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Updated: May 24, 2025
Then there were Dutton's party, with the barque 'African'; Nicholson's, with the barque 'Cheviot', from Hobarton; Chamberlain's, with the barque 'William the Fourth', of Hobarton; the 'Hope' barque, and a brig, both from Sydney. The Hentys also had a whaling station at Double Corner, and by offering to supply their men with fresh meat three times a week, obtained the pick of the whalers.
They bought the special editions of the evening papers; they read the military dispatches and the stories of the war correspondents from beginning to end; they stared blankly at the printed columns that recorded the disasters of Nicholson's Nek, and Colenso and Spion Kop.
We need only refer to a few of the many battles fought during the war to show what these simple untrained farmers did accomplish battles which certainly merited for them the attribute of being brave. On the 30th of November, 1899, General De Wet, who was then only Assistant Commandant, led 200 men up Nicholson's Nek, a hill which was then in the possession of the enemy.
In front of them, hardly visible, stretched a long black kopje. It was the very Nicholson's Nek which they had come to occupy. Carleton and Adye must have heaved a sigh of relief as they realised that they had actually struck it. The force was but two hundred yards from the position, and all had gone without a hitch.
The State of Pennsylvania held a lien upon Nicholson's estate for unpaid taxes amounting to $300,000. Notwithstanding this lien, different individuals and corporations contrived to get hold of practically the whole of the estate in dispute. How they did it is told in many legislative documents; the fraud and theft connected with it were a great scandal in Pennsylvania for forty-five years.
It is the warfare of Nicholson's Nek, not that of Laffan's Plain, which has to be learned in the future. During those weary hours lying on the bullet-swept hill and listening to the eternal hissing in the air and clicking on the rocks, the British soldiers could see the fight which raged to the south of them.
A party of burghers, under Commandant Nel, of Kroonstad, were ordered to station themselves on a kop with a flat top, called Swartbooiskop, an hour and a half to the south of Nicholson's Nek. After the battle which was fought on the 30th of November this kop was christened by us Little Majuba. Just after sunrise on the 30th of November the roaring of cannon came to our ears.
About twenty men in one of the captured trenches abandoned their resistance, threw up their hands, and called out that they would surrender. Colonel Thorneycroft, whose great stature made him everywhere conspicuous, and who was from dawn till dusk in the first firing line, rushed to the spot. The Boers advancing to take the prisoners as at Nicholson's Nek were scarcely thirty yards away.
"It was indeed," replied Frank. "Three Turkish cruisers sent to the bottom," said Jack briefly. "Good!" cried Lord Hastings enthusiastically. "And the submarine wasn't damaged, eh?" "Oh, yes, it was," broke in Captain Nicholson, and proceeded to relate the details of the encounter. "And how did the two lads behave themselves?" questioned Lord Hastings. "Admirably," was Captain Nicholson's reply.
Nicholson's starched bosom, no outward sign was visible; nor did he delay long to make a choice of conduct.
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