Biggar's Range. General Louis Botha, who was engaging Buller's relieving forces at Colenso, was then also compelled to retreat. After Cronje's capture the way to Bloemfontein and Pretoria lay open.
Now all Johannesburg and Pretoria were discussing Labor and nothing but Labor. Bloemfontein was in conference thereon. Our work of repatriation which had loomed so large on the southernward veld became here a business at once incidental and remote. One felt that a little sooner or a little later all that would resume and go on, as the rains would, and the veld-grass.
At midday they halted at the farm of Gregorowski, he who had tried the Reform prisoners after the Raid. The cavalry pushed on down Kaal Spruit, and in the evening crossed the Southern railway line which connects Bloemfontein with the colony, cutting it at a point some five miles from the town.
We marched out again in the grey of the morning, and at about ten o'clock a.m. we saw dense clouds of dust rising away in the distance to our extreme right, and shortly afterwards saw horsemen galloping towards us, whom we vainly hoped might be our own cavalry, sent to our relief by Lord Roberts at Bloemfontein; but in a few minutes all our hopes were shattered, when we heard firing and saw our men engaging the enemy and retiring upon the adjacent kopjes, which we at once took possession of, and arranged our hospital, planting the Red Cross flag immediately in front of our ambulance wagons and hospital tents.
Thus Bloemfontein had fallen into the hands of the English; but whatever valuables it contained were spared by the enemy. I did not myself consider the place much superior to any other town, and I would not have thought it a matter of any great importance if it had been destroyed. Still, I felt it to be very regrettable that the town should have been surrendered without a shot.
They have a rest after a few hours, and fall out by the wayside, fling off the heavy accoutrements, light pipes, and fall a-yarning, stretched on the grass, or pull out scraps of old newspapers to read." That was written the day we left Bloemfontein, just a month ago, and 250 miles away. We have come along well, have we not?
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