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Such a one befell the small body of South African Constabulary stationed near Vereeniging, who encountered upon July 13th a strong force of Boers supposed to be the main commando of De Wet. The Constabulary behaved with great gallantry but were hopelessly outnumbered, and lost their seven-pounder gun, four killed, six wounded, and twenty-four prisoners.
Lord Roberts ordered Ian Hamilton to march from the right flank to the left, across the front of the main Army, and then in conjunction with French to wheel round to Meyerton on the line between Johannesburg and Vereeniging. On the evening of May 26 he entered the Transvaal at Wonderwater Drift.
The condition of affairs in the Transvaal was no better. We Free-Staters had thought and I, for one, had supported the view at Vereeniging that, before sacrificing our independence, we ought to tell the owners of these farms, where there were still women and children, to go and surrender with their families, and thus save them from starvation.
He held a strong line enclosing Vereeniging and the drifts and extending from near Heidelberg to Potchefstroom, but it impotently watched the British troops crossing the river.
Notwithstanding this, however, and the obstructions placed in the way by obnoxious regulations and deliberate blocking of the line with loaded trucks at Vereeniging, and also the blocking of Johannesburg stations by non-delivery of goods measures which resulted sometimes in a delay of months in delivery, and sometimes in the destruction or loss of the goods the Southern line more than held its own.
"This meeting of Representatives of the people of the South African Republic and Orange Free State, held at Vereeniging, has learnt with regret of the proposal made by his Majesty's Government in regard to the cessation of existing hostilities, and of the intimation that this proposal must be accepted or rejected in an unaltered form.
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