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The girl who had stood up in defence of three nuns against a threatening gang of rowdy Transvaalers, one day in the Recreation Ground, the girl who had passed as the Staff dismounted at the Hospital gate on the day of appropriation. The Mayor had had no chance of fulfilling his promise of an introduction. The Mayor's wife, with her two children, was an inmate of the Women's Laager.
The sound came from the extreme end of our position, where the Transvaalers were stationed. No sooner did we hear it than the order to off-saddle was given. I myself asked Commandant Steenekamp, who had arrived the previous day from Bezuidenhoutspas, to go to General Croup's laager, about two miles distant, and to request him to advance to where the firing was taking place.
On October 20th the same day as the Battle of Talana Hill the line was cut by the Boers at a point nearly midway between Dundee and Ladysmith. A small body of horsemen were the forerunners of a considerable commando, composed of Freestaters, Transvaalers, and Germans, who had advanced into Natal through Botha's Pass under the command of General Koch.
Thus encouraged, the Transvaalers annexed Bechuanaland in 1868, but three years later it was taken away from them under the Keate award, in an arbitration to determine the respective rights of Boer and native over the debateable territory.
On the 18th of September, construction of defence works began, reports of movements by the burghers of the Free State as well as by Transvaalers being received, and arousing apprehension of a sudden attack. On the 27th of September, an officer of the garrison, by personal observation at Boshof in the Free State, ascertained that the burghers of the latter had been ordered out.
In the minds of many Dutchmen and Dutchmen who were sincerely patriotic Transvaalers the conviction was strong that the natural capabilities of Boers did not lie in the direction of developing, as they could be, the amazing wealth-producing resources of the Transvaal and of the Orange Free State. By British help alone, such men believed, could their country hope to thrive as it ought.
Next day the passage of the river was effected; but Lord Roberts' hope of getting round and grappling each flank of the enemy, who numbered about 3,000 Transvaalers and 5,000 Free Staters, was not realized, and Botha withdrew without serious loss. That night the Army went into bivouac astride the railway between Zand River and Kroonstad.
It is very certain that the Boers would have had no such compunctions, for when in 1857 the Transvaalers had a quarrel with the Free State we have Paul Botha's evidence for the fact that they intrigued with a Kaffir chief to attack their kinsmen from the rear.
No accurate information had come in as to the strength of the Transvaalers, the estimates ranging from five to ten thousand, but it was known that their position was formidable and their guns mounted in such a way as to command the Dundee and Newcastle roads.
While the Free Staters were assaulting Wagon Hill and Wagon Point, the Transvaalers obtained a footing on the edge of the Caesar's Camp position; but their supports failed them. A considerable proportion of the burghers detailed for the attack on Caesar's Camp, most of them Transvaalers, again either refused, as on November 9, to take part in it, or shirked during the advance.
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