Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 10, 2025
We might win another victory, but we are certain to be obliged to fall back soon, and my opinion is that we shall be very lucky if we get through safely." "Why not start to-morrow morning, Chris?" Peters said. "We shall be of no use scouting here, and not much use if there is hard fighting. I hear that some natives have brought in the news that there was some firing to-day at Elandslaagte.
He was toying with a spray of wild jasmine, as if its perfume brought back vague memories of home. I learned that he had been wounded at Elandslaagte and again on Waggon Hill. Then came Intombi and malaria. He had only been discharged from hospital that morning. His appetite was not quite equal to the horseflesh test, so he had gone without food.
The British force in that part was small, and though in the various actions at Talana Hill in which the situation of Majuba Hill may be said to have been reversed Elandslaagte, and Rietfontein, portions of the Boer forces had been met and defeated, it became evident that their numbers and their mobility had been absurdly underestimated, and that when once concentrated they far outnumbered the forces at the disposal of Sir George White, who therefore decided to entrench and await reinforcements at Ladysmith, not a strong position, for it was commanded by hills on all sides, but it had been a great depot of military stores which could not be removed.
They are Regulars, only they are bigger, more effective specimens than Manchester mills or East Lancashire mines can spare us for the Regular Service in peace time. Anyway, no soldier need wish to see a finer lot. On them has descended the mantle of my old comrades of Elandslaagte and Caesar's Camp, and worthily beyond doubt they will wear it. Hon.
Major-General French, who commanded, had been out from before daybreak with the Imperial Light Horse and the battery of the Natal Volunteer Artillery reconnoitring towards Elandslaagte. The armoured train slate-colour plated engine, a slate-colour plated loopholed cattle-truck before and behind, an open truck with a Maxim at the tail of all puffed along on his right.
They were all strong fellows belonging to fighting peoples, and would, the boys had no doubt, show as much courage as the Indian bearers had displayed at Dundee and Elandslaagte. In the evening Captain Brookfield sent for Chris. "The orders for to-morrow are out," he said, "as far as we are concerned.
Our Pretoria comrades were apparently safe, and considerably relieved we decided to ride to Elandslaagte which my men would by that time have surely reached. Our carts were sooner or later bound to arrive there, inasmuch as they were in charge of a field-cornet known to us as one of our best "retreat officers."
It soon became apparent that we had been sent to Natal with the object of cutting off the English who were stationed at Dundee and Elandslaagte. We were to be aided in our task by the Transvaalers who were coming from Volksrust and by a party of burghers from Vrede, all under the command of General Roch. We did not arrive in time to be successful in this plan.
The two were to charge simultaneously, but Erasmus failed him at a critical moment, which means a loss of 130 men killed and wounded, and Lukas Meyer in retreat across the Buffalo River. And now Elandslaagte on the top of all! All this owing to the disobedience and negligence of my chief officers." The old man spoke in this strain for some time, until I grew tired and left.
In the battle of Elandslaagte, where some of the hardest hand-to-hand fighting of the war occurred, this Amazon was by the side of her husband in the thick of the engagement, but escaped unscathed. Later she took part in the battles along the Tugela, and when affairs in the Free State appeared to be threatening she was one of the first to go to the scene of action in that part of the country.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking