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Updated: July 27, 2025
After my men had gone northwards, those burghers of Hoopstad, Jacobsdal, Fauresmith, Philippolis, Bethulie, Smithfield, Rouxville, Wepener, Bloemfontein and the southern part of Ladybrand, who had laid down their arms and remained at home between the beginning of March and the end of May, were left undisturbed by Lord Roberts so far as their private liberty was concerned.
In the north-eastern and northern districts for instance, in Ladybrand, Winburg, Kroonstad, Heilbron, Bethlehem, Harrismith and Vrede there were still many families, and these could not be sent to Boshof or to Hoopstad or to the Colony. And when, reduced to dire want, the commandos should be obliged to abandon these districts, their wives and families would have to be left behind to starve!
And, in the end, we shall get to " "A glorious fight, I trust," Weldon supplemented. Gloomily Carew shook his head. "No; merely to Winburg. We are going to provision Weppener and Ladybrand, and then make for the railroad again. We'll strike it at Winburg most likely. It is an unholy sort of hole, and I hear that the hotel serves watered ink and currant jelly under the name of claret.
All was propitious, therefore, for the attempt which Steyn and De Wet were about to make to carry the war into the enemy's country. We last saw De Wet when, after a long chase, he had been headed back from the Orange River, and, winning clear from Knox's pursuit, had in the third week of December passed successfully through the British cordon between Thabanchu and Ladybrand.
In front of us there was the line of fortifications from Bloemfontein to Ladybrand, which had been greatly strengthened since we had forced our way through it at Springhaansnek. It was impossible to get through at Springhaansnek now. I decided to march towards Thaba'Nchu.
Nevertheless, my words fell on unwilling ears. It was not long after I had arrived in the camp when I got the burghers together and spoke to them. After thanking the officers and men for not having surrendered with Prinsloo at Naauwpoort, I congratulated them on their success at Ladybrand, where they had driven the English out of the town and forced them to take refuge in the caverns of Leliehoek.
This had been cut off by the enemy, and the Army was dependent upon the disused and tainted wells within the city. The Boer commandos, which under the command of Olivier had retreated from the Cape Colony to Ladybrand and Clocolan, now began to threaten Broadwood, who, when French was sent to Glen, succeeded to the command of the mounted column.
I was very anxious to prevent the "granary" of the Orange Free State from falling into the hands of the English; with this object in view, I left behind me at Korannaberg General De Villiers, with Commandants De Villiers, of Ficksburg, Crowther, of Ladybrand, Roux, of Wepener, and Potgieter, of Smithfield, and ordered the General to carry on operations in the south-eastern districts of the Free State.
On September 2nd another commando of Free State Boers under Fourie emerged from the mountain country on the Basuto border, and fell upon Ladybrand, which was held by a feeble garrison consisting of one company of the Worcester regiment and forty-three men of the Wiltshire Yeomanry. The Boers, who had several guns with them, appear to have been the same force which had been repulsed at Winburg.
The English had built a line of forts from Bloemfontein to Thaba'Nchu and Ladybrand. And just at the point where we wanted to pass them, there were two forts, one to the south and the other to the north, about 2,000 paces from each other, on the shoulder of the mountain.
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