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Updated: June 12, 2025
Late in the afternoon our scouts returned to the column and reported having located the enemy three miles ahead, entrenched in a donga, or dried-up stony river course, on the farm Nooitgedacht No. 4. We prepared for action, and encountered the rebels in the next half hour.
Now he is better, and he was let out from hospital at Jackhalputs. Ah, that Mankeltow! He always makes me laugh so. I told him long back at Colesberg, I had a little home for him at Nooitgedacht. But he would not come no! He has been sick, and I am sorry. "'How d'you know that? I says.
The south-western part of the Transvaal is certainly exceedingly inferior in appearance to what I saw in Bechuanaland. We remained at Klerksdorp three days. While there I visited one or two of the gold mines of this promising district. At the Nooitgedacht Mine I saw the process performed of pan washing of the previously crushed quartz.
The British losses at the battle of Nooitgedacht amounted to 60 killed, 180 wounded, and 315 prisoners, all of whom were delivered up a few days later at Rustenburg. Of the Boer losses it is, as usual, impossible to speak with confidence, but all the evidence points to their actual casualties being as heavy as those of the British.
The "Fifes" crossing the Vaal captured the town of Christiana in the Transvaal the first act of war on Transvaal soil. After the death of Captain Hodge, Captain R. Purvis took command till wounded at Nooitgedacht, when Lieutenant J. Gilmour succeeded him. In May 1901 the first contingent, after having marched 2575 miles and taken part in 85 engagements, proceeded home.
The remains of his former force had, however, been sent into Pretoria to refit, and nothing remained of it save the 8th R.F.A. and the indomitable cow-gun still pocked with the bullets of Nooitgedacht. He had also F battery R.H.A., the Inniskillings, the Border regiment, and a force of mounted infantry under Alderson.
Moreover, a great fault of the burghers had come to light at Nooitgedacht namely, that they shirked their duty in their eagerness for plunder. He was afraid that if they took the town their plundering spirit would get the better of them and so give the enemy a chance of catching them or putting them to flight.
Amid rain and mist the British columns were pushing rapidly forwards, but still the burghers held together, and still their artillery was uncaptured. The retirement was swift, but it was not yet a rout. On the 30th the British cavalry were within touch of Nooitgedacht, and saw a glad sight in a long trail of ragged men who were hurrying in their direction along the railway line.
I was ordered to go down the mountain in charge of a number of Helvetia burghers to try and reach the railway, which I was to defend at all hazards. General Smuts, with the remnant of our men went further south towards the road leading to Barberton. Early the next morning we were attacked and again obliged to fall back. That night we stayed at Nooitgedacht.
The Boer position at and near Nooitgedacht was unique. Here was a great camp in which 2,000 English prisoners-of-war were confined, but in the confusion the majority of their Boer guards had fled to Nelspruit. I found only 15 burghers armed with Martini-Henry rifles left to look after 2,000 prisoners.
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