Presentation from the Anglo Boer War 110^th Anniversary Conference in Ladysmith in 2010.

On the farm Langverwacht there is a monument to the 23 New Zealander soldiers, who died in an encounter with a Boer commando on the night of 23^rd and 24^th February 1902. Sometime in 2000 the monument was destroyed by a falling tree, one of the two oak trees planted around the site of the mass grave. A grass fire had damaged and weakened the old oak. A high wind sometime later did the rest. Built from local stone, cut to shape on the site, the cairn had remained intact for 99 years from 1903 when it was erected. This was my first sight of the ruined structure in 2002.

The monument was still intact in October 1999. A small gathering paid tribute to the combatants of both sides on 11^th October of that year. Willem Naudé from Vrede arranged the ceremony and, in spite of making contact with the New Zealand High Commission in Pretoria, nobody from New Zealand was able to attend.

Getting the monument rebuilt was no easy task. The New Zealand Government Heritage Ministry are the custodians of New Zealand’s war graves but this is no longer a war grave. The remains of those buried in a mass grave at the foot of the monument were re-interred in a Garden of Remembrance in the Town Cemetery in Vrede in 1965. However, the fact that Langverwacht was the first occasion when a significant number of New Zealand soldiers lost their lives in a war on foreign soil was a deciding factor. The Prime Minister, Helen Clark, in fact ordered the rebuilding. Let into the base of the monument was a white marble plaque with inlaid lead lettering giving the names of the fallen. The plaque had been broken, fortunately into only two pieces. Finding the missing piece was the easy part.

Sadly, Willem Naudé passed away on 17^th November 2008 without ever seeing the rebuilt monument. His last visit was on 5^th August 2008. Willem had an abiding interest in Langverwacht and the history of Vrede and its inhabitants. He wrote a book about the area during the Anglo Boer war which he had privately printed. He made a number of contacts in New Zealand who supplied many of the pictures that he used in his book. This was his last visit to the site in company with the farm owner, Jan van Reenen and the New Zealand Deputy High Commissioner, Mike Walsh.

The rebuilding of the structure was completed in November 2008. Certainly it was an emotional moment for me when I saw the rebuilt cairn on this occasion. The two pieces of the white marble plaque were joined together and replaced. A further plaque has been placed to show the part played by the government of New Zealand in bringing this project to completion. The construction crew is all smiles on this occasion, like the New Zealand Deputy High Commissioner, Mike Walsh and contractor, Gerna van Heyningen. Joseph Buthelezi, the man who lives on the property and was in the 1997 picture, was present in 1965 when the remains were disinterred. He pointed out to us exactly where the bodies of the slain were buried. The monument was erected at the head of the mass grave.

This is the completed monument. The name plaque has been repaired and replaced and the New Zealand government plaque installed alongside. The tree that fell and smashed the cairn has been placed on the grass behind.

This is the New Zealand government plaque indicating their role in the rebuilding.

This is the mass grave before the monument was built – probable some time in 1902.

In 1937 five New Zealanders visited the site. They were brought to the monument by Mr. Lombard who owned the farm where the battle had taken place. One of them was the brother of Farrier Leonard Retter who was a casualty of the battle of Langverwacht  and whose name appears on the monument. They found the monument to be in reasonable shape, looked after by the South African Police from Vrede. The original name plaque, made from a slab of sandstone was eroded and the names were illegible. A new plaque was made of white marble with inlaid lead lettering at a cost of £18. This is the plaque that has now been repaired and is now in the base of the obelisk.

On 22^nd February 2009 the monument was rededicated in a ceremony attended by almost 80 people. Speeches were made by the New Zealand High Commissioner, Geoff Randal, the Mayor of Vrede, John Motaung, and myself.

The last post was played and wreaths were laid on the monument as well as at the cemetery in Vrede.

Sky Sport New Zealand paid a visit in July 2009 as did Margaret Marks of the new Zealand Heritage Ministry.

New Zealand was the first of the colonial governments to offer troops for service in the war that seemed imminent between the British Empire and the Boer South African Republic. Prime Minister Richard Seddon’s motion to the House of Representatives received overwhelming support. Following the motion’s adoption the members rose to sing “God Save the Queen” and gave three cheers for Queen Victoria. Seddon referred to New Zealanders’ duty “as Englishmen to support the imperial cause.” New Zealand sent almost 6500 men and 8000 horses to South Africa. The First Contingent arrived on 23^rd November 1899 and was quickly followed by four more contingents early in 1900. When it appeared that the war was likely to be prolonged beyond the optimistic forecasts of the middle of 1900, further fresh troops were sent, the Sixth Contingent arriving in East London on 13^th March and the Seventh in Durban on 10^th May 1901.

Throughout the war there was no shortage of volunteers for service in South Africa. The medical examination became more systematic as the war progressed and the large number of volunteers meant that the doctors could be quite strict in their assessment of medical status. Dental fitness was a matter of real concern. The shooting test does not seem to have been particularly onerous but most ‘dejected rejecteds’ were those who failed the riding test. Early contingents were very short of up-to-date equipment and at first were equipped with single-shot Martini-Enfield carbines but by 1901 they were all using Lee-Enfield or Lee-Metford magazine rifles. The Sixth Contingent, arriving at East London and ordered very promptly to the front were without water bottles. The quartermaster took 50 men to a local hotel, purchased 500 empty wine bottles and pressed them into service for the contingent.

Commanding the Seventh Contingent was Lieutenant Colonel Thomas Porter, an outstanding, if somewhat controversial character. His only active service had been in the various campaigns in New Zealand from 1863 to 1871. He was 58 years old when he came to South Africa. In South Africa he was mentioned in dispatches and appointed a C.B. for his service. He was still an active soldier in 1917 when he would have been 74 years old.
The Seventh Contingent’s excellent record clearly reflected the fact that 12 officers and at least 6 NCO’s with previous service in South Africa sailed with the contingent. In addition, 69 men from previous contingents joined the Seventh in South Africa. These experienced men were without doubt one of the key reasons for the good record maintained by the later New Zealand contingents.

It was in the Orange Free State where one of the most successful of the Boer guerilla leaders, Christiaan de Wet, operated. De Wet may be said to have been the first to advocate and demonstrate the hit-and-run strategy that the British always found very difficult to counter. With the capture of Bloemfontein, and later Pretoria, by Lord Roberts’s “steamroller” the Boers became very dispirited. It was Christiaan de Wet and President Marthinus Steyn who roused the hopes of their people by a brilliant revival of the form of warfare which was carried on by the Boers with varying success all over South Africa until the end of the war in May 1902.

De Wet was respected for his savage determination. He imposed severe discipline on his commandos making them fear him and obey orders. Stories of keeping his men in order with the sjambok are probably exaggerated. He seldom told them what it was he intended and worked entirely on his own schemes. There was little in the way of a strategic plan and he operated by surprise marches, attacking the enemy’s weak points, cutting the railways, seizing their isolated garrisons and skillfully avoiding capture by rapid flight from pursuing columns. That de Wet remained at large was an astounding feat since he was always in the thick of the fighting and many times had been very close to capture. He never stayed long with any one commando and continually kept moving to give his commandos directions.

Throughout 1900 his successes mounted – Sanna’s Post, Mostert’s Hoek but a reverse at Wepener. There the British force, mostly Colonial troops, put up a stout defence. De Wet’s attacks continued and on ^7th June 1900 his commando succeeded in overwhelming a small British force at Roodewal Station. The Boers captured a huge quantity of stores said to value anything up to £250 000. (De Wet in his book “Three Years’ War” said £750 000!) What they could not carry away was burnt, including the army mail. Communications between Pretoria and Kroonstad were cut and the rail line for several miles was completely broken up.

In December 1900 Lord Roberts, in Durban and on his way back to England, told a gathering that the war was practically over. President Kruger, after living some weeks as a fugitive in a railway carriage, had left for Europe aboard a Dutch warship. However, Louis Botha, Koos de la Rey and Christiaan de Wet were still at large with bands of guerilla fighters. Roberts had given orders that Boer farms were to be burnt as a way of denying them food. The war was practically over – the war of set-piece battles. But a new war, just as costly in time and human lives, and far more bitter, had only just begun.

In deciding to wage guerilla warfare, the Boers took note that they were well-mounted and possessed of the best modern weapons. They were unconvinced of any tactical inferiority to the invaders of their countries. They undertook what became a long, heroic struggle adapted to the existing military organization of the two Republics. Throughout this new war, for that is what is was, the political and military control of their forces remained intact. The Boers retained their tactical superiority wherever numbers were even approximately even. For the British, this required the development and application of an entirely new technology and strategy.

The new British commander, General Lord Kitchener’s first priority was his lines of communication, railways and telegraph lines. To protect the bridges along the railway lines, the British built small stone forts or blockhouses at strategic points. These were usually two storeys high and had a garrison of up to thirty men under a sergeant. However, they took too long to build, about three months, and were far too costly at £800 to £1000 each.

As the Boer attacks on the railways became more numerous, something cheaper and more quickly and easily erected was needed. Major Spring Rice of the Royal Engineers, then in Middelburg, devised a blockhouse made of two concentric cylinders of corrugated iron filled with shingle. These were proof at least against rifle bullets and cost but £16. A party of six sappers with some African assistants could complete a blockhouse, its ditch and wire entanglement in six hours. Construction crews could build three blockhouses per day.

The rule was that each blockhouse must be in sight of its neighbour. The wire fence connecting each interval ran at an obtuse angle so that fire could be directed along the line from both ends without risk to either blockhouse.

By June 1901 lines of these small forts extended along all the railway lines and a start was made on cross-country lines which had a different purpose. They were to be barriers to the free movement of the Boer commandos who were now to be driven and cornered against them. The country was to be divided into fenced areas of manageable size within which the Boers could be dealt with piecemeal. More than 8000 blockhouses had been erected by the war’s end.

This system was devised when it was realised that British “flying columns”, composed mainly of infantry, with guns, field hospitals, engineers and a cumbersome train of ox wagons, were hardly that. De Wet ordered that these columns should not be opposed and the burghers ran few risks of capture for the British had very few mounted men. The British walked where they liked and the Boers rode where they pleased. Boer attacks on weak points and the railways continued. The campaign might have continued for ten years had some new way of countering the fleet-footed Boers not been evolved.

Over the last few months of 1900 and the early months of 1901, de Wet and more especially President Marthinus Steyn of the Orange Free State Republic were engaged in reorganizing their demoralized commandos. By the middle of 1901 the British were throwing much of their considerable resources into attempts to corner de Wet as well as the Free State government.

Steyn came very close to capture in Reitz on 11^th July 1901. His scouts had reported that Colonel Broadwood’s column was five miles away and headed towards Bethlehem. Thus Steyn and his government went to sleep in the deserted town. Just after midnight Broadwood turned around and galloped back into Reitz. The haul was 29 prisoners but President Steyn and his groom, a coloured lad named Ruiter, managed to evade the crowd of British soldiers and gallop out of the town.

Steyn was wearing only a nightshirt and had only a halter for a bridle. At the farm of one de Jager, the lady of the house gave him her husband’s wedding suit and one of his scouts had a spare hat. Almost the entire Free State government was captured that night but Steyn soon formed a new executive. De Wet too was not in Reitz that night, he had preferred his favourite farm Blijdschap, a few miles to the west.

By November 1901 the principal centres of Boer resistance were the north-eastern Free State, the highveld of the eastern Transvaal and the western Transvaal, under de Wet, Louis Botha and Koos de la Rey. Kitchener decided to disregard de la Rey and throw the bulk of his forces against Botha and de Wet. In the first week of November there were 14 British columns in the Free State. Three columns were in Winburg, Colonel Julian Byng was in Heilbron, Colonel Michael Rimington in Standerton and Colonel Dartnell and the Imperial Light Horse at Harrismith.

Kitchener’s scheme was for all 14 columns to march inwards so as to converge on Paardehoek, a farm south of Frankfort, where de Wet had summoned the commandos to assemble. Extraordinary precautions were taken to maintain secrecy and even the officers commanding the various columns knew nothing of the objective until the march actually began. Efforts were made to deceive the Boers as to what was intended. The columns moved smoothly and on 12^th November the circle of columns duly converged on Paardehoek and found the trap empty. During the drive they had neither seen nor heard of any large hostile body. Boer intelligence and mobility had been equal to the occasion and they had escaped through the gaps in the cordon, particularly at night.

Following the Reitz incident, the government party had become very cautious, rarely sleeping in the same place on successive nights. Steyn and de Wet met at Blijdschap on 16^th November. A letter had arrived from Louis Botha suggesting that this might be a favourable moment for the opening of overtures for peace on the basis of the independence of the Boer republics. Botha had enjoyed a smashing success at Bakenlaagte on 30^th October which may have prompted the letter. Steyn, of course, returned a characteristically fiery reply. De Wet now decided to take the field and attacked the Imperial Light Horse at Tyger Rivier Poort on 18^th December but was forced to retire into the Langberg. Wessel Wessels had a success at Tafelkop on 20^th December but de Wet dealt the British a stunning blow in the early hours of Christmas morning, 1901. The attack was nade on a force of 500 Imperial Yeomanry encamped on the top of a small hill called Groenkop, between Harrismith and Bethlehem.

The British were engaged in completing the blockhouse line between those two towns. Major Williams, the British commander, had no outposts lining the edge of the precipitous western side of the hill. British intelligence had not discovered any Boers the previous day and thought an attack unlikely, especially up the steep western side.

The unsuspecting British were taken completely by surprise. They suffered 145 casualties in the fight, including 57 killed and de Wet left as dawn broke with 200 prisoners and two guns. A rider was sent to Elands River Bridge to summon assistance but by the time the Imperial Light Horse had galloped the 12 miles to the scene of the engagement, de Wet and his men were long gone.

The Free State president, Marthinus Steyn was now ailing. He was suffering from ataxia, a nervous complaint, almost certainly caused by the strain that he had undergone for almost two years. His sight was affected as well as his limbs and riding a horse would have been difficult. His physical collapse was a shattering experience. Around the village of Reitz were a number of farms where they were safe from pursuit and Steyn stayed at Slabbert’s farm Rondebosch, to the north east of Reitz for much of the first two months of 1902. The President was able to rest at Rondebosch for some weeks and busy himself with the business and correspondence of the Free State government. De Wet’s whereabouts needed to be established before a decision was made by the British as to the direction of the first attempt at the new model drive. His base near Elandskop, today’s village of Petrus Steyn, was well-known but all attempts to nab him there had thus far failed.

Colonel Julian Byng camped at Fannie’s Home on a bluff overlooking the Liebenberg’s Vlei river early in February 1902. Sending Lieutenant Colonel Garatt to Armstrong Drift on the Liebenberg’s Vlei river, they came across the rear-guard of a Boer force under Commandant Walter Mears on 3^rd February. Mears had been ordered to bring the guns, captured by de Wet at Groenkop on Christmas Day, across the blockhouse line between Lindley and Bethlehem. Garatt’s men included the 7^th New Zealand Mounted Rifles who had “a hard gallop and a running fight of some miles” in succeeding to rout the Boer rearguard and recapture the lost guns. Major Bauchop, their commander, received a personal telegram from Lord Kitchener and Garratt “gratified the New Zealanders by assuring them that it was one of the best mounted charges he had ever seen.”

By the beginning of February 1902 the lines of blockhouses in the north eastern Free State were complete. Early in February 1902 the new system of sweeping using the newly-encompassing blockhouse lines to the maximum was attempted. Up until then the Boers had been able to pass the British lines when night fell and gaps in the line opened up as the troops bivouacked. With the blockhouse lines now complete and reinforced for the occasion of a drive, the mounted troops would now form a continuous line ninety kilometres in length. The flanks would be on a blockhouse line and the horsemen would maintain the line riding straight ahead by day. At night every officer and every man would be on picquet duty in a continuous entrenched line of picquets. In theory in this way there would be no holes in the net and every Boer commando would be hedged in by the line of horsemen, the blockhouses with their wire entanglements and armoured trains on the railway lines. To maintain such a line over broken country with hills and rivers to be crossed required discipline and skill, not to mention endurance since the drives covered fifteen to twenty kilometres per day for a week or more.

With intelligence that de Wet was in the vicinity of Elandskop, the British line was formed along the Liebenberg’s Vlei River in a line ninety kilometres long. The sweep to the west as far as the main railway line was detected by de Wet’s scouts and he moved south with his force of seven hundred men who had joined him at Slangfontein. Managing to avoid the advancing British line they crossed the Kroonstad-Lindley blockhouse line on the farm Doornkloof on the night of 6^th February heading for the Doornberg, north west of Senekal. The British swept on westwards and closed off the area between America Siding on the main line and Heilbron on the night of 7^th February. Numbers of Boers were known to be within the cordon and every possible means was used to ensure their capture. Nearly three hundred were killed, wounded or captured.

Lieutenant Edward Gordon of the R.S.F. wrote in his diary of the last night of the drive: “Firing almost continuous all night. There were undoubtedly a number of Boers trying the line at various places all along to find good places for breaking thro’. About eight armoured trains could be counted on the main line and the Heilbron branch line, by their searchlights going all night. It was a wonderful sight, like a great display of fireworks with the beams of searchlights flashing all over the sky and a continual roar of rifle fire, punctuated by the rattle of a Maxim or the report of a field gun. It was about the most wonderful night I’ve ever spent and didn’t sleep a wink all night.”

The first drive had failed to capture their principal target but a second, much larger scale drive was now planned. A segment of the Transvaal to the south of the Natal railway would be the initial target when the line would wheel right and sweep down the north eastern Free State between the Wilge River and the Drakensberg. This time nearly thirty thousand troops were involved and the drive would take nearly two weeks.

De Wet, hearing that the coast was clear, had returned to Elandskop, crossing the blockhouse line once again but this time under fire and losing two killed and eight wounded. In preparation for the second drive, Major-General Elliot reached Lindley on 16^th February, making for the Wilge River as his men were to form the line along the river.

Receiving intelligence of de Wet’s whereabouts near Elandskop, Elliot sent Lieutenant-Colonel de Lisle to capture him but once again de Wet was not where he was supposed to be. The following day de Wet rode eastwards and joined the government at Rondebosch. President Steyn had remained there and had been well outside the limits of the first drive. De Wet’s intelligence, for once was faulty and on the approach of Elliot from the west he made the decision to cross the Wilge River and try to break through the British line somewhere near the Drakensberg. President Steyn and the government would have to come too as Elliot’s men approached.

On the night of 22^nd February they had reached the Cornelis River and Commandant Manie Botha and his Vrede commando joined them. Botha told them of the British force sweeping in a line from the Wilge to the Drakensberg. They were thus in danger of being trapped against the Bethlehem-Harrismith blockhouse line. Shortly they were joined by two more Commandants, Alexander Ross and his men from Frankfort as well as Hendrik Alberts and some men from Heidelberg. There were also significant numbers of people and their animals who had left their farms and were fleeing southwards.

This picture is of the Heidelberg commando and Commandant Hendrik Alberts is in the centre and looking somewhat more military than in the previous slide.

On the 23^rd the crowd followed the commandos as they moved along the right bank of the Cornelis River. By late afternoon they had arrived at the farm Brakfontein to the south of the Witkoppe. De Wet had intended to skirt the Witkoppe to the east and travel north up the valley to Strydplaas but his scouts told him that the British held a strong position at the head of the valley. Unable to delay until the next morning, de Wet resolved to break through the British line at Kalkkloof. Colonel Michael Rimington’s line stretched from Pramkop, which practically overlooked the Wilge River, to Mooifontein where it joined with Colonel Julian Byng. From Vrede southwards the country is rolling grassland and the columns were able to maintain their line with little difficulty. The line swept over the Bothasberg, low hills rather than mountains as their name would seem to imply, but the Kalkkloof provided something more of an obstacle. The right of Byng’s line, the 7^th New Zealand Mounted Rifles, filed down across the valley of the Holspruit and formed their line along the crest of the next high ground to the south on the farm Langverwacht.

To join up with the left of Rimington’s line, Lieutenant-Colonel Cox’s 3^rd New South Wales Mounted Rifles, they had to stretch their line so as to reach up a kloof leading to the farm Mooifontein and Rimington’s line which was north of the Holspruit. At the head of the kloof, Captain A.R.G. Begbie of the Royal Garrison Artillery placed a pom pom gun in a small redoubt of stones that they quickly erected.

The Boer scouts, seeing this kink in the line, needed to investigate exactly where the entrenched picquets ran, and drove a mob of horses along the line. The New Zealanders opened fire and thus revealed their position.

They were entrenched in picquets of six men but inevitably there was a small gap where the line crossed the Holspruit. This stream, like all the rivers and streams in the vicinity, has high banks, something of a barrier to the easy passage of horses and vehicles. The Boer multitude left Brakfontein once it was dark and retraced their steps of that afternoon along the valley of the Cornelis River. The commandos led the way followed by the crowd of carts and spiders and the herds of cattle and horses. They arrived at the Holspruit at midnight. De Wet and Steyn and his mule wagon crossed over at a ford. The commandos skirted the road to the east. The three commandos would have constituted a force of seven hundred men and they were mostly veteran soldiers. They advanced in two groups, one quietly up the bed of the Holspruit.

The New Zealanders had heard the noise of the Boer multitude for some time and were alert. The sentries had heard the “lowing of cattle, the rumbling of wagons and the voices of women” and roused the men who were sleeping after a good meal of roast sheep. The Boers in the donga, the bed of the Holspruit managed to get in behind the line while the rest of the force rushed one of the pickets. Ross and Manie Botha and their men now turned left and advanced along the line of trenches in a half-circle. The New Zealanders were concerned about hitting their own men if they fired along the trench line but soon put up a stout resistance although under fire from all sides. “The fire was something terrific. Bullets! They were just like hail stones falling on cabbage leaves” wrote Trooper Lytton Ditely from the hospital in Harrismith where he was taken after the fight.

Trooper Lytton Ditely was initially reported killed and his name appeared in the list in the Wellington newspaper, The Evening Post on 1^st March. Hopefully his family were quickly apprised of the error.