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Updated: June 4, 2025
While the three of us were pushing our way from position to position into the neighbourhood of the few khakies who already dared not raise their heads from behind the rocks, I noticed, some 500 paces to our front, a number of khakies moving in our direction. I warned Malherbe to keep up his courage, as the enemy were getting reinforcements.
When I went back to the farm later on, I was told that one of the girls had clapped her hands with delight when the enemy fled past them. That must have been the reason why she and her family were so cruelly insulted and plundered by the khakies afterwards. We met with great kindness during our stay in the Magalies Mountains.
But the Krugersdorpers, formerly notorious for their rough behaviour, were now the most orderly, and did not descend before all the men were collected. The kloof was strewn with bodies of khakies, who were sent up as reinforcement and pitilessly shot down by the burghers. The little stream of water was red with blood, so that we could not even quench our thirst.
A moment later, while our corporal had again moved onwards, I noticed several khakies on a stone ridge some 150 paces in front of us. It appeared that they were driven on by part of the centre and right wing, for just then two men made their appearance, whom I at once recognised as Boers from the colour of their clothes and the quick way in which they aimed at me.
While Malherbe and I were peering from behind our hurriedly erected entrenchment, and occasionally firing a few shots, I discovered four or five brave khakies busy dragging along an ammunition waggon, or a gun; from such a distance we could not distinguish which.
When the enemy, a few days later, drove us from Olifantsnek, General de la Rey sent Captain Kirsten with twenty men to the neighbouring kopjes to prevent the enemy from going on a plundering expedition. Then I for the first time saw a farm-house burnt down by the enemy. From a high kopje, by the aid of a telescope, we could distinctly see the movements of the khakies.
Such heavy cannon as the Long Toms were of no use to us now. Hence-forward we were to live on the produce of the surrounding country, as there was no basis from which we were to operate. Besides this, the khakies very kindly made over some of their provisions, arms, and ammunition to us in a skirmish or battle, so that afterwards we had more Lee-Metfords than Mausers in our possession.
Here some of the burghers had before our arrival forced eleven khakies to surrender, but they had not succeeded in occupying the position, as some khakies had remained in the kloof, and had shouted to them that they would not surrender. We were therefore warned against that kloof.
Khaki was on the one side, we on the other. Some of our men had a most original and amusing way of getting at the khakies. 'Come out, you rabbits, come out of your holes, else we'll shoot down the lot of you! Then the poor things answered: 'We're afraid to come out. You'll kill us! They really thought we would shoot them down if they surrendered.
Our ponies, with their quick, peculiar gait, soon caught up the heavily-laden waggons, and we supplied ourselves with mealies, flour, fowls, etc., that had been thrown overboard or left behind on a broken-down waggon. Such is the fortune of war, and the things were better in our hands than in those of the khakies.
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