General De Wet

GENERAL DE WET

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A Biography

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By

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Eric ROSENTHAL

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Contents

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22

1

The Hartebeest House

23

2

The Basuto War

24

3

Trekker And Trader

25

4

Mr. Gladstone And Majuba

26

5

The Absentee Candidate

27

6

As The Sands Ran Out

28

7

De Wets First Victory

29

8

The Camp At Paardeberg

30

9

The Ambush By The Waterworks

31

10

The Great Escape

32

11

Joining General Hertzog

33

12

Escapes By Flood And Field

34

13

The Blockhouses

35

14

Surrender

The Treaty Of Vereeniging

De Wet In England

The Old Farm And The New Rulers

Goodbye To General Botha

The Seer Of Lichtenburg

General De La Rey Comes Home

Maritz's Treaty With Germany

In Mr. Ferreira's Dining Room

An Appeal From The Church

President Steyn Takes A Hand

The "Five Shilling" Rebellion

First Shots

Escape At Mushroom Valley

Captured At Last

In Prison

In The Dock

Under Sentence

Released

Sunset Years

The Last Trek

At The Monument

Chapter 1
The Hartebeest House

THE sixth baby was being born in a two-
roomed homestead on the stupendously empty
veld.

Resting on skins of wild animals and on home-
woven coverlets, lay a tall, strong-boned
woman, whose placid face and fair hair told of
a long Dutch ancestry. Aletta Susanna
Margaretha de Wet — born Strydom — her
name stood written in the Bible on the living-
room table. An old farmer's wife from the next
homestead, ten miles away, and a small black
servant girl, seated modestly on the floor,
paved with its fresh layer of neatlyplastered
dung, were the sole companions of Mevrouw
de Wet as she waited for her child to arrive.

Overhead were rafters, covered with thatch.
From the wall hung the powder-horns and the
muzzle-loading guns which her husband and

her older sons used when they went shooting
buck, welcome game that saved the family's
precious herd of sheep and cattle. Earthenware
pots; made by natives in some up-country
kraal, and a few tin dishes were all the
crockery that stood upon the shelves. Outside,
in the open air was a stove hollowed out from
an ant-heap. A few stools stood with criss-
cross seats plaited from strips of hide, and a
couple of lion-skins on the floor — beyond
these there was little of note.

On the skyline of the veld, which stretched
unendingly around the farm, moving creatures
could be seen. Hartebeest, big, handsome
antelopes with curly horns, were among the
commonest animals wandering, in their
thousands from pasturage to pasturage,
according to the rains. Hartebeesthouses, like
that of de Wets, were the earliest kind of huts
which the Boers, almost as migratory as the
buck they hunted, put up in the places where

they halted their ox-wagons. Unable to secure
bricks, they contented themselves with walls of
reed, resting on roughly-trimmed branches,
and capped with a pitched roof of the same
material. In the history of South Africa the
Hartebeest-house plays the same part as does
the Log Cabin in that of America. More than
one of her greatest sons first saw the light
within it. One of them was the small boy
whom the good wife Aletta held towards her
husband, when he came in from a long ride to
the nearest village.

"Christiaan Rudolph shall be his name", said
old Jacobus Ignatius de Wet, smiling all over
that honest beard-fringed face, which has been
preserved for us in an antique photograph.
Christiaans and Rudolphs had belonged to the
family, back to the very beginnings of white
colonisation in South Africa in the 17th century.
And in the family Bible, by the light of a home-

made candle, he wrote down the name of his
youngest and the date, October 7,1854.

One hundred and fifty-nine years had gone by
since the first of the de Wets reached the Cape of
Good Hope. Whether they originated in the
Netherlands, from which the original Jacobus of
the family set sail in 1695 or whether they really
belonged to Germany it is hard to say, but the
latter seems more probable. In the districts of
Westphalia the name is still found and the great
woman poet of those parts, Annette Von Droste—
Hiilshoff, in the Purgatory of the Westphalian
Nobility (Fegefeuer des Westfalischen Adels)
mentions a certain Johannes de Wet, as the un-
intentional witness of the hell to which she
commits the landed gentry of the province in the
after life.

From the first the family was of good repute in
its new homeland. Many of its members were
officials in the service of the old Dutch East
India Company. One of his ancestors, Olaf de

Wet, was "Chief Director" of the first mining
company formed in South Africa, as early as
1743. Olaf de Wet's namesake, Olaf Gotlieb de
Wet, is mentioned about 1780 in the responsible
position of "Master of the Warehouses" for the
district of Stellenbosch, and as Landdrost, or
Magistrate, of this fertile wine-growing country.
Another Christian Rudolph de Wet in the 18th
century was Keldermeester, or Master Cellarer
for the Government's Wine Store.

When, in 1829, the South African College was
founded at the first institution of higher learning
in the sub-continent, there were several de Wets
among the pupils, and for more than one hundred
years an almost continuous list of students has
come from the same family. Sir Jacobus de Wet,
who held the highly responsible post of Agent
for the British Government in the Republican
Transvaal, was a distant relative of Christiaan's,
and in the very year that saw his birth, a cousin,

not too far removed, took his seat in the first
Parliament of the Cape of Good Hope.

Over a country as big as England, between the
Vaal and the Orange Rivers, lay dotted a few
hundred houses, most of them separated by half
a day's trek in the crawling ox-wagon. Two or
three settlements, scarcely big enough to be
called hamlets, had sprouted out of the veld,
groups of whitewashed huts scattered haphazard
around churches, whose members were still too
poor to afford steeples.

Hunters' tracks, crooked and heavy with red dust,
meandered inland from the coastal mountains.
Irregular in their courses, the passing wheels of
the First Trek, twenty years earlier, had ground
the roads out of the virgin soil of Africa. With its
white hood up the long vehicle came creaking
behind its sixteen oxen, cooking-pots dangling
from its axles, women sitting with their children
under the tent, men walking by their side, gun in
hand, on the lookout for buck, while naked little

black boys strode with the team and touched an
occasional laggard animal with a flick from their
long whips.

Christiaan de Wet's father did not call himself a
Voortrekker. That name belonged to the earliest
group of 10,000 pioneers who left the Cape in
the thirties. His departure from the "Old
Colony", as it was called, was of a later date. Its
fertile vineyards and orchards, wheatfields and
oak avenues, among the rugged mountains near
Cape Town and its rolling hilly sheep-country
and kaffir kraals in the East, had not been
rendered intolerable to him for the same reasons
that drove out the earlier settlers. Right through
the forties they stayed in their district, continuing
to farm, until, at length, overcome by the eternal
wanderlust of the Boers, they too resolved to go
Northward. Major Warden had defeated their
undisciplined commandoes, and once again they
owed allegiance to the great Queen Victoria, in

the Orange River Sovereignly, between the
Orange River and the Vaal.

Was there no way of breaking loose from that
far-off monarch across the seas?

Jacobus de Wet was satisfied to remain in the
Orange River Sovereignty. Six hundred miles
from the coast of the Cape of Good Hope, 400
miles from Natal, 700 miles from the Atlantic
shores, the entire country boasted of about 2,000
white inhabitants, practically all of the Dutch
Reformed faith, all members of big families, all
interested in sheep-breeding, in ivory-hunting,
and in being left alone.

The hand of the Queen rested but lightly on her
Orange River Sovereignly. She sent a dozen or
so of officials, who were more interested in big
game than in administration. A few hundred
soldiers were stationed at the new "Capital" of
Bloemfontein, in the lee of an isolated hill,
where the army chest helped to set turning the

wheels of prosperity. Merchants began to put up
stores, the church was improved in size and in
appearance, gardens were planted on the veld
outside the various cottages, and a newspaper,
The Friend of the Sovereignty (still
running) made its appearance in 1850.

Little Englanders were in power at Downing
Street. Writers of eminence, including Benjamin
D'Israeli, as yet an unreformed Radical,
thundered against the "Burden of Colonies"; the
British tax-payer was rather bored with native
wars in Africa, India and New Zealand; and
Gladstone and his Government in their economy
decided to circularise the various Departments,
the Colonial Office included. In this way the
Orange River Sovereignty came up for
discussion. There seemed no reason for keeping
it. Nothing was native to the land but grass and
Basuto warriors. Of minerals there were none,
but of Boers there were too many.

So the Orange River Sovereignly was "axed".
With due ceremony and against the wishes of a
large number of its inhabitants, the Union Jack
was hauled down, and the emigrant Boers were
told that they might in future govern themselves,
as an independent republic. Full of doubts and
trepidation, without money, and with the threat
of a native invasion, the long-bearded Fathers of
the People assumed the burden.

On March 28, 1854, ten months before
Christiaan Rudolph de Wet was born, the Orange
Free State elected Josias Hoffman as its first
President.

Chapter 2
The Basuto War

THE small boy who toddled around the farm
"Leeuwkop" (or Lion Head) was a typical Boer
urchin. His shapeless veldschoens were of home-
tanned buck-hide, his shirt, remade from one
belonging to his elders, his straw hat plaited by
some kind aunt from reeds gathered along the

nearest river. Despite the isolation of the farm,
there were plenty of other children with whom to
play — not only his own brothers and sisters
(who continued to arrive at fairly regular
intervals, until there were fourteen in the family),
but the piccanins of the black servants who,
according to the unwritten rule of South Africa,
were welcome among white boys and girls, until
their growing-up brought into force the colour
bar. From these respectful companions the young
Orange Free Staters learnt amusing games —
how to make dolosse, or animals of clay, how to
kill snakes, hunt out queenants, locate birds by
their calls, and how to ask riddles. Father and
grandfather and other kinsfolk taught them
songs, brought to Africa by the first settlers, 200
years ago, games played with sticks, stones and
bones, and other amusements.

Christiaan's first big adventure came when he
was five years old, when his father, with that
restlessness that still possessed him at intervals,

resolved to shift his home into another part of the
country. The Smithfield district., whose name
told of the British occupation, no longer satisfied
him, so in 1859 all his chattels were loaded up
and the trek Northward began again, towards
Bloemfontein. Jacobus de Wet chose a farm
called "Kalkfontein" (Lime Fountain), where
there seemed more water, better pasturage and
easier access to shops. The journey was
unhurried. Every night the servants unpacked
pots and pans, provisions and beds, while the
men and older boys went out with their guns to
bring in the supper. By one of the laws of the
newly-founded State, each farm must have its
"outspan" reserved for travellers, to camp there
without hindrance from dusk to dawn, to gather
fuel and refill their water bottles free of charge.

Money indeed was as yet of minor importance.
The Orange Free State Treasury was quite
accustomed to receiving its revenues in kind, in
the form of wool, skins or other produce. The

President's salary of £600 a year often went
unpaid, the members of the Volksraad or
Parliament were also its civil servants, while the
total income of the State was under £5,000.

Patriarchal conditions obliged the President to
visit every settlement in the country once a year.
The highest judicial power was in the hands of a
magistrate and appeals were heard by Parliament
itself. The legislators had adopted certain old
Dutch legal treatises bodily, and the system
worked remarkably well. Despite the simple
conditions, the average settler was a superior
type, interested in education. Wandering school-
masters, run-away sailors or soldiers trekked
from farm to farm, glad to instruct the
youngsters in return for their keep. In this way
Christiaan's brothers learnt to read and write
between their duties as herders of sheep and
drivers of wagons. Reading from the Bible was
their earliest accomplishment, and very soon
after their settling at Kalkfontein, whose flat and

uninteresting landscape scarcely differed from
that of their earlier home, hundreds of miles to
the South, neighbouring colonists came together
and decided to put up church. However poor
they were, (and, here, as elsewhere, haartebeest-
houses were the rule) a place of worship was
considered essential, to supplement morning and
evening prayers at home. Close to the new farm
a Dutch Reformed Church was built, and, as
usually happens in South Africa, a village began
to grow around it: This one is still in existence
and is known as Redder sburg.

How slender a hold civilisation had on the
Orange Free State was shown at the time when
the great stampedes of game occurred. When
Christiaan de Wet was a small boy his parent's
haartebeest-house was nearly wiped off the face
of the earth by an invasion of wildebeest, and his
mother with her babies found a wounded animal
blinded by pain, dashing into her living room.
No one would have lived to tell the tale had not

the farm dogs come to the rescue, and held it
until the menfolk returned.

About the time when the American Civil War
began, in 1861, old Mr. de Wet packed up once
more and went East. Sixty miles away, in the
direction of Basutoland, he discovered a
promising looking piece of land, and as every
burgher of the Republic was entitled to buy such
ground for the equivalent of a few pounds, the
change was easily made to Nieuwejaarsfontein
(New Year's Fountain). To-day the village of
Dewetsdorp stands near this site. It was called
after Christiaan's father, though the township
was not formally established till 1880.

Seven years old, his fair hair cropped short, and
his blue eyes looking shrewdly round him, young
Christiaan formed the tail-end of the procession
which trudged to the new farm. All the calves
had been placed in his charge and one of his very
earliest reminiscences was of the trouble they
gave him on this journey. In after life he proudly

told how he prevented the calves from "drinking
dry" their mothers, thus rescuing the milk for his
family.

Anyone who has seen the strong firm
handwriting of General de Wet must be surprised
to find how rudimentary was his schooling. "I
had but three months of it", he used to say, "and
that from a woman who knew only her letters. I
was aged eleven. One of my fellow pupils, a
little girl, a niece of my father's wife, was lively
in disposition. She annoyed the teacher, but the
teacher thought it was I who had carried on the
pranks. That was not true. She hit me with a
quince stick. I repeated: 'It is not true', but still
she went on. I bent my back and shouted: 'Hit
me!' She went on hitting until she was tired, but
I never uttered a sound." Fiftyfour years later
there was a strange echo of this incident. When
he was sentenced for high treason, Christiaan de
Wet turned to the judge and said: "Is that all?"
The name of the old lady who taught him has

been preserved, Mrs. Margaretha Nel. Apart
from this we know that his mother taught him to
read, and that when he was growing up he had
further lessons from Isaac Baumann, a German-
Jewish pioneer of the Orange Free State, whose
family is still known and respected in that part of
South Africa.

Just as important perhaps as schooling were the
hours Christiaan spent on the veld with his father
and elder brother. From them and from one
Hendrik Fouche he learnt how to use a gun, an
old-fashioned contraption, worked with a pan-
full of powder, and with a kick so strong that his
shoulders ached after every shot.

Despite its remoteness and lack of population,
the Orange Free State was going ahead. Settlers
trickled in steadily, both from the Cape of Good
Hope in the south, and from the wild Transvaal
Republic in the north. Commerce already
flourished, and relations with the British
Government were of the friendliest.

Troubles however, were not slow in coming.
First there were the everpresent threats from
independent Native tribes. On the Eastern border
of the Republic, where the mighty Drakensberg,
the highest chain in Africa south of the Equator,
towered 12,000 feet above the sea, dwelt the
Basutos. Their Chieftain Moshesh, was probably
the greatest man the blacks have produced.
Fragments of nations scattered by the bloody
warfare of the Zulus, had been gathered by him
into these fastnesses, where by sheer diplomacy
and skill he maintained his sovereignty against
far mightier rulers and continued to do so despite
the arrival of the white man. On top of all these
worries came the great drought of 1862, when
animals were driven mad by thirst, and the veld
stank from the thousands of dead sheep and
cattle.

Jacobus de Wet was not the only farmer who lost
his fortune during those grim months. It was but
cold comfort for him to receive the rank of Field-

Cornet for the Ward of Modder River, near
Bloemfontein. As such it was his duty to
organise the military levies, mobilised whenever
there was danger. He had to see that every
ablebodied man, between the ages of 16 and 60
turned out with his horse, his bandolier of
cartridges, his gun, and provisions for one week.
It was the old, old South African system, going
back to the very beginnings of white settlement.

The final trial strength for which the Free State
had long prepared, came upon it in 1865. Riding
on their tough, hairy, little ponies, the Basutos
descended from their mountains to meet the
Boers. Every white man and boy who could bear
arms, was called out to fight, and even
Christiaan, eleven years old, took his turn by the
flickering watchfires. As Nieuwejaarsfontein
was no longer safe, the family moved nearer
Bloemfontein, to a place called "Paardekraal".
Many months passed before the commandos
straggled home. A sad day was June 15, 1865,

when Lourens Jacobus Wepener, the bravest
man in the Orange Free State, called for
volunteers to storm Thaba Bosigo. He himself
fell in a hailstorm of lead, and when the horses
tethered far below came back to camp there were
dozens of empty saddles.

For three years the Boers attempted again and
again to drive the Basutos out of their mountains.
Money, cattle, crops, lives — all were being used
up. In the midst of the campaign, the Republic
elected a new President, John Brand, and it was
this wise and far-seeing lawyer from the Cape,
who ultimately managed to restore peace.

Chapter 3
Trekker and Trader

WHITE ribbon decorated the whip of the old
Hottentot driver, who waited on the front seat of
the two-wheeled Cape cart. He sat in the shadow
of the blue-gum trees, outside the little church in
the veld. Presently the main door opened and out

came a group of tall men in solemn black frock-
coats and white ties. A dozen women, in white
sun-bonnets and flowered dresses, crowded
among them, a few children pushed their way
through and then the bridal pair themselves
stepped into the bright South African sunlight.
Christiaan de Wet helped his young wife into the
cart, and, amid laughter and the waving of
handkerchiefs, they drove off towards the
horizon ...

Moshesh was back on his mountain; his warriors
had off-saddled their ponies, and again pastured
their flocks on the green slopes of the Maluti and
the Drakensberg. But a large strip of fertile
lowland country, today one of the granaries of
South Africa, had passed into the possession of
the Orange Free State. Burghers were taking up
farms there, and laying out new villages in what
is still called the "Conquered Territory". Folks
again had smiles upon their faces; it seemed as

though even the weather had improved and
droughts were scarcer.

Sturdier and more thickset than the majority of
his fellows, Christiaan de Wet, a newly-sprouted
beard upon his face, had decided that the time
had come for him to set up house. His brothers
had already taken that step, except for Jan
Albertus Stephanus de Wet, who had chosen to
study for the Ministry. Down at the Theological
Seminary, in the oakshaded, wine-growing town
of Stellenbosch, Cape Colony, where the Dutch
Reformed Church taught Theology, this young
man was regarded as the most promising
member of the family. Whether these hopes were
justified can never be told, for he was carried
away by some mysterious Victorian ailment
before his gifts had a chance of being used. Most
of the other boys already had farms of their own.
Nineteen years was by no means too young,
according to the standards of the day. Not only
had Christiaan who at eleven had fought the

Basutos, qualified as a voter and as a member of
his country's defence force, but he had been
recently confirmed in his church, and was
regarded as a most presentable lad.

So thought Cornelia Margaretha Kruger, a girl of
seventeen from the farm "Middelpoort" near
Bloemfontein. She was a typical Boer meisie —
healthy, kindly and with no other ideas of a
home than those of a farmhouse. She liked the
look of "Chrissie" when he came to call on her
parents, and the courtship proceeded in
accordance with custom.

Old Mr. Izak Kruger and his good wife Cornelia
knew the de Wets as a good and respectable
family. Whenever the lad arrived a candle was
duly lit on the livingroom table, the parents
retired and the lovers talked until the guttering of
the flame announced the moment for Christiaan
to saddleup again and go.

Now they were safely married. As the Cape cart
toiled along the dusty track, with nothing to
break the view on either side, Christiaan talked
about their new home, a little house of three
rooms which had just been finished on his
father's farm. Young couples usually began like
this among the Boers, especially when they
could not afford to buy land of their own.
Christiaan had made the bricks with his own
hands and cut the bullrushes with which the
place, was thatched and had collected the stones
of the kraal within which his modest herd of
livestock was kept. Native servants cost only a
few shillings a month, but they could not afford
those shillings. Nor were there any heroics about
their new beginning. For both Christiaan and
Cornelia all this was a matter of course. Seven
cows her parents gave towards her dowry, and
her husband had one wagon, a horse and 60
sheep. For a few borrowed pounds, young
Christiaan secured a plough and some other
implements, with which he began to cultivate the

soil his father allowed him to occupy. As the
eighteen-seventies advanced babies arrived with
truly Victorian regularity. Before Cornelia was
of of age she already had several children, and it
is on record that the gallant little woman copied
the native mothers and tied her first-born in a
shawl to her back, while she worked on the lands
far into the evenings. Maize and wool were the
main produce of the farm, and both crops for the
first few years were a heavy struggle.
Contrasting with the historic drought of the
sixties were the rains of 1872, and the plague
that killed most of the sheep and cattle. Five
pounds was the value of Christiaan de Wet's first
wool clip. Even by the simple standards of the
Orange Free State, and with all the neighbourly
help that was forthcoming, this did not suffice to
feed the family, so it was fortunate that there was
another source of livelihood for almost anyone in
South Africa who chose to use it.

Ever since the historic day in 1867 when the
children of farmer Van Zyl near Hopetown had
picked up the pebbles which proved to be
diamonds, the Orange Free Staters had kept their
eyes on the development of the mining industry.
At first indeed the harassed little Republic had
hoped that the land where the most furious
digging occurred formed part of its own territory,
but, as many claimants to the new Golconda at
Kimberley had appeared, the jurisdiction which
President Brand attempted to exercise from
Bloemfontein was challenged. Not only did the
sister republic of the Transvaal also demand this
region, but the Griqua chief, Waterboer, was
backed up with all authority of the Queen, and in
due course ceded his rights to the Crown of
England. Within a year or two of the discovery
Griqualand West had more inhabitants than the
whole of the Orange Free State, and President
Brand, a realist of realists, decided to make the
best possible terms for his country. £90,000 in
cash was ultimately paid to his Treasury. For a

group of mines that have yielded something like
£250,000,000 since then, this does not seem
much of a price, yet Brand knew that he was up
against forces too great for his little country to
master. Something warned him that the Orange
Free State might not survive an influx of
uitlanders or foreigners, such as proved so fateful
to the Transvaal a generation later. Making a
virtue of necessity he gave up his claims to the
diamond fields with a good grace. While the
handsome, long-bearded First Citizen duly
received an English knighthood, his superlative
tact and wisdom never lost him the confidence of
his own burghers. In twenty years, from 1868 to
1888, the little pastoral commonwealth became
the "Model Republic". Certainly it had more than
one claim to that enviable nickname; in
proportion to its size it spent more on education
than any other country in the world. Despite its
lack of resources, its finances and its credit stood
higher than those of lands many times bigger. Its
Civil Service attracted the best brains in South

Africa. Tolerance prevailed for all religions. No
breath of racialism could be noticed. English and
Dutch lived together in an amity still to be
emulated.

The close proximity of the Kimberly Diamond
Fields, only a few miles off the Western border,
must, President Brand considered, bring
reflected prosperity to his own country. He did
everything to encourage trade, and a large
percentage of the Orange Free Staters were soon
occupied in that most characteristic of old South
African industries, known as "transport riding".
Mining material, building material, food and
other stores required by the 20,000 or 30,000
diggers living in Griqualand had to be carried
from the nearest railheads, 600 to 700 miles
down-country. Among the transport-riders was
Christiaan Rudolph de Wet. The young man
soon was a regular visitor at the open-air market
at Kimberley, carting pumpkins, bags of maize,
loads of forage and a hundred other commodities

to the noisy, blistering-hot rialto on the veld,
with its background of crooked lines of
corrugated iron houses. Each time he came to
Kimberley he saw new things — steam-engines
hoisting buckets of earth from the great crater;
hotels offering comforts unknown on the farms,
at fabulous prices; a Stock Exchange where
shares were bought and sold, to the
accompaniment of a din bewildering; the
telegraph, that brought this mushroom city into
touch with the Coast and even with the lands
overseas.

De Wet said little of all this when he returned to
his home, but it was easy to see how much he
enjoyed the contrasting repose of his own little
farm. Soon, by learning to keep his wits with the
gentry who were his customers, he managed to
accumulate a little money. He too would
occasionally buy a load of produce and sell it at a
profit. He found there were crafts practised on
the farms useful in urban surrounding. One of

these was butchery, and he added to his income
by the slaughtering of oxen or sheep.

Bit by bit his journeys extended in directions
other than that of Kimberley. He found himself
steering his oxen Northwards to the drifts or
fords of the Vaal River and into the Transvaal.
Men here were digging for gold, at Lydenburg,
and in the "Low Country". While the Orange
Free State steadily grew in happiness and in
prosperity, the progress of the other Boer
Republic was by no means so steady.
Prospecting had gone on since the sixties, yet no
payable fields had been located, and the diggers
made a bare living.

The election of the high-minded but rather
visionary President Burgers resulted in a fruitless
attempt to build railways but money gave out,
the natives rose, and Downing Street decided to
step in. Sir Theophilus Shepstone, an
experienced administrator from the colony of
Natal, was instructed to occupy the Transvaal.

Accompanied by 24 policemen he arrived at
Pretoria in 1877. The Volksraad protested;
President Burgers resigned, and, without a shot
being fired, the country was placed under the
Union Jack. Indignation swept the Orange Free
State as it did the Transvaal.

When Christiaan de Wet heard the news, as he
afterwards told, he was busy building a wall on
his farm. "The Transvaal must come back," he
muttered grimly. Like most of the Boers, he
frankly disbelieved the excuse given for the
anexation. The idea of white men being
endangered by blacks sounded laughable to him,
even though the Basuto War had been so hard
fought. No Free Stater imagined that Europeans
could ultimately be beaten by Natives. Was not
the whole of the South African history in itself a
proof that their contention was right?

Outwardly the country looked calm enough. The
friendliness and hospitality of the Boer was such
that even the foreign invasion could hardly upset

it. British officials travelling round had little to
complain of the reception given them by the
farmers. Here and there might be a surly
welcome, but South Africa was still sufficiently
wild for solidarity to be maintained among all
Europeans. Traders hastened up and down the
roads with their gold, soldiers of the new
garrisons marched to and from the various small
forts erected at strategic points, diggers
continued washing gold in the creaks of the Low
Veld, and the Governor of the Cape, Sir Bartle
Frere, who paid a visit of inspection, considered
that there was very little reason for worrying
about the pacification of the country.

Christiaan de Wet, however, was a Boer, and he
could see deeper. The bitterness which gripped
the nation had not yet died away, the old long-
beards would tell him, as they sat with him at
night, and they spoke with a freedom they would
never adopt in addressing an Englishman. No
matter what the British Government did, the

Transvaal would not be reconciled to losing its
independence. From the bottom of his heart
Christiaan de Wet, trained in the tradition of
emigrants who had left the Cape forty years
earlier, sympathised with this point of view.

At Lydenburg, the centre of the gold country, in
the tumbled Eastern mountains that looked down
on Portuguese territory, he parked his wagon and
for a while attempted to make his living as a
butcher. Survivors of those days say that when
practising this trade he looked more warlike than
when he commanded the Orange Free State
forces in the Field. The butchery was not a
success, but the Transvaal, with its richer
pastures and greater resources, tempted him to
fetch his family and make his home there.

Chapter 4
Mr. Gladstone and Majuba.

"It was impossible, for many important
reasons, most of which have been thoroughly

discussed in previous correspondence, that
Her Majesty's authority should be removed
from the Transvaal." ... It was in the
Albemarle Hotel, off Piccadilly, that those
sturdy Transvaalers, Paul Kruger, Petrus
Johannes Joubert, the Rev. S. J. du Toit, and
Mr. W. E. Bok, their Secretary, sat reading an
official message just delivered from Downing
Street.

Christiaan de Wet was back in the Orange
Free State, while all this happened. Not far
from the Vaal River, in the district of
Vredefort, he had bought himself a farm, only
to sell it again after a few months, and move
to the site of the present village of Koppies, to
a property named "Weltevrede" (Well
Content).

When the Delegation returned from England
and broke the news to the Burghers that the
Union Jack was there to stay, de Wet tasted to
the full the wave of bitterness and anger

which swept from one lonely homestead to
another. Men met after dark and discussed the
next step. What few newspapers were
published in the land were read from end to
end. What had been foretold as a threat to the
Transvaal now suddenly, in 1879, became the
fate of Natal. Thousands and thousands of
well-drilled black soldiers, some armed with
the traditional stabbing assegaais, and others
with guns smuggled in by the unscrupulous
whites, marched on that Colony. Lord
Chelmsford, who commanded the troops,
forgot the advice given to him by none other
than the future President Kruger — his
warning against the Zulu tactics of encircling
the enemies by a hornshaped formation, and
his plea for camps of wagons, properly
secured whenever the sun went down. Result:
The massacre of 800 troops at Isandhlwana, a
desperate series of fights around improvised
defences on the Natal frontier, the death in a
skirmish, due entirely to carelessness, of the

Prince Imperial of France, who had
volunteered for the campaign, and a
depressing series of blunders that cost the
British taxpayers something like £9,000.000.
As if this were not enough, the Basutos again
went to war — not with the Orange Free State,
as so often happened — but with the soldiers
of the Queen in the Cape Colony.

"They want to teach us how to defend
ourselves against natives", snorted the old
man. "Why, we may have to come and help
them, as things are looking now." Even after
the tide turned against the Zulus, and the
British Government, by sending out thousands of
fresh troops, began to recover ground, the
prestige of England had declined heavily.

The British Lion was not what he had been in
former days.

Gatherings were held in various parts of the
Transvaal. At first they were small groups, just a

few farmers at a time. Messages were exchanged
about stores of arms that had never been seen by
the British, about the possibility of securing
access to the arsenals, about the scattered nature
of the garrisons. Before long the meetings were
of larger size, though they were generally far out
in the country, where there was no probability of
interference by the authorities.

Unexpected support came from overseas. Mr.
Gladstone was on the warpath, and about to
begin the great election campaign that brought
him back into office. In the thick of the
Midlothian turmoil, he declared: "Ten thousand
Zulus have been slain for no other offence than
that they have attempted to defend, against
British artillery, their hearths and their homes."
On the question of Transvaal independence, he
was equally emphatic, and hopes rose among the
— farmers on the High Veld. "Our territory, not
our strength has increased", Gladstone
thundered, "we are like a landlord who buys an

estate on the condition that he pays all the rates
and taxes and receives no rents. That is the
meaning of adding places to the Empire like the
country of the Boers in South Africa."

Driven by some strange urge, Christiaan de Wet
chose this time to settle permanently in the
Transvaal. Sympathy with the Sister Republic
was growing daily in the Orange Free State,
where it was generally recognised, better even
than amongst the English, that a war must break
loose soon. De Wet was one of hundreds to
declare openly that they would fight for the
Transvaal. When his wagons and his herds
reached Viljoensdrift, the nearest ford across the
Vaal River, they had a comparatively short
distance to go to the farm Rietfontein, not very
far from what is now Johannesburg. Once again
his wife unpacked her household treasures in a
modest homestead.

Red-coated troops marched frequently along the
main roads, but hope had not yet died. Paul

Kruger and Piet Joubert, the tried emissaries of
the nation, now down at Cape Town, were
negotiating with the Government and
exchanging letters with Downing Street. After
seven years of exile, Mr. Gladstone was back at
No. 10. Early in July came the Prime Minister's
reply to their latest message: "Having regard", he
wrote, "to all the circumstances in the Transvaal,
as also in the rest of South Africa, as well as the
necessity of anticipating the renewal of
irregularities which might lead to terrible
consequences, not only for the Transvaal, but for
the whole South Africa, it is our view that we
cannot advise Her Majesty the Queen to give up
her sovereignty over the Transvaal. Yet in
conjunction with the maintenance of this
sovereignly we wish to give to the white
population of the Transvaal, full freedom to
conduct their own affairs. We believe that this
freedom can be most easily and quickly granted
to the Transvaal, by making her a member of a
South African Confederation".

When the answer was carried, first by train to the
railhead at Beaufort West, and thence by coach
to Pretoria; and beyond, every farmer knew what
it meant — War.

Rain was pelting down, hour by hour and day by
day, as the columns of mounted Boers trudged
their horses through the mud of the Eastern
Transvaal. District after district sped by, all
equally wet after weeks of soaking. Had the
summer of 1881 been less disturbed by political
events the farmers would have looked forward to
a record harvest. But the country was at war and
only women and children remained in the home-
steads and tried to till the lands.

In one commando of burghers, slithering their
horses in the direction of the Vaal River at
Standerton, rode Christiaan de Wet.

Much had happened since that Dingaan's Day at
Heidelberg, when thousands of men stood under
the hot sun and raised their hands as they took

the oath to free their country. Even while the
meeting was in progress, the fighting had already
begun. Potchefstroom, former capital of the
country and still one of its most important
centres, had risen against the English Garrison
on December 15, 1880. Forty "Rooibaadjes"
(Red jackets) under Major M. Clarke were
penned in the Government offices of the town,
away from its pleasant avenues of willows and
murmuring irrigation ditches. They tried to
defend the place by boarding up windows and
doors, but could not hold out longer than three
days, and on December 18, 1880, the old
Republican flag again waved over a building,
where it had not been seen for more than four
years. The Fiery Cross had travelled far and wide
through the Transvaal. De Wet joined one of the
columns ordered towards the nearest British
territory, the colony of Natal. Fifteen hundred
men had turned out almost overnight from the
neighbourhood of his farm and were on the move
towards the South-East. The young Free Stater

was delighted he was to be in the field. The
mobility of the burghers, with no long columns
of supplies; the welcome which they received at
every farm and village, warmed his heart. He
was 27, though he looked a, great deal older,
thanks to his sturdy figure and his obvious touch
of Leadership. In his hand he carried the famous
little sjambok or whip of rhinoceros hide, which
remained a symbol of his energy long after this
campaign.

Commandant-General Piet Joubert, the same one
who had visited London with President Kruger,
in quest of a peaceful settlement, was now at the
head of the army. Grown old in the many
campaigns against the natives, fought by an
earlier generation, he was a genial and popular
officer. Not a uniform was to be seen in all his
motley force. Bell-shaped top-hats, antique
straws, with handkerchiefs wrapped round them,
curious frockcoats, homemade shirts and trousers
— to the smart military men from abroad it

seemed the caricature of an army, until it was
encountered in the field. No time was wasted on
training the recruits, for everyone could shoot
and was a born hunter. In his saddle-bag each
warrior had biscuits, dried biltong, made from
the meat of cattle and game, some coffee, and a
supply of home-grown tobacco. Bullets were
either cast on the farms, or purchased in the
stores. As they trekked across the veld the riders
sang psalms to keep up their spirits. Officers
would frequently be addressed as "Oom" (Uncle)
and in their turn would call their men "Neef ' or
"Nephew".

A telegraph line ran between Potchefstroom and
Cape Town, the only one linking the Transvaal
to the outside world. The nearest British troops
were in Natal and Sir George Pomeroy Colley, a
former land-surveyor who had become a very
popular and successful Governor, took charge of
them in his capacity as commander of her
Majesty's local forces. He had only been in

office a few months when this ordeal came to
him. Detachments of the 60th Rifles, the 58th
Regiment, the 21st Regiment, the Natal Brigade
and some artillery made up a thousand men — all
that he had at his disposal.

While the Red-coats and the Blue-coats marched
through the foothills of the coastal ranges
towards the North, the Boers steadily approached
the border and, as the New Year, 1881,
commenced, de Wet with his Heidelberg
commando looked down into the Garden
Colony. Dominating the hilly country that
marked the frontier was a great, flat-topped peak,
now wreathed in clouds and driving mist and
nearly 5,000 feet in height. Amajuba was the
name the Natives had given it. Lesser heights
stretched southwards towards the pass known as
Laing's Nek. Both armies moved forward very
slowly through the rains, and more than once
scouts lost their way in the fogs that lay, thick as
in the Scottish Highlands.

Only one place seemed to offer Colley a chance
to take his forces through the Drakensberg to the
Transvaal, and that was Laing's Nek. Here then
General Joubert set up his headquarters, and here
de Wet too waited for the British. In those
bitterly cold and damp weeks; when the Boers
lay on guard in the mud, and the Tommies, far
below, dug their eight pieces of ordinance out of
one quagmire after another, Christiaan never lost
his cheeriness nor his watchfulness. At the
Councils of War, which were held more or less
in public, his suggestions carried so much weight
that he was entrusted with a force of 200 men to
search for the enemy. He found them near Mount
Prospect, not far from Majuba, and on January
28, 1881, de Wet for the first time faced a white
army. With bright-blue tunics, made as though to
serve as targets for the Boers, the British
soldiers, tried to climb the slithering muddy
hillside at Laing's Nek.

British artillery opened fire and a number of
Transvaalers, unused to this form of assault,
scattered from their shelter in old cattle kraals.
Then the British advanced to screen the men on
foot. Christiaan himself walked up and down,
behind the edge of the hill, to prevent the men
from getting in each other's way.

"There", he related afterwards, "I came upon a
small fellow, lying at the foot of another burgher.
"Get out of the road". I shouted at him. He
answered: "I am almost dead, please let me go to
the horses". So I gave him a rap with my
sjambok, saying; "Run after the horses, and if
anything is wrong, even with one of the bridles,
I'll teach you a lesson". In this free-and-easy
warfare General Joubert himself was not above
walking under fire.

General Nicolas Smit was in charge of the
section to which de Wet belonged. As they
approached within range the advancing soldiers

for the first time saw the rows of Boers lying on
their stomachs, their guns pointing at them.

The first murderous volley emptied almost half
the saddles and, despite the bravery of the
infantry, including" particularly Major Burnie
with the 1st Dragoon Guards, who actually
reached one of the Boer trenches, the wave of
men melted away. Several of the British officers
fell dead, and as the excited defenders swooped
downwards, Field-Cornet de Wet was in the van.

Seventy-three dead and one hundred wounded
were the losses of Sir George Colley's force on
that ill-omened day, and it is typical of him that
when he congratulated his men on their bravery,
he added "the entire blame of the repulse rests on
me".

President Brand, who was immensely respected
by both sides, sent word to the Transvaal and to
Downing Street, that he would try to mediate.

The fact that hundreds of his own burghers had
joined the Republican forces was not all to his
liking, and he formally called upon them to
return, an invitation which was however
disregarded.

At the Heights of Ingogo the armies again
collided. Once more de Wet, under the
leadership of General Smit, was under fire. This
time the British artillery did less damage than
before to the Boer position. As usual the
Republicans lay hidden behind boulders,
shooting at the individual gunners, and Sir
George Colley himself missed a glancing bullet
by a few inches. Thunder and lightning rolled
through the hills and the downpour grew so
heavy that the fight virtually came to a stop.
When night fell they again retreated. Brigadier-
General Sir Evelyn Wood set sail from England
with thousands of reinforcements, landed his
men, and, when the Boers tried to repeat their
trick of cutting off his convoys, he

outmanoeuvred them. Colley resolved to meet
the approach of help with a master stroke of his
own. Far above on the skyline towered mighty
Majuba, the stronghold which he could render as
impregnable as the Basutos had made Thaba
Bosigo. Scouts had told him that the flat top was
still empty. The burghers believed no one could
climb those steep crags. February 28, 1881 saw
hundreds of British soldiers in dead, silence
winding up the cliff paths through the night.

Looking upwards at the mountain as day broke
the Boers scarcely believed their eyes, when they
beheld helmets and the glittering weapons
blinking down on them from the summit.
According to de Wet himself. Commandant-
General Joubert had himself envisaged the
possible coup, and had ordered a special guard or
brandwacht to be kept. On the fatal night they
had not watched sufficiently. Cooking breakfast
on the hillside below, they discussed what should
be done. Joubert came along. "You are going up

to fetch them down", he said briskly. Some of
the men had already put oxen into the wagons in
preparation for a retreat, before General Smit
spoke up: "Those who are not cowards must
follow me". From the rush of those who wanted
to help, sixty men were chosen as the storming
party. One of them was Christiaan de Wet.
Before they had climbed far, shots fell from
above and came more heavily with each step.

What happened on the summit is hard to say
after these many years. General Colley was
there, cheering on his men. The soldiers of the
28th Regiment, 60th Rifles and 92nd Regiment,
and the sixty-four sailors of the Naval Brigade
kept up steady firing until the Boers below came
within a few hundred yards. At that point the
bullets went over the heads of the attackers, and
it was no longer possible to see them in the scrub
of the precipices. Three scattered parties were
moving, one under Field-Cornet Joachim
Ignatius Ferreira, one under Field-Cornet

Johannes Roos, and one under Assistant Field-
Cornets D. Malan and S. Trichardt. De Wet was
with the party that swarmed up the North-East
side, hanging on to the grass to prevent
themselves crashing into the abyss. Somehow
they crawled up until they saw the little heaps of
stones, behind which the soldiers had taken
shelter. Why the nerve of the defenders should
suddenly break is a mystery, but they no sooner
saw the Boers on the top of the hill than they
turned and fled. "Fix bayonets!", was the order
given; nobody moved. "The officers in
desperation clutched the men by the throat and
threatened them with pistols", said a colonist
who was present. Over the edge poured the
Boers in relentless flood. The top of Majuba was
almost level, with puddles of water here and
there. There was a cry. "Look at Colley!",
shouted someone. He lay on the ground with a
bullet through his head, in front of his whole
force.

"He met his death bravely", said de Wet, "for he
was among the first to be killed."

The Boer who fired that bullet made history. It
meant the virtual end of the campaign. Not only
had the Republicans lost but a single man and
five wounded, as against 92 dead, 134 wounded,
and 59 prisoners on the British side, but the
Tommies were now without a commander. He
was buried with many others during the truce
that followed, and Dutch as well as English
saluted the body of the gallant Governor whose
last campaign had been so unfortunate. Less than
a week after, on March 3, President Brand sent a
telegram to Sir Evelyn Wood, proposing an
armistice.

Before the final terms were agreed upon, which
restored the independence of the Transvaal under
the suzerainty of Queen Victoria — an expression
of much ambiguity — Christiaan de Wet home
again at Heidelberg, carrying a Highland dirk as
a souvenir, found his wife had taken refuge with

a neighbour, trekking through the heavy rains
with her children. Hard times had come upon
them, but she had "sown the grain, milked the
cows, and doctored the animals". Within a few
months, however, he had again to ride down to
Natal, but under happier auspices, to be present
on the historic day.

As he passed the 300 Free Staters, who had
served in the Transvaal army without legal
permission, old President Brand in his fatherly
manner went up to them and shook his finger in
a reproving way.

"Naughty boys", he said.

Chapter 5
The Absentee Candidate

WOMEN'S voices and the laughter of children
mingled with the clatter of cooking-pots and the
drone of the Native drivers, ministering to the
oxen pastured on the green field in the centre of
Pretoria. Dozens of waggons stood at all angles,

outspanned in the shadow of a church, by far the
finest building in the Transvaal capital. Around
Church Square were cottages and stores, each
with its verandah, belonging to the leading
townsfolk. On the same site where to-day stands
the stately home of the Transvaal Provincial
Council, was yet another building, thatched like
all the others, its front balcony supported by
roughly-trimmed poles — the Parliament House
of the South African Republic in 1884.

Inside His Honour the State-President, Stephanus
Johannes Paulus Kruger, better known as Paul
Kruger, wearing over his jacket a sash of office,
embroidered with the national coat-of-arms;
while on the benches round him sat the deputies
of all districts between the Limpopo River and
the Vaal, bearded to a man, and each in the same
type of go-to-meeting attire. A new member was
being sworn in on the great official Bible. He
represented the vast but minutely-populated
Lydenburg area, as big as the whole of Holland,

yet with fewer whites than an average European
village. Christiaan de Wet, holding up his hand,
swore allegiance, as the Constitution prescribed,
to "Land en Volk" (Land and People).

Britain had said goodbye to the Transvaal. Her
soldiers had withdrawn, as Mr. Gladstone had
promised when the negotiations began at
O'Neil's homestead near Majuba and only one
little grain of comfort was left to her wounded
pride; independence was granted subject to the
Suzerainty of Her Majesty, and a "Resident",
whose duties were the same as that of a Consul,
was to be appointed. What exactly that word
"Suzerainty" meant was never really settled and
gave rise to infinite trouble less than twenty
years later. Soon after it became apparent that
greater certainty on doubtful points must be
obtained and President Kruger, newly-elected to
that office by a large majority in May, 1883, was
instructed to proceed to Europe to settle the
matter. Once again the old statesman from the

veld and his assistants took a long voyage across
the ocean, this time in the Roslin Castle. At
Plymouth a deputation of South African
students, most of whom were studying theology
or medicine in Edinburgh, welcomed the Boer
delegates. In the address which J. Murray, G. D.
Mai an and a number of others handed to the
visitors they declared: "As we are convinced that
nothing will do so much for the well-being and
prosperity of our country, as good relations
between England and the South African States,
we express the wish that your labours in this
country may be crowned with success". In his
reply President Kruger spoke of his gratitude to
the representatives of the various republics and
colonies in our Southern Hemisphere and to the
descendants of the various races of which our
nation consists", a phrase foreshadowing the
bigger Union that was still a long road ahead for
South Africa.

While all this was happening Christiaan de Wet
was visiting his family in the Orange Free State.
He still lived at Rooikoppies in the Heidelberg
district of the Transvaal, where he now had built
himself a fine homestead. His friends re-elected
him Field-Cornet, and the solemn swearing-in
took place afresh at Paardekraal, where a great
service of Thanksgiving was held on the
Dingaan's Day after Majuba. Transport riding
was no longer possible, because of his duties to
the State. By collecting the substantial amount of
£630 arrear taxes from the Natives, he made a
considerable impression upon black and white,
for it was no easy matter to go from hut to hut
and gather shillings and sovereigns, due to the
State, out of the unwilling and impecunious
tribesmen. Though the work did not appeal to De
Wet, he realised that it was necessary, and he
devoted his usual driving power to this task as he
did to all others.

Few people are more impressed by sheer
personality and less impressed by showmanship
than the Boers. With his pawky sense of humour,
slow and frequently stern method of talking, and
his habit of giving his decision in few but very
definite words, "Oom Krisjan" was a man after
their own hearts. Perhaps his success was less
due to tact than to forcefulness. In any event he
was known as a "gawe kerel", an expression
most nearly translated by the American "some
boy".

De Wet was not particularly interested in his
neighbours, but he saw them at church and in his
own living-room; they came to him to drink
strong coffee and to talk about the herds and
crops and how President Kruger was getting on
with the English. So little was he concerned with
their opinion that he did not even take into
account the prestige value of his Field-Cornetcy.
Within less than two years he threw up the
appointment and, once more seized by the

wanderlust, trekked 300 miles towards
Lydenberg and the more fertile regions of the
Low Veld. Once again Christiaan saw diggers, as
he had done at Kimberley, though they sought
not for diamonds, but for gold. Here there was
something of the atmosphere of old-time
California. Men in corduroy breeches sluiced in
the creeks for the precious dust and lone men set
off for the hills to prospect among lions as well
as treacherous Natives. Fever was the curse of
the Lydenburg district, and this was the reason
de Wet did not remain.

One day when he came home from his work he
found a deputation waiting for him on the
verandah. One of the burghers stood up and
made a little speech!

"We would like you to accept this requisition to
become our Member of the Volksraad", said the
visitor. Christiaan de Wet was lukewarm. Flat-
tered though he felt at the chance of entering the
highest body in the land, he did not think it

sufficiently important to postpone a trip to the
Orange Free State, and he told his would-be
constituents in so many words that they would
have to do the electioneering in his absence. This
was, however, by no means unusual in the early
Transvaal. Campaigning was regarded as the
privilege of the voters and supporters, so de Wet
set off with his family on a visit of some weeks
to his father at Nieuwejaarsfontein, without in
any way hampering the arrangements for his
candidature. Having signed the paper accepting
the nomination his duties came to an end.

His wagon disappeared towards the Vaal River,
and there was a great welcome for the family
from the old Mr. Jacobus de Wet and the other
folks. What a lot there was to talk about! The
War; the Peace; the new railway, that was
creeping from the Cape towards Kimberley and
was likely soon to enter the Orange Free State;
the reports of new gold discoveries in the Eastern
Transvaal, along the De Kaap Valley; the news

that President Kruger and his comrades were
back, with a brand-new Convention with
England in their luggage-guaranteed to remove
the Queen's influence once and for all. These and
many other subjects were discussed. Yes, the
world had changed. There were even diamond
mines in the Orange Free State now... "Patience,
Courage, Freedom, Immigration", was the motto
of the Orange Free State, and the workings of
Jagersfontein and Koffiefontein contributed
considerably towards the realisation of these
aims. The population now stood at 60,000 whites
and 120,000 blacks.

Moshesh was dead. There was peace on the
Basuto frontier and the former warriors rode
down on their ponies in order to work for the
farmers. Schoolmasters from Holland, from
Scotland and from the Cape arrived in shoals,
and in no part of South Africa did fewer children
lack an education. Such institutions as Grey
College at Bloemfontein and Eunice High

School for Girls drew pupils from far beyond the
borders of the Model Republic. No wonder de
Wet felt tempted to come back from the
Transvaal. His own family urged him to return.
Nieuwejaarsfontein had become a fine property,
as the young man soon recognised. His father
was thinking of retiring to the village.

"What about buying the farm, Christiaan?", he
asked, and Christiaan nodded. At home a
surprise awaited him. He had almost forgotten
about the Volksraad, and now he found himself
duly elected. Unwillingly he went to town to see
his lawyer. The advice he received was
ingenuous. Since it was possible for a man living
in the Orange Free State to attend the Assembly
at Pretoria, de Wet told the voters he would
oblige them and keep his seat.

Volksraad meetings usually coincided with the
quarterly Nachtmaal. From all parts of the
country the wagons plodded to the nearest town
and, after intervals varying from one to three

months, the burghers and their wives and
children met each other again, attended Divine
service, took Communion, had their babies
christened, their sons and daughters confirmed or
married, their wills drawn up, their lawsuits
prepared, their stocks of groceries replenished,
their agricultural implements overhauled and
their affairs for this world and the next generally
put in order.

So it came about that one afternoon in 1884
Christiaan de Wet stood in front of the old
President and, raising his hand, repeated the
formula: "Being chosen as a member of the
Volksraad of this Republic, I declare, promise
and solemnly swear that I have not given any
gifts to anyone to obtain this position, that I shall
conduct myself in accordance with the
constitution of this Republic to the best of my
knowledge and belief, and I shall have no other
aim than furthering the happiness of the citizens
in general, so help me God."

In the bar of a hotel at Bloemfontein stood a tall
man, with fair untidy hair. He wore his slouch
hat at the back of his head, and his white trousers
contrasted oddly with the blackness of his coat
and with his butterfly collar. Not, however, the
style of his clothes, nor the fact that he spoke
Oxford English to those who stood around him,
nor that he drank more glasses of whisky than
was usual in the capital of the Orange Free State,
caused bystanders to watch the stranger.
Everybody knew that, despite his mere thirty-
two years, he was probably the richest man in
South Africa. Mr. Rhodes chatted to a group of
burghers, occasionally drawing his own
travelling companions into the conversation.
Everyone knew the diamond magnate from
Kimberley was successfully progressing with his
amalgamation of rival companies, and that he
was now a member of the Cape House of
Assembly. Stock-prices and railways, customs
duties and land settlement; more irrigation dams
for the farmers; the need for subduing the wild

Matabele north of the Transvaal; the importance
of closer links between the Cape, Natal and the
two Republics. Such were the topics of which
they remembered he had talked in that
Bloemfontein bar-parlour. No one, not even the
most fanatical Republican patriot, could take
exception to Cecil Rhodes' sentiments.

Somewhere on the verandah, however, stood de
Wet, watching him silently.

Then, without exchanging a word, he went upon
his way. "That fellow has a wonderful head", he
said to his friends. "No one can deny it, but he
will do us harm..."

More or less against his wishes Christiaan was
becoming well-known in the land. To all
appearances he was merely one of several
thousand farmers who formed the backbone of
the Orange Free State. But his neighbours knew
him as one of the most progressive among them,

who delighted to try out new implements and
new methods of cultivation.

In a good year he harvested nearly a thousand
bags (or 3,000 bushels) of maize on
Nieuwejaarsfontein. His herds flourished and his
homestead was the best-kept in the district. Still,
none of these achievements sufficed to explain
Christiaan's popularity. The quiet young man
was listened to with respect at public gatherings,
whether on questions of the day or when giving
instructions as a Field-Cornet. Though bigger
positions were offered to him, it was not until
1889 that he agreed to stand for election to the
Orange Free State Volksraad. For some years he
sat in the parliament of the Transvaal as well — a
tribute to the free and easy ways of the age. He
would make the trek northwards two or three
times a year to Pretoria, usually in his own
turnout, a smart Cape cart, drawn by a neat pair
of greys, and driven by his black coachman.

Problems piled up faster in the land of President
Kruger than in that of President Brand. Gold on a
scale never before witnessed had been struck in
the wild Eastern mountains of De Kaap. Within a
year Barberton, the new village among the hills
near the Portuguese frontier of the Free State
found itself a community of 6,000 whites —
bigger than Pretoria, the capital of the Republic.

Scarcely forty miles from Pretoria itself, a
greater gold-field was found on the Witwaters-
rand. Before 1886 was out a large chain of farms
had been thrown open by the President for
pegging claims. First in hundreds, then in
thousands, diggers made their way to this bleak
tract of windy veld. For a while it even seemed
as though Christiaan's own old farm near
Heidelberg might be included in the magic zone,
for the everwidening area staked off by miners
came exceedingly near to it. De Wet, however,
was not interested. To him Johannesburg — that
camp built up over-night out of tents, wagons

and houses walled with sods — was just another
Kimberley — a rather noisier, nastier and more
aggressively wealthy version of the Cape
community. The growth of the new town soon
put anything on the diamond fields far into the
shade. Of railways there were none in the
Transvaal, but the diggers willingly paid colossal
freights for ox-wagons to convey their
machinery and stores. Costly furniture was
brought out straight from Europe to adorn the
hotels and homes where they took their ease. A
telegraph line was rushed up to serve
Johannesburg, and the Stock Exchange turned
over millions of pounds weekly. Expensive stars,
imported from London to perform in tin theatres,
drew houses that would have been envied by
many a West End cashier. Before proper roads
had been made, the banks in the new town were
handling more money than did the rest of South
Africa put together. Telephones imported by the
Uitlanders for their own use led the Post Office
into competition. Horse-trams trotted up and

down Johannesburg, while the gas lamps paled
before the first electric lights. The primitive
system of licenses for prospectors, and of
mining-titles for diggers, proving completely
inadequate, Paul Kruger decided that a system of
concessions, largely modelled on American
precedent, would best meet the case: so a bill to
this effect was drafted and, for the first time the
President found himself listening to de Wet as a
debater. The longbeards sat back in their chairs
when they beheld Christiaan arise and thunder
against the measure. He warned against
monopolies; he told of high finance and the
power of big companies, as he had seen them at
Kimberley. He argued that the individual digger
was a better citizen; he foreshadowed bigger
fields that the law would not be able to control.
Though de Wet was voted down, 1 everyone
allowed that it was a good speech and the tribute

1 As events subsequently proved the new Gold
Law had to be changed more than once.

of Paul Kruger warmed his heart: "I saw how
you opposed me in the Volksraad, but I have got
to like you in spite of that".

Pretoria was a relief from all this. It still had
pleasant irrigation rivulets along avenues shaded
by weeping-willows and hedges of roses. The
President still sat on the verandah of his house
early in the morning, ready to meet visitors and
to offer them the cup of coffee, for which the
Government allowed him a "Koffiegeld" of £500
a year. The Orange Free State was still more
peaceful, though even there eternal clouds of
dust that hovered over all roads leading North,
told that the day of the Uitlander had come.
Unending caravans of ox-wagons, Cape-carts
and mail coaches ploughed up the earth, until the
tracks were hundreds of feet wide, and the
outspans at night could scarcely cope with all the
campers.

Railways were wanted, so the Progressives
preached, both in the Transvaal and in the

Orange Free State. Few objected in principle, but
many had their doubts as to the method of
securing them. Above all, President Kruger
thought that the Transvaal must not depend
solely on outlets to the British Cape of Good
Hope but must have her own railway to the sea,
serving the Portuguese harbour of Lourenco
Marques. For years, while this undertaking hung
fire, he stopped short the lines from the Cape and
Natal at the Transvaal frontier. President Brand,
on the other hand, strongly favoured a railway
connection between the Orange Free State and
the Cape, whose system ended just South of the
Orange River. He also realised that his little
country, whose entire budget was only £190,000
a year, could never finance the 452 miles,
costing £2,800.000, needed to traverse the land
to the Transvaal. 2 So it was suggested that the

2 In 1886 the total property of the Free State
Government was £ 530,000 while the public debt
amounted to £170,134.

Cape Railways, which had all the money of
England behind them, might build the system
and run it on behalf of the Government at
Bloemfontein. Feeling ran high among the
burghers and all over the country protest
meetings took place. "Anti-Railway Con-
ferences" sat at Dewetsdorp, Ladybrand and
Brandfort. Christiaan de Wet and his brother Jan
de Wet of Maboela were the leaders of the
opposition. "Oom Krisjan" presided at one big
meeting at Dewetsdorp, where such points as
these were made:

(a) All railways are unnecessary;

(b) They are detrimental to transport-riding by
wagon;

(c) They are injurious to horse-breeding;

(d) They are likely to entail heavy land-taxes;

(e) They will encroach on property rights.

Undeterred, a special session of the Volksraad
was called: On this occasion de Wet took a step
which foreshadowed the far more serious
incident of his later career. "Armed Protests"
were threatened by certain Boers if the
Government persisted in measures thought likely
to imperil the independence of the country.
Christiaan was with the commando that waited
outside Bloemfontein while the Parliament
argued about the law. In spite of the strength of
his opinions he was amongst the first to
acknowledge that a satisfactory compromise had
been reached, and the incident, which might so
easily have caused grave trouble, ended in the
peaceable departure homewards of the protesters.

The prominence de Wet gained on this occasion
was of great use to him after his election to the
Orange Free State Volksraad in 1889, as member
for the Upper Modder River Ward. In the
Parliament of fifty-five delegates the procedure
was very similar to what he knew in Pretoria.

Any citizen might walk in and listen to the
debate in the tiny "Raadsaal". When Oom
Krisjan first took his seat, the Parliament met in
a long single-storeyed house with green shutters.
"Black coat, black trousers, black waistcoat and
black hat" was prescribed, but as there was no
regulation concerning shoes, delegates were not
above coming to the sessions in velskoens of
raw-hide. Details of attire were actually specified
by law, and in the Transvaal also the standing
orders of the Legislature, adopted on May 12,
1882, laid down, in Section 14: "Members are
obliged to appear at the sessions, dressed in
black with a white tie. The Chairman shall be
dressed in a black toga, which shall be hemmed
in front and along the collar, with a black border
of velvet".

Hitherto considered a hothead, Christiaan now
surprised his colleagues by his moderation. He
upheld the Calvinist ban on Sunday trains; but he
acknowledged the necessity for all children to

learn English in addition to Dutch, and did not
fail to push all measures likely to assist the cause
of education. When, however, it was suggested
that an Englishman be appointed to teach his
language at Grey College at Bloemfontein,
Christiaan plumped for a Teutonic applicant,
saying "French is taught there by a Hollander, so
why not English by a German?"

De Wet was responsible for the State Grant for
the Dutch Reformed Church, a measure which
greatly added to his popularity. Once he moved
the withdrawal of the modest £50 annual subsidy
to the Catholics, but was over-ruled. Far in
advance of his time was his scheme, in 1895, for
the establishment of compulsory labour colonies
for "Won't Works", a project only realised in
South Africa during 1937. The one-time
opponent now worked with great energy for
more railways, particularly to the grain districts,
for more irrigation dams (some of them are only
now being built) and for "agricultural

rehabilitation" as it would be called in to-day's
jargon.

His views often underwent a change and
characteristically he readily acknowledged in
after years that President Kruger's Gold Law for
the Transvaal had been drawn on correct
principles after all, though he had fought against
it. Similarly he came to see the virtues of a
Customs Union, provided the interests of the
Orange Free State were safeguarded.

Some indication of the prominence which he had
gained was given in 1896 when Christiaan de
Wet seconded the nomination of Marthinus
Theunis Steyn as State President.

Chapter 6
As the Sands Ran Out

CLICK-CLACK, click-clack - the old-
fashioned press was running in the "Steam
Printing Works" of Mr. C. Borckenhagen, at
Bloemfontein, Printer by Appointment to the

Government of the Orange Free State. Beneath
the coat-of-arms on the front page of the Staats
Courant (State Gazette) stood a heading:

"Political Treaty with the South African
Republic. The Orange Free State Republic,
being convinced of the many bonds of blood and
of friendship which unite the people of the
Orange Free State with the people of the South
African Republic:

"And being desirous of combining more closely
the interests of both countries, and of adjoining
States by means of a solemn alliance:

And having regard to this and hoping to bring
about a Federal Union of both States, even
though such Federal Union cannot come into

operation for some years does

declare and these presents witness

There shall be eternal peace and friendship
between the Orange Free State and the South
African Republic who bind themselves

reciprocally and declare themselves prepared to
help each other with all their power and
resources, if their independence should be
threatened from without

THUS DONE AND SIGNED at Potchefstroom
on this, the 9th day of March, 1890.
(Signed) F. W. REITZ,
State President of the Orange Free State.
(Signed) S. J. P. KRUGER,
State President of the South African
Republic.

Misgivings were rife among the burghers when
they read this document. Trouble was again
brewing up north. Scarcely four years had passed
since the first payable gold had been found on
the Witwatersrand, and already there were nearly
as many foreigners as Boers in the Transvaal-
Englishmen, Colonials, Americans, Germans,
French and Hollanders. Even now they were
asking for the vote and if they got it, the real
Transvaalers would soon lose all political power.

"No Taxation without Representation", that old
cry from the far side of the Atlantic, was heard in
the land. Wealth they had in plenty, those
diggers and business-men, yet without citizen
rights it did not satisfy them. Complaints
continued about their disabilities and about the
Government monopolies in various essential
mining commodities, such as dynamite.
President Kruger had been trying to slip into
Matabeleland ahead of the British, only to find
his way barred by swifter expeditions sent by
Cecil Rhodes from the Cape. Hoping to secure a
foreign port at Lourenco Marques, independent
of the British Empire, he had again been
hemmed-in. The intervening territory of
Swaziland he could only administer in
partnership with England. On the West the
English occupied Bechuanaland, and the two
little Boer Republics of Stellaland and Goshen,
that might have served as a spearhead for a
Transvaal advance, were also absorbed by
them."

How lucky was the Orange Free State not to
have goldfields! Indeed she was superior in one
respect even to the Transvaal, since she owed no
suzerainty to Britain.

Although Christiaan de Wet occupied the unique
position of having sat in the Parliament of both
countries, he relished the alliance as little as did
most of his friends. Ever since the recent visit to
Bloemfontein of Sir Henry Loch, the Governor
of the Cape, and since the conclusion of an
agreement authorising the British Colony to
build the first railway on behalf of the
Volksraad, all friction with the South had
vanished. Incalculable possibilities arose from
the new alliance, for all its guarantee of the
Transvaal's independence; more than one Free
Stater foresaw that it might ultimately cost his
own country its independence.

But for the time being there was peace. The rails
from Colesberg and Norval's Pont on the Cape
border reached Bloemfontein on December 17,

1890, and approval was given for their extension
to the Vaal. Trade boomed on both sides of that
river, and de Wet found no difficulty in selling
his excellent crops. Prompted by this he
developed, for the first and last time in his life,' a
"get-rich-quick" scheme. Potatoes were in great
demand on the goldfields. Poor transport and
insufficient production made their sale very
profitable. There were signs that the next harvest
might be a poor one, so Oom Krisjan decided to
buy for a rise. For weeks and months the centre
of his interests lay in the crowded Market Square
of Johannesburg, where hundreds of wagons
brought in the daily requirements of the city.
Then came the new potato season and, instead of
a poor harvest, it turned out to be an
uncommonly good one. De Wet was ruined. It
has been said that he went bankrupt, but I have
found no evidence of this. At any rate he lost
most of his money and with ten children found
himself in middle-age facing the world again.
His boys were growing up and life was not such

a battle that he needed to worry unduly, yet the
potato speculation remained an unpleasant
memory to him for the rest of his days. Curiously
enough potatoes retained their fascination for
him. He grew them again near Kroonstad, in the
Orange Free State, where he presently bought a
farm, and there were nation-wide chuckles
during the Boer War when, at Nicholson's Nek,
he captured not only 1,200 British prisoners, but
some thousand bags of "spuds". As Mr. Howard
Hillegas, of the New York World declared, from
personal observation, "They seemed to please
him almost as greatly as the human captives".

The "Gay Nineties" ran on. Business, other than
potatoes, brought de Wet to the Transvaal, and
he took occasion to visit Oom Paul. "Where do
you live now?", asked the old President: "By the
Vaal River", answered Christiaan.

"Empty out the Vaal River", said Kruger,
alluding to the alliance. Quick as lightning, de
Wet retorted: "The Vaal River is empty".

It was his way of saying things had developed
too far for the Orange Free State to go back.
Thunder-clouds grew thicker and thicker. Nego-
tiations for the solution of difficulties between
the Transvaal and the " Cape brought little relief
to the tension. Even when President Kruger
agreed to reduce the period of residence which
would qualify the Uitlanders for the vote from
fourteen to seven and then to five years, the
trouble did not abate. Now it was the Dynamite
Monopoly, now the Dutch language basis to the
system of education and now the urge to push on
the railways from the Cape and from Natal to
Johannesburg, ahead of the completion of the
rival line to Lourenco Marques. The excessive
number of Hollanders in the Civil Service
excited criticism, as did the growing intimacy of
the Government with the Kaiser. None the less
the gold output rose from £80,000 in 1887 to
£15,000,000 in 1899. Johannesburg had its first
100,000 inhabitants by 1895. The Free State told
a similar though more sober tale of budget

surpluses, additional railway lines (now often
sponsored by de Wet himself) and of the erection
of a stately new Raadsaal building.

With growing concern Bloemfontein watched
the progress of the Uitlander organisations.
Almost as soon as President Kruger himself,
President Reitz was notified of the formation of a
military camp on the Bechuanaland border,
which the British fondly imagined was a secret;
when Dr. Jameson, with his 511 men, swooped
down into the Transvaal on the eve of Christmas
1895; the Orange Free State was on the alert as
promptly as the Transvaal, and immediately
Reitz, in the terms of the Alliance Treaty of
1890, agreed to mobilise his burghers. They met
Sir Hercules Robinson, Governor of the Cape, on
his way to Johannesburg, in the hope of restoring
peace.

At this awkward moment the resignation of
President Reitz made it necessary to choose a
successor. Judge Marthinus Theunis Steyn was

opposed as a candidate by John George Fraser.
There was perfect equality in the land for both
races; many of its highest offices were held by
men of English or Scottish birth. Fraser himself
was Chairman of the Volksraad, the Postmaster-
General was A. C. Howard, the Superintendent
of Education was the Rev. J. Brebner, the
Secretary of Executive Council was Mr. H. B.
Bell, the State Attorney was A. J. Macgregor,
whilst names like Brain, Savage, Kestell,
Conroy, Martin, Barlow, Baumann, Rorke,
Dickens, Murphy, Smith, Hooper, Pratt and
many others told of perfect political toleration. In
the war that was soon to begin not a few of the
English-speaking Free Staters were to lay down
their lives for their new country.

In the heat of the moment, however, de Wet for
once lost his usual judgment: 'Ek sal my bloed
stort voor ek 'n Engelsman sien President word",
he thundered ("I shall shed my blood before I see
an Englishman as President"). He toiled

furiously for Steyn and was delighted to see him
win at the polls in March, 1896.

Christiaan felt that war with England had only
been postponed. A distant cousin of his, Sir
Jacobus de Wet, (descended from a branch of the
family which had remained in the Cape), in his
capacity as British Agent in Pretoria, was urging
the Reform Committee to surrender to Paul
Kruger, and proved the anxiety of Downing
Street to disown this "armed protest". De Wet no
longer opposed Closer Union: on the contrary he
joined a special delegation to Pretoria and at the
special sitting of the Volksraad in 1896 he
moved that notice be given to cancel the
Extradition Treaty between the Orange Free
State and Rhodesia: that the Customs' Union
with the Cape and Natal be terminated; and that
a stringent new law regulating the vote for
foreigners be adopted by his own country, as it
was in the Transvaal. Within a few months a new

secret Treaty of Alliance with the Transvaal was
agreed to.

President Steyn, however, decided that the
mediation which old President Brand had so
successfully used in the war of 1880 might
forestall another and greater outbreak. Christiaan
de Wet, like any other burgher, waited for the
worst. His term in the Volksraad had come to a
close in 1898, and with it his official status
disappeared. Ammunition had been stored, and
the only standing force in the Republic, the 400
men of the State Artillery, with their smart
equipment and Prussian uniforms, stood ready to
take the field at any time..

The fateful year 1899 began. After months of
discussion, President Kruger and Lord Milner, as
Her Majesty's High Commissioner in South
Africa, agreed, at President Steyn's request, to
meet in Bloemfontein. Every man at the Cape-
firom the Chief Justice, Sir Henry de Villiers, to
Mr. J. H. Hofmeyr, popular leader of the Dutch

community, was trying to bring about a
reconciliation. The Orange Free State Volksraad,
like that of the Transvaal, held meetings, many
of them in secret.

Four months more passed by: efforts were still
being made on both sides. De Wet sat on his
farm, busy with his herds and with his
ploughing. One day a man rode up to his farm
and handed a paper to him and to his three eldest
sons, Kootie, Isaak and Christiaan junior. It was
a summons to prepare for active service. He
must have his riding horse ready, with saddle
and bridle, also a rifle and thirty cartridges,
failing which "thirty bullets, thirty caps, and half
a pound of powder". Eight days' provisions must
be in the saddlebag-Boer biscuits, biltong or
sausages. The date was October 2, 1899. Nine
days later, on October 11, 1899, Britain and the
Republics were at war.

Chapter 7
De Wet's First Victory

DOWN the gang-planks of troop-ships, moored
beside the wharves of Port Natal, British soldiers
were tramping in long rows, heavily loaded with
packs, wearing tropical helmets and the new
"karki" uniforms for active service. Day by day
they landed in their thousands, as the steamers
arrived from India, from Britain and from other
parts of the Empire.

They lined up along the quayside, they marched
away through the cargo sheds at the Point into
the town of Durban, and to the railway stations,
for destinations up-country. Civilians cheered
and waved little Union Jacks as the trains
steamed out, but there was a heavy foreboding
over the land. As the soldiers looked across the
coastal sugar-fields, through which their coaches
were climbing before reaching the highlands of
Natal beyond Pietermaritzburg, other trains,
going in the opposite direction, came by,

crammed with women and children, some in
compartments, some in goods trucks: the
refugees who had been travelling for days on the
overloaded lines from the Transvaal.

Although the anxiety which South Africans felt
in those grim days, early in October, 1899, could
not escape the newly-landed Tommies, their
natural good spirits soon overpowered them.
Cheerful military music was heard, and the
topical songs of the day, such as "Goodbye,
Dolly Grey" were rendered with gusto far into
the night. Smart young officers in their brandnew
uniforms talked about cricket-matches and polo
ponies, and commiserations were expressed for
those who would not reach South Africa before
the end of the campaign, somewhere about
Christmas.

Fifty miles away, among the crags of the
Drakensberg, that dropped thousands of feet into
the headwaters of the Tugela, the Boers lay
waiting. In more or less continuous lines their

commandos were encamped for hundreds of
miles along the mighty escarpment which
marked the edge of the Queen's authority. Horses
stood tethered in the little sidevalleys, while their
masters, still dressed in farming clothes, but with
cartridge bandoliers around their waists and
Mauser rifles in their hands, took turns to watch
the coming of the English; their coffee-kettles
swung from iron tripods over the crackling fires,
as though it were all a vast hunting expedition.
Early rains were soaking the veld; the blanketed
Basutos, sitting on their ponies, tended their
herds of mountain sheep.

Native servants came with their masters, to cook
and run messages. Only now and then a Red
Cross, painted on the side of a horse-drawn
ambulance, still without passengers, met the eye
as something unfamiliar and disturbing. Around
tables, set up in the open-air, the commandants
sat in council, discussing plans for attack and
defence or receiving the news brought in by

scouting patrols. Now and then a baboon would
bark on a neighbouring precipice, or a vulture
would sweep upon some buck that had been
slain.

At Bezuidenhout Pass, where the rough road
from Natal climbed through a narrow gap in the
Drakensberg, a commando from the district of
Heilbron lay encamped, its members ranging in
age from fifteen to seventy years. Old fellows
with white beards shared tents with boys who
only a few days earlier had been at school. Most
of them were neighbours and many were
relatives.

Christiaan de Wet was with them, not as an
officer, but as a humble burgher, like the rest.
History seemed to be repeating itself. The year
of Majuba had returned; would another General
Colley come to lead his forces to destruction? De
Wet had his doubts. This time the English had
not 5,000 but 50,000 men to draw upon, and
behind them were untold millions.

As de Wet said goodbye to his wife, he made
plans to be away for several years, even though
he hoped from time to time to revisit his
homestead. Cornelia was expecting another
baby, but this did not prevent her from preparing
the food which her men were to take along with
them, from helping to pack the little two-
wheeled cart for her husband's personal effects
and papers, and from assisting in the choice of
his ridinghorse. Kootie de Wet had been asked
by his father to secure a mount for him, one that
was "salted" against disease, good to look at and
able to stand unlimited hardships. Proud to be
entrusted with this mission, the lad brought along
a magnificent charger, "Fleur" by name. This
animal became world-famous ere many months
had passed. An Arab by descent, it was as loyal
and brave a companion as Christiaan ever
possessed, and it lived to an honourable age after
the fighting was over.

Among the first duties that fell to de Wet, once
his commando reached its war station, was to
assist in the election of a Commander-in-Chief
for his section of the front. An experienced Boer,
by the name of Marthinus Prinsloo, was chosen.
His authority, however, was restricted to the
border, the principal command for the Orange
Free State being in the hands of the Transvaaler,
General Piet Cronje, on the opposite side of the
country.

While he was away in Natal an incident
happened to de Wet, reminiscent of the occasion
when he was elected against his will into the
Transvaal Volksraad. Coming home after an
uneventful day he was informed that his
comrades had picked him as a Vice-
Commandant, his duties being to relieve the
Commandant should he be incapacitated. Within
a few hours this actually came to pass.
Commandant Steenkamp was taken ill and
Christiaan de Wet found himself at the head of

600 men, joining in the invasion of Natal.
Almost simultaneously long files of burghers
trotted down every approach that led into that
Colony from Botha's Pass, from Van Reenen's,
from Tintwa's Pass, from Olivier's Hoek.

As they followed their new Vice-Commandant
de Wet, the Free Staters were in high feather. At
long last the period of waiting was at an end, and
references of the Smiting of the Amalekites and
similar Biblical happenings were frequently on
their lips. Red roofs and white tents and the
winding curve of a railway line told them the
direction of Lady smith. Already the Drakensberg
was behind them, and they could see the flat-
topped outline of a hill, Spionkop, later to be
drenched in blood. They camped on the veld and
continued at dawn. The railway line was crossed
and, on October 24, 1899, thirteen days after
war had been declared, Christiaan de Wet was
under fire again.

Flashes of bursting shells sprung out of the plain
towards Ladysmith, and shrapnel fragments
hailed on to the heights where the Boers lay
waiting, under orders to hold their fire. As usual
the Republicans were told to hold their fire, their
only gun giving up its pitiful attempt to answer
back. Then came the assault of the "khakis", and
the tactics that had prevailed at Laing's Nek were
brought into effect at Modderspruit. The
Tommies walked towards their death, throwing
up their hands as they were hit. Survivors
crouched among bushes and behind stones, but
the bullets rattled down with dreadful accuracy,
from eight in the morning till three in the
afternoon. Then the burghers could be heard
sounding a retreat, and, as the rain of lead died
away, the stretcherbearers came out to pick up
the wounded. Commandant de Wet was
surrounded by his jubilant followers asking leave
to pursue the enemy. "Enough for to-day", he
said. "We are not strong enough to catch them".

The Boer Council of War decided, however, that
the time had now come to lay siege to
Ladysmith, a fatal mistake, as was shown later,
for they might well have pushed on to the coast,
leaving the British garrison isolated.

For nearly a month de Wet and his men in
comparative peace, closed in along the hills
surrounding Ladysmith. He saw little of the
fighting, his men placed upon heights West and
North-west of the British positions. At last heavy
booming of guns, heard in the camp early on
November 29, told them that there was trouble in
the direction of an isolated hill known as
"Swartbooi's Kop". Commandant Nel had long
been ordered to occupy this with his men, and
had not done so. Memories of Majuba flashed
back upon the veterans under de Wet when they
beheld the enemy at the top of the steep ascent,
shooting almost straight down; and, as on that
occasion nearly twenty years before, a storming
party was called for.

From boulder to boulder, from bush to bush, the
farmers skipped under the fusilade from above.
They reached the northern end of the hill,
without much loss, only to see the English firing
across the flat top of Swartbooi's Kop from the
shelter of ruined cattle kraals. The Boers
charged. Every now and then a man dropped, but
the suddenness of their appearance spoilt the
accuracy of the English fire. Before long ; white
flags were hoisted and Christiaan found himself
in possession, not only of several prisoners, but
of two Maxims and two mounted guns, minus
ammunition, 1,000 Lee-Metford rifles and
twenty cases of cartridges. Then only did he
discover from his captives that essential portions
of the guns had been lost during a stampede of
mules, so that it had been almost purely a battle
between riflemen. Before nightfall the
unfortunate surviving British soldiers had
retreated, 817 of their comrades having been
captured and over 200 killed. Among those who
cheered the victory was a twenty-four-year old,

clean-shaven young lawyer from Pretoria, Jan
Christiaan Smuts, who met de Wet for the first
time on that battlefield.

Looking up from their trenches around
Ladysmith the British' soldiers saw hill after hill
occupied by their foes. "The greatest reverse
since Majuba" wired the war correspondents on
the "Defeat of Nicholson's Nek" and, like Sir
Pomeroy Colley in his day, the commander of
the Ladysmith garrison, General Sir George
White, accepted all the blame.

Worse was to come. Bulwana, an imposing hill
overlooking the little town, fell into the hands of
the Boers, and as November ran on, shells from
Long Tom and from scores of other pieces of
ordnance dropped almost incessantly on the
defenders. Sweating gangs of white men and
natives hoisted artillery on to the top of
Pepworth and other hills, and four days after
Nicholson's Nek defeat, the British abandoned
the village of Colenso.

In their wildest dreams the sober commandos of
Boers never expected such success as this. Not
only in Natal but in the Cape was the tide
running with them. Burghersdorp was evacuated
by the British; so were Stormberg and
Naauwpoort.

A Republican army was outside Kimberley,
another one at Mafeking. Why not continue the
invasion of Natal, pushing nearer the coast and
cutting the railway wherever possible?
Thousands of fresh troops were on the water and
every day was precious. Thus thought General
Louis Botha, as yet a comparatively unknown
figure, and thus also reasoned Christiaan de Wet.
Ten days later a telegram reached de Wet, in
which President Steyn offered him the rank of
"Vecht-generaal" or "Fighting General", to
operate along the western boundary of the
Orange Free State, 300 miles away from Natal,
Christiaan's native diffidence came out once
more. His old friend, the late Dr. J. D. Kestell,

has placed on record how de Wet with four or
five friends went into the veld away from the
camp "to confer in the sight of God". One of the
men, Johannes Celliers, spoke up presently;
"You must go". And go he did. "To tell the
truth", said de Wet, "I should have much
preferred to have gone through the campaign as a
private burgher". But here were his friends, and
here was a further wire from Abraham Fischer of
the Executive Council: and so with a heavy heart
he said goodbye to his Heilbron Commando.

Chapter 8
The Camp at Paardeberg

LORD ROBERTS, England's crack soldier, with
the fame of many Indian wars upon him, had
just been made Commander-in-Chief, and so
many troopships were reaching Cape Town that
Table Bay could take no more, and an overflow
port was opened at Saldanha Bay. Sheer weight
of numbers was pressing back the Boers under
Cronje along the Modder River towards

Paardeberg. The conical hill was passed which
gave the place its name and he was
concentrating his men on the protection of
Bloemfontein, when the British troops under
General French caught him up.

De Wet, the newly-appointed Vecht-generaal of
the Orange Free State army, watched his
Transvaal colleague's manoeuvres with growing
anxiety. Now that he had his highly responsible
post, he was immediately at loggerheads with
Cronje. Those English were learning from their
enemies, he pointed out. At Magersfontein they
would have had far more serious losses had they
not copied the Boers' tactics of digging
trenches. Their guns were shooting better than
before. Again and again de Wet pleaded with
his stubborn old superior, to allow him to make
raids against the English, to cut the railway
lines serving Lord Methuen from behind, and to
raise trouble among the colonists in the Cape.
Somehow Cronje seemed to have lost his

judgment, for it was only when a vast force of
English were advancing that de Wet was told to
meet them with 350 burghers, and to hold them
up. Like a good soldier, he did his best with the
inadequate troops he was allowed. Not that he
ever reckoned on anything like equality with the
English, but his shrewd judgment told him that
if he had 500 men instead of 350 and only two
guns instead of none, he might have
accomplished something. Once again he tried
the Majuba tactics of storming a steep
mountain. His burghers scaled the
Koedoesberg, while Cronje's caravan coiled for
miles into the Orange Free State. British
artillery was brought to bear upon them and
many valuable hours lost. Suddenly changing
his mind, Cronje allowed Major Albrecht to
take two guns to back up de Wet. With thirty-
six men lie charged against the oncoming
British mounted troops — 800 or 900 of them. It
seemed madness, with shrapnel beating down at

about 400 yards, but they were saved by the
sudden African dusk.

For days the manoeuvring continued. Forty to
fifty thousand Britishers were trailing
northward in the course of the "Big Push". De
Wet remained detached from Cronje's force and
did his best to hold them up. Danie Theron, the
famous Boer scout, kept bringing in disturbing
reports. Saved by a miracle from the assault of
Roberts' cavalry at Koedoesberg he turned the
tables on the British, who had suddenly drawn
off under cover of night, and at Riet River
secured a great collection of booty hastily left
in the abandoned camp — 200 wagons, with
tinned meat, tinned fish, condensed milk,
liquor, forage for animals, clothes, am-
munition. It was the first of a very long list of
such captures de Wet was to make in this war,
which, in the aggregate, was to cost the
British Treasury millions of pounds. Merely
to remove this accumulation was no easy

matter, with his grazing oxen spread out for
miles.

Isolated groups of English still lurked in the
neighbourhood and the Free State scouts
discovered a small group of about fifty or
sixty who were surrounded. There followed
an amusing attempt at bluff on both sides.
Under the white flag an orderly appeared,
asked for General de Wet and told him that a
thousand men were about to relieve them; that
they were fully supplied with stores and in a
very strong position. De Wet smiled. "I will
give you just enough time to go back and tell
your officer that, if he does not surrender
immediately, I shall shell him and storm his
position". Ten minutes later the English were
all prisoners.

Meanwhile on 17th February 1900 the British
troops caught up the retreating forces of
Cronje. With a sinking heart de Wet took
stock of the position, yet he did not give up

hope. If Cronje was willing to abandon his
transport, he might still cut his way out from
Paardeberg Camp. Calling his famous Danie
Theron he asked whether it would be possible
for him to make his way through the British
lines. "Yes, General, I will go", said this King
of Scouts. Early on February 27, the sentries
on the British lines thought they saw
somebody moving in the tall grass. They
fired, but missed. Tattered, soaked and with
the skin scraped off his hands and knees,
Danie Theron slunk back to the schantzes, or
emplacements, behind which de Wet had
quartered himself.

Cronje had refused to break out, had refused
to take advantage of the chances which de
Wet had created. Fifteen thousand British
troops lay around the camp. The Boers fought
bravely. On a single day they lost 1,262 men,
of whom 320 were killed. At six o'clock on
the morning of February 27, de Wet saw a

white flag go up. Four thousand one hundred
and five men had surrendered.

"I am glad to see you. You have made a
gallant defence, sir", spoke dapper little Lord
Roberts, as the heavily -built, tired old General
came towards him. Cronje said nothing in
reply, but some miles away de Wet and his
commando, with more bitterness in their
hearts than words could describe, rode
northwards, in an effort to save their country's
capital.

De Wet was now Commander-in-Chief, for all
practical purposes, of the Orange Free State
forces, and insisted on a standard of discipline
which startled his easy-going underlings. That
little sjambok had taught a couple of them some
painful lessons, which had been widely
discussed. Yet the force of tradition could not be
disregarded, even by Christiaan de Wet, so every
now and then the commando would be allowed
to disperse, in a manner completely baffling to

the British. They were told to assemble at a
certain place on a certain day and, allowing for
inevitable desertions, the system worked
astonishingly well. The proverbial elusiveness of
the General and his forces is in part accounted
for by this. Other questions of discipline were
not so easy to settle. For a long time the worst of
these was the refusal of most of the Boers to
abandon their convoys of carts and wagons, even
after explicit orders had been circulated by
President Reitz himself. Mile-long corteges of
vehicles, carrying anything from ammunition to
bedsteads, cluttered up the transport of the
Republicans.

Many months passed before the wagons, that had
contributed so largely to the defeat of
Paardeberg, were abandoned by the remaining
fighters. Strange were the mixtures of panic and
desperate bravery, of uttermost good faith, and
inexcusable desertion among the Boers. Nobody
has been more outspoken on this than de Wet

himself, and it is borne out by every Afrikaner
writer of the period. "Hands-Uppers" was the
term of abuse bestowed by the Transvaalers and
Free Staters on those of their men who walked
over to the enemy. Christiaan de Wet's own
brother was to be one of them.

Heavily leaning on the shoulder of the man who
helped him out of his little two-wheeled horse-
wagon, a tall old gentleman in a top-hat, with a
fringe of white beard on his chin, climbed down
to the sodden grass. Great clouds rolled over the
heavens, and the clothes of the Boer soldiers,
who stood with their cartridge bandoliers around
them, waiting to shake hands with their guest,
were damp from many hours of recent rain.

"Good day, President", said de Wet, as he
clasped Paul Kruger's mighty fist; "Good day",
said the burghers, in their turn. The President of
the Transvaal Republic answered slowly, and
then disappeared into Christiaan's tent. An
orderly with a telegram was warned not to

disturb them. If President Kruger had come all
the way from Pretoria to Bloemfontein, and then
96 miles across the veld, by cart, there must be
something pretty important in the air. The
messenger took no notice but went in, and,
within a minute or two both Kruger and the
General were out of the tent. "Petrusberg in the
hands of the English", read the wire.

"Inspan the horses", roared out de Wet, and the
astonished native driver, who had scarcely
turned loose his exhausted animals, began to
collect the harness again.

"They're too near, President", said Oom Krisjan.
"I am sorry, but you are not safe here". Krugger
nodded. As the tragic old man took his leave,
shells began to fall within a hundred yards of the
camp.

Bloemfontein could no longer be held, though de
Wet rushed across country to confer with
President Steyn about the defence. Small groups

of men scattered over the veld wherever a road
led towards home. Even Christiaan's sjambok
could not prevail against such an outburst of
hopelessness.

"War in Final Stages" the jubilant war
correspondents accompanying the advancing
British cabled to Fleet Street. A couple of
railway coaches, steaming northwards
Kroonstad, was all that was left of the
Government machinery. Could anyone blame
those ignorant of South Africa from assuming de
Wet's decision to disband his commando was a
sign that he too had thrown up the contest? The
General himself was riding to Kroonstad on the
northern boundary. An older campaigner than
himself, General Piet Joubert, veteran of Majuba
and of earlier wars, the rival of Paul Kruger for
the Presidency of the Transvaal, fell in with him
on the dusty road. At the moment Joubert had no
command for he was taking stock of the

prospects in order to devise some plan to save
his country.

"Where are your men?", asked General Joubert,
when he saw his colleague, travelling all alone.

"I have given them leave to go home for ten
days", de Wet replied, and they have got to be
back on the 25th".

"Do you mean to tell me that you are going to
give the English a free hand while your men take
their holidays?".

"I cannot catch a hare with unwilling dogs".
Joubert snorted.

"You know the Afrikaner as well as I do", said
de Wet. "It is not our fault that they do not know
what discipline means. No matter what I said, the
burghers would have gone home: but I give you
my word that those who do come back will fight
with renewed courage."

Christiaan's hair was turning grey. Men noticed
it as he rode ahead of them and when he off-
saddled there was something hard and decided in
his walk. He had little time for jokes now — not
that he had ever been a humorist. His orders
were curt and that little sjambok was not merely
used to emphasise his gestures. Fewer men than
ever were taken into his confidence, and fewer
councils of war held. They made way for him
respectfully when he walked past their
campfires. Often he was deep in thought, sitting
on a rock by himself. Now and then his boys
came to see him, or a note would arrive from his
brothers or his wife. He was not far from his own
farm now and, indeed, had paid it a visit during a
lull in the fighting. Nobody was living there.

Mr. H. W. S. Pearse, an English journalist, saw
the place soon after and wrote to the Daily News
in London: "Rounding the shoulder of the kopje
we came suddenly upon a deserted farmhouse,
the country homestead of Commandant

Christiaan de Wet, who had been there only a
few days earlier, as the postmark on an envelope
scattered about the house-door proved. The only
signs of life about that gloomy place were one
hen, with chickens a few days old, and some
brood-mares, standing knee-deep in frost-
whitened winter grass. Not a grain of forage was
to be found in the barn, not an article of furniture
in the vacant rooms, where open doors yawned,
as if in weariness of the sleepy silence about
them. Only a set of boot-trees, carelessly thrown
aside by an owner who had no further use for
such aids to dandified neatness, told of recent
occupation. In an outhouse, beside the broad
mere, or dam, as it is called in this country, was a
net, showing that others beside Kaffir cranes had
access to fish in the waters. Languid air, stirred
by the warmth of the sunrise, rustled the reeds,
bringing with it a sweet scent of wild thyme
from the veld. It would have been a pleasant
place to rest for a while and to cast a net, in the

hope of catching something better than bullybeef
on which to breakfast".

Cornelia de Wet was far away these days. For a
couple of months she remained on the "plaas",
with those of her children who were not in the
field. Her youngest baby had been born after her
husband left. Then the Tommies turned up,
commandeered the cattle and gave her a terrible
fright by asking one son to help them collect the
animals. She had visions of the lad never
returning, but he gave them the slip and came
back safely to the homestead. When Christiaan
managed to call, he found the fields trampled
down, the cattle gone, and Cornelia living on
food borrowed from her neighbours. The railway
line to the North was still open, so de Wet
decided she must leave. Accordingly his wife
and their youngest children were packed off by
him to relations at Klerksdorp, in the Transvaal.
Those were precious hours which they spent
together amid the turmoil of war. Soldiers in

Europe or America might be astonished at a
General going over to visit his home while
operations were in progress, but they did not
understand the Boer customs. The burgher's duty
to his country was acknowledged, but every now
and then he must return to his farm, not always
asking for permission.

Chapter 9
The Ambush by the Waterworks

WHEELS were turning inside a little group of
sheds, some of corrugated iron and some of
brick, and the steady thud of the pumps was
heard across the veld. Here and there a British
soldier could be seen, his rifle across his
shoulder, marching up and down on guard over
the waterworks upon which depended the life of
Bloemfontein. On the side of the buildings ran
the Modder River to where it suddenly dropped
fifteen feet into the bed of the Koornspruit. A
line of hills looked down upon the waterworks

and the neighbouring railway station: "Sanna's
Post" it was called.

As the sky paled early on March 28, 1900, a
group of natives herding sheep and cattle by a
wagon near the river bed, stood in conversation
with a company of mounted Boers.

"Whose wagon is that?", one of the white men
demanded. "Baas, it belongs to another baas at
Thaba Nchu. He has told us to take it to
Bloemfontein to sell to the English".

"And who owns those cattle and sheep?"

"That English baas of the soldiers; he has just
gone down to Sanna's Post over there".

"General Broadwood!" cried the Boers, in
astonishment.

De Wet looked at the little pumping-station and
at the unfinished buildings. It was now almost
daylight, and there was no difficulty in
recognising soldiers a few thousand yards away.

Eighteen hundred of them there were, as he
afterwards discovered.

Hidden among the sheep kraals of Pretorius'
Farm was his own detachment of 350 Boers. The
remaining 1,100 of his commando, who, after
visiting their homes three days before, had
gathered at the appointed place, the railway
bridge across the Sand River, now lay miles
away in the hills. With them were the five
remaining precious guns and they had orders to
bombard any British force appearing near the
waterworks. In dead silence the Republicans
waited for their orders while de Wet watched
tents springing up out of the grass.

Dog-tired from a long forced march through the
night, the Tommies dropped off to sleep, and
even the sentries took little notice of a couple of
shots to the East. Twenty minutes later came the
crash of a shell, and in an instant the English
camp sprang to life. Oxen bellowed and black
drivers shouted as shrapnel burst among the

transport wagons. Four miles away a commando
under Piet de Wet (soon to abandon his brother
and surrender) had found the range of Sanna's
Post.

General Broadwood gave orders to bring the
convoys through the Koornspruit, to what was
thought to be safety. On the other side Christiaan
de Wet and his followers noiselessly waited for
them to enter the trap. They lay on their
stomachs, their rifles cocked, while the
frightened animals were hastily marshalled by
the teamsters. A traffic jam occurred on the steep
approaches to the drift. Somewhere among the
rocks of the ravine, which was giving such
valuable shelter to the Boers, was a keen-eyed
man with a long moustache and a strong
American accent. Frederick Russell Burnham,
the famous scout, had just arrived to join Lord
Roberts' forces and had already discovered into
what danger the British troops were walking. He
rushed down to the river-side, but could not

reach his commander before he found himself a
prisoner.

Meanwhile General Broadwood had decided not
only to bring his transport out of the range of the
distant guns, but to move on the whole camp.
Slightly hidden by a rise in the ground,
Christiaan waited for the first wagon to come
through the drift. A woman sat on the front seat,
next to a man in civilian clothes. "Jump on to the
cart", said the General to Commandant Fourie
and Commandant Nel, and before the astonished
arrivals could shout the two men were at their
side. "Make any noise and you will be shot",
came the warning.

One after another wagons splashed through the
drift, many of them with women and even
children-English refugees from Thaba Nchu.
One after the other the Boers pounced upon
them, disarming the drivers and covering them
with their loaded guns. Save for the artillery on
the hills, not a shot had yet been fired, although

Piet de Wet had moved much closer. Now the
cannons of the English were rolling through the
ford. Hundreds of soldiers were greeted with the
words: "Hands up!", as they approached the
other bank. The slowness with which the
crossing took place, the glut of transport in the
river-bed continued to deceive General
Broadwood. "Dismount, you are prisoners", were
the words that greeted Major Taylor of the "U"
Battery. It was Oom Krisjan himself, working,
like a man possessed, giving orders, and
watching the other side, where the enemy waited
for him, in cheerful ignorance. Two hundred had
already been disarmed in dead silence and scores
of carts captured. Major Taylor watched for a
moment, till something attracted the attention of
the Boers, and then dashed back to warn Major
Phipps Hornby of "Q" Battery, who was behind
him. His guns were pointing the wrong way, but
were immediately swung round and at the same
moment Colonel Dawson, of Roberts' Horse,
arrived on the left of the convoy. At last

Broadwood' s men knew what had happened, and
de Wet ordered his commando to fire. Like a
hailstorm the Republican bullets rattled out from
the Mausers upon the army sheltered by the little
station building of Sanna's Post. De Wet jokingly
remarked in later years that he had been
responsible, after his conversion to the policy of
railway-building, for laying of the line from
Bloemfontein to Dewetsdorp. That day he was
sorry he had done so.

Just then, one of those errors of judgment
occurred which showed that even the Boers were
not supermen. The firing of the Republican guns
died away, the commando moved forward, but
instead of crossing the Modder River at a narrow
point, tried to do so where the waterworks had
created a great dam. Three precious hours they
lost before they reached the obvious place, the
same wagon-drift which had cost the English so
much. By that time General Broadtvood had
recovered his wind and withdrawn towards

Bloemfontein, crossing the Koornspruit more or
less out of range.

"Had I commanded a larger force", said de Wet,
"I could have captured every man of them, but it
was impossible with my 350 to surround 2,000."

Four hundred and eighty prisoners, seven guns
and one hundred and seventeen wagons, loaded
with valuables, were the trophies of that
memorable morning.

Within a few hours de Wet was on the move
again in the direction of the little town of
Reddersburg. He encountered an English force
on the plains, and raced them to seize the crown
of a ridge. The prospect once more arose of
storming the position. De Wet sat down at his
camp table and wrote a note which he sent to the
British commander under the white flag.

"Sir,

I am here with 500 men, and am every
moment expecting reinforcements, with

three Krupps, against which you will not
be able to hold out. I therefore advise you,
in order to prevent bloodshed, to
surrender. "

The answer from Captain McWhinnie of
the Irish Rifles was entirely verbal: "I'm
damned if I surrender. "

Before de Wet could carry out his attack,
darkness fell and, after dropping a few shells on
to the hill, he put out sentries to surround the
British position, and wait for another day.
Actually he had 400, not 500 men, but his
messengers were out in the district, and the
magic of his name was already sufficient to
summon every burgher who was back on his
farm to join in the chase. From half-past five to
eleven the next morning, the shooting continued.
Then the white flag went up, and 470 of the
Royal Irish Rifles and the Northumberland
Fusiliers surrendered, another 100 lay dead on

the kopje. Among them was Captain Mc
Whinnie.

Chapter 10
The Great Escape

FLAMES rose into the night from bales of
blankets, stacks of mail-bags, bundles of
fodder and packing-cases of a hundred
different sizes. They flared and flickered on
the metals of the railway line, on shiny barrels
of naval guns, and upon thousands of letters,
pulled out of those postal sacks and now
scattered upon the veld. For miles the glare lit
up the grasslands, as it devoured mountainous
quantities of stores, deposited at Roodewal
Siding. Here, at a lonely point in the Northern
Orange Free State, the British had placed one
of their most important depots. Roaring and
crackling, the fire ate its way through three-
quarters of a million pounds worth of military
equipment, while the 15 Boers who had started
the blaze were riding hard to a place of safety.

By their side ran their two hundred prisoners.
Every now and then they turned to look back
over their shoulders at the costliest fireworks
display that Africa had ever seen.

Christiaan de Wet had given leave for captors
and prisoners to help themselves to whatever
they liked. As the procession came away they
looked as though they were returning from a
fair, with booty, thick woollens for the cold
June nights, tobacco, newspapers, knitted
mufflers, socks, bandoliers and cartridges, and
almost every yard of their trail was littered
with trophies, too heavy to be carried further.
The night wind blew a mighty gust through
numberless letters never to reach their
destination at the Front. It fanned the blaze till
molten metal could be seen pouring down the
station building, and the rails began to curl
from the sheer heat.

The Tommies joked about their unusual duties
as postmen, and swore when their burdens had

to be reduced. Less than a mile now lay
between the fire and the retreating commando.

Boom! The first shells exploded of a most
stupendous cannonade, its the huge projectiles,
lent by the Navy to bombard positions up-
country, shot into the air and burst — cascades
of sparks, volcanic tongues of flame, red and
white, pyrotechnics from burning cordite, the
whistle of shrapnel as it was shivered into bits.
Not the whole of that great capture was
however destroyed. Somewhere on the plain,
in a place known only to the General and one
or two of his trusted comrades, rested a great
cache of English rifle ammunition, to replace
the Boers' Mauser cartridges that were running
low. Republican rifles were so few by this time
that almost everybody was carrying a captured
Lee-Metford. The London War Office was now
supplying most of the needs of their foes. Even
the dynamite, with which railway lines to the
Cape, Orange Free State and Southern

Transvaal were being shivered to pieces, came
from the same source.

Christiaan was in a good humour. He had cut the
communications of the English once again; he
had shown that, in their anxiety to push North
into the Transvaal, they had forgotten the
country behind them was anything but pacified.
Moreover £750,000 was quite a substantial loss,
even to the British Treasury.

Major Stanham, commanding the Imperial
Yeomanry Field Hospital, met de Wet as a non-
combatant and described him as "a man of
powerful physique, but with weak eyes, which
necessitated his wearing tinted glasses in the sun;
a good face and one showing, as I thought,
shrewdness and determination; a quiet, kindly
manner and the general bearing of a gentleman."
He spoke highly of the courtesy and
consideration which the General showed to the
wounded of the Derby shires.

General Froneman was working in conjunction
with de Wet in a neighbouring district. Bigger
game, however, was waiting to be stalked.
Somewhere near Kroonstad, which for a short
time after the capture of Bloemfontein had been
the capital, was the man the Boers feared most,
more than old Lord Roberts, who now had
charge of the operations around Pretoria. Lord
Kitchener was travelling Northward, that cold,
efficient strategist, with his laurels new-won in
the Sudan, where, less than two years before, he
had subdued the Mahdi and avenged General
Gordon's death at Khartoum. De Wet had a
certain inkling of this, as he aptly quoted from
the Bible concerning the people of Samaria.

This was Oom Krisjan's plan. North of the
Rhenoster River, not far from Kroonstad, there
was to be an ambush. Leeuwspruit Bridge, which
they must pass, was well guarded by the British.
So Froneman was to launch an attack on the next
train that came and, while the attention of the

passengers was taken up with defending
themselves, de Wet would blow up the rails. Out
of the gloom of the nocturnal veld came the
sound of the approaching locomotive, its
headlight blacked-out for fear of sharp-shooters;
blinds hung over all the carriage windows.
Froneman waited till it was near and then
ordered the advance. Again that lack of
discipline which sometimes beset the Boers
overcame them, and they refused to obey.
Slowly the train rolled by, and with it Lord
Kitchener. None of the Republicans knew that he
was on board. "K of K" quickly ordered the
engine to be stopped. A horse was taken out of
one of the cattle-trucks and, accompanied only
by two officers, Kitchener disappeared into the
night — as he himself admitted, the narrowest
escape from capture which he ever had.
Somehow the Boers soon heard about this
capture if ever human tongue could scourge it
was that of Christiaan de Wet, when he met his
recalcitrant burghers.

Lack of discipline was noticeable in de Wet's
camp, as it was in Froneman's. Just when the
British drew near the important town of
Bethlehem, and when de Wet had to assume
responsibility for the safety of President Steyn,
and the entire migratory Orange Free State
Government, a number of dissatisfied officers
came to complain that he had not been duly
elected by law. Ignoring the President's
indignation, de Wet called his men together
during a lull in the fighting and told them; "If
you vote against me I will send in my
resignation, and no longer continue as
Commander-in-Chief. Only the Field-Cornets,
Commandants and other officers this time took
part in the ballot. Two other claimants to the
command came forward, his brother, General
Piet de Wet, and General Marthinus Prinsloo.
Both of these were among the pessimists, who
openly said the Boers must make terms with the
English. Here is the result of the voting:

ChristiaandeWet.. 27
Piet de Wet. ...1
Prinsloo 2

Cheers went up in camp when the result came
out. But the last had not yet been heard of the
dispute.

Christiaan himself had decided to defend
Bethlehem, the more as his forces had grown to
5,000 men. He ordered the women and children
to leave the town, and once again tried to leave
behind the new convoys of wagons encumbering
the commandos. It was an unlucky day.
Although the Boers held the hills round
Bethlehem, another column of English, under
General Sir Hector Macdonald, with the Royal
Artillery, dropped an incessant shower of shells
on to the koppies. When losses grew too heavy,
de Wet ordered the retreat. Across the
Roodeberg, or Red Mountains, a great chain
forming a portion of South Africa's Switzerland,

the Basuto country, the Boer commandos
withdrew. With immense skill they made their
way through the passes, while Danie Theron, the
famous scout, with eighty men served as their
eyes and ears. Commandant Michael Prinsloo
(not the man who unsuccessfully stood for
election, but his brother) was entrusted with the
rearguard. Hidden by the crevices and ledges of
the pass around Slabbert's Nek, its task was to
watch for the approach of the English, and to
prevent the straying of the herds and cattle, upon
which the Boers still depended for much of their
food. General de Wet said good-bye and
proceeded across the defiles of the Berg towards
the North. Two thousand six hundred Burghers
were under Oom Krisjan's command, and as he
grieved to admit, another four hundred wagons.

Icy winter gales blew through the upland valleys
as they passed nearly 10,000 feet above sea-
level. Very cautiously de Wet guided his men
onward. July 19 broke. As the cavalcade curled

its way through more level country, he decided
to take a look at his pursuers from a neigh-
bouring hill. By his side rode President Steyn,
broad-shouldered and tall, with his great red
beard and bald head, and also a few other
Government officials, one of them Christiaan's
brother, General Piet de Wet. At the home of a
neighbouring farmer named Wessels,
meditatively standing outside, the Commander-
in-Chief saw Piet approach:

"Christiaan", he said, "I want to ask you
something. Do you still think there is a chance of
continuing our struggle?" The Commander-in-
Chief grew black as thunder and fingered his
sjambok.

'Are you mad?" he roared, turned his back on
Piet and went, in to join the others at breakfast.

Not much was to be seen from the peak, save
windblown clouds and the hill country, brown
with winter. Piet de Wet was not to be found.

One of Christiaan's sons, who was with the
commando, said:

"Uncle Piet told me we shall all be captured to-
night by the railway line." During that day the
General's sjambok was not idle. He was very
angry, and the burghers kept out of his way as
much as they could, brought in the news that the
British had pitched their camp nearby, and the
greatest care had to be taken to prevent the
whole force being trapped, with the President
and the Cabinet. Meanwhile there was trouble
with the rearguard under Prinsloo. Instead of
following on the main commando, quarrels
broke out about the appointment of its new
Commandant, Marthinus Prinsloo considering he
had a claim, as he had failed to obtain the bigger
prize of the High Command. Ballots and political
canvassing, very inappropriate at such a critical
moment, were going on while de Wet's back was
turned.

From his post of observation in the English
camp, Mr. Bennett Burleigh, the London war
correspondent, was describing for overseas
readers the great scheme to capture the Boers. "A
combined movement is being made to surround
de Wet", he cabled. "Meanwhile the route is to
be patrolled by armoured trains, but interruptions
to the wires and transport continue."

Scouts Danie Theron and Scheepers had gone
ahead to see what could be done about the
railway. They reported that the line was clear,
and, barely out of sight of the pursuing English
army, de Wet made his crossing of this
dangerous obstacle. With a bleeding heart he
forbore to blow up the rails, as he had
temporarily run out of dynamite. To make up for
this a train came along, and had a breakdown.
For a second time within a few days the
Burghers were given leave to help themselves to
whatever stores they could carry away, including
coffee, sugar and other groceries, all priceless in

these times. Another ninety-eight prisoners were
added to the long procession accompanying the
force. Safely, in de Wet's opinion, must now be
sought on Transvaal soil, and, making his way
across the flat grain country around Vredefort,
(where several loads of maize were quickly sent
for grinding to the local mill) they reached the
ford across the Vaal at its confluence with the
Rhenoster River (to-day the site of one of
Africa's largest irrigation works).

July 1900 was over. Most of the Burghers had
recovered their courage, and now showed in
skirmishes that their valour was as great as ever.
August dawned across the Vaal River. Tents and
wagons could be seen afar, where a cordon of
English troops were posted to keep them out of
the Transvaal. While de Wet considered his next
plan, a messenger arrived from the South-East.
The camp knew him well. It was Kotze,
Secretary to General Prinsloo, the man in charge
of the rearguard. But what was this? A letter

came from General Broadwood, "authorising
him to pass through the English lines." The
young man looked troubled as he handed over
his message to General de Wet and President
Steyn. This is what they read:

"To the Commander-in-Chief,
C. R. de Wet,
Sir,

I have been obliged, owing to the over-
whelming forces of the enemy, to surrender
unconditionally, with all the Orange Free
State Laagers here.
I have the honour to be,
Sir,

Your obedient servant,
M. PRINSLOO.

Commander-In- Chief. "

General De Wet was too angry to speak. He took
a pen and wrote his answer:

"To Mr. Prinsloo, Sir,

I have the honour to acknowledge receipt of
your letter dated the 30th of last month. I am
surprised to see that you call yourself
Commander-in-Chief. By what right do you
usurp that title? You have no right to act as
Commander-in-Chief.

I have the honour to be,

C. R. DE WET,

Commander-in- Chief. "

As they made their way back to camp, leaving
Mr. Kotze to return to the British camp, the
Republican leader tried to take stock of his loss.
How many men could have been captured by the
British - 3,000, 4,000 or 5,000? Who knew? It
was a day more bitter than that of Paardeberg.

Like giant umbrellas of greenery, the mimosas
stood out of the yellow grass that ran from
horizon to horizon. The air was warm and

summery, although August, the coldest month of
the African year, was still only half gone, and
snow had fallen on the far-off peaks of the
Eastern Transvaal. Comfortably ambling through
gaps in the trees, dotted about as though they
grew in an English park, the commando of
Christiaan de Wet made its way towards the
North. Here they were in the Bushveld at last,
that sub-tropical region which began with
startling suddenness beyond the Magaliesberg.
Forty thousand English troops were behind them,
along the Vaal River, the mining towns of the
Witwatersrand, and Pretoria, where the Union
Jack now flew, and over a great part of the
territory further on. By dint of surpassing
generalship and knowledge of the land, Oom
Krisjan had found a way of crossing a badly-
guarded ford near Venterskroon, not far from
Potchefstroom. It was a race against time, for the
enemy had already ordered down
reinforcements, and as the last of the Boers
disappeared between two ranges of hills on the

Transvaal side, the first of the Tommies hurried
towards the banks of the grey, silent border
stream.

Next morning de Wet had a fresh alarm. Before
his men had time to breakfast they were on the
move again, skirting the populous outliers of the
North Rand and gradually approaching the
Bushveld. Having blown up more railway lines,
de Wet resolved to travel quickly and lightly. At
last those cumbersome wagons were left behind,
and the dozens of prisoners who had marched
with him were set at liberty. Within a few hours
he was in the Magaliesberg, where he received a
friendly welcome. De Wet himself did not yet
know whither he was bound. He was certain of
only one thing — the English would take days if
not weeks, to find him. Some comfort had been
brought him by two Burghers with the news that
of Prinsloo's force 2,000 had successfully got
away.

Lord Roberts now turned out every man who
could be spared in order to close in upon de Wet.
Colonel Baden-Powell, fresh from the fame of
the siege of Mafeking, was in the offing and had
charge of scouting operations. General Methuen
was at his heels, Smith-Dorien awaited him at
Bank Station, not far from Johannesburg. Ian
Hamilton occupied Oliphant's Nek, though he
did so too late.

"Scene of the Final War Operations" read the
caption on a newspaper map. Only the pessimists
foreshadowed that the campaign might last
another six. months and nobody dreamt of the
two years that were to go by before Peace could
be signed. "It seems scarcely possible", Lord
Roberts wrote to Milner, "that de Wet and Steyn
can getaway now."

From time to time the commando encountered a
homestead where the burghers were offered,
food, fodder and, above all, information. Yet on
August 18, 1900, both the Commando Nek and

Oliphant's Nek Passes across the Magaliesberg
were in the enemy's hands; Lord Kitchener
himself was at Wolhuter's Kop, and the circle
round de Wet was complete. The English scouts
had actually seen their quarry. Millions of
pounds which were being spent on the "Great de
Wet Hunt" were at last to bear fruit. Even his
despatch of a force to harass the English at Van
Wyk's Rust, almost in the suburbs of
Johannesburg, to blow up a railway line and
capture a train, could not change the outcome.
One chance alone remained. All the passes of the
hills around them were occupied, but he had
climbed to victory up the trackless sides of
Majuba; he had done so at Nicholson's Nek; he
had got away across the Roodeberg. He must
now attempt the Magaliesberg.

"Oh, Red Sea", sighed Corporal Adriaan
Matthysen.

"The Children of Israel", retorted Oom Krisjan,
"had faith and won through. All you need is

faith. This is not the first Red Sea on our trek,
and it won't be the last."

"Are you a Moses?" asked the irrepressible
Adriaan, but the General had other things to
think about.

Doubling back from the English camp, they
found on the foothills straw, beehive huts
inhabited by natives. Two thousand feet above
rose the peaks of the Magaliesberg.

"Can a man cross there?" asked Christiaan of the
old Bantu who came out and saluted politely.

"No, Baas, you cannot."

"Has no man ever ridden across?"

"Yes. Baas, long ago."

"Do baboons walk across?"

"Auw! Yes, baboons do, but not men."

The bearded followers of de Wet stood close by,
listening to this talk. "Come along, fellows!" de

Wet cried to the Burghers, "where a baboon can
go, we can too."

Some little time passed before the incredible fact
dawned upon the British outposts that the Boers
had actually climbed above the belt of bush on
the lower slopes of the mountain, and were
attempting to scale the cliffs above. Now they
could see them plainly. Shaggy, surefooted
Basuto ponies slithered gingerly on to the
shingle. There was no question of riding. As
though it were not difficult enough, they reached
a great ledge of granite, almost as slippery as ice,
where a number of horses and farmers in their
hob-nailed boots slipped and fell headlong.
"What if the English range their guns on us?"
someone called out. With his teeth bitten
together, and his little sjambok pointing forward,
Christiaan de Wet marched on.

"Let them try", he said. "They have only got
howitzers." It was an unsatisfactory reply, as he
knew, but at any rate his men were content and

no shells fell. Silent and perspiring, the men
worked their way higher, under the hot bushveld
sun. No time for rest. Occasionally a man gulped
down a mouthful from his water flask, or passed
it to a neighbour. Could they make the top of the
mountain? It was only a few hundred yards off,
and still there was no firing, and no signs of a
move from the enemy. Panting and exhausted,
they reached the top. Even the horses had
managed it. Those baboons that jumped away,
barking harsly, were no longer in sole possession
of the peak.

Sitting on a rock, in the coolness of the summit,
the General gazed towards the country that
separated him from the Orange Free State. The
blue hills on the left were the Witwatersrand,
with Johannesburg and its gold mines in the
centre. Far and wide stretched the Highveld, and
somewhere in the distance was the Vaal River.
Railway trains could be seen puffing here and

there, bringing up convoys. De Wet knew that he
had escaped.

As the tide of war dragged on, occasional
atrocity yarns were told about him, mingled with
reflections on his sanity, doubts whether he was
still alive and daily accounts of ill-health. All of
them were untrue. Even his use of the sjambok
was much exaggerated. None of these tales
affected his astonishing popularity with the
masses in South Africa and elsewhere. Sober
facts were quite impressive enough. For
instance: just after his get away through the
encircling lines in the Magaliesberg, the General
made an uninterrupted ride of ninety miles, and
turned up, quite fresh at the end, for a speech at
Klerksdorp. "Capitalists", he told his men in the
market square of that village, "are as common in
these Republics as bags of pumpkins. If I get
caught there will be a successor to take my place.
No neutrality is possible among the Afrikaner
nation; either they are for us or against us. Not

all the English are bad: I myself have a good
English friend." Fresh significance was given to
this remark in conversation.

"How you must hate Rhodes", said one of his
Burghers.

"Not at all", answered Oom Krisjan. "He tried to
patch up matters as long as he could, but when
things got so bad he sided with his own country,
and I should have despised him if he had done,
otherwise. I too have sided with my country, and
when it is all over I should not mind shaking
hands with him."

When this was reported to Cecil Rhodes down at
the Cape, he said, "I think de Wet must be a very
fine fellow."

On the otherihand, de Wet was like an avenging
angel with any Republican whose loyalty he
doubted, and he considered that the right
punishment for treachery was the firing squad, as
also that of any native who might dare to

interfere in the White Man's War. While outrages
were occasionally reported from armed
tribesmen and black campfollowers, there was
no occasion when the latter threat was ever put
into force.

Concerning the Oath of Neutrality, which the
British sought to obtain from as many Boers as
possible, de Wet declared at Potchefstroom that
such an oath was being extorted under duress. "If
the promise is disregarded willingly by our
Burghers, the Lord takes the responsibility and
the oathbreaker is blameless. If he is coerced by
us, our Government is responsible. If he fails to
break his oath, the Burgher remains responsible
and will get six months imprisonment with hard
labour."

Chapter 11
Joining General Hertzog

Oom Krisjan, the farmer of Nieuwejaars-
fontein, an obscure place in an obscure state of

Africa, was now a world figure. Just as the war
between England and the Boers had risen from
the status of a secondrate colonial campaign to
that of a drama, taking the resources of the whole
British Empire, so the importance of the
Republican leaders had steadily risen, even
though the number of men under their command
was declining. Nobody, not even President
Kruger himself, had so caught the fancy of the
public at home and abroad as had de Wet.

Folk ditties came into existence, of which no one
knew the author. To-day they are still sung at
Afrikaans picnics and other jollifications. One
extract can suffice:

The bravest of our Generals is — De Wet.

The bravest man across the Vaal — De Wet.

The Briton in his pride to-day

Turned on his heel and ran away.

De Wet! de Wet!

Who comes and passes like a ghost? — De Wet.

And whom does Tommy fear the most? — De

Wet.

By night and day it's always he

Who lurks where none would think he'd be?

De Wet! de Wet!

A horse-truck stood drawn up beside a platform
at Potchefstroom railway station, but it carried
no horses. Instead a number of human voices
could be heard from within, and presently a
round-faced, middleaged woman, with a baby in
her arms, looked over the side. Other youngsters
sat on a bench among the straw. Men in uniform
walked up and down the platform, worried and
pre-occupied, with no time to glance at the
spectacle, too familiar in those days, of Boer
wives and children being taken away from the
theatre of war. Cornelia de Wet said nothing. She
and two other women with babies had now been
travelling for days by ox-wagon to Koekemoer
Station and now by train to some unknown
destination. Presently her small boys and girls

began to whimper, pale little figures, very unlike
their usual selves;

A Tommy came along, heard the hungry children
and began to rummage in his haversack.

"Here you are, mum", he said, and dropped
something into the horse-truck. It was a loaf of
bread and a tin of biscuits. Mrs. de Wet drew
herself up and stopped anybody getting near the
gift.

"No!" she said, "he now has nothing himself to
eat until to-night. He does it out of pity." The
soldier waved to her and disappeared into the
crowd, so she reluctantly broke up the loaf and
began to give bits to her fellow-travellers. Some
hours later, when the train moved on, there was
an improvement in the feeding arrangements.
Four times during the next day the guard brought
meat and bread. The veld no more looked so
empty. Villages and mining towns appeared,
then great white dump-heaps, and clusters of

blue gums. Late one evening they reached
Johannesburg, no longer the bustling peacetime
city, but a place of ambulances and artillery
convoys. With a number of other Boer refugees,
Mrs. de Wet was given quarters at the North
Western Hotel.

Newspapers had heard about her coming, and the
Cape Times correspondent called on her. All she
had to offer as refreshment was a cup of
sugarless tea. The young man gingerly asked
whether she had heard from the General lately.
"You Englishmen", she said, "will never catch
my husband. He is going to win back for the
Free Staters and Transvaalers what they have
lost. He has enough food and ammunition to last
for three years, and that is just how long the war
is going to last."

While his wife sat in Johannesburg with her
children, waiting to be sent down to a
concentration camp at Pietermaritzburg in Natal,
Christiaan de Wet was back again in the Orange

Free State, safe from the pursuing armies that
had so nearly caught him in the Magaliesberg.
Forewarned by a kind of second sight, de Wet
had made another wonderful escape near
Bothaville, just south of the Vaal River. A
Hottentot had come to him, asking for work as
an "agterryer" or groom for the horses.

"Good", said Oom Krisjan, "I'm busy now, but I
shall see you about this later." In bed that night,
in the homestead of a neighbouring farmer, he
suddenly felt uncomfortable and called his own
native servant.

"Where is that Hottentot?" he demanded.

"Baas", said the black man, "he has gone to fetch
his things, to go with the baas."

Leaping out of bed, Christiaan roared out:
"Upsaddle, everybody!" and within an hour the
whole camp had been shifted miles across the
veld. Before dawn a force of 200 English

swooped down upon the homestead. They came
too late.

Flight, however, was no longer the General's
aim. General Hertzog had done his work well
when he went ahead. Revolt had swept the newly
annexed Republic from one end to the other.
Thousands of men who had abandoned their
rifles were now back with the commandos,
blowing up railway-lines and capturing convoys.
Plenty of dynamite had fallen into the hands of
the Boers, and even a Shadow Government
operated again, despite the new British Colonial
Administration. The time had come to carry the
war into the enemy's country, to start a revolt
among the sympathetic Dutch farmers in Cape
Colony. Dodging the hundreds of thousands of
troops wich Lord Roberts and Lord Kitchener
were swinging round to engulf them, de Wet
made his way to the district of Smithfield, not far
from the Orange River. At Dewetsdorp he had
the satisfaction of capturing the town founded by

his father and which commemorated his own
name.

Every day his prestige was rising. He broke
through a chain of little forts, some of them only
2,000 yards apart. General Hertzog, with another
commando, joined him at Bethulie on the way to
Smithfield, and they agreed to operate jointly.

Summer had arrived and the rains had broken.
Soaked to the skin, the burghers trudged on, in
the direction of the famous railway bridge at
Norval's Pont, near which they hoped to find a
suitable ford across the Orange River. The soil
grew muddier and the guns of the Free Staters
were delaying the whole expedition. De Wet had
a personal fondness for his precious pieces of
ordnance, but he was also a realist. His last shell
had been fired on an English column near
Bethulie, so he left them behind with the empty
ammunition cart. Three miles north of a place
called Odendaalstroom they struck the Orange,
usually an almost empty bed, with occasional

rivulets and pools of water between the
thornbushes on its lofty banks. "The river is up
again", the scouts reported. And so it was. From
its upper reaches, towards Basutoland, a great
wall of water had roared down towards the sea
and had filled it from bank to bank till it looked
like a young Mississippi. As though this was not
bad enough, the camp-fires of the English could
be seen twinkling on the southern shore.

General Knox, "my dear old friend," as Oom
Krisjan was accustomed playfully to call him,
had command of the English forces. If ever de
Wet was in a tight corner, it was this time. His
scouts hurried towards the Caledon River, a
tributary of the Orange, seeking a bridge. There
was none. Then a miracle happened: the river
suddenly begun to fall. How long would it take
to become passable? Somebody now
remembered that, at a place called Zevenfontein
upstream, there was a ford which was useless in
flood time, and for that reason might possibly be

overlooked by the enemy. The patrol came back,
saying that it was unoccupied and could be
crossed. Now occurred one of those moves
which were so typical of the General. He
doubled back to Dewetsdorp in order to lay a
false trail, then zigzagged about the southern
Free State, to shake off the thousands of fresh
troops in pursuit. Near Edenburg he discovered
that they were on both sides. He quickly dug
himself in on a range nearer Wepener. The
African night descended, and to their
amazement, de Wet ordered everything to be
abandoned. They moved away like ghosts from
the camp which General Knox's men were
watching. All through the evening they slogged
across Sprinkhaan's Nek Pass. As the sun rose
they saw the town of Thaba Nchu below them,
where more than 1,000 men lay in wait in the
chain of fortifications. From both sides of the
pass bullets and shells suddenly rained on the
commando. Leaving a portion of his men on to
higher ground, to fire into the forts and distract

attention, de Wet made a dash for safety, with
the rest of his 3,000 men. Less than a mile wide
and without any cover, the zone of No-Man' s-
Land seemed to offer certain death. All the way
they were under bombardment. British
heliographs twinkled the news to General Knox
in the South, to General White on the left, to
Colonel Barker, to Colonel Williams and to
Colonel Long, whose men formed a great circle
round Thaba Nchu. Then came a message: "In
spite of heavy fire the Boers are now pouring
through the Nek." "Not a single man was killed",
says de Wet, "and only one was wounded." Not
unnaturally he added: "Our marvellous escape
can only be ascribed to Providence, and the
irresistible protection of Almighty God, who
kept his hand graciously over us."

And so he escaped again, and fresh jokes were
invoked to celebrate the occasion. A Boer
farmer's wife, so the wags declared, had a British
officer quartered on her. He was explaining the

position at breakfast. "We have caught de Wet",
he said, and put a circle of eggs around another
egg. "This is how we caught de Wet." Just then a
native servant came in and the officer looked up.
Quick as lightning the wife removed the centre
egg. "And where is de Wet now?" she asked.

Chapter 12
Escapes by Flood and Field

"Ubique" means "'They've caught de Wet

and now we shan't be long"

"Ubique" means "I much regret the

beggar's going strong".

Rudyard Kipling.

Locusts were upon the land: giant
grasshoppers that skipped away from the feet
of the horses, as de Wet's commando rode
slowly across the veld. The Cape summer
was heavy on the land, the ground bare and
an unpleasant smell in the air, as of
ammonia. Through the sides of the ponies,

which up to now had withstood all hardships,
the bones were sticking out.

A new century had begun. It was now 1901.
For nearly two years the war had been in
progress, and for the hundredth time the
Press was assuring its readers that the final
mopping up was almost completed. Yet here
was de Wet with 1,400 men - on British soil!
Despite the watchfulness of General Knox
and his guards, at every ford and bridge he
had carried out his plan to cross the Orange
River into the Cape Colony.

Equipped with ammunition, buried by him
six months earlier, after the capture of the
British convoy at Roodewal, with dynamite
secured from an enemy railway train near
Jagersfontein Road, with clothing that had
once belonged to British soldiers, and above
all with a spirit still unbroken, the little
expedition made its way towards the

quaintly-named Hondeblaf (Dog's Bark)
River.

As for General Knox, he had been misled by
the story which Oom Krisjan had deliberately
sent into the world - that he was discouraged
by the vigilence of the sentries on the Orange
River, and that he had therefore resolved to
force a passage higher up. Decoy commandos
under General Fronemann and General
Fourie became active, and immediately
British troops were concentrated near them.
While heavy rains drenched the land, de Wet
made for Zanddrift in quite a different
neighbourhood, where, for several hours, the
watch had been relaxed. Willem Pretorius
and four Boers captured the covering force of
twenty Tommies. Despite the exhaustion of
men and beasts, and despite the locusts,
which had eaten the veld bare, the invaders
rapidly pushed on.

Heavier and heavier grew the rains, but even
nightfall failed to stop the trek. In addition to
all their other troubles the burghers were now
obliged to cross an unending quagmire,
where the horses at times sank into mud up
to their knees, and where the riders often led
their animals by the bridle. Ahead lay the
railway to the South, which they must cross,
patrolled by an armoured train with search-
lights. Though it would soon be daylight, the
line had not yet been blown up, as de Wet had
ordered. There was plunging and swearing and
the whipping of oxen outspanned from the
ammunition carts and store wagons. Many of
them were bogged for good, and only with
difficulty did the General succeed in salving his
own precious little pony-trap, loaded with
papers. Human endurance could not cope with
much more-unless it had the physique of Oom
Krisjan. Even the latter saw this and allowed a
hundred of his men to stay behind.

Marching with the bedraggled company into the
dawn, hungry and unwashed, caked with mud,
their clothes dripping wet, were ninety British
soldiers, captured after recent engagements. For
twenty-four hours nobody had been able to lie
down and still they dare not halt, save to rest
those invalids whose capture must perforce be
risked. At sunrise a metallic streak showed the
railway line, with breaks in its continuity here
and there. The blasting patrols sent ahead had
managed to do their work after all. No trains,
armoured or otherwise, would pass on the route
to Colesberg for days to come. Staggering and
breathing hard the horses climbed the
embankment and down again on the other side.
On the horizon rose a farm-house. Somebody
went in to buy a sheep or two from the Boer,
who gave them a friendly welcome. Drunk with
exhaustion, they then rode on, but the ground
was so barren that de Wet said: "The time for an
outspan has not yet come." Only after another
full hour were they allowed to stop where scanty

grazing showed on the sodden veld. Like limp
sacks the Boers fell from their saddles, to get the
first sleep for two days. Only the General still
had reserves of energy, and was able to lay plans
for the immediate future. Then he too pulled his
hat over his eyes and dozed off.

On February 10, he entered the Cape, and less
than a fortnight later knew that he must return.
With the same fervency with which his men had
once hoped for a southward crossing of the
Orange, they now gazed on its tumultuous waters
on the twentieth of the same month, yearning to
find a northward path. British scouts saw him as
he made his way, almost parallel with the great
bend of the river, towards Hopetown.
Commandant Hasebroek, one of his trusted
aides, warned him that there were only a few
hours to get across. "It is impossible", said de
Wet, "to escape either to the South or in the
direction of the enemy, for the veld is too flat to
afford us any cover. If we are to be cornered

against an impassable torrent, we must make our
way down-stream to the North-West." Very
carefully the men kept in the lee of a low range
of hummocks, beyond which lay the English
scouts. Once again the sun was the deciding
factor. As Joshua prayed for the lengthening of
his day of battle, so did the Boers pray that it
might be shortened, and when night really fell, it
was black from the threatening clouds. Six miles
up-stream, so de Wet was told, there was a
solitary boat, which could possibly hold twelve
men. There was no rest for anyone until he had
seen that precious ferry. All night and far into the
next day it laboured backwards and forwards
between the Cape and the Orange Free State.
Horses paddled by its side, good swimmers hung
on to its gunwales. Only two things they could
not get into the boat, those last field-guns of the
Orange - Free State artillery. Both were left
behind.

February 23 was the Independence Day of the
Republic. It saw Christiaan de Wet on the way
back to his own country, fighting a rear-guard
action against the English. He worked his way
along the south bank of the Orange Free State,
past the historic village of Hopetown, near which
the first diamonds in South Africa had been
found thirty-four years earlier. Once more he
slipped back into the Colony, dodging in and out
among the encircling armies. As though it were
playing with him, the river rose and became
impassable: Even Zanddrift, where the
commando had originally crossed over into the
Cape, was now too deep when they reached it on
February 26. A couple of young Burghers
offered to swim across. Stripped naked, they
took their horses through the floods and
continued their journey thus on the far side.
Minus their clothes, they looked for all the world
like some figures from the frieze of the
Parthenon. Grim though the moment was, there
were loud chuckles in camp when they made

their way to a neighbouring homestead, where
they intended to ask for some dresses from the
women. Fortunately the good wife still had
trousers and shirts belonging to her husband,
who was on commando, and she modestly
despatched them to the invaders by her young
son. Fifteen fords they vainly attempted to cross,
before they reached Bothasdrift, not far from
Philippolis. As they camped in comparative
peace for the first time in several weeks, they
fetched out their old hymn-books and sang the
Psalms of David.

At this stage in his life, de Wet was a strange
mixture of soft-heartedness and ruthlessness.
Even after two years in the field, he felt the death
of his brave followers as though of his own sons.
And how many of them there were! Danie
Theron, the great scout, Willem Pretorius, the
young fellow of twenty, who had-captured a
whole redoubt with four men; his nephew,
Johannes Jacobus de Wet, Sarel Cilliers,

grandson of the famous Voortrekker, his own
Jewish secretary, and many, many more. In
simple, rugged sentences he paid tribute to the
fallen, and even wrote an occasional message of
sympathy to their families in the midst of all the
alarms. Nor was the news from his own wife
calculated to cheer him up. After being left alone
in a little cottage at Johannesburg for a few
months she had been sent down to
Pietermaritzburg to a concentration camp.

As yet the name had not the evil significance
which it was to acquire thirty years later, but
bungling and mismanagement contributed to
make it a term of abuse in South Africa.
Originally it had been said that Boer women and
children could not be left unprotected in their
homesteads. Then the argument was added that
they were helping their men folk in the field. Out
of these two reasons developed the policy of
deportation, which was to result in 100,000 non-
combatants being placed in a series of camps,

some of which became hotbeds of disease:
Typhoid began to carry off the inmates.

From England itself came the first protests. Miss
Emily Hobhouse, a middle-aged society woman,
who had done social work in American mining
camps, and who by virtue of her Quaker
affiliations, was anxious to restore peace in
South Africa, arrived in the Cape to see for
herself what was happening. While Christiaan
was raiding the north of Cape Colony, she set out
to interview the military chiefs, often the only
woman for hundreds of miles. She made her way
into the lonely places where the refugees were
detained and saw the conditions under which
they travelled, at times in cattle trucks, as Mrs de
Wet had done.

The officers were anxious to help, but there was
a lack of money and medicines and doctors,
balanced by an overplus of red tape. Here is a
typical extract from Miss Hobhouse's diary:
"Then I went straight to my camp and just in one

little corner this is what I found: Nurse Kennedy,
underfed and overworked, just sinking on to her
bed, hardly able to hold herself up after coping
with some thirty typhoid and other patients, with
only the untrained help of two Boer girls, with
cooking as well as nursing to do herself. Next I
was called to see a woman panting in the heat,
just sickening for her confinement. Fortunately I
had a nightdress in my bundle to give her and
two tiny baby-gowns. Next tent, a little six
months baby gasping its life out on its mother's
knee. The doctor had given it powder in the
morning, but it had taken nothing since. Two or
three others, drooping and sick in that tent. Next,
child recovering from measles, sent back from
the hospital before it could walk, stretched on the
ground - white and wan, three or four others
lying about. Next a girl of twenty -four lay dying
on a stretcher. Her father, a big, gentle Boer,
kneeling beside her, while in the next tent his
wife was watching a child of six also dying, and
one of about five also drooping. Already this

couple had lost three children in the hospital, and
so would not let these go, though I begged hard
to take them out of the hot tent. We must watch
them ourselves', they said. Captain H. had
mounted guard over me - he thinks I am too
sympathetic, but I sent him flying to fetch some
brandy and get some down the girl's throat: But,
for the most part you must stand and look on,
helpless to do anything, because there is
nothing to do anything with. Then a man
came up and said: 'Sister' (they call me
Sister), 'come and see my child, sick for
nearly three months.' It was a dear little chap
of four, and nothing left of him except his
grey brown eyes and white teeth, from which
the lips were drawn back, too thin to close.
His body was emaciated."

Mrs de Wet was interned with her small
children in one of the better camps. It was
rumoured that £10,000 had been offered to
her, if she would hand over her husband, but

that she had said: "No money shall buy me to
commit high treason." This story may not be
true, but what is certain is that she was
invited to head a petition to stop hostilities.
She tore it up in the presence of her guards,
and expressed herself in such terms that she
was threatened with deportation from South
Africa. Fortunately the Governor of the camp
was a reasonable man, and heard about the
incident: he intervened and stopped all
further arguments.

Many years later, at the graveside of that
same Emily Hobhouse who was to bring
reform and relief to this suffering
community, and was to be idolised to her
dying day by the Boer nation, General Smuts
said: "A policy had been adopted by the
military authorities in a spirit of muddle,
with results which were never foreseen or
intended, but which threatened to decimate a
whole generation in the life of the people. It

was at that dark hour that Emily Hobhouse
appeared. We stood alone in the world:
almost friendless among the peoples, the
smallest nation, ranged against the mightiest
Empire on earth - and then one small hand,
the hand of a woman, was stretched out to us.
At that darkest hour, when our race seemed
doomed to extinction, she appeared as an
angel, as a heaven-sent messenger. Strangest
of all, she was an Englishwoman ... She
could speak to her people, even in that hour,
when the passions of war and of patriotism
ran high. She spoke the word. It was heeded
by the British Government. Reforms were
instituted and the young life which was
ebbing away in the camps was saved for the
future."

Small wonder that Christiaan de Wet was
among those who later became the closest
friends of Emily Hobhouse. She herself is
responsible for a little story of how, at a

critical point, Oom Krisjan heliographed to
the British guards: "De Wet nearly
surrounded. Send one column more." And
they did!

The General was back in the Orange Free
State, working his way northwards, and
blowing up a railway line almost as a matter
of routine. He had got as far as Petrusburg,
when a letter arrived for him from the
Transvaal. It was signed by General Botha,
the new Commander-in- Chief of the sister
Republic, and it told him that Lord Kitchener
had proposed they should negotiate for a
peace.

Chapter 13
The Blockhouses

"... and in consequence I must inform your
Honour, that, if the terms now offered are not
accepted after a reasonable delay for

consideration, they must be regarded as
cancelled.

I have the honour to be, Sir,

Your obedient servant,

KITCHENER, General.

Commander-in Chief, British Forces, South
Africa.

To His Honour, Commandant-General Louis
Botha."

Christiaan, sitting in his tent near the village of
Vrede in the Northern Orange Free State, read
these closing words to a long letter, and he
nodded slowly.

"So you could not agree", he said to the burly,
vivacious-eyed farmer who faced him, the
Commander of all the Transvaalers:

"No!" said Botha, "we couldn't; we are at it
again."

"Virtually", Louis Botha declared, in a letter to
his Burghers some days later, "Lord Kitchener's
letter contains nothing more, but rather less than
what the British Government must be obliged to
do should our cause go wrong ... The cause is not
yet lost, and, since nothing worse than this can
befall us, it is well worth while to fight on."

One man felt no regrets at the collapse of the
talks. His wife might be in the concentration
camp, his children in the hands of the enemy, his
farm destroyed and his whole future obscure. "I
would rather see my husband in his grave, than
see him lay down his arms", Mrs de Wet told the
commandant at Pietermaritzburg. Christiaan
himself no longer believed that the war could be
won, although he had slight hopes that the
intervention of the German Kaiser might obtain
better terms. His instinct, however, told him that
he must continue the battle yet awhile. As
though the war had only just begun, he prepared
for another winter in the field. His men made

clothes out of animal hides, coffee out of roots of
trees. They lived mostly on meat commandeered
from the natives, for on the farms hardly
anything was left. Even the leather in the tanpits
was being cut to pieces and burnt by the
Tommies, so that they might not have boots.
"Uitskud", literally, "emptying out", was the
device by which the Boers began to save
themselves from going naked. English prisoners
found themselves stripped almost to the skin.
Neither de Wet nor his fellow-commanders
approved, but there was no alternative. More and
more desertions to the English were taking place.
In 1901, a letter arrived from F. W. Reitz,
formerly President of the Orange Free State, and
latterly State- Secretary for the Transvaal
Republic: "I have the honour to report to you that
to-day the following officers met the
Government, namely, the Commandant-General,
General B. Viljoen, Generaal J. C. Smuts
(Staats-Prokureur), the last-named representing
the Western Districts. Our situation was

seriously discussed, and, among others, the
following facts were pointed out:

1. That small parties of Burghers are still
continually laying down their arms, and that the
danger arising from this is becoming every day
more threatening, namely that we are exposed to
the risk of our campaign ending in disgrace, as
the consequence of these surrenders may be that
the Government and the officers will be left in
the field without any Burghers, and that therefore
heavy responsibility rests upon the Government
and War Officers, as they represent the nation
and not themselves only.

2. That our ammunition is so exhausted that no
battle of any importance can be fought, and that
this lack of ammunition will soon bring us to the
necessity of flying helplessly before the enemy.

3. That, through the above-mentioned conditions,
the authority of the Government is becoming
more and more weakened, and that thus the

danger arises of the people losing all respect and
reverence for lawful authority, and falling into a
condition of lawlessness.

Up to the present time the Government and the
Nation have been expecting that, with the co-
operation of their Deputation and by the aid of
European complications, there would be some
hope for the success of their cause, and the
Government feels strongly that, before taking
any decisive step, an attempt should again be
made to arrive with certainly at the results of the
Deputation and the political situation in Europe.

Having taken all these facts into consideration,
the Government, acting in conjunction with the
above-mentioned officers, have arrived at the
following decisions:

Firstly, that a request should be addressed this
very day to Lord Kitchener, asking that, through
the intervention of ambassadors sent by us to
Europe, the condition of our country may be

allowed to be placed before President Kruger,
which ambassadors are to return with all possible
speed.

Secondly, that, should this request be refused, or
lead to no results, an Armistice should be asked
for, by which the opportunity should be given us
of finally deciding, in consultation with your
Government, and the people of the two States,
what we must do."

With scorn and anger, President Steyn reported
that, as far as the Orange Free State was
concerned, there was no question of surrender.
He enumerated recent successes of de Wet and
others, finishing up: "All these considerations
combine to make me believe that we should be
committing national murder if we were to give
in now. Brethren, hold out a little longer. Let
not our sufferings and our struggles be all in
vain; let not our Faith in the God of our
Fathers become a byword. Do all that you can
to encourage one another."

General de Wet had decided to work his way
back into the Transvaal. The war seemed to
have settled down into a stalemate. General
Smuts was just beginning his famous 2,000-
mile raid through Cape Colony, which, despite
the fact that he had scarcely 300 men with him,
was to occupy thousands of British troops, and
to cost millions of pounds to suppress. Oom
Krisjan was lying low. "It is difficult to follow
de Wet's movements, or to estimate his forces",
wrote the Sunday Times. "In London de Wet is
now said to be discussing surrender", another
journal declared for the 99th time.

A new factor was coming into the war: bags of
cement. Train-loads of them were reaching
every part of South Africa now under the
control of Britain, with vast quantities of
bricks, corrugated iron and above all, barbed
wire. Entirely new methods of ending the
campaign had been adopted. Little one and
two-storied buildings sprang up in the loneliest

reaches of the Karroo, on the Highveld, in the
Lowveld - everywhere. Each was protected by
sandbags. There were loopholes in the massive
walls, and occasionally a crow's-nest for a
lookout. From blockhouse to blockhouse ran
monster fences of barbed wire. They criss-
crossed the plains and climbed through the
mountains, in an effort to hem in the
commandos. At first the Boers pooh-poohed
their importance, and were not unsuccessful in
dodging them. Reports had it that herds of
oxen had; been used to trample them down.
Even though South Africa was too vast to be
completely divided up into paddocks, there
was no more question of moving round
unhampered. Every week further obstacles
separated the various commandos. To pass
from district to district, it was necessary to
move by night, and even then powerful enemy
searchlights swept the horizon.

De Wet modified his tactics again. If anything,
he, became more mobile than before, sneaking
past a blockhouse by creating diversions,
setting fire to the veld, and adopting other
tricks of the Boer hunters. British scouts
located him once more in the Heilbron district
of the Orange Free State, and across the bare
brown plains an officer with a white flag
brought him a letter from the Commander-in-
Chief calling for his surrender.

"... All Commandants, Veldcornets and leaders
of armed bands - being Burghers of the late
Republics - still resisting His Majesty's forces
in the Orange River Colony and the Transvaal,
or in any part of His Majesty's South African
possessions, and all members of the
Government of the late Orange Free State and
of the late South African Republic, shall,
unless they surrender before the 15th
September of this year, be banished for ever
from South Africa: and the cost of

maintaining the families of such Burghers
shall be recoverable from, and become a
charge on, their properties, whether landed or
movable, in both Colonies.

God Save The King.

Given under my hand at Pretoria, the seventh
day of August, 1901.

KITCHENER, General.

High Commissioner of South Africa. "

De Wet was getting used to this kind of
correspondence. "Bangmaak is nog nie
doodmaak" (Threatening is not killing), he
muttered as he wrote a brief note in reply:

"Excellency,

"I acknowledge receipt of Your Excellency's
missive, in which was enclosed Your
Excellency's proclamation, dated 7th August,
1901. I and my officers give Your Excellency
our assurance that we have only one aim for

which we are fighting, namely our
independence, which we shall never sacrifice.

Yours obediently,

CHRISTIAAN DE WET."

On September 15, the day when all the
burghers were to surrender, on pain of
banishment, General Botha had begun a fresh
invasion of Natal; General De la Rey had
inflicted a severe defeat on General Methuen,
and General Hertzog had gained some fresh
successes in the Orange Free State.

In spite of the blockhouses, in spite of the
National Scouts, the search-lights and the
barbed wire, de Wet, Botha and Steyn on
August 25 had decided to continue the war.
One typical story of this period concerns his
passage of the fortifications between Lindley
and Kroonstad.

"General", said one of his men as they rode
through the night, "when are we getting
through the blockhouses"

"We have passed them long ago", was the
answer.

The guerilla war went on right through 1901,
till another Christmas passed and another
New Year broke. President Steyn sent a letter
to Lord Kitchener: "The whole of the Orange
Free State, except the capital and railways, is
in our possession. In most of the principal
towns there are landdrosts appointed by us.
Thus in this State the keeping of order and the
administration of justice are managed by us, and
not by Your Excellency. In the Transvaal it is
just the same; there also justice and order are
managed by ministers appointed by our
Government. May I be permitted to say that
Your Excellency's jurisdiction is limited by the
range of your Excellency's guns."

Beneath the carved timbers of the House of
Commons a peppery Irish member stood up in
his seat on the Opposition benches on the last
day of January, 1902. Mr. Dillon, later to
become famous in connection with the Sinn Fein
agitation, turned towards the Secretary of State
for War, and asked: "Has the Right Honourable
Gentleman's attention been drawn to the fact that
Mrs. Christiaan de Wet has been sent to a
concentration camp? Is Mrs. de Wet now in
camp, and, if not, what course have the British
authorities adopted in regard to this lady?"

The House suddenly looked up, as Lord Stanley,
Financial Secretary to the War Office, replied on
behalf of the Government: "I have not special
information but, as far as I am aware, this lady is
in a refugee camp." "Is she," roared Mr. Dillon,
"in a concentration camp now?"

Lord Stanley: "Yes, sir."

"Scandalous, most scandalous!" retorted a
member, while the Nationalists cheered and
called out "Shameful!" and another Irishman
pointed out the Colonial Secretary and said:
"There's Chamberlain laughing", a sally at which
the celebrated "Joe" indignantly shook his head.

A couple of days later, Mr. Scott took up the
matter: "In which concentration camp is the wife
of General de Wet now confined? Is she
compulsorily detained? If so, on what grounds?
Will special care be taken to secure for her the
utmost possible consideration?" Mr. Broderick
read from his papers: "Mrs. de Wet is reported
by Lord Kitchener to be in a concentration camp
in Natal, and to be quite comfortable." Again Mr.
Dillon jumped up; "Is she at liberty or is she a
prisoner?" "I cannot say she is at liberty to leave"
soothed Mr. Broderick, "unless she chooses to go
out of our lines and returns to those who will
maintain her. "

Meanwhile, on a hill outside the town of
Pietermaritzburg, among the long line of
cantonments, with their strange mixture of
patrolling soldiers, women cooking their meals,
children playing about, hospital orderlies coming
and going, Mrs. de Wet nursed her babies, and
waited for news of her husband, whom she had
not seen for many months. Despite her refusal to
sign any petition for peace, or perhaps because
of it, her relations with the Commandant were
those of mutual respect.

It was Mrs. Steyn, the wife of the Orange Free
State President, and herself a prisoner of the
English, who testified long after that Christiaan
de Wet said to her: "Now only do I really love
my wife, for I have seen what she meant to me in
the difficult days of the war."

General de Wet faced the New Year 1902 with
the resolve to operate with smaller commandos
than hitherto. He had found his way back into the
Free State, where his brother, Piet de Wet, who

had been his leader at Nicholson's Nek, and who
had fought so well for the Republic, was now a
National Scout, giving valuable help to the
English. 3 The mountain approaches of the
Drakensberg promised valuable shelter for the
Republicans. December 24, 1901, saw them
approaching Tygerkloof, six hundred in single
file, on foot, the horses having been left far
below and the wagons having, at long last, been
abandoned. Ahead lay Groenkop, precipitous on
three sides, but with an easy slope on the third,
defended by a semi-circle of British forts, and

3 "Dear Brother", Piet wrote to Christiaan. "From
what I hear you are so angry with me that you
have decided to kill me if you find me. May God
not allow it, that you should have opportunity to
shed more innocent blood. Enough has been shed
already.... I beseech you, let us think over the
matter coolly for a moment and see whether our
cause is really so pure and righteous that we can
rely upon God's help".

commanding the enemy communications into
Basutoland. Though his officers thought that the
easy approach should be taken, the memory of
Majuba was still strong with de Wet. They
would expect an attack where the slope was
gentle, but not near the precipices. Long before
sunrise the British sentry thought he heard a faint
clatter among the hills.

"Halt! Who goes there?" Below him fiery flashes
of rifles blazed out, and then the words followed
in Afrikaans: "Burghers, storm"! As the
Tommies tumbled out of their blankets they
could hear the boulders and shingle rolling down
into the valley, while the cliff-faces seemed alive
with Boers. Only three or four minutes passed
before the alarm went round the camp; which lay
100 yards from the edge of the koppie, but it was
enough to give the Republicans a lead, and as for
the gunners, whose leaders had placed them with
Maxim- Nordenfeldts and Armstrongs facing the
wrong direction, they were shot down. The

tactics of Majuba and Nicholson's Nek had
answered once again.

Wire-cutters saved the burghers on the night of
February 6, 1902. As they stumbled across the
roadless and moonless veld, they walked into a
barrier scarcely 100 yards from a blockhouse.
How they passed unnoticed is hard to explain,
but the following morning the willow-shaded
banks of the Valsch River came into view. Three
of the cattle-drovers joined the fighting men a
little later in the day. Not as lucky as their
comrades, they had lost their way, and had only
reached a gap in the fence after dawn. Twenty
oxen and one horse, fell under the fusillade of
bullets, but Gert Potgieter, Wessel Potgieter and
Jan Potgieter, the men in charge, came through
unscathed. This incident is believed to be the one
which led to the story that de Wet used livestock
to trample down the barbed-wire fences. At
Wolvehoek Station, a little siding on the line to
the North, de Wet heard with much amusement

that Lord Kitchener himself had been waiting
there, in anticipation of his capture and that of
President Steyn.

While the Great de Wet Hunt proceeded
unabated, both Republican Governments decided
to have a conference at a place called
Liebenberg's Vlei, not far from Reitz. Telling his
men to disperse most of them made their way
singly through the British lines-one of those
baffling Boer tricks with which no recognized
rules of strategy seemed capable of coping - de
Wet rode to the meeting place, silent but in good
spirits. If he had any doubts about the future, he
certainly never showed them. Every mile or two
there was a homestead, roofless, with black
flame-marks along its windows and doors. The
cattle paddocks stood in ruins, the fields
overgrown with weeds. Occasionally women
might be seen living in an abandoned native hut,
or even in a cave. Barbed wire no longer
appeared as fearsome to the Boers as it had been.

The unending trek was resumed after the
Conference President Steyn and the surviving
members of the Orange Free State cabinet, as
well as the unofficial chaplain of the forces, the
Rev. J. D. Kestell, joining de Wet's commando.
Most of the men were near breaking-point, yet
only occasionally did it become evident. Barely
300 yards away the English were firing at them.
When de Wet ordered them to charge, only 250
complied with the order. "I used all my powers
to arrest the flight of my burghers, even bringing
the sjambok into the argument." His son, Kootie,
now his secretary, who had charge of the
precious little buggy containing his papers, and
his son Isaak, newly-recovered from his wounds,
were with him in the thick of the melee. In the
twilight horses plunged in the river bed, but there
was a steady stream of Boer fugitives to the rear.
All of a sudden de Wet looked up. He noticed
that there was a slackening-off of fire from the
side of the spruit. For some reason the English
were retreating. No doubt they would again

begin shooting very soon, but there was
breathing-space.

Colonel Rimington and Colonel Barratt, lying on
opposite hills with their men, saw with dismay
that a slight gap in the British lines, due to the
existence of a spur in the neighbouring range of
hills, was being forced by the Boers. Under the
light of a full moon, six hundred men, with
natives, cattle, women and children, extending
for miles across the veld, had cut through the
cordon, despite the firing of pom-poms and
rifles. Over 200 Burghers and a large part of the
convoy had been lost, but the main thing was
that de Wet was once again at liberty. As though
to make things worse for Kitchener, another
force of 350 burghers escaped at another spot.
That was a crowning point. On Majuba Day,
February 27, the Republics suffered a reverse.
News came that a full commando of 400 men
under a Commandant van der Merwe had been
captured.

For the next few weeks de Wet led a
comparatively quiet existence, while President
Steyn reorganised the Boers in the Western part
of the Free State. Christiaan himself remained on
a farm till the word came in March that a move
must be made back to the Transvaal. One sad
leave-taking now fell due. That little cart, which
had travelled thousands of miles from one end of
South Africa to the other, could no longer
continue in use. Almost shaken to pieces by
incessant travel, it was becoming an
encumbrance. On the farm of General Wessel
Wessels, not far from Heilbron, in a cave a few
of the General's most trusted officers buried the
official records. Almost as valuable to them were
the clothes and ammunition also left here for
future need. Colonel Rimington, the Commander
of the famous English Cavalry Unit, soon after
found his way up the hill to the newly-dug patch
of soil. What became of the tin boxes, with those
invaluable papers on the, campaign, with diaries,
correspondence and other material, remains a

mystery to this day. While the British soldiers
looked through the documents, de Wet, President
Steyn, a few officials and thirty burghers skipped
over the railway line near Viljoensdrift, under
the nose of the foe. Having cut the telegraph
wires as they passed, they reached the Vaal on
March 15, swam their horses through the
powerful current of the big river, and clambered
over the boulders on the northern side until at
Witpoort they encountered General de la Rey
and his commando.

The weather was already growing very cold;
another winter lay near.

Chapter 14
Surrender

Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands, still a
young and pretty girl of twenty -two, rose from
her seat and closed the meeting of her Cabinet at
the Hague. Scarcely had Her Majesty withdrawn
to her own apartments than clerks set to work,

coding a telegram for London, where Baron
Gericke, Minister to the Court of St. James,
awaited his instructions. Only a few hours later,
on the afternoon of January 29, 1902, a
messenger delivered an aide-memoire for the
Marquis of Lansdowne at the Foreign Office.

"It is the opinion of the Government of Her
Majesty the Queen", began the document, "that
the exceptional circumstances in which one of
the belligerent parties in South Africa is situated,
which prevents it from placing itself in
communication with the other party by direct
means, constitutes one of the causes for the
continuance of this war, which continues without
interruption or termination to harass that country,
and which is the cause of so much misery."

The paper went on to show that the three
Republican delegates in Europe, Messrs.
Abraham Fischer, Wessels and Wolmarans, were
almost completely cut off from communication
with the surviving commandos in the field.

"These circumstances cause the question to arise
whether an offer of good services could not be
made by a neutral power, with the object of at
least making it possible to open the way to
negotiation, which could otherwise not be begun.

Although Lord Salisbury's Cabinet met
immediately, in order to discuss this document,
and Baron Gericke received the Marquis of
Lansdowne's reply the same day, another month-
and-a-half was to pass before the world heard
anything fresh about the approaches.

"...It is evident that the quickest and most
satisfactory means of arranging a settlement
would be by direct communication between the
leaders of the Boer forces in South Africa and
the Commander-in-Chief of His Majesty's
forces, who has already been instructed to
forward immediately any offers he may receive
for the consideration of His Majesty's
Government."

March arrived. From the borders of Mozambique
to the frontiers of the Cape, from Lydenburg in
the Transvaal, almost to the outskirts of
Kimberley, the Boer commandos were still on
the move. General Smuts passed within sight of
Table Mountain. He had then turned north to lay
siege to the copper-mining town of O'Okiep in
the desert wastes of Namaqualand, where the
garrison was more than hard-pressed. In seven
months his command had grown from 200 to
3,000, although his effort to rouse the mass of
Boers in the Colony had so far proved a failure.
Somewhere in the mountain country of the
North-Eastern Transvaal the fugitive
Government of that Republic still bravely carried
on, their offices in railway-coaches and in ox-
wagons, with a portable coining-press striking
sovereigns out of the half-finished gold disks
removed from the Pretoria mint.

Nobody, not even Lord Kitchener, knew exactly
where to address the letter that conveyed Lord

Lansdowne's correspondence with Baron
Gericke. Mingled hope and fear swept South
Africa as the March of 1902 ran on.

Christiaan de Wet heard about the peace
overtures on March 15. In a fiery speech
President Steyn told the men that his views about
continuing resistence were unchanged, but Oom
Krisjan was less sure of the prospects: "I leave
the matter in your hands", he said to his fellow
officers. "You decide."

Across the hills and valleys, and through the
Highveld and the Lowveld, messengers travelled
under the white flag. Kitchener at Pretoria had
agreed that he must give facilities for the various
scattered commandos to confer. On March 10
Acting President Burger, writing from
"Government Laager, In the Veld, S.A.R.",
advised His Lordship that it was essential for
him to meet President Steyn and demanded a
safe-conduct. To this Kitchener consented and
even placed the telegraph system at his disposal.

By the time that the formal safe-conduct reached
him de Wet had returned to the Orange Free
State. A messenger caught him somewhere near
Boshof, to tell him what was afoot. He awaited
further news, still collecting his men, as though
the campaign were likely to continue
indefinitely.

We know comparatively little of his thoughts in
those days. With the suit that he wore as his sole
possession, with a diet consisting chiefly of
goat's meat and maize porridge, with not a soul
to be met in the homesteads which he passed,
with the land almost as barren as before the
white man came, he well knew the position of
his country. The other leaders were not all as
realistic. Bold theories were exchanged at the
camp fires, as to intervention by the Kaiser, the
Czar of Russia, or the President of the United
States. De Wet kept his counsel. Already he
could see the Union Jack as a permanency
between the Orange River and the Limpopo.

Reports had come up from the Cape that Cecil
Rhodes was very ill at his little seaside cottage at
Muizenberg. Republicans regarded him as their
deadliest enemy, the author of the Jameson Raid,
the man who had stopped Kruger from reaching
the sea, and from breaking through to the vacant
North. On March 26, 1902, the day when de Wet
was preparing to join Presidents Burger and
Steyn, the founder of Rhodesia breathed his last.
In ordinary times this would have caused a stir
throughout the world. As it was, even South
Africa was too preoccupied to give him the
attention he merited.

Kruger was in exile; Rhodes was dead. It was a
different world. Not till April did the combatants
agree that each commando should send a
representative to Klerksdorp, there to discuss a
possible approach to the British Government for
peace terms.

A large tent had been pitched by British soldiers
on an open space outside the willow-shaded little

town, and here, on the afternoon of April 9,
General de Wet joined the conference. On the
Transvaal side was Acting President Schalk
Burger, lanky and with a droopy beard. With him
was General Louis Botha, head of the Northern
forces, lively, blue-eyed, with a spring-like step
that told of unabated energy. There was the calm,
dignified General de la Rey, solemn and silent,
and State Secretary Reitz, one-time President of
the Orange Free State, and now one of the chief
mouthpieces of the Transvaal. Gravely troubled
with his eyes, and ill from his prolonged
hardships in the veld, President Steyn had also
dragged himself to the meeting. General Olivier,
another Free State stalwart, studious-looking,
bespectacled General Hertzog, the Rev. J. D.
Kestell, all were present when de Wet arrived,
along with dozens of officials. The prayer which
was said by the delegates as they started was no
mere formality. If ever they needed Divine
guidance, it was on this occasion.

President Burger lost no time in broaching the
subject. He told of the correspondence between
Queen Wilhelmina and King Edward VII, and
how the present meeting had come about.
"Faithful to our compact", he said, "we can do
nothing without the Orange Free State. I consider
that it is the time for us, the leaders of the
people, to meet each other and discuss things
fully, with our eyes fixed on God. We must face
our condition as it really is. Our subject is to
make a proposal for the restoration of Peace."

Each General now gave an account of the state
of his forces. Botha declared that he still had
eight commandos, numbering 8,500 men, but
that there was hardly a sheep left in his section of
the country, and only twenty head of cattle.
Christiaan de Wet followed. "Innumerable
hostile forces", he said, "have continually
operated against me during the last eight to ten
months. I, with my Government, was so
surrounded by the enemy in the north-eastern

districts of the Free State, that we had to fight
our way out. Seven hundred burghers were then
captured, but among them were many
greybeards, boys and other men not capable of
serving, so that the number of serviceable
burghers captured was not more than 250. As
regards cattle, if we compare the present
condition with that before the war, we will have
to say: There are none. However there is
sufficient to eat for the burghers and their
families. In the Western and South-Eastern
portion of the Free State almost all the men laid
down their guns when the great forces of the
enemy marched through there for the first time.
Consequently the commandos there are very
weak. Yet they have still enough corn in those
districts for a full year. Cattle, however, are so
scarce that bulls and rams are slaughtered. From
the district where General Brand was in
command the enemy at an earlier stage of the
war removed all the cattle, but now they have
large herds again and sufficient corn to last for

twelve months. In the south-eastern portion of
the Free State matters are much the same as in
the south-west. In the districts of Boshof and
Hoopstad there are many sheep and cattle and
there is no want of mealies. Our strength in the
entire State amounts to 5,000 men, besides
which there are many burghers in the Cape
Colony. The spirit of all of them is splendid."
Next came General de la Rey. He told of the
2,000 men with whom he had been harassing the
British, and of another 1,800 in the Cape Colony
still under his command, and of the 600 who
really belonged to de Wet. All the afternoon and
into the following day the discussion raged in
that tent.

General de Wet spoke afresh. "I do not wish to
boast when I say that the enemy concentrated
against me their greatest forces, and that I had
the smallest force, but as far as I am concerned
there can be no mention of surrender of our
independence. Our cause has progressed since

last June. The places of the burghers whom we
lost in the Republic have been filled by recruits
in the Cape Colony. I have sufficient food,
clothes and ammunition for more than a year.
Before I concede one iota of our independence I
will allow myself to be banished for ever."

On the third day the delegates decided to offer "a
perpetual Treaty of Friendship and Peace" to
Britain, including a settlement of the vexed
question of the franchise for Uitlanders, the
dismantling of all state forts, equal rights for
English and Dutch languages in the schools, and
sundry other concessions.

A wire arrived in which Lord Kitchener
proposed to have a personal interview with the
Boer representatives, and on Saturday morning,
April 12, two special trains were shunted into
Pretoria station. One carried the Government of
the Orange Free State and the other that of the
Transvaal. Just twenty-one months had passed

since President Kruger and his officials
abandoned the capital to the advancing British.

To the tall, bearded, brave men who got out on
the platform it looked a different place from the
one over which their four-coloured flag had once
waved. There were still the forts on the
neighbouring hills, the trees and the water-
furrows on the streets, and the newly-built
Government offices on Church Square, token of
a prosperity that was no more. Pretty villas on
the roads to Arcadia and Sunnyside: still stood in
bowers of roses and the Aapies River cut its
stony bed along the side of Meintjes Kop, yet the
highways through which the official carriages
took them breathed another atmosphere. Over
the doorways of the Government building was
the Lion and the Unicorn; the Union Jack hung
from scores of flagstaffs, English was spoken by
every second person, whether in uniform or
mufti, a new style of architecture was shown in
the buildings under construction; there was a

different coinage; the bands of the troops that
marched by would never play the Volkslied.
Handsome and steely-eyed, Lord Kitchener came
to the gate of a bungalow in the suburb, outside
which stood two sentries. At times he would
nervously stroke his thick moustache, as the
company ranged themselves around the heavy
table of the living-room, with its door to the
sunny verandah.

In slow Dutch sentences, translated into
English by Mr. Reitz, the Boers explained
their scheme, that they were ready to give up
much in order to restore peace, that they
wanted the peace to be a lasting one, but that
they must retain their self-respect.

Bit by bit the Republicans explained their
plan for an alliance, for disarmament, for a
mutual amnesty and equality for Uitlanders.
Next morning the reply from Downing Street
lay on the table. This time Lord Milner, in
his sleek, black frockcoat, every inch a

diplomat, attended the meeting at Lord
Kitchener's house.

"How are you, Mr. Steyn? How are you, Mr.
Burger?" he addressed the heads of the
delegations, and then lapsed into "President".

If the Commander-in-Chief had scarcely
been encouraging about the scheme
submitted, Lord Milner's "No" was even
more decisive. The countries were annexed,
had been annexed for over two years, and
their independence was already gone. It was
merely a question now of accepting a
proposal which embodied a promise of
ultimate self-government within the British
Empire.

With sinking hearts, the Boer representatives
took another resolution, of which they
handed a copy to the Statesman and the
Soldier:

"The Governments, considering that the
people have hitherto fought and sacrificed
everything for their Independence, and that
they constitutionally have not the power to
make any proposals affecting their
Independence, and since the British
Government now asks for other proposals
from them, which they cannot make without
having previously consulted the people,
propose that an armistice be agreed upon to
enable them to do so. At the same time they
request that a member of the deputation in
Europe should be allowed to come over to
see them."

Time was running on. It was decided that
both the Orange Free State and the South
African Republic should each elect thirty
delegates who were to meet at Vereeniging
on May 15.

For the first time since 1899 de Wet found
himself engaged in peaceful pursuits. Up and

down the length and breadth of the Orange
Free State he travelled with General Hertzog,
supervising the meetings - now on a farm,
now in a camp, now in a town - at which the
commandos elected their delegates for the
final gathering, to be decided once and for
all, whether to accept the conditions offered
or whether to continue the fight.

Vereeniging was not, as it is today, an
industrial town. It stood by the banks of the
shady Vaal River, a village but a few years
old, with a railway bridge, one or two collieries,
and little else. Long lines of goods-trucks waited
at the sidings, with uniforms, with food of every
kind, visible evidence, if any were needed by the
Boers, of the immeasurable power of the Empire
they had fought for three long years. Men saw
each other for the first time who had been
separated since the outbreak of the war. There
was talk and exchange of reminiscences, but
little laughter, Some came in their Sunday frock

coats, but most of them were in the worn, often-
patched garments, stained with rain and cut by
barbed wire, in which they had been in the field.

Lord Kitchener had caused a large marquee to be
erected on the veld near the railway station, and
a fence put up to prevent intrusion. War
correspondents prowled around outside. One of
them, Edgar Wallace by name, was to make his
fortune by obtaining the first exclusive report.

"We the undersigned swear solemnly that we, as
special representatives of the People, will be
faithful to our People and Country and
Government, and serve them faithfully, and that
we will diligently perform our duties with the
necessary secrecy, as behoves faithful Burghers
and representatives of the People so help us God
Almighty.

Vereeniging, South African Republic. May 15,
1902."

That was the oath which every one of the sixty
men swore and signed as he entered the tent.
There were no heroics about the speeches, but
their sheer drabness was more than eloquent.

General Nieuwoudt said that in Fauresmith there
were no more cattle and all but three women had
been evacuated. "About seventy bags of grain
are left." General Prinsloo had cattle at
Ficksburg, but could not move them owing to the
blockhouses. In the whole of Rouxville, so
General Brand said, there were only nine
women. At times his men went two or three days
without food. General Wessels thought that
round Harrismith they might still hold out for
another three months. General Smuts said there
was not sufficient grazing left in the districts
they had invaded at the Cape. Commandant
Schoeman from Lydenburg had lost his 800 head
of cattle and all his grain. So the tale went on.
General Botha with his men lived on what they
could get from the natives as a favour.

Commandant Uys, from the district of Pretoria,
believed they might hold out another month.
Nobody had imagined that the plight of the
Republics was so serious. General de Wet
proposed that the policy of raiding might be
extended, but it was a half-hearted scheme.

Next morning was Friday. State-Secretary Reitz
rose: "I have a proposition to make. Should we
not offer the British the Witwatersrand and
Swaziland? We can also sacrifice our foreign
policy and say: 'We desire to have no foreign
policy, but only our internal independence. We
can then become a protectorate of England.
What have we got in the Witwatersrand? After
the Franco-Prussian War France surrendered
Alsace and Lorraine to Germany to retain her
independence. What has the wealth from
Johannesburg done for us? That money has
only injured the noble character of our People.
This is common knowledge: And the cause of
this war lay in Johannesburg."

Reitz's idea gained the approval of several
delegates, and the outcome was that General
Smuts and General Hertzog were instructed to
frame a scheme in which this might be
embodied. Everybody knew that an agreement
of some sort must be signed. At this stage de
Wet stood up in his place from his little
folding-stool, and began:

"I intend to say nothing on this great matter,
because my opinions on it are no secret. I still
have the same opinion that I had when the war
threatened us. In the Orange Free State you
find the same critical conditions that exist in
the South African Republic. There are nine
districts which were entirely abandoned by us
for a time, but which were later on again
occupied by the Burghers. The only food there
was some corn, which had been hidden. Meat
had to be taken from the enemy.

"I deeply respect the feeling of Commandant-
General Botha, although I differ from him and

others, who are of the opinion that we must
stop the war. I believe what has been said
about the general misery in so many districts
of the South African Republic and about the
difficulty of keeping up the struggle there, but
you must not take it amiss in me if I paint out
that the unfortunate correspondence between
our two Governments, which fell into the
hands of the British at Reitz, painted the
conditions in more or less the same colours as
those in which they are now represented. That
was a year ago. I wish, however, to accept
what has been said as true. Still the Free State
does not wish to give up the war. I wish to
speak openly, and let no one consider it a
reproach when I say that this is really a
Transvaal war. I say this in a friendly and
brotherly spirit, because for me the waters of
the Vaal River never existed. I always was an
advocate of closer union. There are unfaithful
burghers amongst us too, unfaithful to the
compact between the two Republics, but I

cling to that compact, and say that the entire
war is our common cause.

"What is now the mood prevailing among the
burghers of the Orange Free State? The
meetings there were attended by 6,000 of
them. I myself was present at various
meetings, at which altogether 5,000 attended,
while General Hertzog met the remaining
1,000. At these meetings a voice as of thunder
was given for independence. The resolution
was: 'Continue. We have always been prepared
to sacrifice everything for our independence,
and are still prepared to do so.' Not a single
man spoke differently. There is thus only one
course open to me. We must see what can be
done for those parts of the country which are
helpless. I do not wish to be the man to say what
must be done, but I shall do everything I can do
to help. It would be very hard for me if we have
to adopt General Botha's suggestion to send men
into the enemy's lines with their families. We

must continue the war. Let us consider what our
numbers were when we commenced. Let us
assume that there were 60,000 burghers able to
bear arms. We knew that England had an army
of about 750,000 men. Of these she has sent here
about 250,000, namely one-third. And
experience teaches that she cannot send out
much more than a third. Have we not also still
got about a third of our fighting forces?

"I am also prepared to give up something for the
sake of our independence, but, with reference to
the suggestion of offering the Goldfields, I agree
with General de la Rey on the point. We can
have no other government, no English colony, in
the midst of our country. That will cause friction.
It is said that the Goldfields have been a curse
and a cancer for us. Well, they need not remain a
curse. And then, how shall we materially rescue
our people without the Goldfields? Swaziland is
not of much importance. That we can give up.

"The war is a matter of faith. If I had not been
able to do so in faith, I would never have taken
up arms. Let us again renew our covenant with
God. If we fix our eyes on the past we have more
ground to continue in faith. The entire war has
been a miracle, and without faith it would have
been childish to commence the war. We must not
think of intervention. That there has been no
intervention is a proof that God does not will it,
because through this war he wishes to form us
into a people. Our help and not our deliverance
must come from him alone, and then we shall not
become proud. I cannot see into the future, but
this I know. It is dark, but we must go on,
trusting God, and then, when victory comes we
shall not be proud.

"With reference to the Cape Colony, I may say
that I am also disappointed, not with the reports
from there, but because there has been no
general rising. People who sent us information
have not kept their word. We must accept the

report of General Smuts, and he says we must
not depend upon the Cape Colony; but he does
not say that our cause is declining there. The
Cape Colony has been of great assistance to us,
since it compelled the enemy to withdraw about
50,000 troops from the Republics.

"I feel for the poor families who are suffering so
grievously, and also for our burghers in the
camps. I think anxiously of their misery, but I
have nothing to do with facts. The entire war is a
matter of faith. I have to do with a fact only
when I have to remove it.

"I must still make this one remark - that if we
surrender vanquished, we shall be able to depend
on small mercy from England: We shall then, in
any case, have dug the grave of our
independence. Well then, what is the difference
between going into our graves in reality, and
digging the grave for our national existence?"

The same evening Christiaan de Wet, with
Generals Smuts, Botha, Hertzog and de la Rey,
again sat in the train to Pretoria. They made their
headquarters at the home of Mr. Carl Rood,
Parkzicht, Van der Walt Street. This was the
letter they handed to Lord Kitchener and Lord
Milner:

"To Their Excellencies Lord Kitchener and Lord
Milner, Pretoria,

May 19, 1902.

Your Excellencies,

With the object of finally terminating the
existing hostilities we have the honour, by virtue
of the authority from the Government of both
Republics, to propose the following points as a
basis of negotiations, in addition to the points
already offered during the negotiations in April
last:

(a)We are prepared to give up our independence
as far as foreign relations are concerned;

(b)We wish to retain internal self-government
under British supervision.

(c)We are prepared to give up a portion of our
territory.

If Your Excellencies are prepared to negotiate on
this basis, the above-mentioned points can be
more fully set forth.

We have the honour to be,

Your Excellencies' obedient servants,

LOUIS BOTHA.
C. R. DE WET.
J. H. DE LA REY.
IBM. HERTZOG.
J. C. SMUTS."

Christiaan took an active part in the discussions
between the two delegations. He tried to cut
away the legal technicalities and to keep the
peace between General Hertzog and Lord Milner

in their dispute about the powers of the
delegation.

'You must know", he said, "that if I speak, I do
not do so as a lawyer." Here, at any rate, was
something to stir a common feeling, for Lord
Kitchener broke into a laugh and said: "It's the
same with me." From Monday till Wednesday
the discussions went on. De Wet demanded that
the Boer delegates consult their people before
they might sign away their independence, that
provision be made for further concessions by
Britain, and that the Boer arguments be referred
to London before being turned down. "If it was
the intention that we should give an answer only
on the basis as given in the British proposals it
would not have been necessary for the people to
come to Vereeniging. Yet we have virtually
come with something which, in the proper sense
of the word, is almost similar to the Middelburg
proposals, and which meets the British
Government as far as possible."

"Take it or leave it", was the decision of Lord
Kitchener and Lord Milner. Concessions might
be made, for instance a gift of £3,000,000
towards meeting the claims of the old burghers;
there were prospects of a big loan and of self-
government within the Empire. Independence,
however, was at an end. De Wet fought hard
towards getting extra grants to help the ruined
burghers to re-establish themselves. The
payment of Republican requisition receipts was a
matter of honour to him.

"I can give His Excellency Lord Milner the
assurance that the idea always lived with the
people, that, even if everything was lost, they
would still, after the war, receive the money in
payment of the receipts, and if this is not
conceded I cannot conceive what the result will
be. I fear the result and hope that you will try to
obviate it."

"It cannot be a large amount", said General
Botha, "but we do not know how much it is."

De Wet: "You can well imagine that our
expenditure was as a drop in a bucket compared
with yours. And if I am not mistaken, the Orange
Free State had three-quarters of a million
pounds, when we commenced the war; and the
expenditure by means of receipts began after that
amount was exhausted. Your Excellencies must
therefore admit that these receipts impose upon
us the same obligation towards creditors as any
other debt would have done."

He remembered that there were prisoners of war
in Ceylon, St. Helena and the Bermudas, who
held these notes and who should have a chance
to cash them in. "I hope it will not be presumed
that we sit here to bind the hands of His
Majesty's Government. Sufficient other points
will continually crop up, by means of which the
Government can gain the confidence of the
population. But with reference to the financial
condition of the burghers who have been entirely
ruined, we feel ourselves obliged to make some

arrangement, which will be a weapon in our
hands when we return to the Delegates."

De Wet was already thinking of a peacetime
problem. When Kitchener indicated that
£2,000,000 to £3,000,000 would probably be
made available, he said: "I understand this is
something that must be settled by a
proclamation, but I want to have as many
weapons in my hand as possible when I go back
to the Delegates; and one of the first questions
which they will put is: 'What guarantees have we
that we shall not be ruined by our creditors?'
And what objection is there that a draft
proclamation be given us to take to Vereeniging,
which will be promulgated as soon as peace is
concluded?"

Lord Kitchener: "But this will be something
apart from this agreement."

Chief Commandant: "Yes."

Lord Milner: "What is the good of it to them?"

De Wet: "It is such a vital question for us that it
cannot be taken amiss in us if we insist upon it,
because we must give up everything else." Lord
Kitchener: "Of course no one takes it amiss in
you."

When legal advisers of both sides had drafted out
the final conditions, for submission to the
conference at Vereeniging by a "Yes or No"
vote, de Wet said to Lord Milner: "I will abide
by what the delegates do." On Wednesday, May
28, the final terms were handed over. An answer
had to be given by Saturday, the 3 1st.

Chapter 15
The Treaty of Vereeniging

Cold and sunny, the South African autumn lay
upon the land. Already there was a nip in the air,
and the grass on the plains around Vereeniging
was turning to stubble. In their ragged and
patched greatcoats the Boers shivered as they
came to their meeting-place, on the morning of

May 29, 1902. President Burger looked tired and
old, when, in the damped light of a marquee, he
put on his glasses to read the text of the report
which he and his fellow-emissaries must render
about their conversations at Pretoria.

Christiaan de Wet sat like a sphinx at the long
table as the sonorous Dutch sentences rang out.
Most of those in the tent already knew what was
coming. "We are informed; on behalf of the
British Government, that this proposal cannot be
further altered, but must be accepted or rejected
in its entirely by the delegates of both
Republics."

Five of the Boer leaders, de Wet included, had
signed the letter and as he folded it up President
Burger said: "There are three courses open to us:
to continue the struggle, to accept the proposal of
the British Government and conclude peace, or
to surrender unconditionally." At the mention of
the last alternative the discussion flared up
afresh. Would it not be better to lay down one's

arms and place the burden of settling all details
on the enemy? Not a few delegates thought it a
good idea. The rather desultory discussion on the
forfeiture of farms and on an amnesty (which
Lord Kitchener had foreshadowed for King
Edward's forthcoming Coronation) gradually
gave way to a consideration of this major issue.

Mr. C. Birkenstock from Vryheid urged: "Half a
loaf is better than no bread", while General S.
P du Toit of Wolmaransstad demanded: "On
what ground can we hope to prosecute the war to
a successful issue? If such grounds can be
pointed out to me, I shall very willingly decide to
go on manfully, but as far as I can see there is no
hope for us. Mention is made of Faith. Yes, we
had Faith, but in my opinion faith must have its
grounds. Abraham wanted to sacrifice Isaac, but
knew that, even if Isaac were killed, God's
promise would nevertheless be carried out. If we
believe that God will ultimately deliver us, we
must use our brains."

All the while the burghers sat watching de Wet -
wondering what he would say. When a number
of others had spoken he slowly began: "I too feel
myself compelled to express my feelings. The
previous speaker declared that the final word we
had from our deputation was that we must fight
till the last man was dead and the last cartridge
fired. I must say that I never heard such a
message. What I know is that the Deputation told
us last year they saw no hope of intervention, but
that we should hold out until all means of
resistance had been exhausted. But I did not
understand from them that we must continue
until the last man was dead and the last cartridge
fired. I wish to express my feelings briefly, but
candidly, and I must go back to the beginning of
the war. I must say that when we began the war I
had not as much hope of intervention as now. In
saying this I do not wish to intimate that I now
have hope of intervention, but that we did not
know then whether we had the slightest
sympathy in England or in Europe. And now we

have found out that we have indeed sympathy.
Though no one intervenes on our behalf, our
cause is nevertheless strongly supported, so that
even English newspapers give reports of 'pro-
Boer' meetings over the whole world. This
information we obtain from Europe through a
man sent here by the Deputation, and I have no
reason to say or to think that our informant is not
trustworthy. He brought the last letter from the
Deputation, and thus certainly enjoys their
confidence. The man is acquainted with public
feeling in Europe towards the two Republics, and
informs us that our cause is daily gaining ground
in Europe, and even in England. The question
may now be asked: Why have the Deputation not
sent us a report on those conditions? The reason
is clear as daylight to me. We sent the
Deputation to seek help for us. They went to
ascertain from the other Powers what could be
done for us, and thus came to know what was the
policy of those Powers. Will they now be able to
lay bare that policy to us? No, certainly not,

because there is a great danger that their letters
will fall into the hands of the enemy. Even
though the members of the Deputation were here
themselves, I doubt whether they would be free
to explain to us the future policy of the European
Powers. It is therefore significant to me that the
Deputation is silent, and this should not
discourage, but rather encourage us.

"If there is any man that feels the pitiful
condition of our country, then I am that man.
And I believe every word that has been said here
about the conditions in the various divisions. It is
asked: What prospect have we of continuing the
fight with success? To reply to that I must go
back to the beginning of the war, and ask what
hope and prospects we, then had? My reply is:
'Only Faith, nothing more.' And that Faith we
still have. How weak we were in comparison
with that Power, our enemy, with his three-
quarters of a million of soldiers, of which he has
sent some 250,000 to fight us! How could we

have entered into such a struggle if we had not
done so in Faith! We could only speculate on
help from Natal and the Cape Colony. Some said
that Natal and the Cape Colony would stand by
us, but now we miss the persons who said that.
They are lost to us, but we have not lost them on
the battlefield, for they sit amongst the enemy,
and many of them are even in arms against us.
However, I never built on that help, although I
hoped, - from what history taught us, that we
should not stand alone to defend our rights by
force of arms.

"I feel why some, taking into consideration our
position, seek for tangible grounds upon which
we can justify a continuance of the struggle; but
then the question arises again: What tangible
grounds had we when we began? Has the way
become darker or lighter to us? It is still all
Faith, and we know that a small people can by
Faith triumph over the most powerful enemy.
And if we, a small people, overcome by Faith,

we shall not be the only people that has done so.
Those who say that the struggle must be given
up want tangible grounds from us for the
continuance of it, but what grounds had we at the
commencement? Has it become darker now? On
the contrary, the history of the last twenty-two
months has given me strength. A year ago
General Botha wrote to me, and correctly too,
that the scarcity of ammunition gave him
anxiety. We also had that anxiety, because our
ammunition too was exhausted. There was a time
when I feared and trembled when a burgher
came to me with an empty bandolier and asked
me for ammunition. But what happened? Since
September last ammunition in large and small
quantities has miraculously poured in, so that, to
use an expression of the late General Joubert's, 'I
was agreeably surprised.' And what happened
with ammunition occurred also with horses. We
always obtain a supply from the enemy. I do not
take it amiss in those who want grounds for our
Faith. I have mentioned some grounds, but those

are only a thousandth part of what might be
mentioned. I may add this further reason. The
enemy has approached us. I agree that this
proposal is an improvement on the Middelburg
proposal of last year. The enemy have made
further advances. How have they not approached
us since the commencement of the war, when
they forced themselves into our country? When
our Governments negotiated with Lord Salisbury
at the beginning of the war, in April, 1900, the
British Government would hear of nothing but
unconditional surrender. Today England is
negotiating with us. Before we accept this
proposal, let us once more take up the struggle,
and do our duty - do what our hands find to do,
and I have no doubt that the enemy will
approach us again with more favourable
proposals, if they do not leave us our entire
independence. The Deputation said to us:
'Persevere', but I do not think that they can lay
bare to us on what grounds this advice was
based. Remember, too, that in the First (Boer)

War the South African Republic stood alone
against powerful England, without any
assistance. Then also there were waver ers - the
so-called Loyalists. It was then also a struggle in
Faith only, and what was the result? They fought
in Faith only and won. Is our Faith then going to
be so much weaker than that of our forefathers?

"It is asked: What about our families? Certainly
we must care for them, but only as far as, and as
well as we can. More we cannot do. It has been
said that we must let the men lay down their
arms to save the families, but it is a hard matter
to say to a Boer: 'Take your family, go to the
enemy, and lay down your arms.' However, we
could do that rather than see an entire people fall.

"We can learn much from the history of
America. It has been said that our circumstances
cannot be compared with those of the
Americans, and yet a comparison is not out of
place. Even powerful England had to give in to
them. It may be said that America is much larger

than the two Republics, but we are not bound to
the territories of the two Republics. The Orange
Free State offers many difficulties on account of
her situation. The railways pass through the
entire country, and on the borders we have the
Basutos, a powerful nation. We have no
Bushveld like the South African Republic, and
have thus to find our way through the British
forces.

"The matter is a very grave one for us, but we
cannot part with our arms. Everything else is of
minor importance to me, but if we give up our
arms, we are no longer men. Let us persevere.
Three or six or twelve months hence or later, a
time may dawn when we may be able to do
everything with our arms. But if we give up our
arms and such a time dawns, we shall all stand as
women.

"Now I wish to ask you: Why has Lord
Kitchener refused to allow our Deputation to
come out? And why did he say that we could see

from the papers that there was nothing brewing
in Europe? Which papers, however, did, he refer
to? The Star, The Cape Times, The Natal
Witness, and other jingo papers, which, you
must moreover bear in mind, are all censored. If
we can accept his word that the deputation can
bring us no favourable news, it would have been
to the interest of England to let the Deputation
come out, or to allow all newspapers through.
But there is no question of allowing certain
European and even certain English papers
through: If we give up the struggle now, we do
so in the dark. We do not know what is going on
in the outside world. We cannot say that the
enemy are making their terms more and more
onerous, because that is not so. They are offering
concessions.

"Considering all this, and also the fact that the
tension in England can be looked upon as
indirect intervention, I believe that we should
continue with the bitter struggle: By standing

manfully we shall get our just rights. When the
time arrives that we cannot go any further, we
can again open negotiations. Let us keep up this
bitter struggle and say as one man: We persevere
- it does not matter how long - but until we
obtain the establishment of our Independence! "

The burghers murmured their applause, and
General Beyers proudly exclaimed: "It is said we
shall never get such an opportunity again for
negotiating. General de Wet has touched upon
this matter, and I agree with him and others that
we shall always be able to negotiate anew. This
is proved by what has already taken place, and I
may further point out that there was a time when
General Botha wished to see Lord Roberts, and
when the latter replied that it was not necessary.
And now the British are negotiating with us; in
fact they opened up these negotiations."

The following morning, when the representatives
arrived from their hotels, President Burger held a
telegram in his hand. "Before we begin", he said,

"I consider it my duty to inform the Delegates
and the members of both Governments, that
President Steyn had to tender his resignation as
President of the Orange Free State yesterday, on
account of illness, and that he was forced to give
the enemy his parole to enable him to obtain
medical treatment. General de Wet has been
appointed in his place, as Acting State-President,
and, on behalf of the members of my
Government, on behalf of you all, and on behalf
of myself, I wish to assure him of our deep
sympathy, and to express our heartfelt regret at
the loss of a man who has hitherto been the
support and the rock of our good cause. His
retirement is a great loss to us all."

Oom Krisjan got on his feet and looked down
modestly at his papers, as he thanked his
comrades for their confidence, "As far as my
poor powers go", said he, "I shall do everything I
can for the Afrikaner." In this unique manner
Christiaan de Wet began his term of office

as the last President o f the Orange Free
State-for one day!

It was already Friday; scarcely twenty-four hours
remained before the decision had to be given to
Lord Kitchener and Lord Milner. The tension of
the harrowing week grew worse, that there was
much change in what they had to discuss. Every
man gave his opinion and it was noticeable that
more and more began to side against the "Bitter-
Einders" as they were called. General Hertzog
spoke as a judge, as though he were summing up
in a court case. He told of the new Wheat Tax
which England had just adopted - a sign that her
finances were affected and that the public would
be getting restless. As though the spirit of
prophecy were upon him, he spoke these words:
"We are nearer the time when a Great War must
break out. It is a known fact that the nations are
arming themselves more and more, and building
ships of war, which is all done in preparation for
the day when war will break out in Europe."

The 30th of May ran on. No delegate had a wish
for food or drink now that the real time of trial
had arrived. A stern young man of 32, who had
kept silent almost right through, began to talk -
Jan Christiaan Smuts, newly-arrived from the
Cape Colony, who had broken off the siege of
O'okiep in order to attend at Vereeniging. He
was still weary from the two-days journey by
special train, placed at his disposal by the British
High Commissioner, and in sentences that will
be remembered by the Boer People as long as it
exists, he set out the facts as they really were.
"We are still an unvanquished military force", he
told them. "Hitherto I have not taken part in the
discussion, although my views are not unknown
to my Government. We have arrived at a dark
stage in the development of the war, and our
cause is all the darker and more painful to me,
because I, as a member of the Government of the
South African Republic, was one of the persons
who entered into the war with England. A man
may, however, not shrink from the consequences

of his acts, and on an occasion like this, we must
restrain all private feelings, and decide only and
exclusively, with a view to the permanent
interests of the Afrikaner People. These are great
moments for us - perhaps the last time when we
meet as a free people and a free government. Let
us rise to the magnitude of the opportunity and
arrive at a decision for which the future
Afrikaner generation will bless and not curse us.
The great danger before this meeting is that it
will come to a decision from a purely military
point of view. Almost all the representatives here
are officers who do not know fear, who have
never been afraid, nor will ever become afraid of
the overwhelming strength of the enemy, who
are prepared to give their last drop of blood for
their country and their people. Now, if we view
the matter merely from a military standpoint, if
we consider it only as a military matter, then I
must admit that we can still go on with the
struggle. We have still 18,000 men in the field —
veterans, with whom you can do almost any

work. We can thus push our cause, from a
military point of view, still further. But we are
not here as an army, but as a people; we have not
only a military question, but also a national
matter to deal with. They call upon us, from the
prisoner-of-war camps, from the concentration
camps, from the graves, from the field, and from
the womb of the future - so decide wisely and to
avoid all measures which may lead to the
decadence and extermination of the Afrikander
People, and thus frustrate the objects for which
they made all their sacrifices. Hitherto we have
not continued the struggle aimlessly. We did not
fight merely to be shot. We commenced the
struggle, and continued it to this moment,
because we wish to maintain our independence,
and were prepared to sacrifice everything for it.
But we may not sacrifice the Afrikaner People
for this independence. As soon as we are
convinced that, humanly-speaking, there is no
reasonable chance to retain our independence as
Republics, it clearly becomes our duty to stop

the struggle, in order that we may not perhaps
sacrifice our people and our future for a mere
idea, which cannot be realised."

They laughed bitterly as the young General went
on to say: "Europe will sympathise with this only
when the last Boer hero goes to his last resting-
place, when the last Boer woman has gone to her
grave with a broken heart, when our entire
Nation shall have been sacrificed on this altar of
history and humanity ... Comrades, we have
decided to stand to the bitter end. Let us now like
men admit that that end had come for us, come
in a more bitter shape than we ever thought. For
each one of us death would have been a sweeter
and a more welcome end than the step which we
shall now have to take. But we bow to God's
will. The future is dark, but we shall not
relinquish courage and our hope and our faith is
in God. No one will ever convince me that the
unparalleled sacrifices, laid on the altar of
freedom by the Afrikaner People, will be vain

and futile. The war for the freedom of South
Africa has been fought, not only for the Boers,
but for the entire People of South Africa. The
result of that struggle we leave in God's hand.
Perhaps it is His will to lead the people of South
Africa through defeat and humiliation, yea, even
through the Valley of the Shadow of Death, to a
better future and a brighter day."

Shadows of evening swept over the Transvaal
and the Orange Free State as the leaders of the
Boers made their way out of the tent with
President de Wet among them. Few of them slept
that night. They sat in their tents, on the
verandahs of their hotels, and walked up and
down the ill-lit streets of the little town,
challenged here and there by the British sentries,
talking about the inevitable end. Next morning
they assembled at halfpast nine. President de
Wet had a suggestion to make: "The time is too
short to admit of further discussion on these
proposals, and we must arrive at a decision. I

propose that we appoint a committee, consisting
of Advocates Smuts and Hertzog, to draft a
proposal embodying the views of this meeting.
I do not say what the proposal must embrace.
Let us then adjourn for an hour, and let the
delegates of the South African Republic and
the Orange Free State meet each other
separately, in order to come to unanimity. We
must arrive at a unanimous decision, because
that will be of incalculable value to us for the
future."

Shortly before noon the final proposals were
drafted. They contained a record of the
devastation of the country, and the prospect
"that by continuance of the war an entire race
might die out." They invoked the sufferings of
the People. "This meeting is therefore of
opinion that there is no reasonable ground to
expect that, by carrying on the war, the People
will be able to retain their independence, and
considers that, in the circumstances, the People

are not justified in proceeding with the war,
since such can only tend to the social and
material ruin, not only of ourselves, but also of
our posterity.

"Forced by the above-mentioned circum-
stances and motives, this meeting instructs
both Governments to accept the proposal of
His Majesty's Government, and to sign in the
name and on behalf of the People of both the
Republics.

"This meeting of delegates expresses the belief
that the conditions thus created by the
acceptance of the proposal of His Majesty's
Government may speedily be so ameliorated
that our people will thereby attain the
enjoyment of these privileges to which they
consider they can justly lay claim, on the
ground, not only of their past history, but also
of their sacrifices in this war.

"This meeting has noted with satisfaction the
decision of His Majesty's Government to grant
a large measure of amnesty to those British
subjects who took up arms on our side, and to
whom we are bound by ties of blood and
honour, and expresses the wish that it may
please His Majesty to extend this amnesty still
further. "

General de la Rey and General Botha had
taken de Wet on one side and had pleaded with
him how necessary it was that there should be
no division in the voting. The President of the
Orange Free State had nodded, and had called
together the representatives of his country. One
of those present said: "I shall never forget how
we sat in that tent and listened, as General de
Wet told us that there was no more chance of
continuing the fight, and that there must be no
division among us. I still see him there, this
inflexible man, with his freezing eyes, his
strong mouth, like a lion at bay. He would, he

could not, he must give up the fight. I still see
the grave, drawn faces of the officers who had
hitherto been irreconcilable, and who had been
ordered to maintain our, independence. I see
them staring, as though into vacancy."

Sixty men walked back into the main tent at
two o'clock that Saturday afternoon. One by
one they gave their votes, fifty-four in favour
of accepting the peace, six of them against.
Slowly the tellers wrote down the names. First
one, then another broke down and sobbed.

Those grim old Boer soldiers sat there at the
long table, and scarcely one of them but had
given way. Clearing his throat as though to
collect himself, President Burger began once
more: "We stand here at the graveside of the
two Republics. Much remains for us to do,
even though we cannot do what lies before us
in the official positions which we have hitherto
occupied. Let us not withdraw our hands from
doing what is our duty. Let us pray God to

guide us and to direct us how to keep our
people together. We must also be inclined to
forgive and to forget when we meet our
brothers. We may not cast off that portion of
our people who were unfaithful. With these
words I wish officially to bid farewell to you,
our respected Commandant-General de Wet,
members of both Executive Councils and
delegates."

Mr. Kestell fetched out his prayer-book for the
last time. Van Velden said: "President Burger,
will you please call in Lord Kitchener's
representatives." Two British officers, who had
been walking up and down on the veld,
Captain P. J. Marker and Major Henderson,
stooped as they entered the doorway. General
Botha faced them with a paper in his hand. A
silence as of death prevailed.

"Gentlemen", he said, "this meeting has
accepted the peace proposals of the British
Government ..."

While the frenzied telegraph operators ticked
out the message, which was upon the streets of
London, of New York, of Berlin, of
Amsterdam, of Sydney, of Calcutta, of
Montreal and of Cape Town, within a few
minutes of its arrival, General de Wet was
riding at top speed in a carriage through the
streets of Pretoria, usually so silent and now
filled with a crowd. Outside the residence of
Mr. George Heys in Mare Street - where Lord
Kitchener now had his headquarter s-the guard
turned out as the Government Delegation
arrived from the railway station. Lamps burned
over a board-room table, cleared of documents.
The clock struck eleven, as Lord Kitchener,
dressed in mufti and preceded by his orderlies,
walked into the room and the Republicans took
their seats. Milner placed President Burger on
his left with the Transvaalers, Kitchener waved
to President de Wet to take his seat on his right
with the other Free Staters. The Secretaries
produced a file of typewritten sheets of

parchment in four copies. At five minutes past
eleven on May 31st, 1902, Burger signed the
Treaty of Vereeniging. Then came State
Secretary Reitz, General Louis Botha, and
General de la Rey, Mr. J. C. Krogh and
General Lucas Meyer. Now came the turn of
the Orange Free State-President Christiaan de
Wet, General Olivier, General Hertzog, Acting
Government- Secretary W. J. C. Brebner.
Lord Kitchener and Lord Milner wrote their
names last. Not a word was said as the Statesmen
and Commander-in-Chief laid down their pens.
There was something unreal about it all.

The Orange Free State and the South Africa
Republics belonged to the past. Lord Kitchener
rose from his chair and held out his hand to each
of the Boers. "We are all good friends now", he
said.

Chapter 16
De Wet in England

In the cabin of the Royal Mail Steamer Saxon,
homeward bound from the Cape, a man sat at a
small table with stacks of papers around him.
Stewards knocked at his door occasionally,
asking whether he had any instructions for them,
but he shook his head. Christiaan de Wet was
busy on a book. In well-turned, vivid sentences
in High Dutch he was composing De Stryd
Tusschen Boer en Brit, soon to become a South
African military classic. Within a few months it
was to be no less famous in English, under the
title of The Three Years War.

Even while the fighting was still in progress, he
had conceived the idea of setting down his
experiences, but now that not only his own home
but those of so many of his friends lay in ashes,
and the rebuilding of the entire country had
begun, he decided that an exact account of what
he had seen and done would awaken sympathy

and, by its sales, contribute towards helping the
innumerable war victims.

On the morning following the signing of the
Treaty, the Boer delegates at Vereeniging passed
resolutions delegating General C. R. de Wet,
General Louis Botha and General J. H. de la Rey
to proceed to Europe to collect the said funds, for
the relief of their women and children.

Oom Christiaan had come from Pretoria by train,
stopping over at Bloemfontein, where an
enterprising young journalist, F. R. Paver, later
editor of the Johannesburg Star, contrived to
interview him at the station. Some few weeks he
had spent with his wife, who had returned from
Pietermaritzburg, before he set out for Europe.
At every town a crowd collected on the railway
platform, and at Cape Town loud cheering could
be heard as his train drew in, and again when he
walked aboard. There she was, the big grey liner,
with her red and black funnels; there were his
comrades, Botha and de la Rey, with a handful

of friends to say goodbye, and a great mass of
Dutch and English, calling out friendly messages
from the quayside. A few countrymen of theirs,
including the Rev. J. D. Kestell, who had been
chaplain to his commando, Messrs. Brebner,
Ferreira, Van Velden and others were also to
sail, as their secretaries and assistants.

Table Mountain, with its blanket of clouds and
the beautiful city at its feet, had scarcely faded
out of sight, when Christiaan locked himself in
his cabin, sorted out his notes and began to write.
People who expected him on deck at first
thought he was seasick, till they saw him coming
to meals and eating heartily. Whereas Botha
occasionally sat down to a friendly rubber of
bridge, and de la Rey relaxed sufficiently to
indulge in a game of dominoes, de Wet, save for
an hour or two after lunch, worked almost from
morning to night. Only Mr. Kestell would come
in at times to give a hand, but, despite the fact
that it was the General's first effort at writing, we

have the clergyman's own testimony that his
assistance was purely technical, and that the
striking imagery, the extraordinary liveliness of
description and general accuracy were the
author's own. Before the manuscript was passed
for publication, de Wet went over it himself once
more.

"I am no book-writer", he said in his own
introduction, "but I felt that the story of this
struggle, in which a small people fought for
liberty and right, is justly said to be wanted
throughout the civilised world, and that it was
my duty to set down my own experiences in this
war for the present and future generations, not
only for the Afrikaner people, but for the whole
world." He cautiously added: "The book has
been written by me in Dutch, so I cannot be
answerable for its translation into other
languages." Not only did he prepare the text, but
he drew out, with admirable correctness, the
maps and battle-diagrams accompanying it.

Few are aware that he entertained ambitions of
further authorship, although unfortunately stress
of other events prevented him from realising
them. "I intend", said de Wet, "to write on
another occasion a book dealing with the Art of
Scouting". (What a pity that this never
materialised!)

The boisterousness of the many troops and
civilians on board contributed not a little but to
the gloom of the little company of Boers,
conversing with each other as they sat at their
own table. The captain of the Saxon showed
them the greatest courtesy.

Dense fog hung over the English Channel one
early morning in August, 1902, and over, the
many hundreds of thousands of people gathering
along the south coast of England to see the great
Coronation Review at Spithead. Although the
Saxon was due in Southampton at dawn the
signal-station at Hurst Castle, only sighted her at
8.30. Then the clouds lifted and those who had

found their way to the docks were rewarded with
a fine view of the liner coming up the fairway.
Even the excitement of the naval celebrations
had not dwarfed the importance of the visit of
the Boer Generals. Silently a few persons got
into a launch and went out to meet the Saxon
off Netley. One of them was a woman with a
sad, kindly face - Emily Hobhouse. Another
was a burly, bearded Afrikaner from the
Orange Free State, Abraham Fischer, a
member of the Delegation sent over by the
Republics to Europe in their last effort to
secure foreign intervention. Mr. Percy Molteno
followed, a relation of the first Prime Minister
of the Cape and finally one who wore a chain
of office, His Worship the Mayor of
Southampton.

The Mayor came towards the Boer delegates,
beaming a friendly smile, but was coldly
received. "Influenced by extreme depression",
as the newspapers put it, the Generals cut the

welcome as short as possible and went off to
their cabins for a long talk with Abraham
Fischer. The latter had a letter to deliver to
General Botha. As he tore it open his face grew
graver than before. His old friend, General
Lucas Meyer, had just passed away.

The passengers were thinning out, yet the
crowd still waited on the quayside. "There they
come!" shouted someone. First came Lord
Roberts' aide-de-camp; then the visitors -
General Botha, with his neat beard and blue
eyes, wearing a semi-military tunic of dark
green, set off with a stiff collar, then de la Rey
with morning coat and a round felt hat, and
lastly the man who evoked the loudest cheer,
Christiaan de Wet, in a serge suit, loosely-
fitting and homely, such as is worn on the
farm. When he saw the enthusiastic faces
below him, De Wet hesitated, but on second
thought faced the inevitable and allowed
himself to be hemmed in.

Hero-worshippers were disappointed at the
visitors' response. Hardly nodding, the men
hurried through to the customs sheds behind
two police inspectors. The Coronation Review
was due the following day, and it had been
planned to let them spend the night in the
Nigeria, which lay only a little distance from
the Saxon. The Boer Generals, declining all
official hospitality, in the end reluctantly
agreed to walk across to the warship.

Soon the long hull came into view, and to a
boisterous welcome the Boers were piped
aboard. "The position", said an eyewitness,
"was a little novel. If now they were
bombarded it was only with kind attention. It
had long been our duty to destroy their food,
but now everybody wanted them to dinner.
They who had been shot at had now been
snapshotted. The adventurous strategists, who
had retired before the approach of Lord
Roberts and Lord Kitchener, now walked

unguardedly into their arms." On the
unfamiliar quarter-deck of the cruiser two
soldiers stepped towards them with a cordial
greeting, the tall well-knit figure of Lord
Kitchener and the wiry one of Lord Roberts. A
third gentleman-Joseph Chamberlain-in mufti,
with an orchid in his buttonhole, bowed to
them and his bow was returned stiffly. De la
Rey spoke the best English of the three, but
even so it was difficult to work up a
conversation. Botha spoke about the death of
his friend Lucas Meyer, and explained that they
did not care to see the Coronation Review. "I
think you are making a mistake", observed Lord
Kitchener rather awkwardly. The Boers then said
good-bye and found their way to the special
boat-train which was waiting to take them to
London.

That day did their spirits begin to lift a little. As
the railway coaches rolled past the meadows and
hedges of Hampshire, past old churches and

country houses, the instinct of the farmer rose to
the surface, and they talked about the soil and
about the beauty of the land. How green it all
was, thought de Wet and how crowded. He could
now understand why the English were so proud
of their country. Town upon town, village after
village and factories ever closer and closer
together as they came near London. All these
millions of people., living in a country smaller
than the Orange Free State!

At 2.35 that Saturday afternoon they pulled into
the great halls of Waterloo Station. However
cordial their reception at Southampton, it paled
before that of London. "Long before the train
came to a standstill", said one journal, "people
were cheering with wild enthusiasm and scores
of newspaper reporters were struggling to get
near the saloon door. So great was the crush that
it was quite impracticable for the travellers to get
on the platform. The three Boer leaders gravely
raised their hats in acknowledgment of repeated

cries of "Good old de Wet!", "Our friend the
Enemy!" and "Brave soldiers all!". To those who
pressed round the door of the saloon they
politely but firmly declined to say a word.
Members of the party, in answer to the appeal as
to where the Generals were going, replied: "They
want to have a rest, and do not wish their
whereabouts to be known". Railway police and
porters came to their rescue, and by sheer force
cleared for a time a space about the saloon door.
Still they were hemmed in, not only the
Generals, but Mrs. Botha and her son, the Rev.
Kestell, Mr. D. van Velden, the Translator, old
Mrs. de la Rey and her daughter, Advocate and
Mrs. Ferreira, Mr. Brebner, Abraham Fischer,
Miss Hobhouse and Mr. Clark. Constables
opened a special side-door of the station, and as
they climbed into a horse-bus another wave of
humanity descended upon them.

At Horrex's Hotel in Norfolk Street, off the
Strand, the delegates tried again to shake off

their interviewers. All that evening the street was
blocked with masses of people but they were
disappointed. Applying their veldcraft to mass
psychology, the generals remained out of view.
Nor would they say what they proposed to do
next. Behind the curtain of their sitting room, as
evening fell they sat, planning the immediate
future. There was Botha, determined, to make
the best of a bad job, to make friends with the
conquerors and, by gaining their confidence, to
justify self-government. He had written-off the
Republican episode; it belonged to the past, and,
however painful it was, every good South
African should admit it. De la Rey was not quite
so definite in his views, but what he thought he
said with the utmost plainness. Nobody could
foresee what the future might bring. He agreed
with Botha that, for the time being, they must
make friends with the English, and secure the
best possible terms for the Boer nation.

As for de Wet, it is hard to fathom his
sentiments. The dedication of his new book
stood: "To my Fellow-Subjects of the British
Empire". Yet he was determined not to forget the
possibility of a revived Republic. That did not
necessarily mean treason or revolt; might there
not be a day when peaceful secession could be
carried out? Who might tell?

Persistence on the part of the newspapers was at
last rewarded by a little statement through the
Secretary. "The Generals", he said, "are much
impressed by the warmth of their reception in
England, and desire it to be made known that
they received every courtesy from the captain of
the Saxon, their voyage being made exceedingly
pleasant. They were also delighted with the vista
of green fields and trees which unfolded itself on
their journey from Southampton to Waterloo".
He added that their primary object was to collect
funds for the relief of distress in their nation, and
that many letters of welcome from prominent

men had awaited them. Among the latter may be
mentioned Mr. Lloyd George, Mr. Ramsay
MacDonald, Mr. W. T. Stead, the great editor of
the Review o f Reviews, Mr. C. P. Scott, editor
of the Manchester Guardian, and Mr. John
Singer Sargent, the great artist.

Sunday morning broke over London in pleasant
summer weather. A carriage drew up at Horrex's
Hotel to take the Generals back to Waterloo,
where a special train was to convey them to the
King who was at Cowes. This was the first time
that de Wet could look upon 'the city in comfort,
and his devout nature was pleased at the ringing
of bells and the large number of people on the
way to church.

H.M.S. Wildfire lay moored at the Ocean Quay,
Southampton, and by the gangway were Lord
Kitchener and Lord Roberts, the commander of
the vessel, and his officers. Everybody saluted
and the Boers bowed politely. Within a few
minutes the ship was steaming, beneath an

overcast sky, towards the Royal yacht Victoria
and Albert. In the distance lay Cowes, of
yachting fame, and the vast armada that was to
be reviewed. King Edward's intuitive tact was
evident from the start. With him were Queen
Alexandra and Princess Victoria. Before the
Boer leaders had all left the gangway, His
Majesty was already stepping forward to shake
hands with each of them, and introduced them to
his wife and sister. He spoke with cordiality "of
the gallantly and brave manner in which you
have fought those long and arduous campaigns",
and he also stressed the consideration and
kindness with which the Boers always treated the
British prisoners, particularly the wounded. "I
wish you the very best for the future", he told
them, "and I hope that you will have a chance of
a trip round the fleet". For a quarter of an hour
they talked; nobody touched on any political
theme and then, with another handshake, they
said goodbye.

By evening they were once more in London, and
despite all the secrecy, over 200 people waited
for them at No. 4 platform.

Botha and de la Rey told their pursuers: "His
Majesty received us very kindly. We are pleased
with our reception and thoroughly enjoyed the
journey". De Wet, however, only smiled, shook
his head and hailed a cab to go back to his hotel.

Heavy rain was falling on August 19, when the
Generals, hemmed in by another crowd, drove to
Fenchurch Street Station on their way to
Blackwall, where they caught the Batavier III for
Rotterdam. If they had been greeted with
cordiality in England, their welcome on the
continent might almost be described as frenzied.
In an "Appeal to the Civilised World" the three
generals announced the creation of a General
Boer Aid Fund, to be used to help the widows
and orphans, the wounded and the impoverished
left over from the war. "We ask for the hearty
collaboration of the existing committees in the

various countries of Europe and America. We
now are on the point of visiting these countries
for the purpose of properly organising the
collections." No sooner had they reached
Holland than the meetings began and
contributions flowed in from rich and poor.

The day after they landed at the Hague, de Wet,
in a voice broken with emotion, addressed the
crowd at an exhibition in aid of their cause. "The
artists and other persons", he said, "who
organised this display have contributed to the
growth of our nation. We South Africans were
on the road to development in art and industry,
till the legs were cut from under us. Now we
need help and support again ... The fact that we
feel so much at ease in Holland conclusively
proves that we are the descendants of the Dutch
people. Our hearts are too full to speak". For the
first time de Wet felt rather exhausted, and he let
a doctor examine him. He could find nothing
seriously wrong but exhaustion. "I cannot

understand it", said de Wet. "I have done nothing
special. All that I did on board was writing a
book, and I am still writing it". "Writing a
book!" exclaimed the doctor with a laugh. "As if
that wasn't work!" In spite of this Oom Krisjan
insisted on finishing the job, spending almost his
whole free time (such as it was) on the final
chapters. Reports had it that Botha and de la Rey
were to contribute a preface,- but this scheme
was not carried out. Publishers bid eagerly for
the right of handling the volume and translations
were to appear immediately in half a dozen
languages, America demanded its own edition at
the earliest possible date.

After rounds of meetings, through Holland and
Belgium, they returned to England on August 3 1 .
Precautions were taken to ensure privacy, and
the fact that it was raining when they arrived at
Tower Wharf prevented crowds from gathering.

"Generals Botha and de la Rey want it to be
distinctly understood that they do not wish to

grant interviews to any representatives of the
papers. They have no announcements to make to
the Press for the present."

From his home in Chelsea, Sargent sent word
that he would be glad to do a portrait of General
de Wet, as an illustration for his new book. The
experience of being sketched was not entirely
new to him, for Anton van Wouw, the
distinguished Dutch sculptor, had drawn him
once before, and the picture figures as a
frontispiece in a volume about the war issued in
Holland. As the great American artist had been
strongly pro-Boer, de Wet overcame his
repugnance to sitting still for hours on end.
Though Sargent at that time was charging up to
5,000 guineas for a picture, and though he
offered this one as a gift, Oom Krisjan did not
fail to debit the cost of his car-fares to his
subsistence allowance. The portrait itself is
perhaps the best ever done of a South African, a
strong, vigorous charcoal drawing, which has

become known all over the world in The Three
Years War.

The immediate cause of the generals' return to
London was a far more urgent one. Joseph
Chamberlain had just arrived back from
Birmingham, wearing his famous buttonhole,
and on the stroke of three, Lord Kitchener rang
the door-bell at No. 10, followed by Lord
Onslow, Under Secretary for Colonies, and Mr.
F. Graham of the South African Department of
the Colonial Office. In the presence of the
interpreter and the shorthand-writers the Boer
Generals took their last chance of fighting for the
betterment of their people. They spoke
eloquently and, at times, bitterly, at the
inadequate compensation offered. De Wet,
occasionally breaking into English, told
Chamberlain how martial law was keeping alive
hatred, not only in the former Republics, but in
the Cape Colony, and that the £3,000,000
mentioned in the Treaty of Vereeniging would

not nearly suffice to ease the most urgent needs
of rebuilding. Chamberlain listened politely,
made notes and promised to look into things, but
would not commit himself. The visitors felt
disappointed. Though General Botha had a
further interview next afternoon with
Chamberlain, no information was given to the
Press, until the official report came out.
Invitations were still being showered upon the
Boers, and gave the chance for long discussions
with W. T. Stead and with some of the Liberal
politicians. Gradually they gained the impression
that the Conservative cabinet might not last as
long as had been feared, and that perhaps self-
government for the Transvaal and Orange Free
State might be nearer than anyone imagined.

Back in Holland, de Wet for the first time took
note of the country. He expressed his amazement
at the intensive agriculture, practised behind the
dykes, and at the wonderful quality of the cattle.
The caps of the peasant women seemed strangely

familiar to the descendants of the Voortrekkers.
At The Hague, late in September, a cable was
waiting for him. His thirteen-year-old little boy
had passed away. For a little while he could
hardly remain master of himself. Then he put
aside his own heartache and resumed his daily
campaigns. At Brussels he astonished the public.
Arrangements had been made to let him see the
one sight thought to have a unique interest for
him as a soldier, the battlefield of Waterloo. "I
am not going to a place where England gained
renown by a great victory", said de Wet, and that
ended the matter.

Now the question of his visit to Germany loomed
up. Most of its people were glowingly pro-Boer,
yet the Kaiser's own attitude was hesitant.

He was in one of his rare pro-British moods
when discretion won the day. So, although the
hotel where they stayed in Berlin was
surrounded by multitudes, although the generals
laid wreaths on the tomb of Bismarck and

although they were shown over the Reichstag
building, the audience with the All-Highest
never came to pass. Instead, they proceeded to
Paris, where there was a further bout of visits, a
reception at the Foreign Office by M. Delcasse: a
visit to the Louvre and a round of theatres and
collections. "I will not again take up my rifle, as
I have signed the Treaty"; said de Wet, a
statement that had a queer flavour in view of
subsequent events. One pleasant incident
occurred in France. De Wet was able to secure a
reprieve for a young officer who had overstayed
his furlough; he had spent it fighting with the
Boers in South Africa. Invitations came for them
to attend the inauguration, in the old Huguenot
city of Nantes, of a monument to Colonel
Villebois-Mareuil, who had fallen while fighting
under de Wet in the Orange Free State, but time
was lacking.

On October 21 they were back in London. The
book had now gone off to the printers, and the

English publishers were rushing it through the
press in time for Christmas. During his last ten
days in London, de Wet saw a little more of
England, but refused to meet a single
newspaperman. Leaving Botha and de la Rey to
return later, he took ship once more on the Saxon
on November 1, accompanied by his friend
Wessels. "I enjoyed my visit", was all he would
say.

Collections from the trip reached £103,819, 12s,
lOd - not as much as had been hoped for.

Chapter 17
The Old Farm and the New Rulers

Midnight had struck by the clock in Kopjes
railway station. Across the Northern Free
State the winter gales whistled through the
bones of a handful of passengers waiting for
the Transvaal train. Emily Hobhouse put
away her fountain pen and dropped a letter
into the post box, just as the locomotive drew

in. This is what she had written to her aunt in
England, Lady Hobhouse:

De Wet's Farm, July 1, 1903.

"...I am actually staying with de Wet, having
arrived at the unpromising hour of 2.45 a.m.
Only one train in the day stops at Kopjes
station and that, when it is not too late, at 1
a.m. But it is usually late. It was a fine night.
The new moon had turned upon its back and
sunk into the veld before we left Kroonstad,
so there were only the stars to tell me when I
had got to the siding and to light us on our
drive across the country. Two young de Wets
came to meet me and I felt quite certain they
would be able to see in the dark, which
indeed they could. We slunk into the house
as quietly as we could and were very glad of
a warm bed after the cold drive. I am
shocked to see how thin General de Wet has
become, only a shadow of what he was in
London. This is partly owing to hard work,

he says, and also to a bad finger which for
seven months has caused him acute pain.
Now it is better and he is riding about his
farm on the white horse which carried him
through the war. The white horse was
captured once, having a lame leg at the time,
but it wisely ran away and came back to its
master. When the war ended, this horse and
his rifle were all the movable possessions de
Wet had in the world. He found his wife in
Vredefort camp, three hours distant (eighteen
miles) and brought them here and he told me
that then he himself climbed the kopje above
the homestead and sat down for the first time
to look at the heap of ruins spread beneath.
Houses, out-houses, kraals, wiped out - fruit
trees cut down, not a tree left - a desert all
round. Of all the money he had spent upon
the place only the great dam remained.

"Like all the other Burghers, de Wet is
laughing. If he did not, he says, he should

die. It gives him great fun. I do regret not
being quick enough to catch all the Dutch
proverbs which spice his conversation, nor
the humour which runs through all the family
talk - they talk so quickly. De Wet is quite
delightful in his own house, though, here as
elsewhere, he is seldom to be found. In the
evening one can catch him at last for a talk,
but not for long, as at 8.30 p.m. we all go to bed.
I think he is having a very hard pull this year.
The only help he has had was the comparatively
small advance-sum he got for his book and a
royally of 6d. on each volume-which has not yet
been paid to him. It was all he had to begin life
upon again.

"I am just finishing this before my midnight start
to catch the 1 a.m. train. I shall reach Heidelberg
tomorrow, having promised de Wet to attend
Botha's great 'Volks Vergadering' (gathering of
the people). At first I refused, but I was strongly
urged to go, as men from all over the country

will be there and they want to see me and I them,
and so hear of each different district ..."

De Wet's return to South Africa from England
had been more depressing in some ways than his
outward trip for, his book now finished, he had
nothing with which to occupy himself. All day
he would sit gazing on the endless waters of the
Atlantic, until at last he was back in sight of
Table Mountain. Friends were there to welcome
him, yet only when he was on the train for his
beloved Free State did his mood lift.

At the farm his wife was waiting and the builders
at work on a new homestead. Living for months
in a tent, de Wet complained that the fencing had
all been removed, and that the new government
wanted him to buy it back. Had it not been for
the returns from his book, which appeared in
English, French, Dutch, German and Russian, he
would never have recovered from his losses. He
presently sold the copyright out and out, rumour
said, for a sum of £10,000.

"Reconstruction" was the watchword of the day.
All around convoys of released prisoners of war
were on the move towards their homes. Cattle
were imported to re-stock the devastated farms.
The concentration camps stood empty. Schools
carried on under canvas. Some £30,000,000 had
been loaned by the British Government for the
Transvaal and Orange Free State, in addition to
the £3,000,000 which was a direct gift. Diehards
declared that it was not more than was needed.
Sir Hamilton Goold-Adams, a fine type of
British officer, who had administered
Bechuanaland before the war, was now
Lieutenant-Governor at Bloemfontein, but
Milner had the last word in ruling the former
Republics - a bitter pill for de Wet.

Substantial progress was, however, made. Even
before the signing of peace, in July, 1901, a
Department of Agriculture had been formed,
farming experts' imported, and near Thaba Nchu,
the scene of one of de Wet's battles, a great

plantation laid out. Teachers arrived from
Britain: because they taught in English the
demand went forth to start Dutch schools, if need
be with the subscriptions of the Boers
themselves: Relief works for unemployed were
organised under Lieutenant H. O. Armstrong,
of the Royal Engineers. The Repatriation
Department secured assistance from leading
Free-Staters, including de Wet and Joseph
Chamberlain himself came to South Africa.
The General never met him, but his brother
Piet was a member of the deputation that
pleaded for a more generous disbursement than
the £3,000,000 free gift.

Meetings of protest took place in both new
colonies and Christiaan de Wet was among the
most energetic speakers. Bit by bit they began
to have their way, though the General presently
realised that, until a change in the ministry of
England occurred, he could not see self-
government for his country. All the leaders

took a hand: they established the Urangia
Union in the Orange River Colony, asked for
mother-tongue tuition in the schools, for self-
government, for more railways, and more
assistance to the farmers. As a preliminary the
Government in 1904 established a Legislative
Council, only partly elected, yet a step in the
right direction.

In the midst of all this ferment came a cable
from overseas. President Kruger had
peacefully passed away at his villa in Clarens,
Switzerland. It was July 14, 1904. If anything
marked the end of an epoch in South Africa, it
was surely the farewell of this old warrior. For
months the preparations for his burial
proceeded and when, on Dingaan's Day,
December 16, 1904, the State Funeral wended
its way through Pretoria, it seemed as if the
Republics were back. Everywhere flew the
"Vierkleur". On Church Square General de
Wet addressed the crowds that had come in

tens of thousands from the utmost corners of
the land, old and young, men and women, all
with the memory of the recent conflict fresh
upon them.

"Brothers and friends", he began, "we all feel
that we are living through a solemn moment
to-day. I feel quite incapable of speaking of
such a man as President Kruger, for my tongue
is too clumsy. Yet I am doubly thankful to
have the honour to say a few words on this
occasion, thankful to be able to bring to you
the sincere sympathy of the people across the
Orange River, a nation that still maintains the
same attitude as in the past, which feels with
you today and which wishes to join you in
paying the last honours to President Kruger.
We yonder are grateful and proud that such a
great son of Africa has lived. Need I enter
upon the deeds which he accomplished? No!
For I would not be able to do justice to them.
We can only do what President Kruger

accomplished if, like him, we remain faithful
unto death. Such a man as President Kruger
and his deeds will speak. They live - indeed
only now do they begin to live - for us, if we
really want to appreciate what God gave us in
him and to assess him at his true value. The
Afrikaner Nation must not forget the past. We
cannot be loyal subjects if we cannot keep the
past before us.

Woe to him who fails to keep this in mind. The
Afrikaner Nation is; built upon its history. Woe
unto him who will disturb the building of this
Afrikaner Nation. I say 'Woe unto him', and
God says so too. Dear Brothers, I hope we
understand each other well, for misunderstanding
is the cause of our misery." Here the audience,
despite the solemnity of the occasion, cheered
loudly. De Wet went on to urge the crowd that
stood bareheaded before him in the sunshine, to
remember Paul Kruger, who had paved the way
for the Nation, and to allow those who had

thrown in their lot with the Afrikaner Nation to
join in the work. "Think of Paul Kruger", he
called out. "He has made a Nation, a Nation the
history of which has hardly begun ... Our duty is
to carry on the battle in the future."

The body of the old President was lowered into
its grave, the crowds returned to their homes and
de Wet to his farm. He was among his cattle and
his sheep, as though there had never been a war.
He proudly showed visitors his famous white
horse, "Fleur", which had carried him through
shot and shell and which in all its thousands of
miles of travelling had only stumbled once, and
that after fearful hardships on the veld. "Fleur"
lived until 1907 and his passing was recorded
like that of a public man.

With the beginning of the Crown Colony
Government, the Orangia Union grew more
influential than ever. In July 1905 de Wet,
Hertzog and Wessels met Sir Hamilton Goold-
Adams to discuss reforms in education. The

Lieutenant-Governor agreed to recommend that
the "Christian National" schools, which had been
started by the Boers, should be amalgamated
with those of the State, so as to provide adequate
Bible teaching. Other signs of change were
evident. Lord Milner's term of office ended in
April 1905 and in December the resignation of
the Conservative government in England was
handed in by Mr. Arthur Balfour. Commissions
visited South Africa, and early in 1906 General
Hertzog declared that the country was on the eve
of a new era. "I have hitherto been silent", said
de Wet at a meeting in Heilbron on February 19,
"because of the intolerable humiliation entailed
in bowing my knee to Mr. Balfour and to Mr.
Chamberlain. I hope that God will forgive
England for the iniquities which Mr. Balfour and
Mr. Chamberlain have caused them to commit.
But England now has a government whose
principal members have always been fair and
even friendly to the Boers. Therefore the Boers
should, as a matter of honour, suspend all

agitation for Responsible Government for at least
six weeks and give the Liberals a chance of
doing justice to the Boers without being pestered
to do so."

Curiously enough the Orangia Union was not in
favour of the English Cabinet system. At a
meeting in Bloemfontein it was proposed that
there should be an executive of three elected
members, and three nominated by the Imperial
Government. De Wet was in his element. He
stumped the country and on April 22 we find
him in the village of Vredefort, giving his views
afresh: "Although it has leaked out that the
Constitution of the Orange River Colony has
been decided upon, our leaders must be ready to
supply all information. I entirely agree with the
proposed articles drafted by the Committee ... If
the Liberals do not grant us government on the
lines which Lord Milner and Lord Kitchener had
faithfully promised, the Boers will accept
nothing less. There is no necessity to establish a

branch of the Orangia Union, as we have not two
parties. We have not to fight De Beers and
Capital, as the Cape and the Transvaal do. I urge
unity in reinstating our model government. It is a
great curse that the English political parties are
always flying at each other's throats. There is no
racialism in this country", he declared at
Bloemfontein, "The Dutch will show the same
loyalty to the British flag as they once did in the
old Orange Free State." Before the year ended
the first Parliament assembled at the old
Raadzaal in Bloemfontein. There was a guard of
honour of British regiments, but the mass of the
thousands of people who thronged the building
spoke Afrikaans. On November 27, 1907
Christiaan de Wet was sworn-in by the Chief
Justice, Sir Andries Maasdorp, as Minister of
Agriculture in the Cabinet of Mr. Abraham
Fischer. "I swear", he said, "loyalty to His
Majesty the King, his heirs and successors, to
serve His Majesty well and truly in the office to
which I have been appointed, to advise His

Excellency the Governor to the best of my
discretion, for the good of the King's honour,
without partiality, through affection, doubt or
dread, to keep the Executive Council secrets, to
avoid corruption and to help in the execution of
whatever shall be resolved, to withstand all
persons who would attempt the contrary, and to
observe, keep and do that which as a member of
the Executive Council, I ought to do."

Typewriters rattled, telephones rang and janitors
in uniforms prowled down passages, guiding
strangers watching those new-fangled motor-cars
in Maitland Street, Bloemfontein. Behind a large
desk in his own sanctum sat Christiaan de Wet,
now Minister of Agriculture for the Orange
River Colony. For the first time in his life he was
an office worker, taking the train every morning
from Kaal spruit and bringing home wads of
papers to read through overnight. Secretaries and
messengers attended to his wants. "But", said he,
"it is a tied-down kind of life, to which I am not

accustomed". Still Oom Krisjan was not a bad
Minister. He was excellent at receiving
deputations, and at understanding the grievances
- not a few - of his farming friends. Many of
them called him "Oom Krisjan" as a matter of
course, and there was the inevitable hand-
shaking as the long-beards of the veld came into
his room. Often they talked about a hundred
different subjects before getting to the point.
Since de Wet was a Boer himself he had the
necessary patience, and would ring for cups of
coffee, in a manner reminiscent of President
Kruger and President Steyn. In the afternoon he
walked down to the Raadzaal in order to answer
questions or to deliver addresses on the activities
of his department. Englishmen, such as Sir John
Fraser, were now working with him every day
and they all got on well together.

His lack of experience in administration was
soon made good and, for all his conservatism,
the list of measures which he put through

Parliament was impressive, and contributed
substantially to the prosperity of the Colony. One
of the best was an Act prohibiting the export of
Angora goats, whose wool is the product known
as "mohair". Save for Turkey, only South Africa
can rear this animal, and it was for the purpose
of strengthening the control of an important
industry that the law was adopted. Similar steps
were taken to preserve a local monopoly when
the Ostrich Export Prohibition Act was placed on
the Statute Book. Even though the Cape was the
main producer, the Orange Free State wished to
support its sister colony against overseas rivals.
Improved facilities for land settlement were
provided in the Crown Lands Disposal Act and
in the Irrigation Settlement Act, while the
foundation for self-help among the farmers was
laid by the Agricultural Society Act of 1907, the
Central Agricultural Act and the Co-operative
Agricultural Societies Act of 1910. Invasions
such as those which had afflicted Australia
through the introduction of rabbits were

forestalled by the Exotic Animals Act of 1909,
and his conversion to new ideas caused the
whole basis of sheep-farming to be
revolutionised through the new Scab Acts.
Similar benefits were conferred on the cattle
farmers through the East Coast Fever
Amendment Act which gave adequate powers to
Government inspectors; while the veld was
safeguarded with the aid of laws restricting the
burning of grass and the spread of noxious
weeds. Finally General de Wet was responsible
for providing financial facilities for progressive
farmers with the aid of his Land and Agricultural
Loan Fund Act.

Railways were again a vital issue, and de Wet
was responsible for getting a line extended to
Rouxville and another to Ladybrand. Though not
regarded as an outstanding orator in Parliament,
which was presided over with decorum and
ability by the Speaker, Mr. Marais, he was

admired for his courteous manner and impressive
mode of address.

At frequent intervals he would tour the
countryside, where he was almost as popular in
the newly-established British settlement at West-
minster, founded by Lord Milner and the Duke
of Westminster, as in his own district. He called
many of the Englishmen by their Christian
names. Occasionally he would have his train
halted out in the veld, to revisit some farms in
which he was interested. In the district of
Clocolan he laid out great orchards which are
still flourishing. Pedigree sheep were introduced
for the first time in the Orange River Colony
under his regime, while the predominance today
of Friesland cattle is mainly due to him. Roads,
dams and other improvements were provided on
a scale never before seen. Sometimes he spent
two or three days on a farm and gave audience to
Boer and Briton, listening attentively to what
they all had to say. Not that he would always

agree to their schemes, but his pleasantly
humorous manner reconciled many a man to his
refusal.

He was very gratified when his motion to pay a
pension to ex-President Reitz was adopted
without opposition. In his office the General was
accustomed to shaking hands even with his
juniors and, after laying down his post, he went
round the Government buildings, saying
goodbye to everybody, even the messengers.

The more friendly spirit that was over South
Africa showed itself in other ways. It was
recognised that the Inter-Colonial Council;
formed to adjust the anomalies of four different
states, was only a stopgap. Lord Selborne, that
wise and popular English statesman, prepared a
memorandum for the Imperial Government,
which expressed the feelings of the majority that
Union in some form was essential. Societies
sprang up to encourage the great ideal, at which
both Kruger and Rhodes had aimed, each in his

own way. At Heilbron, on March 5, 1908, de
Wet told his countrymen what he thought about
the fatal tariff rivalry. "Colony must not protect
against Colony, but must co-operate. South
Africa can only become great under one
Government." And so, when later that year a
National Convention was called to frame a basis
for a Union and (if all went well) to draft a
constitution, Christiaan de Wet joined Abraham
Fischer, General Hertzog and President Steyn as
a delegate in the task of building a new nation.

Scarcely six years had passed since the Treaty of
Vereeniging and what miracles had happened in
that time! At noon on October 12, 1908, the
delegates of the South African National
Convention gathered in the City Hall at Durban.
It seemed as though the millennium had come,
when Dr. Jameson, who had organised the
Jameson Raid on the Transvaal in 1895, could
write to his brother Sam: "Funny that my main
pals to get things done are Botha, Steyn and,

perhaps, Christiaan de Wet", while the Speaker
of the Cape House of Assembly, Sir James
Tennant Molteno, recalled: "General Christiaan
de Wet became a special friend of mine and I
spent a memorable day with him visiting Port
Shepstone, the Umzimkulu River and the South
Coast". And it was de Wet who, in November,
1908, refused to transact business because it was
the birthday of King Edward VII! This is not the
place for describing the long debates that led up
to drafting the Act of Union. No reporters were
allowed to be present and the minutes give but
an inadequate account of the historic gatherings.
Those surviving show, however, that Christiaan
de Wet's part was a progressive and helpful one.
The General was in favour of calling the Upper
House the Senate, instead of the Legislative
Council, a scheme that was accepted, and would
have preferred the American "House of
Representatives" to the "House of Assembly".
His policy seemed to favour strengthening the
Upper House wherever possible. When Lord de

Villiers, presiding over the Convention,
proposed that the number of members of
Parliament be based on the number of white
male adults, de Wet qualified the definition with
the words "British Subjects", but he wanted
sailors and soldiers in the employ of the British
Government to be omitted.

On the vexed question of the Colour Bar he
hoped to remove the franchise granted to the
non-European voters at the Cape. Here he found
himself in the minority, as also when he opposed
the establishment of a sinking fund for the
National Debt. Generally speaking he favoured
extensive powers for the various provinces,
which were to replace the four existing colonies,
but not in such matters as Native Affairs. For the
benefit of backward districts he demanded the
construction of railways, even if they might not
be payable. He approved of compensating the
older colonial capitals for the loss of trade during
the centralisation of government. He was not in

favour of a minimum number of members of
Parliament for any Province, but advocated the
most extensive powers for the Court of Appeal.
As regards votes for women, de Wet objected to
the proposal to extend the franchise to them,
even though only at some future date. He was
not, on the whole, as active in the National Con-
vention work as in the Committees. Occasionally
adjournments took place, giving opportunities
for the representatives to expound to the public
their views on the progress of events. So it came
that at Parys on March 6, 1909, General de Wet
gave vent to his disappointment at the attitude of
the great leader of the Cape Dutch, J. H.
Hofmeyr, in not being sufficiently helpful to the
framers of the Constitution. He also declared that
the scheme (ultimately adopted) to let Parliament
meet at Cape Town while the Government
offices remained in Pretoria, would not prove
practicable for all time. Nearly fifty years have
passed since then, yet the old statesman's
forecast may still come true.

One dramatic incident happened while the
Convention was sitting at Cape Town. The
Mayor of Paarl invited the members to visit his
picturesque wine-growing town, with its
mountainous boulder, whose pearly surface gave
its name to the place. Through the heat the
delegates climbed to the top, 1,500 feet above
the sea. Valley opened behind valley and the
unending rows of fruit trees and grape-vines
spoke of the intensest cultivation in South
Africa. Here and there among the oaks were
stately houses with their scrolled gables, erected
by the early French and Dutch settlers. The main
street of Paarl, seven miles from end to end,
stretched down the floor of the valley, shaded by
hedges and trees. Dutch and English, they stood
on the top of the great Paarl Rock, talking softly
and thinking of the future. An old ship's cannon
had been loaded (relic of the days when the
Dutch East India Company ruled the land) and
someone asked de Wet to fire it. He struck a
match and stepped towards the touch-hole.

"Where", he roared, "is the man who is against
Union? Let him come here and stand before this
cannon, so that I can blow him away."

Chapter 18
Goodbye to General Botha

Beneath an umbrella, in streaming rain, stood
Christiaan de Wet, around him an eager throng
of old-fashioned farmers, clerks, railway
workmen, women, students and hundreds of
other Afrikaners from town and country. They
crowded the paths in Prince's Park, Pretoria, and
overflowed into the neighbouring streets - more
than 1,000 people - all hanging on the General's
words. He looked around with satisfaction as he
steadied himself on a chair upon the little
hillock. By his side stood a chubby-faced lawyer,
with a thick moustache, named Tielman Roos. A
Dutch Reformed minister, in his white tie and
black coat, had just finished saying a prayer
when Oom Krisjan began:

"I have travelled through the night", he said,
"and have caught cold, so my voice is not over-
strong. I feel proud at being on this platform,
although it is only a dungheap". At this sally,
which happened to be perfectly true, a roar of
laughter went up and he added: "I am proud, on
account of the circumstances. Men and people
are never uplifted until they have been debased. I
would rather stand among my own people on a
manure heap, than live in a palace among
strangers. No other group, we can claim, has
produced so many statesmen as Afrikanerdom in
the short period of its existence". De Wet praised
the Huguenot ancestors of the Boer nation and
complained that the party system was a curse to
the country. The jingoes were doing more harm
to the British Empire than they imagined. "I told
Lord Kitchener that when I laid down my arms",
he said. "I have kept my word. Now, let us stand
together". It was an extraordinary speech. He
condemned the pro-Government paper, Die

Volkstem, and said that he was going to see the
editor and stop his subscription.

"General Hertzog", he rambled on, "is a greater
British subject than many who have boasted of
being Britons. I have known General Hertzog
since 1891: he is a marvellous fellow: he has an
eye to the interests of the people. He is a man the
South African people need ... I have laid down
my weapons and am an honourable subject, but
my patriotism towards England does not mean
that I am taking off my coat and handing it to an
Englishman. It is all very well to say we have to
live side by side. It is true, but it does not mean
that we have to get under one blanket." When he
finished talking, the crowd surged up to De Wet
and chaired him. Then finding a horse 4 among

4 This horse, "Rooibok", was given to De Wet by
his good friend, Mr Harm Oost who, in his turn,
had received it as a present from the Transvaal
Farmers for agricultural organising work.

the dozens tied up in a neighbouring street, he
led the procession to General Hertzog's little
cottage nearby, below Meintjes Kop, in order to
bring him an ovation.

The Union of South Africa was two years old. It
was December, 1912. What had happened to the
man who had been so enthusiastic about the new
age heralded at the National Convention?
Perhaps he himself would find it hard to explain
his feelings, for the change had come over him
gradually. Multitudes expected that he would
become Minister of Agriculture in the
government of the new Dominion of which
General Botha was made Premier. De Wet, we
know from his personal friends, did not want the
post. He had had enough of office work during
that period at Bloemfontein under the Crown
Colony. Even when he was in the Cabinet he
tried to reduce to a minimum the period he spent
behind his desk. If he could not get away to his
farm he preferred travelling the various districts

of the Orange Free State. To show that there was
no ill-feeling, it was announced, in the New
Year's Honours for 1910, that General Christiaan
de Wet would permanently retain the title of
"Honourable" even after his Government ceased
to exist. Six months later, he was appointed to
the Council of Defence, the supreme advisory
body controlling the State's military affairs,
where his judgment was much appreciated. Yet
only by degrees did he feel himself urged to
return to the political fray. The former parties
were being dissolved, including the famous
Orangia Union, which had done so much to
secure self -government for the old colony, and
on November 24, 1911 he eloquently praised the
new spirit of friendship that was abroad. In his
view the policy of bilingualism, placing the
English and Dutch languages on an equal level,
was an ideal solution of the trouble. "Loyal and
absolute fulfilment of the compromise is
necessary", he said at Bloemfontein. "To this end
the British and Dutch must be as one, and the

Dutch must loyally meet their British fellow-
subjects".

Another year began, and the world learned that
harmony was not as universal as everyone
hoped. De Wet's old comrades-in-arms disagreed
with his friend General Hertzog about Empire
and international affairs. In a speech made in a
little hamlet called De Wildt - so small that it
could not be found on most maps - Hertzog
threw down the gauntlet. Its immediate cause
was the proposal to increase South Africa's grant
to the British Navy, a modest £50,000 a year.
Rumour had it that this was to be multiplied
many times over. General Hertzog declared
"South Africa should be governed by pure
Afrikaners ... We in South Africa have come to
realise that we have attained our manhood and
have resolved to manage our own affairs. When
the proper time comes South Africa will look
after its own interests first and those of the
Empire afterwards. All this clamouring for great

fleet contributions emanates from a few thousand
or ten thousand people who have axes to grind.
The main object is to keep the Dutch and English
separate."

That speech set up a storm throughout South
Africa, and was the beginning of what became
the Nationalist Party under General Hertzog.
Immediately de Wet came out as an enthusiastic
supporter of this point of view and when General
Botha took him to task in the Cabinet (for
General Hertzog was still the Minister of Justice)
Oom Krisjan decided that his path was clear. "I
am a great supporter of the Defence Act", he
remarked, "but if one of the eleven Apostles had
been requested to co-operate with Judas, what
would have been his reply?" When 1913 began
he was once again on trek, speaking in village
after village, both in the Orange Free State and in
the Transvaal to support the new slogan: "South
Africa First". General Botha decided to say
good-bye to Hertzog and to reconstruct his

cabinet without him. At Dewetsdorp, Oom
Krisjan declared darkly: "The recent crisis is the
result of a long pre-arranged plot among the
Ministers to seize the opportunity to get rid of
General Hertzog. General Botha, by one blow,
killed conciliation by words and promises to
increase contributions to the Navy." At Winburg
he told his audience that, if Botha would
reinstate Hertzog, he himself would return to the
Council of Defence, but the hint was never
taken: And so his campaign went on. "All lovers
of England", he told his friends at Kopjes, "do
not need to take money from ruined people for
the perfection of the Navy. We have too many
widows and orphans for that, and need railways
and other things to develop the country." His
reception in the Transvaal was less enthusiastic
than in his own province and at Potchefstroom a
meeting, lasting until two o'clock in the morning,
culminated in a vote of confidence in General
Botha. Still he hesitated to break with his old

friend. "Botha is dear to me", he said long
afterwards, "but my People are dearer still."

One of de Wet's most characteristic speeches
was delivered before an English audience at the
Scotia Hall in the working-class suburb of
Braamfontein, Johannesburg. They gave him a
cordial reception (except for one solitary
enthusiast, who was twice thrown out in
attempting to heckle). His friends could see the
General was worried. "I regret," he said, "that I
cannot speak both languages. Were I able to, I
would speak in English. Often it entered my
mind since this meeting is held at Johannesburg.
I regret the circumstances are not more
favourable. Whenever that thought enters my
mind I think that, out of what is apparently evil,
good may come to South Africa. It is only now
that we understand the Government is travelling
on two roads. I think if the Government does not
know how to keep on one road it must make
room for the party which can do so".

"We ought to invest our money in South Africa,
in order to protect our own harbours. The day is
far off when we can speak of a fleet of our own,
but let us do what we can. If I cannot buy a farm
I can start with a portion. The greatest fleet in the
world started from a small beginning and I am in
agreement with Canada and Australia because,
as long as we keep loyal, South Africa should be
left alone." De Wet expressed his sympathy with
the white working men and his anxiety about the
existence of a black vote at the Cape: "I want to
conclude with a hearty vote of thanks to
Johannesburg. Even in the Free State I have not
had a more respectful meeting, and there they are
excellent."

Strikes and labour troubles made the year 1913
troublous beyond measure. White miners on the
Witwatersrand demanded higher wages, the
situation got out of hand and the troops, as well
as the burghers, were called out. It was largely
this which enabled de Wet to gain such a hearing

among the English-speaking people on the
Goldfields. Men had been shot, and martial law
proclaimed before the annual congress of the
South African Party, of which de Wet and
Hertzog were still members, gathered in the
Hofmeyr Hall on Church Square, Cape Town.
The roll was called and the grave elders of South
Africa, Dutch and English, began to discuss the
policy of their United Party for the ensuing year.

General Botha spoke for over an hour,
explaining why it was necessary, in the light of
approaching threats to world peace, to support
the British Empire, and point by point he met the
indictments of his critics, explaining how
involved many questions were and how they
required statesmenship and compromise.

Hertzog returned to the charge in his reply, and
then de Wet, amid a silence, rose in his place and
declared: "Our Court of Appeal is the People.
There is a deadlock and it must be solved." He
moved that General Botha place a leadership of

the party in the hands of one whose standing and
honesty was respected by all South Africans -
ex-President Steyn, who should lead for the time
being with the power, if necessary, to find a new
Prime Minister. "I am interested", he said, "in all
people who have adopted South Africa as their
Fatherland, and I am not friends with others."

Flushing with anger, the Minister on the platform
waited. Mr. C. J. Krige, Speaker of the South
African Parliament, put forward another motion:
"That the Government be instructed to carry on."
By 131 votes to 90 this proposition was declared
carried. Everybody watched General Hertzog.
The reporters laid down their pencils. Slowly,
methodically, the General adjusted his gold
spectacles, and began to collect his papers. In
various parts of the hall other men did the same.
One of them was de Wet. As though by a signal,
they all rose. Hertzog stepped into the alley, and
in a body they walked towards the exit. For a
moment they stood hesitant at the doorway.

Someone was turning back. De Wet stepped
solemnly to the committee table. He waved his
hand and in a loud voice called out: "Goodbye".

Chapter 19
The Seer of Lichtenburg

Dreamy-eyed and bearded; an elderly farmer
sat on the front stoep of a homestead in the
Western Transvaal. All around lay flat empty
plains with occasional bushes and still more
occasional sheep. Yet the verandah was crowded
from end to end with other Backvelders, heavy
men in working clothes, who had come for miles
on their horses and in their pony traps through
the district of Lichtenburg.

Niklaas van Rensburg was talking in a high sing-
song voice, leaning back on his chair, his eyes
shut, his fingers running through his mop of
hair: "I see great trouble. I see the World on fire.
I see Great Bulls fighting in the sky - six or
seven of them I see in bloody combat. The Grey

Bull is winning. What are the Bulls?" The
farmers murmured to each other, as the seer
continued his trance. "The Red Bull", van
Rensburg went on, "is England, the Grey Bull is
Germany. Germany will beat England in a war."

Coffee was handed round in big cups by Oom
Niklaas's wife. Not a soul doubted that van
Rensburg told the truth. Did not all of them
know how; during the Boer War, he had foretold,
time and again, when the English were
approaching his commando? Had he not
frustrated ambushes by this means? Had he not
been so reliable that, when he said that their
laager was safe, sentries were never put out?
And what about that occasion, towards the end
of the campaign, when he forecast, in the
greatest detail, the circumstances in which peace
would be concluded'

Had he not warned against the industrial unrest
which affected the gold-fields and the rest of
South Africa? Wherever Oom Niklaas went

people came to hear him talk. He never charged
money for his advice, or tried to influence his
listeners. 5

5 Every fact referring to this astonishing figure is
officially confirmed by the Blue Book issued in
1915 by the Union Government. Amongst others
the two Supreme Court judges who prepared this
document said: "On many occasions he gave
proof positive of extraordinary powers of
provision, so men said and believed... . It is
certain that he had a great hold on thousands of
his people.... An extraordinary and apparently
quite an authentic vision, correctly foretelling
certain events leading to the conclusion of Peace,
established his reputation. His fame spread
through the land and everywhere strange tales
were told of his wonderful gift. ... Moreover, and
this was perhaps the secret of his continued
success - his visions were invariably symbolic
and mysterious. They possessed an adaptability

Among those who listened attentively and with
respect was a fine old warrior, whom we have
met before, General de la Rey. From time
immemorial, the Boers, like their fellow-
Calvinists, the Scots, had shown psychic gifts.
Niklaas van Rensburg was by no means unique,
but he was the most successful of his fraternity
and the one whose fate it was to play a vital part
in the history of his country. De la Rey himself
as a rule was exceedingly shrewd, though
inclined to be too outspoken.

On the Witwatersrand wage troubles of the
miners and other workers flared up afresh.
Instead of putting an end to the problem by its
sudden coup of deporting the Trades Union
leaders, the Government had caused such a

of character that was truly Delphic. Indeed his
hearers were compelled to put their own
interpretation upon his visions. The Seer seldom
pretended to understand them himself.

revulsion of feeling amongst masses of people,
not normally associated with class struggles, that
the young Labour Party suddenly became a
powerful force in the Transvaal.

President Steyn had spoken publicly of the risk
of war and so had many other prominent South
Africans, Christiaan de Wet included. General C.
F. Beyers, Commander of the Union Defence
Forces, went overseas in 1912. As he watched
the manoeuvres of the Kaiser, the suspicion
came upon him that the great armies, then
exercising, might very shortly be put to use.

That conference of the South African Party at
Cape Town, from which General de Wet had
walked out, along with General Hertzog, was a
sign of the times. Only a few days later de Wet
again appeared before the public.

A tall shaft of white marble, with the bronze
figures of two Boer women and a child at its
base, had been erected on a hill outside

Bloemfontein. "To our Mothers and dear
Children - Thy Will be done", was written on the
stone. From every part of South Africa gifts had
been collected for that memorial, to those who
had died in the concentration camps. An
Englishwoman was to have been the guest of
honour - Emily Hobhouse and, though her health
did not allow her to make the long trip from her
home, she sent a message which was read in the
presence of the leaders of the nation-President
Steyn, General Botha and many others.

Christiaan de Wet was one of those who sat
bareheaded in that blazing sunshine and spoke to
the greatest crowd that had ever gathered in the
Orange Free State. Heavy rain fell the day
before, and it was with reference to this that he
began: "When the storm raged yesterday, it made
me think of our beloved dead, who struggled
through such storms in the camp; to-day there is
an exceptional silence, and that raises another in
me - that our heroines, once in those storms, now

are dwelling in perfect peace. The people of
South Africa can be proud of such mothers and
children. I am not speaking so much to the men,
as to the women and children. A nation can only
be built up by the women, and it can only
become a nation if children are trained according
to the traditions of their ancestors. Is not the
Afrikaner Nation descended from the Huguenots,
who left their Fathers' land, Bible in hand, to
seek freedom of conscience in South Africa? The
freedom of the foundations of their traditions lay
in their worship, and from what I have heard,
and from what I know, it was genuine worship,
and not an imitation. Worship was the guiding
light of our women and children. This was plain
in the camps, for I often heard that the psalms of
the pious resounded there." Meditatively de Wet
asked whether the people had been true to
themselves in the last ten years. He expressed his
doubts, as he closed with a tribute to the dead.
Twenty thousand people caught his final words:
"Be faithful to your Nation and to your

Religion." Hundreds of women and not a few
men were in tears as the multitude dispersed.

Only twelve years had gone since peace had
been signed. In spite of self-government, in spite
of Union, the wounds were still raw. Not all the
sincerity of his beliefs nor his sense of honour
prevented de Wet soon afterwards from taking
up arms against the State and against the crown
to which he had sworn allegiance. It is necessary
to realise that his action was something more
than double-dealing. Born into every Boer is a
deep respect for the law, whether expressed
through his government, or through the words of
the Bible. "Render unto Caesar" is a maxim
which de Wet took very seriously. "Onderdanen"
- the Dutch word for "Subjects" - conveys the
relationship which the old-fashioned Afrikaners
feel towards the State. Democratic they have
been for centuries, and the frame of mind which
made them shake hands with their Presidents and
Commanding Officers, as they did with their

casual visitors, is no mere pose. Yet such a
representative Boer as Paul Kruger himself
emphasised the duty of an "Onderdaan" to the
state in which he lived. In fact it might almost be
said that this was at the root of the entire
difficulties with the Uitlanders.

Once de Wet had surrendered at Vereeniging he
acknowledged in all sincerity his common
allegiance with his English neighbours. The
dedication of his book, the swearing-in
ceremony when he joined the Ministry, the
respect for the King, which he had displayed
during the National Convention - all these were
genuine. An equally striking instance was
provided scarcely a year before he went into
rebellion. In June, 1913, another great mining
strike began at Johannesburg; there was
shooting; troops were called out, and then the
burgher commandos. Had de Wet, with his
grievances expressed at the Party congress fresh
upon him, sought an occasion to make mischief,

the opportunity was ideal. Instead both he and
General de la Rey formally offered their services
to the Government.

What, then was going on in Christiaan de Wet's
mind during the first half of 1914? He was
delighted to be free from official duties again,
and had moved into another district, to the farm
"Allandale", in the vicinity of Memel. In the
village he could often be seen sitting on the kerb,
surrounded by a set of war-time cronies, telling
stories which were not without a distinctly
Rabelaisian flavour. His cattle and his horses
took up plenty of his time, and his attachment to
his family was stronger than ever. Outwardly he
was an oldish man - he had just turned sixty -
spending his latter days in peace and
domesticity.

About this time an incident took place, which,
though unimportant in itself, was to bring a
serious aftermath. De Wet, like most of that
generation, was very strict with his native farm-

servants, being what is known as "kwaai", or
severe in matters of discipline. He administered a
thrashing to a labourer. A charge was laid
against him and Mr. Colin Fraser, the local
Resident Magistrate, found him guilty.
Considering that there had been provocation, and
that the offence was more or less technical, he
fined the General the nominal sum of five
shillings.

The drama of Serajevo was drawing near.
Occasionally lightning flashed in the diplomatic
world. "Dieser Sommerbringt Schicksal" - "This
Summer brings Fate" - wrote the famous German
journalist Maximilian Harden, with uncanny
prescience in January 1914. And in far-off
Africa, that long-bearded prophet, Niklaas van
Rensburg, was saying something similar. He had
followed up his parable of the Fighting Bulls
with a vision about his good friend, General de la
Rey. "I see the Number Fifteen on a dark cloud,
from which blood is flowing, and then General

de la Rey returning home without his hat. Behind
comes a carriage covered with flowers."

"I do not know what it means", he told enquirers.
"I think the figure means 1915 and I think the
flowers mean a great honour for the General."

Meanwhile General Hertzog was busy
organising his new party, the Nationalists.
Although the big strike was ended,
deportations had played into the hands of the
malcontents and an anti-Asiatic law had
produced a campaign of passive resistance
among the Indians, led by the future Mahatma
Ghandi. De Wet emerged from his farm to give
General Hertzog help at his meetings. The "Ou
Baas" (Old Master) had not lost his powers of
repartee. At Potchefstroom, while the crowd
was trying to howl him down, he stood quietly
on the platform until someone from the
audience called out: "Hertzog is talking
nonsense and we must pay for it." Very slowly
and deliberately De Wet drew out his purse

and said, "How much expense has Hertzog
incurred on your behalf? I will refund it."
Amid bellows of laughter, hundreds of
sixpences began to rain on to the platform from
supporters, until de Wet said, "I don't want to
sit with Judas." "Who is Judas?" cried a
heckler.

"Will you pay the cost of the court
proceedings?" Oom Krisjan demanded with an
immovable face.

He was worried about the international out-
look. Germany and England were two
countries with which he had sympathy, but
both were foreign to him. He might be a
British subject, but he was not an Englishman,
nor were thousands of other Boers.

Whatever may have been said of some of the
other rebels, not the slightest evidence shows
that de Wet had any communication with the
powers in the Reich ...

Thousands of miles across the sea an Austrian
Grand Duke and his wife were to pay a visit to
the newly-acquired territory of Bosnia. In a
Serbian arsenal a fanatical young student was
practising with a revolver. The stage was set
for Armageddon.

Chapter 20
General de la Rey Comes Home

Arthur George Sullivan, a miner employed
by one of the great Witwatersrand companies,
had come home from work to his little cottage
in the Johannesburg suburb of Regent's Park.
Sunset was near and after reading the war news
in the afternoon paper, walked out to look at
his fowl-run.

"Hands up!" shouted somebody close at hand.
He peered over the fence. A man with a
smoking revolver gazed down at another who lay
doubled up on the ground; it was Detective
Mynott, of Marshall Square, Police Head-

quarters. Before the astonished Sullivan could
move, another detective appeared, leaning over
the hedge. More shots rang out and the miner ran
for safety. A neighbour stepped out of the door-
way of a nearby cottage, holding a revolver:
"Now I tell you: get back or I will shoot you!"
roared the gunman. One moment later somebody
was cranking up a motor-car, and the Foster
Gang, which had been hunted by the police for
weeks past for bank robbery and murder, had
made another escape. Telephone bells rang in
every police station along the goldfields, every
main road received extra patrols and telegrams
were sent to the ends of the country, in case the
car should break through the cordon.

Police Constable Drury stood outside Christie's
Chemist Shop in the shabby district of
Fordsburg. Down the street he could hear other
police on beat, for extra men had been drafted
into the city to cope with this crime-wave. Upon

the plate glass windows of the closed shops there
fell the glare of two headlights.

"Halt!", he called, as loudly as he could, but the
car made straight for him and Drury leapt for his
life. He saw it disappearing-faster than ever in
the direction of Langlaagte and the open country.
Was that the Foster Gang? As he saw the car
flash down the endless lines of street-lamps, he
fired. Even the whip of the bullet did not seem to
stop its career. Then suddenly it slowed down
and began to turn. Surely it was not coming
back? It was!

"Are you going to stop this time?" asked the
constable.

A man in uniform looked out at him, a middle-
aged; bearded figure, familiar to South Africans
from the newspapers.

"I am General Beyers", he said. "This is General
de la Rey whom you have shot. I was taking him
to his farm".

Huddled on a seat lay a fine-looking old man
with blood trickling down his back. He was
dead. 6

A strange tale was revealed when the police
began to reconstruct the tragedy. The car came
from Pretoria, where General de la Rey had been
visiting General Beyers. The two men returned
together, intending to go via Potchefstroom to
the General's home district of Lichtenburg. On
reaching the outskirts of the Rand, they had been
challenged by a policeman in the suburb of
Orange Grove. Each time they met patrols they
evaded them. Then Fate appeared in the shape of
Constable Drury.

No one knew for sure why de la Rey was in such
a hurry. That General Beyers should be
distressed at the loss of his friend was only

6 On the same night Dr. Grace (brother of W. G.
Grace, the famous cricketer) was killed by
another police bullet at Springs.

natural, yet there seemed something more to it
than that, for when he reached the police station
and helped to lift out de la Rey's body he turned
to Major Douglas and said: "Here I am. What do
you want with me? What instructions have you
got for me from Pretoria?"

Only a few hours earlier General J. C. Smuts,
then Minister of Defence, received this letter
from the Commander of the Union's Permanent
Force:

"Honourable Sir,

You are aware that during the month of August
last I told you and General Botha, by word of
mouth, that I disapproved of the sending of
commandos to German South-West Africa for
the purpose of conquering that territory. I was on
the point of resigning, but, hearing that
Parliament was to be called together, I decided to
wait, hoping that a way out of the difficulty
would be found. To my utmost surprise,

however, Parliament confirmed the resolution
adopted by the Government - namely, to conquer
German South-West Africa without any
provocation towards the Union from the
Germans..."

Beyers then reviewed unforgotten grievances of
the Boers from the time of the South African
War, and challenged the authority of Parliament
to use the Defence Force outside the boundaries
of the country:

"For the reasons enumerated above I feel
constrained to resign my post as Commandant-
General, as also my commissioned rank."

General Smuts's letter in reply was written four
days later, by which time General Beyers had
ceased to be an officer in the service of the King:

"... The circumstances under which that
resignation took place and the terms in which
you endeavour to justify your action tend to
leave a very painful impression. It is true that it

was known to me that you entertained objections
against the war operations in German South-
West Africa, but I never received the impression
that you would resign. On the contrary, all the
information in possession of the Government
was communicated to you, all plans were
discussed with you, and your advice was
followed to a large extent.

"The principal officers were appointed with your
concurrence and the plan of operations, which is
now being followed, is largely the one
recommended by yourself at a conference of
officers ..."

With biting sarcasm Smuts dealt with the various
political arguments that Beyers had used. "You
forgot to mention", said the minister, "that since
the South African War the British gave the
people of South Africa entire freedom, under a
Constitution which makes it possible for us to
realise our national ideals along our own lines
and which, for instance, allows you to write with

impunity a letter for which you would, without
doubt, in the German Empire, be liable to the
extreme penalty..." "Your resignation is hereby
accepted ..."

Christiaan de Wet was at his farm when, on
Wednesday afternoon, September 16th, 1914, a
native messenger hurried in from the telegraph
office, telling him what had happened at
Fordsburg.

"Good God"! cried the old soldier, rearing up
with sorrow and pain, as though he had been
wounded, "Pack my things". He must hurry to
Lichtenburg, to be present when his old friend
was laid to rest. To show that there was no
political ill-feeling, they had asked him to speak
and General Botha, now Prime Minister, had
also accepted the request. Within half an hour he
was on his horse, making for the nearest railway
siding. There is something curious about the fact
that it was Ingogo, near those very Heights on

which he first had fought in the Boer War of
1880.

Thus the old Boer Delegation to England
reassembled, but in what circumstances! All four
provinces of the Union seethed with tales and
rumours. Why had General de la Rey left the
very session of Parliament which decided to
invade German South-West Africa? Did he feel
the approach of grave trouble to his beloved
country? Why had he rushed through
Johannesburg, without stopping? Above all, why
had he been in touch with Beyers, of whom it
was now said that he had already planned an
"armed protest" against the South-West
expedition at the annual training camp at
Potchefstroom? Van Rensburg had seen the
Number Fifteen; great things were to happen on
that day. Nothing had occurred on August 15th,
but on September 15 th ? Subsequently General
Hertzog recalled that he had been present early
in August when de Wet said to Colonel Nussey:

"If the Germans come and take us, you go and
shoot them, but if you lend yourself to an attack
on German South- West Africa, I never want to
see you again."

So rapidly had events moved that it was hard to
remember that, less than a week before poor De
la Rey met his end, had Parliament assembled
for the first time since the outbreak of war.

During the big mine strike of 1914 the
Government had issued 60,000 rifles to the
Backvelders to suppress the unrest on the Rand.
Tales had since been told of secret commandos,
and complaints made that the farming
population, especially in the Orange Free State,
was by no means enthusiastic about an invasion
in South-West Africa. When General Botha
opened the debate in the House of Assembly he
moved:

"This House, duly recognising the obligation of
the Union as a portion of the British Empire,

respectfully requests His Excellency the
Governor-General to convey a humble address to
His Majesty the King, assuring him of loyal
support in bringing to a successful issue the
momentous conflict."

Sitting under the portraits of Queen Victoria and
the old Cape Governors, the same statesman who
had fought Britain for three years announced that
South Africa had agreed to take over all duties of
the Imperial garrison hitherto stationed in the
Union.

Always anxious to be moderate, even at such a
time, Botha added:

"We have in this country a large number of
German people who are British subjects and who
have always co-operated for the welfare and
prosperity of the country. I wish to impress upon
the House that we will not wage war upon
persons. Today we are to fight the German
Crown, which is responsible for this vindictive

war (loud cheers). "The British Government,
after having given them their Constitution, has
regarded them as a free People, as a sister-state.
We are free in South Africa, and on South Africa
depends her own future ..."

Despite the cheers which greeted this speech of
General Botha, the new Nationalist Party was by
no means discouraged. General Hertzog moved
an amendment:

"This House, while fully prepared to support any
measures necessary for the defence against any
attack on Union territory, is of opinion that any
action in the way of an attack on German
territory in South Africa, will be in conflict with
the interests of the Union."

As member of Parliament for Lichtenburg, de la
Rey abstained from taking part in this debate, but
Senator Munnik, an old friend of his, recorded
his remark: "Look here, old chap; German
South-West Africa is bound to come into the

melting pot at the end of the war, and I don't
think at this stage we should sacrifice the life of
one colonist for it, no matter of what
nationality." The government motion was carried
by 92 to 12, but the Backveld did not accept the
verdict. Among the farmers the tale went round
that de la Rey had not been shot by accident at
all. Even the fact that the Foster Gang was
finally run down failed to satisfy these doubters.
De la Rey, they declared, had been against the
South West expedition, and his influence had to
be removed. Though sensible men - even many
of the Opposition - acknowledged that it was
nonsense, the story survived. More forecasts by
van Rensburg were circulated. "The great hour
for liberating Afrikanerdom is at hand", he
declared.

The government had decreed a public funeral for
de la Rey and the Cabinet came up specially
from Cape Town to be present. Although
Lichtenburg had only 2,000 inhabitants, six

times as many strangers flocked into the little
churchyard. Parked against the line of single-
storeyed shops on the Market Square stood a
motor-car, over which flew the colours of the
Republican Transvaal and of the Orange Free
State. De Wet walked up to the driver of the car
and said: "Do not leave these flags there; they
will cause bad feeling." "Ou Baas", declared a
bystander, "it is the car in which the General was
shot. We want to keep the Vierkleur till the
burial is over." As they pointed out the bullet-
hole to him in the back of the car the General
shook his head: "It will cause trouble", he said.

The Prime Minister of the Union was one
speaker. Ex-General Beyers, late Commandant
of the Permanent Forces - an open opponent of
the administration - was another. The third was
Christiaan de Wet, perplexed, unhappy and
anxious to preserve the regard which even now
he admitted having for his comrade-in-arms,
Louis Botha. First Beyers spoke, indignantly

repudiating the allegation that he and de la Rey
had been, engaged in rebellion. Among the
bareheaded thousands that stood around there
was a visible start when this word was
mentioned in public for the first time. Botha
followed, eloquent and dignified, as men
expected him to be. He was so obviously moved
that his appearance told more than his words.

Then Christiaan de Wet began: "I have taken it
upon myself, he said, "to represent the Orange
Free State here, but I can assure all who are
gathered, that the words I now want to speak are
those of all Free Staters. When, during the last
war, I received news of General de la Rey from
time to time, it always gave me new courage, for
I knew that he was a man who loved his people,
and who often showed that he was ready to
sacrifice his life. But you who are present here,
his own people, know this better than I, for you
have fought with him. Although he is dead, he
lives in the hearts of all of you, and not alone in

your hearts. I assure you that he dwells in the
heart of every Free Stater". Next, De Wet
recalled the occasion when President Kruger had
told him: "Empty out the Vaal River!" "The Vaal
River is empty", he continued, "and it is not
possible for that stream to keep us apart. No
power exists that can break down the bond of our
Union ... Here we stand, by de la Rey's
graveside, and who does not feel what South
Africa has lost? None, however, can feel it as his
wife does, and how shall we comfort her? Only
Almighty God can do that. One thing, however,
we can do, and General de la Rey is worthy of it
- one of the bravest of the brave, one of the most
faithful of the faithful."

On this cryptic note the address ended, and the
coffin was lowered into the grave. For hours the
crowd filed past, tall men with broad-brimmed
hats, held in their gnarled hands; old women,
young girls, children. As the old prophet van
Rensburg had foretold, General De la Rey had

returned, "without his hat, and followed by a
wagon covered with flowers."

Chapter 21
Maritz's Treaty with Germany

On the desolate northern frontier of the
Cape, among the glistening granite hills of
Gordonia, stood a group of tents with picket
lines for horses - the annual training camp of
the burghers living in the district. From their
vast farms, some of them 40,000 or 50,000
acres, they had gathered to take part in the
military exercises. These were being carried
out under the command of Solomon
Gerhardus Maritz, with the nickname of
"Manie", a burly, whiskered, thick-set man in
khaki uniform. A veteran of the Boer War, he
had knocked about the world a good deal
since the Peace of Vereeniging. He had been
to Madagascar; had helped the Germans in
the war against insurgent Hereros from 1904-
6, and had come to the Orange Free State,

where he joined the police. In the very month
when the World War broke out, he received
his commission as "Lieutenant-Colonel in
Command of the Union Border Force" on the
recommendation of General Beyers, the
Commanding Officer at Pretoria. Now he
was in charge of the local units stationed at
the frontier village of Upington and at the
settlement of Kakamas. Both lay on the
banks of the Orange River, which, another
Nile, flows through a desert that blossoms
like the rose once it is irrigated.

According to the Government Blue Book,
since the conclusion of the Anglo-Boer war
Maritz had brooded over schemes for re-
establishing a Republic in South Africa. He
hoped to do so with German help, and had
apparently prepared for the day when
Germany and England should be at war with
each other.

On September 10, 1914, after the conflict
had begun, Maritz wired to General Beyers:
"I consider it very desirable that you should
come to address the burghers personally in
the two camps. If you are coming, telegraph
me when you will be here. Everything is still
quiet and in good order."

Beyers never arrived, for only a few days
later he handed in his resignation to General
Smuts. On September 23, when news came
that German soldiers had crossed the Union
frontier at Nakob, Defence Headquarters at
Pretoria sent Maritz the following telegram:
"Commandant General would like to see you
here Tuesday. If impossible for you then send
Joubert." Only two days later did Maritz
despatch a reply. He said there were 3,000
Germans at Ukamas alone and that most of
his men were not properly armed. "When I
was last in Pretoria", he continued, "I warned
you that the public will refuse to cross the

border and advance into German South-West
Africa, or, if Germans advance into the
Union owing to action of Government, they
will also refuse to move.

All my officers of the Active Citizen Force, as
well as the Defence Rifle Associations, have
unanimously resolved to resign as soon as I order
them to cross."

General Smuts read this and straight away sent
down Major B. Enslin to report on the position.

He found a very serious state of affairs: "Wire
me direct what action you propose taking re
Maritz. Wire enable me know how to act. Code
wire to Enslin will be delivered personally."

For days the correspondence with Pretoria
continued, Maritz showing himself more and
more plainly in his new role. Extra troops were
sent up from Durban and Cape Town to
Gordonia and he refused to come to Pretoria to
interview the Minister. October 2 brought

matters to a head. Maritz marched out of
Upington, across the blazing hot plains, towards
the German border and made contact with the
enemy, returning to issue orders not to fight
against them, but against the British. Among the
500 to 600 men who obeyed Maritz were a good
number who were merely bewildered by what
was happening, others who were in sympathy
and some fifty or sixty who openly supported
rebellion. Out in the desert, on October 9, the
perspiring soldiers were ordered to parade.
Corporal van der Merwe, a Loyalist, set down in
an affidavit what happened.

"Maritz got on a box and addressed us. He
started abusing Botha and Smuts and the
capitalists, and said we were being kept under by
them. He said that he did not want the land ruled
by Englishmen, Niggers and Jews. He said that if
ever there was a good time to take back South
Africa, now was the opportunity, because
circumstances now rendered it impossible for

England to land any men in South Africa. He
said that there was a wireless station up north in
German South-West Africa, and that he had
information from there that the Allies were
hopelessly beaten, and that there was now a good
chance of getting back the old flag over South
Africa, which, by hook or crook, would be
planted on Table Mountain."

The next sensation came when the Colonel
hoisted the Vierkleur, the old Republican
Transvaal Flag, and sent a loyalist officer, Major
Ben Bower, to the government, asking them,
inter alia, to let Generals de Wet, Hertzog,
Beyers, Kemp and Muller come and meet them,
so as to negotiate a settlement. To impress the
messenger he showed him German howitzers
and other equipment which he had received., and
the following remarkable document:

'Agreement made and entered into by and
between the Imperial Government of German
South West Africa, and representative of His

Imperial Majesty the Emperor of Germany, and
General S. G. Maritz, who is acting in the name
and on behalf of a number of officers and men,
who are prepared to declare the independence of
South Africa, that is to say:

1. The said General S. G. Maritz has declared
the independence South Africa and
commenced war against England.

2. The Governor of German South-West
Africa acknowledges all African forces which
operate against England as belligerent forces,
and they will, after further discussion, support
the war against England.

3. In the event of British South Africa being
declared independent, either partially or as a
whole, the Imperial Governor of German
South-West Africa will take all possible
measures to get the State or those States
acknowledged as such by the German Empire,

as soon as possible, and bring them under the
terms of the general conditions of peace.

4. In consideration of such assistance the
newly-formed State or States will have no
objection to the German Government taking
possession of Walfisch Bay and the islands
opposite German South West Africa.

5. The centre of the Orange River will in
future form the boundary between German
South-West Africa and the Cape Province.

6. The German Empire will have no objection
to the above-named States taking possession
of Delagoa Bay.

7. If the Rebellion fails, the Rebels who enter
German territory will be recognised as
German subjects, and be treated as such."

Exciting though they were, the rest of Maritz's
adventures need only be recounted here in so
far as they affect de Wet. He finally got away
to the Germans, and, after many wanderings,

reached neutral territory, where he found
safety, while his captives were released by
pursuing units of the Defence Force.

It would be hard to describe the sensation
which Maritz's insurrection caused in South
Africa, although the possibility of a rising had
been talked of for months. Rash conclusions
were immediately drawn. Enthusiasts, both
for and against the Government, lost sight of
the fact that, while there may have been
dissatisfaction in other quarters, these
outbursts were not necessarily links in a
common plan.

Stress has never been sufficiently laid upon
these circumstances in accounting for de
Wet's participation in the revolt. From his
Boer War days the old General knew Maritz
as a "bonnie fighter"; more recently he had
learned about the widespread objections to an
invasion of South West, but there has never
been evidence to show that he ever

collaborated with Maritz or even with
Beyers in so far as a Rebellion was
concerned. With Beyers his contacts were
much closer, and will be dealt with in due
course. Although Maritz sent word to him and
made use of his name, it was done mainly
because of de Wet's high prestige and coupled
with a vague knowledge that de Wet also was
against the South-West campaign.

Chapter 22
In Mr. Ferreira's Dining Room

Divinity books and heavy furniture
emphasised the clerical atmosphere of the
Ferreira's dining room in the little village of
Kopjes, Northern Orange Free State. A few
yards off was the fine Dutch Reformed
Church, and befitting the status of
"Dominee" (as a minister is generally termed
among the Boers) this home was a place of
substance and importance: Around the table,
talking in the deliberate fashion of the veld,

sat a group of men, well known in the
district, one of whom was General de Wet.
Like their Scottish fellow-Calvinists these
Afrikaners did things "decently and in
order", and only after Mr. Ferreira had said
prayers was Oom Krisjan formally elected to
the chair. De Wet had spoken in the Market
Square at Lichtenburg. "I think", he said, "of
our departed brother. We are accustomed to
speak of each burgher as a brother. If there is
anyone who is not my brother, let him go
out." Six people there the audience took the
hint and the General continued: "I see none
of us have gone away, and I assume that all
of us are brothers. If there are any step-
brothers, they too are welcome. But if there
is a traitor I remind him of Judas. The
Government has made the Germans our
enemy, and the fire is in the grass. Now we
must take a decision, but let us be sensible,
cool and collected. We must express the will
of the Nation. All who feel for right and

justice will join us, for the feeling of justice
is a characteristic of our Nation, though I do
not say this in order to boast of my Nation,
or to puff it up. I speak on behalf of my
Nation, and so that we may not sully
ourselves. They talk of our duties as citizens.
Well, we will be obedient, but even in doing
so, we shall not defile our country, and if any
wrong steps are taken, this will not stop us
from doing right: always, however, we must
speak cautiously and constitutionally. Be
careful and, quiet, for there are many in
South Africa as well as in other countries,
who will join us ..."

A great meeting had taken place at
Potchefstroom in the Lyric Hall where
General de Wet had been given a "rough
house". Rotten eggs and dead cats had been
thrown at him without disturbing his
equanimity. He had dealt scornfully with his
hecklers, who, it must be pointed out, were

by no means only Englishmen. The climax
came when somebody switched off the
electric light and the howling mob found
itself in darkness. The meeting was
continued in the open air, where the General
stood on a motor-car. "I am a good target
here", he cried. "You call this Civilisation",
he went on. "Perhaps you meet with that sort
of thing in your part, dear friends, but it is
not known among us. Although it may take a
long time, I hope that such a rough, uncouth
and uneducated class of people from other
parts will learn manners in South Africa...
Friends, remember we are not yet in Russia.
You who boo, go back to your Johannesburg.
That is your place, although there are also
decent Afrikaner Englishmen. That is your
place, I say... The Government proposes to
send volunteers to German South West; but
they are not all volunteers. Many children
were taken from their mothers in a rascally
manner." Here an egg was thrown and just

missed him, causing him to remark: "Listen
here, people, I have got another coat at
home". When the crowd began to sing "God
Save the King", he declared: "I am surprised
that you dare to drag the National Anthem in
the mud; I have much respect for it, but to
sing it in this fashion is a dishonour."

Moved by the real feelings of the Nation an
old Burgher turned to a British officer in the
crowd: "This", he said, "is a family affair
between us Afrikaners. You English must
keep out of it."

The crowd adapted a resolution, in which
"this meeting, having taken notice of the fact
that the Government has decided to take
German South West Africa, and has received
the authority of Parliament to do so, and
having already sent a portion of the Citizen
Forces to the border, and fighting having
taken place, nevertheless begs the
Government to take immediate steps to stop

all offensive warlike preparations, and to
withdraw the forces of the Union.

"And the meeting further politely requests the
Government for an answer before September
20, so that it may be put before a committee
of the People."

As the audience cheered, someone unfurled an
old Orange Free State flag, and held it up,
whereupon General Beyers shouted, from the
platform: "We don't want any of this nonsense
here." Christiaan had been appointed to the
Committee, along with General Beyers and
General Liebenberg. "The fire is in the grass",
de Wet had rightly said.

For the time being the South African
campaign against German South West Africa
was virtually suspended. In order to pacify the
excited Orange Free State, General Botha
announced that no compulsory levies would
be called up in that province-only volunteers.

This again gave rise to misunderstanding and
unfortunately a few overzealous officials
disregarded the instruction. .

As he got out of the train from Bloemfontein at
Kopjes, on October 12, de Wet first read the
correspondence between the Government and
Maritz, in which his own name was mentioned.
In the quiet Main Street, its single-storeyed
shops displaying ploughs and bags of flour on
their verandahs, he then encountered dozens of
his neighbours, while out the little Court House
Mr. Brill, the Justice of the Peace, stood reading
out the Martial Law Proclamation.

Now de Wet was sitting in the dining room of
Mr. Ferreira, talking to his friends about all
these events. He told them that, as Martial Law
had been proclaimed, they would not be able to
hold any more meetings of protest. He told
them that Maritz had refused to invade South
West Africa. "It is now my feeling that we must
help Maritz."

General Liebenberg, his Boer War companion,
who, as recently as the de la Rey funeral, had
violently attacked the Government, stood up in
surprise. "What?", he exclaimed, "I knew you
objected to invading South West Africa, but not
that rebellion was contemplated. And what
about General Hertzog? You all know that
General Hertzog is no warrior, but a lawyer. I
saw him yesterday. He is a man who can be
trusted in the dark. He is in his proper place.
We must have a man to fight in the political
sphere. Do not ask where Hertzog is; he will
always be found when wanted."

The remark that "Maritz must be helped", was
to have very grave results for de Wet. "It is a
pure lie", he said later on oath in court,
discussing this meeting, "that a conspiracy was
hatched against the King and Empire", and he
testified that only the previous day General
Hertzog had told him that he knew nothing of
Maritz's doings, save that he had refused to

cross the border, had resigned his commission,
and that his resignation had not been accepted.
"I intended", de Wet told them, "to continue my
meetings of protest, but Martial Law has
stopped me".

"Where is Beyers?" Liebenberg demanded. The
General had not come. "Let us send a
deputation to wait on General Botha", he went
on. In the end this proposal was agreed to.

Outside the doors a crowd was waiting when
the debate in the dining room came to an end.
Clapping and cheers greeted de Wet and his
friends. "What does it all mean, Oom Krisjan?"
they asked, anxiously referring to the Martial
Law proclamation. "It seems to me, Burghers,
as if there is a misunderstanding here. I have
not come to hold a meeting, merely to meet a
few friends to discuss some business, business
of true importance to all of us. That you are
interested is obvious from the fact that you are
here. Dark clouds are hanging over us, but give

us a little time and we hope that there will be
more light soon. Go back, all of you, to your
farms and plough your lands, for you see that
the rains are near at hand", and he pointed to the
sky, which threatened thunder in the south-
west. The men looked at one another.

Mr. Schalk W. Truter, Secretary of the Kopjes
School Board, said in court that he had seen
fear upon their faces, and that the General had
added: "We are all just waiting for the word."

In the minds of the deputation that caught the
Pretoria train at Kopjes that same afternoon
there was trouble and doubt. How easy it
would be for these negotiations to go wrong!
As citizens they had the right to interview the
Prime Minister. Most of them were men of
standing, and they knew that, even if Britain
had a war with Germany on her hands, there
was no question of her losing her hold on the
country. De Wet himself declared in court:
"Had the Union been attacked by the Germans,

I would have been the first to volunteer." Now
there was this question of Maritz. His
principles might be right, but was he justified
in taking up arms against his own country?

Strictly-speaking, de Wet did not consider
himself a member of the deputation, though he
went to the capital to maintain touch with them
at the house of the Rev. van Broekhuizen. Four
and a quarter hours, from 1 1:45 in the morning
to four in the afternoon, was the time they
spent with the Premier. Patiently Botha took
their points, explaining to them that there was
no question of reversing the decision of
Parliament, for after all those were the
representatives of the people and there could
be no arguing with them. The invasion of
South West Africa was taking place in
pursuance of law, and he could do nothing.
Again and again the discussion flared up, until,
half-despairingly, the Prime Minister said

when they left the room: "What do these
people want?"

According to allegations made afterwards, de
Wet spent his time in Mr. van Broekhuizen' s
house privately discussing matters with
General Beyers, but he himself declared on
oath that on this point the Government Blue
Book was at fault. The confusion principally
arose from the fact that he visited the house of
Mr. P. G. Beyers, the General's brother, and
when the crestfallen deputation returned, the
ex-Commander of the Union Forces joined
them. What happened on this occasion?
General Beyers was still more outspoken and
said that something must be done immediately.
De Wet agreed that a decisive moment had
come, the Government having refused to hear
any further representations. Although he was
accused later on of having told the people "to
go home and wait for a signal", he himself
denied this. But he certainly agreed that a

protest, armed if necessary, must be made. If it
led to fighting that would be unfortunate.
Beyers had his plans for the Transvaal - de
Wet felt that he must go back to his own home.
October 22 was fixed for a further meeting at
Kopjes, when he would speak his mind.
Outside the house, in the shady Pretoria street,
there waited the motor car of the Rev. van
Broekhuizen that was to take de Wet back to
his farm at Memel. Clouds of dust went up on
the rough Natal main road, winding across a
veld just beginning to turn green with the
approach of spring. Little towns and villages
passed by, well known to Christiaan for more
than forty years, from the days when he lived
near Heideilberg, and had fought the English in
the first Boer War. At Ingogo station there was
a little telegraph office. De Wet climbed out of
the car for a few minutes to send two wires.
One of them addressed to Commandant Meyer
of Kroonstad, the other to Commandant Meyer
of Kopjes. These brothers were in charge of

the military arrangements for their respective
districts. The messages were worded alike:
"Resign immediately."

Chapter 23
An Appeal from the Church

His Worship The Mayor of Parys was
present when another public meeting was held
in the grounds of a farmhouse near Rhenoster
River, about two miles outside Kopjes. Five
hundred excited farmers, their wives and
children, waited for the arrival of Christiaan de
Wet. The General looked worried and he came
later than had been expected.

"I have some important news to give the
people", said the Magistrate. "May I speak
first?" De Wet assented and the official said: "I
have permission to announce that the Union
Government will commandeer nobody for the
participation in the campaign against South-
west Africa." As the throng caught these

words a thrill of approval ran through it and
even the General broke into a smile.

De Wet had never expected such a large
crowd, for the real purpose had simply been to
assemble the same committee that had met at
Mr. Ferreira's house and to discuss the result of
its mission to Pretoria. Now however
everybody was expecting him to say something
and there were far more present than he had
hoped for. Someone thought that a resolution
ought to be taken, so the burghers solemnly
decided: "Whereas the Dutch South African
people in the Transvaal and Orange Free State
are oppressed, the meeting resolves to confide
all further measures to General Beyers in the
Transvaal, and to General de Wet in the
Orange Free State." Wild talk was bandied
about and it was noticed that a substantial
number of the audience had brought their
rifles. Heckling began about Maritz. Oom
Krisjan declared that, if it should appear that

he was concerned with German plans to invade
the Cape Colony, he would have nothing to do
with him.

"I will as little take part in a German attack on
the Cape as I would approve of the
Government sending an expedition into
German territory. I am the last one to wish to
introduce German rule in South Africa. I am
not a German nor an Englishman, but an
Afrikaner, and I only seek the good of my
People." "What should be done?" asked
everybody.

The General pointed out that most of them
were without arms, and it seemed to him that
the best thing would be to make contact with
Maritz in order to find out his real attitude.
This, however, did not appeal to the excited
audience. For once they would not listen to
Oom Krisjan. Phrases like "Passive
Resistance" and "Ultimatum to the
Government" were called out.

Ex-General Beyers had sent down an emissary,
partly to find out what the Orange Free State
Boers were thinking, and partly to bring a
message. "Here in the Transvaal everything is
in order, and the burghers are virtually under
arms."

"Wait a little longer", de Wet replied, "you will
know all in good time." Sixty mounted men
with guns waited to accompany him to a
meeting in Heilbron. It was plain that rebellion
was already beginning, although not yet where
de Wet was living.

The late Colonel Deneys Reitz, at that time an
attorney practising in the village, described
how, the morning of the day when the second
meeting at Kopjes took place: "A man came to
my office. Locking the door after him, he
stated that David van Coller, the District
Commandant, was coming that night with a
strong force to take the town on General de
Wet's behalf, and that I was to be shot in my

backyard. Having delivered himself of this at a
gulp, he unlocked the door and quickly
vanished." Immediately Colonel Reitz
telephoned to Pretoria, where his old friend,
General Smuts, was Minister of Defence, and
when Reitz suggested that he should collect
some volunteers to defend the town, Smuts
promptly forbade him to do so. He did not
want to give anyone the chance of saying that
the Government had created trouble.

Immediate efforts had been made by General
Botha to enlist the aid of the influential Dutch
Reformed Church, and on the day following
the proclamation of Martial Law the following
documents were distributed throughout the
land: "Dear Brethren, As we are convinced that
you realise, as we do, the gravity of the
position in which we are now placed, in
consequence of the dreadful war now raging in
Europe, and into which our Fatherland has
been drawn, we take the liberty to address the

following letter to you, trusting you will do
whatever lies in your power to save a portion
of our people from a most dangerous and rash
undertaking, which may plunge our Fatherland
into the greatest misery and wretchedness, and
which threatens our people with certain
destruction. From public speeches and from
other sources it is clear that there are persons
who hold that the time has come to make South
Africa independent of the British Empire, and
who would make use of a war in which the
Empire is engaged to make an attempt which
will cause a bloody civil war in our country,
and which can only terminate in the
destruction of those who take part therein. It is
needless to point out that such an undertaking
would be a faithless breach of the Treaty signed
at Vereeniging and a positive sin against God,
whose guiding hand we recognise in everything,
as also at this place of our history, or to remind
you of the incalculable calamities which are
likely to result, not only to the guilty, but to all

our people, who assuredly will have to pay the
penally of the crime committed by a portion
thereof . . .

"As sons of our country, who have at heart
whatever touches our national interests, we
must inevitably form our own opinion regarding
the great question of the day. As citizens of the
State we have a perfect right to do so; but we,
as ministers of the Gospel, should guard against
being drawn into party politics, whereby we
incur the danger of bringing into contempt the
dignity of our holy office, and to render
powerless, to some extent at least, the Gospel of
Salvation entrusted to us. Our place is not in the
midst of the strife, but on the mountain-top,
with Moses, Aaron, and Hur, where we lift up
Holy Hands without anger or discord, to plead
with the God of our Fathers for our country.
May the Lord grant us all grace in these
troublous times to abide in the secrecy of His

tent. May He have mercy on our beloved
country.

(Signed) A. I. Steytler, J. I. Marais, P. J. G. de
Vos, C. F. J. Muller, B. P. J. Marchand, D. S.
Botha, J. P. van Heenden, G. S. Malan, P. G. J.
Meiring.

Cape Town, October 13, 1914."

Simultaneously the Consistory passed a
resolution:

"This meeting professes its profound indigna-
tion at the treacherous conduct of Lieutenant-
Colonel Maritz. It views his actions as a base
violation of faith, which is calculated to place
our people in a bad light, and which will have
the most fatal consequences. The meeting,
therefore, desires to impress on all members of
the Church to act according to the spirit of the
above open letter, and to support the
Government in all possible ways to maintain
law and order. "

Chapter 24
President Steyn takes a Hand

President Marthinus Theunis Steyn was perhaps
the most honoured figure in Dutch
Afrikanerdom. Old, clever, moderate, with a
tact that had been tested both in war and peace,
and in the hammering out of the Union
Constitution, he counted chief among the elder
statesmen. A fighter who had kept the Orange
Free State in the field, until the very end at
Vereeniging, he enjoyed the regard of the
English as well as of his own people. His health
had been ruined as the result of hardships
suffered in the field, but even so his inscrutable
eyes, the bald head with the straggling beard,
mounted on a burly pair of shoulders, now
beginning to stoop with age, seemed a symbol
of sagacity to the nation.

As early as 1905 he had seen the coming of the
Great War. In 1911 he wrote to General Botha,
warning him that, if fighting broke out between

Britain and Germany, as seemed to him
inevitable, there might be serious trouble in
South Africa. With increasing alarm he now
saw and heard about the growing tension, and
of the insubordination of Maritz. "Onze Rust",
his beautiful home outside Bloemfontein, with
its shady garden and spacious verandahs, more
and more became the centre of negotiations
between the opposing sides.

Two days before the first meeting between de
Wet and his friends, General Botha sent the
following wire to his friend Steyn: "Regret to
have to inform you that Maritz has committed
treason, and has joined enemy with majority of
his officers and men. He has arrested those who
declined to join and sent them to German South
West Africa. He has with him a force of the
enemy near Kakamas, and yesterday sent the
Government an ultimatum in which he threatens
to invade Cape Province further, unless by ten
o'clock this morning it is agreed to allow

Generals de Wet, Hertzog, Beyers, Kemp and
Muller to meet him at his headquarters, to give
him instructions. Government has ignored
ultimatum, but taken strong steps to deal with
situation. For this purpose Martial Law is being
proclaimed tomorrow and burghers in certain
parts commandeered. You, of course, realise the
seriousness of the affair. A word from you will
go far. "

This message brought a quick response. It was
that of a man, honestly troubled as to how to
reconcile his duty to the State with his personal
convictions. His son, Dr. Colin Steyn, later a
Cabinet Minister in the Union, was entrusted
with the delivery of this important message: "I
have received a telegram, containing the serious
news about Maritz and his commando. I need
not tell you that I fully realise its serious
character, and also understand what the
consequences of it may be for our people. You
say a word from me can do much. It is just here

that difficulty comes in. Not that it is hard for
me to repudiate treason, or to condemn the
action of Maritz and his followers. That deed is
done, however, and whatever I might say or do,
it cannot be undone. Yet where I have to speak
a word to the people I must deal with the people
honourably and openly."

President Steyn admitted his own doubt about
the Government attitude to South West Africa.
"As far back as three years ago I warned you
against your policy, and on the outbreak of the
European War I again repeated that warning to
General Smuts. I regret that my well-meant
advice, which I regarded as in the interests of
South Africa and the Empire, has not been
followed. As a result of that policy a number of
officers and men, who as far as I know were
loyal, have become rebels. You will thus see
that a letter, written in that spirit, will not have
the desired effect, but, on the contrary, will do
more harm than good, and yet I cannot

intervene in this affair without making my
standpoint clear. I owe this to my people and to
myself. I am not yet strong; I am already feeling
the evil effects of the terrible times in which we
are living, and therefore I had hoped to be able
to remain outside the present conflict, quietly
and, wherever possible, exerting my influence
in the direction of moderating public feeling in
its excited condition. Even now I still feel that
this is the most effective course for me to
pursue. My position is not easy. It is with
difficulty that I can get about, and, so I cannot
go to the people. I cannot speak to them either,
as even in ordinary conversation I sometimes
find difficulty in speaking.

"An open letter to the effect detailed above is
undesirable. I understand your difficulty and
shall do nothing to render your task more
difficult still.

"I have written frankly, in order that you may
understand my position and also realise my

desire to remain outside the conflict at the
present time.

"I am sending Colin with this letter, so that he
may deliver it to you personally and inform you
fully as to my condition. If you have any
information that you wish to communicate you
may also do so through him.

"It is my heartfelt prayer that in these dark days
the needful strength and wisdom and above all
prudence may be vouchsafed you from on
High."

General Botha expressed his deep
disappointment at the letter in his reply. . .

"It is an abominable thing that Maritz has done.
A large number of unthinking young men, who
had been entrusted to his charge, who were in
one of the annual training camps, and whom we
should not even have employed in the attack
upon German South West Africa, have been
prevailed upon by him to commit the crime of

high treason. President: the misery and the
sorrow that may come upon our people in
consequence of this action are so awful that, in
my opinion, it is the sacred duty of every man
of influence in our country to do everything in
his power to keep the consequences within as
narrow limits as possible. At the same time,
President, if you cannot speak that word
otherwise than in the form you have indicated,
it is better to say nothing, because that would
not encourage our people to support the
authorities loyally in this crisis, but rather the
reverse."

Hard on the heels of this message came
another from General Smuts, who thought it
would be wise to keep secret any mediation, a
policy with which the President agreed.
Telegrams began to reach him from dozens of
places in the Cape, Transvaal and the Orange
Free State, all asking him to intervene. By the
time the meeting at Pretoria had taken place,

and the second meeting at Kopjes, the last
hopes of forestalling violence depended on
him.

The same day that de Wet was talking to his
friends at Kopjes, Botha sent an urgent letter to
the President: "I regret most deeply to have to
inform you that the Government is in
possession of information, which they can no
longer question, that preparations are being
made for a general armed insurrection amongst
our Boer population, and that Generals de Wet,
Beyers and Kemp, with others of our old
officers, are actively employed at the head of
this movement. I consider it imperative that
you should without delay, through your son
Colin and the reliable men, despatch a letter to
de Wet, Beyers and Kemp, and either summon
them to meet you, or in some other way turn
them from the path of destruction where they
now stand. If they come to you, the
Government will take steps not to arrest them

and will provide every facility for your
messengers. Do your best, President, to save
our people from this reproach, this indelible
dishonour. The position is more serious than
words can describe. What you do must be done
at once; an outbreak may now be expected
every day."

When he read this the old President sat for a
long time in his study, and then proceeded to
write three letters. The first of them was
addressed to the Prime Minister, assuring him
that he was asking de Wet, Beyers and Kemp
to visit him at "Onze Rust". He hesitated to
accept the allegations about de Wet.

"In a matter of this kind, General", he said,
"statesmanship is frequently of more effect
than force of argument. I cannot too strongly
recommend the policy of forbearance, not only
in the interest of your people, but in your own.
Once blood has been spilled, the time for
forbearance is past and, rightly or wrongly,

your colleagues will have to bear the reproach
that civil war, if not fraternal war, broke out."
He offered his son Colin to seek out de Wet,
and to deliver another letter to him. This is
what he wrote:

"October 23, 1914.
"General CR.de Wet,
Dear General and Friend,
From the letter of General Botha to me, which
Colin will read to you, you will understand the
purpose of my writing. I don't know whether
conditions in the Transvaal are as alarming as
General Botha writes, but I have no doubt as to
the truth thereof. I have written to him,
however, that I don't accept the reports about
you as correct. No harm, however, can be done
if you will come with Generals Beyers and
Kemp to 'Onze Rust', so that we can discuss
this very serious affair. You don't need to tell
me, for I know from our former conversations
how deeply you feel about civil war, if not war

between brothers. I also know that no one will
see such a thing happen with a heavier heart
than you. Please, however, arrange for a day to
be fixed by General Beyers at 'Onze Rust', so
that we can have a heart-to heart talk, to see
whether there is not an honourable way to
forestall threatening disaster. Please do. Matters
are urgent and don't let anything prevent you.
That Almighty God give us all his guidance in
these dark days is the urgent prayer of your
Afrikaner friend,

M. T. Steyn."'

Neither Beyers nor de Wet were fated ever to
come to that meeting at "Onze Rust". Dr. Colin
Steyn managed to locate the Transvaal er at a
place called Doornhoek, and Beyers said that he
would willingly go, provided de Wet could be
found. This, unfortunately, seemed impossible.
Neither Colin Steyn nor General Hertzog, who
also took up the task of tracing him, succeeded.
Commandos were formed in the Northern

Orange Free State, and they rode into the town
of Heilbron under the command of Rocco de
Villiers, a local attorney.

Why, then, did de Wet fail to meet President
Steyn? He was actually on his way to South
West Africa. "Look here'", he said to his friend,
Mr. Harm Oost, "General Beyers and I went
into this thing together; I am not going to
negotiate alone, for it looks as if I have left
General Beyers in the lurch. If General Beyers
still gets notice, he can come to the
Government, for I have full confidence in him,
but I have no right to demand such confidence
from him."

It was a tragedy of muddle and
mismanagement.

Beyers and de Wet had been planning
something, and on October 28 the secret was
out. Mr. Cecil Meintjes, of Lichtenburg, had
been to see General Beyers in the field, and

found that the latter had composed a document
which read:

" Steenbokfontein,
29 October, 1914.

"Notice is hereby given to all Burghers of the
Union, that, whereas the Government has
deprived the public of its right to protest
peaceably, by proclaiming Martial Law and
regulations, now, therefore, we continue to
protest, arms in hand, against so dangerous a
principle, which the Government desires to
carry out against the wish and will of the
nation, being convinced that our Nation
will be plunged into the greatest misery and
disaster, and that God's curse will fall on
us, if this resolution of the Government is
carried out.

"As our attitude of protest is not to shed
fraternal blood, but on the contrary, as
already proved, to avoid this where
possible and under no circumstances to

assume the offensive (aanvallenderwijze op
te treden). We in conclusion call upon all
Burghers to use their powers and influence
against the conquest of German South West
Africa, and at the same time to refuse to be
used by the Government to fight against us
with weapons, as our only object is the
honour of God and the welfare of people
and country.

(Signed) C. R. de Wet, C. V. Beyers,
Generals of the Protesting Burghers. "

Meanwhile, de Wet was back at his farm,
preparing to rejoin his commando. As one
of the men afterwards said in court: "The
General wanted to arrange everything
without firing a shot, or any bloodshed, but
still - a commando was a commando." All
his sons were present, including the
youngest, Hendrik, who was only
seventeen, and rather undersized. The
horses were brought out, and Mr. Oost

describes how the General turned to Mrs.
de Wet and said: "But, wife, Henkie
(Hendrik) is still so small, you can safely
keep him at home to look after you! There
are only women here."

"Man", she answered, "if your life is not too
good to sacrifice for your people, Henkie's
is not too good, either. Henkie must go
with you too." So all the sons went.

Chapter 25
The "Five Shilling" Rebellion

Vrede is a village of about 4,000 people, of
whom rather less than half are whites. It
lies in the north of the Orange Free State,
and after the evacuation of Bloemfontein
during the Boer War, served for a short
while as the capital of the old Republic. All
through the years anti-British feeling had
remained strong there and when a meeting
was announced on October 28, 1914 trouble

was expected. "De Wet is riding again";
like lightning the message went from farm
to farm and within a few hours
commandoes sprang to life. A strange,
muddled attitude still prevailed among the
insurgents. They spoke of a protest - of
arms in hand as distinct from a protest
where arms were actually used. What was
passing in the mind of de Wet is hard to
say, but that little-known "beroerte" or
apoplectic stroke which he had suffered not
long before, undoubtedly exercised an effect
upon him. "I am a hasty man" (ek is 'n haastige
man), he said afterwards, in court, and he could
offer no other excuse for one or two of the
ensuing incidents.

Sixty burghers had joined him on his farm on
October 26, merely, as he put it, "to give weight
to the protest". When his followers at
Damplaats proposed to raise the Republican
banner, he told them that it was too early. "We

are going to Maritz", were his own words as he
recounted them to the judges, "and when I meet
him I wish to convince my self that there is no
agreement with the Germans. If there is, we
shall return. Otherwise we will go to Pretoria
and see the Government, and if they will not
heed our protest, then we will hoist the
Republican flag." He pointed to a cart standing
near, where lay the colours of the defunct
Orange Free State. "The reason why we trekked
through the district", he told the Bench, "was to
gather people to go to Pretoria". Certainly he
succeeded in raising the countryside. At four
o'clock on Wednesday afternoon, October 28,
150 men on horseback, 100 of whom carried
rifles, clattered down the main street of Vrede,
in the wake of their old General. From every
part of the Province reports were coming in that
the Government's authority was defied.

Rebels were in charge at Heilbron, Harrismith,
Parys, Lindley, Bethlehem and Kroonstad.

Everybody knew that they were approaching
Vrede. By the roadside a young man waited - a
clerk in the local post office. As he beheld the
cavalcade he jumped on to his bicycle and
pedalled back furiously through the village, to
let the postmaster know how many burghers
were coming. Mr. Evans was beside his
telegraph instruments. Arthur Langton, a bank
clerk, was also standing by, when he was caught
up by the commando, who apparently mistook
him for the other youth. "De Wet asked me
certain questions", he said, in court, "and I
replied I did not know. Thereupon he called me
a liar, dismounted from his horse and struck me
with his whip. Then a revolver was held at my
head, and de Wet administered the whip, which
resembled a sjambok." Explaining this incident
de Wet declared on oath. "I gave young
Langton a few cuts because he did not answer
some questions. It did not hurt him, but it had
the effect of getting the Post Office open. I
wanted to see the latest wires and papers."

As the rebels were hammering at the front
entrance, trying to get in, the Postmaster tapped
out a message to Pretoria: soon enough the door
gave way, but they were too late to stop the
report. All the instruments were smashed, and
the telegraphist knocked about by the angry
invaders, though de Wet himself tried to hold
them back. In a tearing fury the General stood
in front of a local war memorial and ordered the
prisoners to be led before him. In his hand was
the dreaded sjambok. "Bring the magistrate to
me!", he shouted. The magistrate was the same
man who had sentenced him to a fine of five
shillings for assaulting a Native. Mr. Colin
Fraser sat in the court house, coolly awaiting
developments. Characteristic of South Africa
was the fact that when the would-be captors
walked into his office they first of all offered to
shake hands. They were greatly taken aback
when His Worship declined to exchange this
courtesy, and still more so when he refused to
attend on Oom Krisjan. Six men hurried down,

with instructions to fetch him by force if
necessary. Mr. Fraser said that in view of this
threat he would go.

An excited crowd of Vrede citizens stood in the
open air beside the monument. Temporarily
losing control of himself, de Wet addressed
some very offensive remarks to the magistrate,
about which even his friends afterwards could
only express surprise. As his old comrade, the
Rev. Dr. Kestell put it: "His inflammable nature
flared up so that unfortunately personal remarks
came into the address."

"Ladies and Gentlemen and Burghers", he said,
"I have asked you to come here to explain my
position". Turning towards Mr. Fraser, de Wet
continued: "Magistrate, I want you to get a
shorthand writer to take down every word that I
am going to say, because, whatever I may do in
the future, I can never commit a greater act of
rebellion than I have already committed. I am
going through to Maritz, where we will receive

arms and ammunition, and from there we are
going to Pretoria, to pull down the British flag
and proclaim a free South African Republic. All
those who side with me must follow me, and
those who side the Government must go with
them. I signed the Vereeniging Treaty and
swore to be faithful to the British flag." Here de
Wet put forth the extraordinary argument that as
the King had allowed a magistrate to be placed
over them "who is an absolute tyrant, he has
made it impossible for us to tolerate the
Government any longer. I was charged before
him for beating a native boy. I only did it with a
small shepherd's whip, and for that I was fined
five shillings."

Mr. Fraser still kept his nerve and, facing up to
the flashing eyes of the General, he said: "Did
you not plead guilty?"

"I did plead guilty", admitted de Wet, "but you
keep still until I have finished. If you won't hold
your tongue I will make you hold it. Moreover",

he continued, "after the magistrate had delivered
judgment, instead of reprimanding the boy and
ordering him in the future to be obedient and to
do his duty, he looked at the native as if he
would like to give him a kiss. The magistrate is
the brother-in-law of a man for whom I have the
greatest respect, and who is very dear to me
(president Steyn), and for that reason I will give
him another chance, otherwise I would have
taken him prisoner and handed him over to the
Germans. The magistrate's father was one of the
staunchest pillars of the church, and if he was
alive today he would be heart and soul with me
in this movement, and condemn the dastardly
act of robbery which the Government are going
to commit.

"The ungodly policy of Botha has gone on long
enough; and the South African Dutch are going
to stand as one man to crush this unholy
scandal. Some of my friends have advised me
to wait a little longer, until England has

received a bigger knock, but it is beneath me
and my people to kick a dead dog. England has
got her hands full enough. I hate the lies which
are constantly being spread to the effect that
thousands of Australians, Canadians and
Indians can be sent to fight us. Where will
England get them from? She has not enough
men to fight her own battles.

"I am going through the town to take the
following six articles, viz., horses, saddles,
bridles, halters, arms and ammunition, and if
anyone should refuse to hand to my men these
articles, if they should be found in their
possession, I will give him a thrashing with a
sjambok. I now order the storekeepers to go
and open their shops, and I will select men to
go round and take whatever I require, apart
from the above articles, and they will give
receipts for what they take, and if they will not
open their shops willingly I will open them in
another way.

"My advice to you English is to remain quiet in
your houses and not interfere with my men,
and if you don't, beware when I come back. I
have got my eight sons and sons-in-law here
with me, and the only people left on my farm
are my wife and daughter. Anyone can go and
see them if they like, and I request the
magistrate to give them any help they may
require if he will do so."

The old warrior's rage rose to boiling point but
quickly calmed down. Mr. Fraser was allowed
to go back to his office in peace, though the
police station was ransacked. The evening saw
de Wet, as he departed, naively instructing the
sergeant to carry on as usual, "for the rebels, if
they won, and for the Government if they were
successful." Rather an unexpected sequel was
that, immediately the commando departed, the
officer arrested a number of local hotheads,
who duly appeared before Mr. Fraser!

By now the Transvaal was also aflame:
Captain Jopie Fourie of the Permanent Defence
Force, had thrown in his lot with General
Beyers, and Pretoria itself was in danger of
being attacked by commandos that had sprung
up in the neighbouring districts. Louis Botha
had taken charge of the position - no longer as
Prime Minister - but as General. A small force
of 150 Natal Carbineers were the principal
protection of the capital but, when messengers
arrived under the white flag to treat for terms,
unconditional surrender was demanded.
Similar reports came from the Western
Transvaal, where Beyers took the lead, and
where a hide-and-seek game was in progress.
There was now no question of an expedition to
South West Africa; order must first be restored
in the Union. According to official figures, over
7,000 burghers took up arms for the Government
in the Orange Free State alone, a vastly greater
number than the 890 who had followed Maritz,

although the latter had the advantage of four
guns and 600 rounds of small ammunition.

Even at this juncture, however, it could be seen
how confused were the notions of the normally
law-abiding communities. When one of his
followers at Stormhoek spoke disparagingly of
Botha, de Wet immediately turned on him and
called him a low dog. At Vrede he left the Union
Jack, although he said that he was not sure
whether or not it had actually been flying when
he arrived. On reaching Heilbron he complained
that the British Flag had been taken down, and
openly deprecated such conduct. We may accept
as a fact the genuineness of his astonishment
when he learned that Botha was prepared to
fight.

Chapter 26
First Shots

Burghers who reached General de Wet's camp
on the Sand River in the Northern Orange Free

State felt as though the Boer War had returned.
There, before their eyes, was a commando as
they remembered it, with its horses, its camp
followers, and its free-and-easy attitude towards
superior officers. As in days of yore, most of the
commandants were elected. Rumours flew from
farm to farm and from laager to laager: some of
them were true; most of them were not. Among
the genuine reports was one that fighting had
taken place in the Transvaal, where General
Beyers' commando had encountered General
Botha's troops in the western districts. There had
been shooting and casualties on both sides. De
Wet feared the initiative had passed to the
Government, and his fiery temper blazed out;
already he had covered hundreds of miles, from
Vrede to Winburg and on through other little
towns of the neighbourhood. Senator Stuart, a
former Republican judge, was seized at Winburg
and brought before him.

Oom Krisjan looked round and fingering his
revolver said: "Are you here, too? I feel inclined
to shoot you where you stand." However, he did
nothing more than detain him with a number of
other Loyalists, including the local magistrate
and, after the next big engagement, they were
released.

Charles Woods, who had charge of a
Government ambulance at Winburg, was sent
for. "If you will attend to our wounded", de Wet
said, "I will guarantee your safely". This offer
was accepted.

The tide seemed to be running with Oom
Krisjan. Somewhere on the veld General Hertzog
came to him, anxious to arrange another meeting
with President Steyn. De Wet pointed to a paper
just received, with the news that Beyers had been
driven into the Bushveld. "They want to lure him
away from my people", he said, "so that they can
surround him". No argument would convince
him that this was not so. In court he told how he

sent out despatch riders to find Beyers, but that
he suspected a trap: Even when his good friend,
Dr. Colin Steyn, arrived, he failed to persuade
him to the contrary. Finally, he wrote a message
that, if General Beyers and General Kemp would
meet him, he would join them in a visit to ex-
President Steyn. Meanwhile he would assume a
tacit amnesty.

Among de Wet's luggage was one rather
suspicious object - a flag of the old Orange Free
State Republic. His wife had packed it for him in
his portmanteau, so he later told the judges - and
he claimed that, in pointing it out to his burghers,
he merely wanted to emphasise its historic
significance. Possibly this was true - de Wet was
a man of sentiment, but unfortunately the
interpretation that his followers and, still more,
his opponents placed upon the act was to provide
the final evidence that he wanted to start a
revolution.

Saturday, November 9, 1914, saw de Wet
approaching a kopje near Winburg, the
Doornberg, or "Thornhill", overlooking the same
Sand River railway-bridge which he had so
successfully attacked during the Boer War. His
commando was trotting through a gully towards
a homestead when they caught sight of a column
of wagons approaching the town. The dry bed of
the stream lay at their feet, with the Doornberg
rising sharply from the veld above it. About 600
horsemen could be distinguished at a distance of
about a third of a mile and, as nobody knew
whether they were friends or foes, de Wet
ordered his men to halt. Next minute bullets
were flying.

Reports on how the trouble started are
conflicting: de Wet's men claimed that the
Government fired first, but Commandant Cronje
placed the blame on the Rebels. At any rate it
was the first actual fighting in the Free State,
and, with his blood up, the General ordered his

men to charge the heights above. "I intended to
pass through without a collision", he said, "and I
never expected the troops to fire; in fact I gave
orders, that no one was to load ... I never
expected Frikkie Cronje to fire on me", he
added, with a catch in his voice, as he referred to
his one-time comrade. Still, he himself admitted
in court that he was not absolutely certain about
the facts. It was just one of the tragedies
foredoomed to happen now that events had
progressed so far. Eight or nine of the rebel
burghers lay dead, eleven of them were
wounded, twenty were taken prisoner. On the
Government side three were killed and six
wounded. As the firing died away and each
side drew off to attend to its casualties, the
General suddenly grew white. There, among
the dead, lay his own son, Danie.

"This is the first victim", he muttered, "now we
must go through to the end". It was a turning-
point in his life. Out on the veld they dug a

grave and the General, slightly bowed and
visibly older, himself delivered the address on
his boy. "There can only be peace", he said,
"when the Government has been overthrown."

With eyes ablaze he followed the retreating
Botha force, right through the main street of
Winburg. Here some of his followers got out
of hand and shop-looting took place. The most
dramatic incident, however, was connected
with the Union Jack which flew over the
Public Buildings. As the commandos
approached, three local women, Mrs. Zylstra,
wife of the Town Clerk, Mrs. W. Pienaar and
Miss van den Berg, lowered the flag and Mrs.
Pienaar, walking past the invaders, wrapped it
round her waist and challenged them to remove
it. They let her go unmolested, but the incident
caught the South African public's imagination.

No further hope remaining of a meeting with
President Steyn; General Smuts, as Minister of
Defence, refused to give General Beyers a pass

to meet General de Wet. Lindley was now
occupied and the station-master at Lovat
described how he saw the General with 1,500
men encamped beside the line. Several of them
commandeered gangers' tools, with the aid of
which they pulled up the rails for a distance of
100 yards, while the wires were cut on the
telegraph lines and the poles knocked down.
Once more the young bloods broke loose, and
started looting. De Wet undoubtedly did not
approve of this, but it is equally true that it
really happened.

Some days later General Botha had the
following announcement distributed through
the land:

"Pretoria, November 12, 1914.
"To all Citizens of the Union of South Africa:
"The Government, with a view to preventing
bloodshed, have spared no effort to avoid
internal strife, and have afforded ample
opportunity to those who have joined in the

Rebellion to lay down their arms and return to
their allegiance.

"In spite of these efforts a large number of
persons still continue forcibly to resist the
authority of the State, and now are actually
engaged in organising armed resistance to the
Government, are in conflict with the military
forces of the Union, and cause not only
considerable loss of life, but also great loss and
damage to the property of loyal and peaceable
citizens ...

" 1 . All persons in Rebellion on and after the date
hereof are hereby called upon to surrender
themselves voluntarily, with their arms and any
Government property which they possess, at the
office of the nearest Magistrate or Special or
Resident Justice of the Peace, or to any officer of
the South African Police or Union Defence
Forces; on or before Saturday, the 21st
November, 1914.

"2. All persons who do so surrender will not be
criminally prosecuted at the instance of the
Government, but will be allowed to return to
their homes and remain there, on condition they
take no further part in the Rebellion, give no
information or any other assistance whatever to
the Rebels, and do nothing or say nothing
whatever which is likely further to disturb the
peace or to prolong the Rebellion.

"3. This amnesty will not, however, apply to
persons who have taken a prominent or leading
part in the Rebellion, or who, while in Rebellion,
have committed acts in violation of the rules of
civilised warfare. The Government reserve their
authority to deal with these cases on their merits.

LOUIS BOTHA,

Prime Minister,

General Officer Commanding-in-Chief the

Union Defence Forces in the Field.

Twenty-seven thousand copies were issued in
Dutch, six thousand in English and eight
thousand in both languages. Fully half of the
Orange Free State was now involved, and a good
section of the Transvaal and Northern Cape.

Chapter 27
Escape at Mushroom Valley

General Botha's offer of an amnesty did not
pass unnoticed in the Western Transvaal, where
Mr. Cecil Meintjes, of Lichtenburg, as an
unofficial emissary, sought out General Beyers
and General Wolmarans had moved off. He
brought back the news that opposition to the
campaign in South West Africa would be
abandoned if it were carried out solely by
volunteers, and if there were an amnesty for all
the Rebels. Within a few hours, however, Beyers
was on the march again and there was every sign
that he proposed to continue his campaign. To
President Steyn's plea that a pass should be given

to Beyers, General Smuts sent a very plain
answer: -

"Had I expected any good result from interview I
should certainly have given Beyers a pass. He is
discouraged and depressed and de Wet is firmly
resolved and determined to proceed. The only
result of a meeting between them in your house
would be that de Wet would talk Beyers round.
We delayed active operations in Free State in
expectation of conference until at last de Wet
had 5,000 men in the field, until he was openly
saying in his speeches to his commandos that he
thought it strange that the Government should be
anxious to negotiate with Rebels, and until, after
temporising for a long time, he finally refused to
attend the conference. We could wait no longer
and unless de Wet is convinced by force I do not
believe he is more likely to listen to argument. It
is therefore in the highest interests of country
and people that we discharge our duty as a
Government".

Two statesmen, both well-meaning, were at
cross-purposes. Steyn thought that there should
be a certain amount of forgiveness on the part of
the Government, and trust in the good intentions
of the insurgents.

On the very day when these wires were passing
Botha met his old brother-in-arms on the field of
battle.

Mushroom Valley lies not far from the village of
Marquard and is surrounded by a circle of hills.
Leaving Pretoria, the Prime Minister - once
again a soldier and guerrilla fighter - placed
himself at the head of those commandos who
still believed that his policy was right. All over
the country loyal burghers sprang to arms, with
horses and biltong and cartridge-bandoliers, as in
the days of the Vierkleur. From first to last,
according to the official figures of Colonel
Hamilton Fowle, Provost-Marshal of the Union,
32,000 men were called out, 24,000 of whom
served in the field, and 8,000 on garrison duty. In

the Orange Free State 12,000 burghers were
mobilised, 8,000 served in the Transvaal and
4,000 at the Cape. Fowle estimated the total
number of Rebels was 7,000. When it was
realised that the Union at that time, more than 40
years ago, had a white population of only about
one-and-a-half millions, and that there were
about 7,000 well-trained troops in South West
Africa, it will be seen how dangerous the
upheaval had become. Not all of the Government
forces were yet at Botha's disposal when he
came riding toward Mushroom Valley in the
hope of trapping General de Wet. All around the
hills were alive with Loyalists, some under
Colonel Brand, others under General Lukin, a
veteran of many Native wars. 3,500 Burghers
had gathered in the valley under de Wet and his
supporter, Hendrik Serfontein, a member of
Parliament. Helios flashed messages from kopje
to kopje; horses stood tethered by the wayside,
while the men boiled their coffee. Clouds of dust
rose where the artillery and supply-columns

rolled forward. Though Afrikaner was fighting
Afrikaner, de Wet himself suddenly felt younger.
His skill and his generalship once more were
back, but there was one difference - beside the
horse now stood a new weapon of war - the
motor-car. Throughout South Africa they were
being commandeered and there were thousands
at General Botha's disposal. De Wet lacked cars
and he lacked petrol. Nothing, it seemed, could
stop his capture by the encircling Government
forces.

Along one section of the skyline, near a hill
called Hoenderkop, was Brand's detachment of
pursuers. Another section was under Botha
himself. A third was under the same Colonel
Brits who had driven Maritz into the desert. The
only one for whom they were waiting was Lukin.
Fate now took a hand. The heliograph operator
twinkled out a message to Lukin, and omitted to
give the code word. Lukin's operator believed
that the message was a rebel trick, and never

passed it on. When the Government forces
suddenly moved forward in a great wave, the
"bag was open". At Koraanberg, where Lukin
was supposed to be waiting, there was a gap. All
the memories of the escape in the Tabaksberg, in
the Magaliesberg and at Paardeberg, and of
many another hard-fought field rose before Oom
Krisjan, as his scouts reported the incredible
news. Quick as lightning a commando thundered
through the opening in the enemy's line and
before Botha knew what had happened they were
on the way south, towards the village of
Excelsior. In bitterly cold weather they camped
out on the veld. Machine-gun bullets had rained
down on them as they made their escape, and
more than one hundred carts of the convoy, two
motorcars, 250 prisoners and a number of killed
and wounded had to be left behind. Those new
weapons were worse than the old Maxims: even
riflemen lost heart before their spitting volleys.

Rest and food were to become scarce after
Mushroom Valley. The worst days of 1902
seemed to return. At Maquatling's Nek they
camped out in the bitter winds that blew from the
Drakensberg, and de Wet ordered his men to
double back so that they might shake off the
troops. Every inch of country was familiar to the
General, but it was familiar to his opponents too.
Near Virginia, where Count Villebois-Mareuil
lost his life in the Boer War, his commando ran
into a small force of 180 horsemen under
Colonel Badenhorst. A fierce engagement
ensued, during which 2,000 Rebels got across
the railway to the north, but, aided by the timely
arrival of an armoured train under Captain
Dickson, the remaining 1,500 were beaten back.
Needless to say, de Wet himself was among
those who escaped. His burghers were getting
fewer and fewer though they still represented a
substantial body, and were by no means short of
arms. That same spirit of defeatism, however,
which had cost the Republic so dear, now spread

among his commando. The offer of an amnesty
by General Botha was causing hundreds of them
to surrender.

The ex-President felt that they could afford to be
generous, so he sent off this wire:

"To General Smuts, Pretoria.
From Steyn, Tempe.

"Brand Wessels just returned. Reports that
General de Wet is willing, if he can obtain safe-
conduct and if safe-conduct can also be sent to
General Beyers, to visit me, along with Beyers,
and open negotiations, in order to see if a way
cannot be found by which peace can be restored..
As I said before, if we do not take advantage of
this opportunity now I foresee bloodshed and
misery that will continue for years. Do not refuse
consent therefore. You know General de Wet,
and it is only by means of the utmost exertions
and by bringing all my influence to bear that he
has been prevailed upon to come to me. If you

agree, please wire separate safe-conduct here for
both generals, also a safe-conduct for Brand
Wessels to take the safe-conduct to de Wet and
accompany him here."

General Smuts did not delay his answer:

"To His Honour President Steyn.
From General Smuts, Pretoria.
"The Government has seriously considered your
telegram of yesterday's date. We feel that the
position has entirely changed since General
Botha first appealed to you to use your influence
with de Wet and Beyers to avert bloodshed.
Then no hostilities had yet occurred, and de Wet
and Beyers were merely busy forming
commandos. Beyers would not go to you without
de Wet, and de Wet put off from day to day, with
the obvious intention of gaining time in order to
mobilise a great force. Meanwhile hostilities
broke out in the Transvaal and later in the
Orange Free State, whereupon de Wet point
blank refused to go too. Since then bloody

encounters occurred in Transvaal and Free State
and many have been killed and wounded. Even
yesterday a battle took place at Virginia, with
considerable losses on both sides. We feel that,
however much we desire peace on an honourable
basis and to avoid further bloodshed, the military
position has become too serious to sanction the
proposed conference. The Government has made
its position clear by the issue of a notice
containing the terms on which Rebels who
voluntarily surrender will be treated. To such an
extent is public feeling embittered that great
dissatisfaction exists among the loyal burghers
on account of the leniency of these terms, and
the Government feels that the position is likely to
become still worse and more fatal than it is
today, if the Rebels are allowed to extort peace
terms from the Government. Unconditional
surrender on the basis of the Prime Minister's
conditions is necessary, on the understanding
that there is at present no intention to apply
capital punishment in the case of leaders.

"While we cannot, therefore, consent to grant a
safe-conduct, there is yet every probability that
General de Wet has met or will meet General
Beyers to-day, and that they will therefore be
able to exchange views and, if they so wish, to
approach the Government. We extremely regret
having to send this reply to your telegram, but
looking to the present position, the manner in
which it arose, and the security for the future
peace of South Africa, there seems no other way
open to us."

Nothing more seemed to be expected, and
General Botha, holding the telegraph system
under his control, moved his troops like a chess-
player is about to checkmate. Up the valley of
the Vet River, a tributary of the Vaal, the
dwindling columns of Oom Krisjan continued
their weary march, stopping occasionally at
friendly homesteads, but rarely able to get what
was needed most, fresh horses and ammunition.
In addition to this the rains were late and the

grass poor. Troops and commandos caused him
to turn back towards Boshof, where the chase
was taken up by a fresh force under Colonel
Manie Botha.

Hope was gone; thousands of fresh soldiers were
answering the call of the Government, thousands
of motor-cars placed at his disposal. Nearby
along the Vaal River, perhaps some ford was
carelessly guarded. Anyhow, he must risk it. He
told his commando he was going to join General
Kemp, who was retreating from the Transvaal
across the Kalahari Desert to German South
West Africa; he would find him. Not a few were
prepared to risk it, yet as De Wet himself said:
"Each rider saw the miserable condition of his
horse, and this made it impossible for him." Each
cried: "Give me a horse and I will go along", but
this could not be done. The General told them to
put away their guns and go home. Taking only
twenty-five men, he left behind his companions
and galloped away towards the border stream,

which he had so often successfully crossed
during the Boer War. This time he was not
dealing with a Kitchener or Roberts, ignorant of
South African conditions. General Botha forgot
no precautions. Far-off stretched the green line
of willows that marked the edge of the river and,
sure enough, there were the outposts under
Commandant S. P. du Toit, with their rifles
pointing at him. One of the bullets wounded a
horse and, as the rest of the tiny force galloped
away towards safety, one of de Wet's staff
officers, carrying most of the General's papers,
fell a prisoner to the Government.

Only eight men were left that evening when de
Wet, in pitch darkness, managed to swim his
exhausted animals across into the Transvaal.

Chapter 28
Captured at Last

Eight weary men trudged their horses across
the veld in the bleak Wolmaransstad district

of the Southern Transvaal: de Wet; his son-
in-law; Mentz; his secretary, Harm Oost; his
adjudant, Spies; and three burghers, Wessel
Potgieter, Gert Muller and Koos van Coller.
That was all that remained of the huge
commando that had followed the General
through the Free State. True, the Rebellion
was by no means over. In the Transvaal,
particularly, Beyers and Jopie Fourie were
still very much on the move. The latter had
been a Captain in the Defence Force, a
permanent officer and, at the end of October,
he had gone to the support of General
Beyers, who had been driven with heavy loss
into the Rustenburg district. Over-confident
at their initial success, one of the
Government commandos, sent in pursuit, fell
into an ambush, losing two killed, five
wounded, and more prisoners. Fourie now
blew up the railway line, thereby stopping an
armoured train, and vanished into the bush of

the Waterberg district in the North, while he
planned to capture Pretoria itself.

Before a supporting group of Rebels under
General Muller could reach him, Fourie
again met Government troops and
commandos under Colonel Dirk van
Deventer. The engagement was described as
the fiercest in the whole Rebellion, but
Fourie got away, to reappear at Hamman's
Kraal, barely twenty-eight miles North of
Pretoria. On the afternoon of November 21,
1914, it was telephoned to the capital that
400 Rebels were threatening its safety.

Only a few policemen were on the spot, but
immediately riflemen were rushed out by
train. Fourie's men dug themselves in,
outnumbering the Loyalists six to one. After
sustaining heavy casualties they withdrew,
but Fourie was captured a few days later and
court-martialled. He and his brother were
duly tried on the charge "that, being officers

of the Union Defence Forces, they were
guilty of treason, in that they in the
Transvaal, on or about the months of
November and December, 1914, and
specially on or about the 16 December, 1914,
in or near the district of Pretoria, did resist
His Majesty's Forces and were found and
captured, together with other persons in
armed rebellion on or about the 16th
December, 1914." Jopie Fourie was
sentenced to death, and at dawn the
following day met his end in front of a firing
party. His brother, although also found
guilty, received five years' hard labour.

For General Beyers, a different fate was in store.
He had finally agreed to meet President Steyn,
but as set out in his telegram, General Smuts, on
learning that de Wet was actually fighting,
cancelled the previous arrangements and had
Beyers taken back safely to his own commandos.
For three weeks hardly anything was heard of

him, and it was during this time that de Wet
managed to cross over into the Transvaal.

On November 22, the day after he arrived, the
following confidential notice was circulated to
all police stations:

"Although General Botha's notice of 12
November in regard to surrendering rebels has
expired, I instruct you to continue to let rank and
file who surrender go home peaceably and
quietly, and await decision of Government in
respect of them. All rebel officers or persons of
prominence, such as members of Parliament or
Provincial Councils, or all who have taken
prominent part in Rebellion should, however, be
kept under arrest until further orders. If uncertain
as to status or prominence of a surrendered rebel,
inquiries should be made by telegraph to the
magistrate of the district to which the
surrendered rebel belongs. If thereafter there is
any doubt whether a surrendering rebel should
be detained, instructions should be asked for

from Defence Headquarters, Pretoria. Of course
all rebels who are captured, instead of
surrendering voluntarily, should be kept under
arrest. Notice addressed to all Force Command-
ers and magistrates in disturbed areas. Latter
should immediately transmit those instructions to
all assistant resident magistrates, special justices
of the peace, and police stations in their magiste-
rial districts."

The Rebellion was by now subsiding to the
dimensions of a police job. One hundred of de
Wet's own men surrendered on the 18th at
Ventersburg, another 72 at Dewetsdorp; at Vrede
and at Winburg 53 gave themselves up to
Colonel Manie Botha; outside Odendaal's Rust
299 were captured by Commandant Cilliers. So
the tale went on.

While General Kemp, one of the Rebel leaders,
was actually making a successful get-away
through the barren wilderness of Bechuanaland,
De Wet and his little band had only one chance

left - to reach the Kalahari Desert as soon as
possible and there to make a dash for German
territory, a curious irony for the man who had
most objected to any dealing with a foreign
colony. As yet, however, he was far from safety.
In the distance could be seen the motor-cars with
which he was ever-lastingly pursued, which, not
far from the town of Wolmaransstad, came
within a quarter of a mile.

From Mr. Harm Oost, a well-known South
African journalist and member of Parliament, I
have the description of how they were nearly
caught: "Spies, one of their number, had
stopped to bathe his weary feet in a
neighbouring stream, and found himself taken
prisoner. A shower of bullets fell round the
fugitives, wounding Mentz, who was also
captured, and killing my own horse. De Wet
turned back, holding the handpaard (spare
horse) of his son-in-law by the bridle. 'Climb
up', he shouted, and together we charged

ahead of the oncoming Government motor-
cars. Suddenly Mentz's horse also collapsed,
badly wounded. The General saw it and
ordered me to dismount, hide the saddle and
try and find safety. At this desperate moment,
when all seemed lost, Christiaan found time to
break a piece of bread in half and to give it to
his comrade. Then he waved good-bye and
dashed away westwards."

Taking shelter somewhere in the veld, Mr.
Oost eluded the excited pursuers, and next day
caught up Oom Krisjan. With tears in his eyes
the General welcomed him: "It is a sign from
the Lord". Next they made their way towards
the village of Schweizer Reneke, where
another fugitive commando under

Commandant Nezer was trying to reach South
West Africa. They decided to join forces.
Though they were better provided with
equipment than for some time past, the odds
were overwhelming.

"De Wet has made many forced marches in his
life, but it is safe to say that he never did such
a remarkable trek", commented P. J. Sampson,
a local newspaper man. Four thousand men
were after him, spread out over a distance of
seven miles, but somehow he still contrived to
dodge the patrols.

Heavy rains came down at Maquassi until the
horses began to sink in the mud, but they could
not wait for the grass to grow, so the animals
remained hungry. Then they came to a railway
line running north and south, the long trunk
route through Africa, planned by Cecil Rhodes,
and entered upon the Great Thirst. 7 Here then

7 Bechuanaland and the Kalahari are almost
synonymous. In a sense the word "desert" is not
always correct, since, apart from the region of
everlasting sand-dunes, there are vast area where
game can exist on the thorn bushes, with their
deep taproots, and where the natives can pasture

de Wet sought safely. Roads there were none,
the paths were known only to the Bechuanas
and the scanty portholes lay at intervals of
many miles apart. Still he pinned his hopes to
the hardiness of the Boer ponies and to the
instinct of their riders.

At Vryburg there waited a fresh fleet of
Defence Force motor-cars, brought up from
Kimberley by train. In those days before
highways it was a question of ploughing
through sand and mud and dodging boulders.
A few hours after de Wet passed into the
desert, this petrol-driven caravan under
Colonel Saker was at his heels: 500 yards away
a volley disabled two cars and gave the Rebels
another quarter-of-an-hour's start, which was
sufficient to save them.

their flocks of sheep on the hardy occasional
scrub.

Covered with dust and in clothes that he had not
taken off for days, General de Wet still kept his
wits. After nightfall he stopped the horses. They
wanted to stampede towards a distant homestead,
but he first made sure that it was safe to go there.
He heard a windmill pumping water and saw a
small dam in the gloom; there was no holding
man or beast: together they rushed to drink. The
snorting and stamping of horses awoke the
owner of the farm-house. A man came out. Once
again the magic of the General's name did its
work. Mr. Klopper had formerly been his
neighbour and did not need a moment to
understand what was happening. The famished
men ate all the food he had ready -a pot of
mealie porridge. All through the night they
talked and dozed, still buoyed up by the hope
that they might reach German territory. Perhaps
their luck would turn. As dawn broke another
Boer galloped towards the homestead. He was
sent by Commandant Neser to tell them that the
other fugitives had found a better place, with

grazing and springs, a farm with the promising
name of "Waterbury": "We must go there", said
de Wet, throwing off his weariness.

For once he had made a mistake. Waterbury was
familiar to everybody as the only oasis for miles.
The Government also knew it. To the men who
had ridden through the thirst land, the green
trees, refreshed by recent rains, looked a
paradise. A small shack was the only dwelling to
be seen. Had he been gifted with the sight of the
aasvogel that hung overhead, de Wet could have
seen the columns of motor-cars making for the
same place, crawling closer and closer round it.
Horsemen had been sent and there were even
camels, borrowed from the South African Police
Stations in the Kalahari Desert.

And now de Wet was actually at Waterbury.
"Does anyone live there?" he asked
Commandant Neser. "Yes, there are two men -
each with his family. They are professional
hunters". For a whole day they remained at the

farm, resting their horses, and themselves, trying
to gain strength for the rest of the journey to
South West. De Wet proposed at no matter what
sacrifice, to omit the intervening waterholes.

Why did the cars not reach them? The sand of
Bechuanaland had proved too stubborn. It was
on horseback that the last stage towards the oasis
had to be accomplished by Botha's men, seventy
of them under Colonel Jordaan. Night had again
fallen when they arrived. Dismounting, they
crawled like cats around the little encampment,
hidden by trees and bushes. November 30, 1914
broke; General de Wet rose, looked around him
and ordered his men to saddle-up. Putting down
their rifles they commenced to collect their knee-
haltered horses.

"Surrender!", came a shout through the cold air
of the early morning. All around could be seen
the helmets and bandoliers of the Government
troops. Instinctively de Wet and Harm Oost
dashed towards their horses, which had remained

saddled, but found themselves gazing at rifle
barrels. Not another sound had been uttered by
their pursuers. Oost wanted to fight his way out
but de Wet said sternly: "It is childish. We
cannot resist superior numbers. It would have
been different if all our burghers had been
together. Then we might have tried."

Colonel Jordaan walked forward. "Do you
surrender?" he asked. General de Wet nodded
and smiled.

"If I didn't want to surrender", he said, "I would
have shot long ago", and very slowly the men
piled their guns and revolvers into a heap on the
veld. They put the General into a horse-drawn
trap, driven by a coloured constable, and he
began his long trek back to the police station at
Marokwen, and on to the railway station at
Vryburg.

"It was the motor-cars that beat me", he said. "I
did not think they would get through the deep

sand, but they managed to hang on to our heels
all the time, and compelled us to maintain a
speed that was killing to man and beast." He
looked around him, full of self-possession - even
with a certain light heartedness: "I will hang
higher than any of you", he said to his misguided
companions, as they moved towards the empty
horizon. When the tin houses of Vryburg came
into sight de Wet turned to the constable who
driving him and felt in his pocket, but found he
had nothing with him. So he pulled out his
tobacco-pouch, shook an ounce or two into the
palm of the coachman and in the patriarchal way
of the farm said: "Goed gedryf, my jong." (Well-
driven, my boy.)

Chapter 29
In Prison

For the first time in his life de Wet was in
captivity. What the whole of the British army
had found impossible during the Boer War had
been accomplished by a troop of his own fellow-

Burghers, using a few motor-cars. Even the
Rebels admitted that he was treated with the
greatest courtesy by Colonel Jordaan and his
officers. They could see that the old man was
exhausted - his strong constitution worn by the
cold and rainy days in the Orange Free State. At
Vryburg he allowed himself to be photographed.
The picture shows his characteristic, steady eyes,
his firmly-set mouth and the slightly humorous
twist of his countenance. People crowded out of
their houses in the village to see the legendary
hero. He did not stay long at the station, where a
special train waited to take him to Johannesburg.
As he passed across the Transvaal de Wet
recognised commandos and columns of troops
still busy on the chase for Beyers; and - what
was even sadder to him - the long lines of
prisoners outside the police stations, bringing in
their rifles and surrendering voluntarily. Even
this, however, could not depress him for any
length of time. His companions and guards saw
him recovering, and when they drew in at

Johannesburg station, the Transvaal Leader
reported:

"Had de Wet stepped from the train with
dejected men and an apparent dread of what his
fate might be, none would have been surprised.
Weeks in the field and the hard life of
campaigning, especially when there is daily
dread of capture, are not conducive to a tranquil
mind; but not a physical or mental sign did de
Wet show of the hardships he had undergone
through the relentless pursuit by the Union
Forces.

"On the contrary, de Wet bore himself bravely as
he did throughout the train and walked into the
waiting motor, which was to carry him to the
Fort. In fact there was a distinctly assertive, if
not buoyant air about the Rebel leader, as he was
unostentatiously surrounded by officers of the
Defence Force. He was clad in a very
presentable grey tweed suit - he had obviously
had a change since he was captured - but had he

worn the accepted garb of the veld, a keen
observer would still have noticed the squared
shoulders and the set head of a man who was
determined to give no outward sign of fear,
whatever his real feelings."

In cars they drove to the local prison, known as
the "Fort". On the top of the Hospital Hill and
above the city, this structure had been erected at
the time of the Jameson Raid by President
Kruger's government to over-awe the Uitlanders.
Its guns had never been used, were, in fact,
dismantled, but the high grass-planted ramparts,
into which a doorway had been cut, remained
among the landmarks of the Golden City. Since
the Boer War it had served as a prison, many
extra buildings having been added at the back.

Hopes had been entertained that the prisoners
would be treated as political offenders, but the
Government decided that the time for
moderation was past. Hundreds of men from all
parts of the Transvaal and Orange Free State

were coming to the Fort. One of them was de
Wet's own son, another was the prophet Niklaas
van Rensburg, who had taken up his gun with the
others. Of this worthy a story was circulated
which confirms the view that, although he was
good at seeing the future, his interpretations were
not always right. In one of his semi-trances
during the rebellion, he foretold that he would
attain a high position in the land, sit in a room of
his own, in a great building, and could only be
seen by written appointment. Reminded of this
story, he was sportsman enough to point out that
the big building was evidently meant to be the
gaol, and not a government office: certainly all
visitors needed a written permit.

As the motor-car drew up outside the entrance to
the Fort, warders arrived to enter up the
General's name and help him with his luggage.

On one side of the courtyard the old Republican
coat-of-arms had been carved in stone. De Wet

said little, but found time for a friendly remark to
his comrades before he was taken to a cell.

It has been pointed out by the historian, Dr. G. S.
Preller, that South African law in 1914 did not
allow for political prisoners, and it was for this
reason, rather than from any desire to humiliate
de Wet, that a number of regulations were
applied to him, which were meant for criminals
awaiting trial. Not for weeks was it realised that
he was subjected to all the ordinary prison
routine, and even obliged to wear prison clothes.
As he was not yet convicted, he was allowed to
receive guests.

News came that Beyers had been hemmed in,
and was now back on the banks of the Vaal
River. Accompanied by only a handful of men,
he made his way past Maquassi. His pursuers
closed in from both North and South. Although
warned by his companions that escape was
impossible, Beyers exclaimed: "So long as I
have any life in me I shall make a fight for it. "

On the Transvaal bank Captain Cherry; with
thirty men; saw him unstrap his gaiters, spurs,
mackintosh and revolvers and, taking a horse
from one of his men, as his own had just been
shot, leap into the grey waters of the Vaal. The
river was high, and treacherous at the best of
times. Johan Pieterse, his Boer guide, swam
ahead. They thought they might after all find a
place on the far bank, though they could already
see the commando from the Free State in the
distance. Bullets splashed into the water before
they were 100 feet in. The government soldiers
noticed the horse turn: the next moment the
General leapt off and made towards the further
shore. Blood mingled with the waters of the Vaal
as a bullet hit Pieterse, but he swam on to help
his commander. As his friend disappeared
beneath the water, Beyers shouted: "Ek kan nie
meer nie". (I can't do any more). Forgetting all
about politics and wars, the burghers anxiously
watched the drowning man, as he tried to float.
One of them held out a tree-branch, but it was

too short. To a shout from one of his pursuers of:
"Are you wounded?", Beyers answered: "I
cannot swim, the coat is between my legs". An
instant later he gave a cry and sank to the bottom
... Awe-stricken and in deep distress the last of
the General's commando gave themselves up to
the troops as they searched for Beyers' body.
Some days later it was found washed down the
river. He had not been wounded, but drowned ...

What was General de Wet himself thinking?
Here is what he said to his friend, the Rev.
Kestell: "Not for a single night could I sleep in
peace before I acted. I had pondered and
wrestled while I thought about the decision of
Parliament. For nights I could not sleep. I
thought of the curse of God: hence I was full of
distress! But when I was out in the veld, I felt
peace, and there was not a night that I was left
alone that I did not sleep quietly till the
following morning. In the Fort I could think
back upon the path which I had followed for the

last three months, and I had no conscience to
plague me." Most of his time he spent reading
the Bible, and occasionally singing a Psalm, until
the warder told him that it was not allowed. De
Wet took no notice and continued to sing.

Dr. F. E. T. Krause, K.C., in his day a well-
known Republican official and later the judge-
President of the Orange Free State, had been
retained as de Wet's counsel at the forthcoming
trial. With him was Tielman Roos, then a young
barrister, and later to become one of the most
brilliant political leaders of General Hertzog's
party. These two came to see de Wet in his cell.
Masses of documents had to be prepared and
scores of statements analysed. Under the
Criminal Law of South Africa, a preparatory
examination would be held by the magistrate,
followed by a trial in the Supreme Court.
Realising that the leaders were the only men who
mattered, the amnesty was increasingly applied
to the rank and file. Stray commandos under

General Wessel Wessels, under General
Serfontein, were still in the Orange Free State,
but within a week of the capture of de Wet, the
Rebellion was virtually over. Only a few
stragglers managed to hold out in the wilder
parts of the country until the New Year.
Meanwhile the Government announced that a
special court would be instituted to try the
prisoners.

Chapter 30
In the Dock

"Rex versus Christiaan Rudolph de Wet"

In his black gown Mr. S. de Jager, K.C.,
Attorney-General for the Orange Free State, rose
from his place in the Supreme Court at
Bloemfontein and turned towards Mr. Justice
Lange, Mr. Justice Searle and Mr. Justice
Hutton. Beside the Attorney-General sat the men
who had prepared the Government's case: Mr.
Nightingale, Chief Law Adviser to the Crown,

and Mr. C. C. Jarvis, Crown Prosecutor for the
Orange Free State; while at their elbow was
South Africa's most famous criminal lawyer, Dr.
Frederick Edward Traugott Krause, K.C., with
his pince-nez and his sleekly brushed hair,
leaning over his stack of papers or turning to his
junior-chubby-faced thick moustached, Tielman
Roos.

Everybody - the Bench, the Bar and the
crowding public was on the alert as the General
was brought in guarded by two armed warders in
the khaki uniform of the Prison Service.
Somewhere up in the gallery sat his wife; a few
seats further on, craning his grey head forward,
was his namesake, the Minister of Justice, Mr. N.
J. de Wet, (until recently the Officer
Administering the Government) helping to move
around some extra chairs.

"Guilty or not guilty?"

Very quietly de Wet answered:

"Not guilty of treason, but guilty of sedition."

A murmur of surprise went up, for it had been
foretold that the General was going to contest
each point (incidentally he was never throughout
the proceedings referred to as "General").

"Do you accept the plea of accused, Mr.
Attorney-General?" inquired Mr. Justice Lange,
who presided.

"No, my Lord", said Mr. de Jager. "In the
circumstances I cannot accept the plea."

Whereupon he proceeded to give an account of
the Rebellion, beginning with the resignation of
General Beyers and the shooting of General de la
Rey. He mentioned the letter written by de Wet
at the house of General Wessel Wessels, and
another one from de Wet to Major Brand, in
which he spoke of the insult which the Kaiser
had offered President Kruger at the time of the
Jameson Raid.

From the lobby outside the court witnesses
began to troop in, to tell of the speeches at
General de la Rey's funeral at Lichtenburg, and
later at Kopjes in the house of the Rev. Ferreira.
One of them told how at the latter place he had
asked de Wet where General Beyers was, and
whether he meant to see General Hertzog. De
Wet had replied that he had not seen Beyers for
some days, but had seen Hertzog the day before.
Hertzog, he told his questioner, would not be
present, but, being a lawyer, his legal assistance
would be available. Then the deputation to
Pretoria had been proposed. Dr. Krause wanted
to know what de Wet had said, but his witness
failed to recall his exact words. Counsel made a
reference to the opposition of the Boers to the
invasion of German South West Africa. "The
place", he said, "was a wilderness, and the
people could not see any value in the country.
They were prepared to defend the Union, but not
to attack German South West Africa." Judge
Lange took a hand in the examination, and was

told that the General had said: "Maritz had
plenty of ammunition. There is only one thing
left for us to do, and that is to go Maritz."

Various citizens of Kopjes told about the
meeting in that village, and Mr. Schalk Truter,
secretary of the local School Board, related how,
at the farm of another de Wet, some two miles
out, 200 to 300 men had gathered; nearly half
were armed. They insisted that the General
should say something, and he replied: "You are
waiting for a word."

Next morning, on June 1 1, Dr. Krause astonished
the court by withdrawing the plea of sedition,
and substituted one of "not guilty", which the
presiding judge declared to be most unusual, but,
which he said he would allow. Senator Stewart
and a Mr. Meyer gave testimony, the latter
alleging that de Wet had wanted to settle
everything without bloodshed.

"Have you listened to political speeches before?"
asked judge Searle.

"Yes."

"Was General de Wet's speech the usual run of
political speeches?"

"Oh no! I have not heard a speech of that
character before."

"So it was not the ordinary political speech at
all", His Lordship observed. "You should be
careful what you say."

Next a storekeeper took the oath and told that his
firm has lost £4,000 worth of goods, in return for
which the rebels had given him a receipt to the
face value of £1,700.

Dr. Krause drew the court's attention to the fact
that a national subscription had been established,
called the "Helpmekaar" (help each other), to
make good the losses sustained in the Rebellion.

£150,000 had already been subscribed to pay
claims against the rebels.

"It is satisfactory to the taxpayers to hear that",
said judge Lange. "I do not think", interposed the
Attorney-General, "that the payment of claims
makes any material difference." On this point
counsel strongly disagreed. "I think it makes a
very material difference, and I will in due course
call ten witnesses on the point - mostly prisoners
in gaol."

The fourth day was taken up with the evidence
of the bank clerk, Arthur Langton, who had been
assaulted by de Wet at Vrede; of the station-
master, Robert Fell, who had seen the rebels in
camp; and of the ambulance-driver, Charles
Wood, whose services had been sought by the
insurgents. One remark of Dr. Krause' s,
commenting on Wood's evidence, gave a
valuable insight into what the General was
thinking. "De Wet", he said, "complained that he
was treacherously fired on." Colonel Hamilton

Fowle, Provost-Marshal for the Union of South
Africa, described activities at Defense
Headquarters. When the Rebellion began 10,000
South Africans had stood on the boundaries of
German South West Africa, but their movements
were brought to a standstill by the internal
danger to which the Union itself was exposed.
Commandeering notices, he said, had been
issued to 32,000 men, to crush the Rebellion.
Voluntary surrender went on after de Wet's
capture, up to February 3, 1915, while the very
last men under arms were only caught on March
23. Casualties on the rebel side were
approximately 170 killed. "No men", he said in
reply to Dr. Krause, "have been commandeered
in the Free State". At this stage the Crown case
was closed.

Counsel then called one of the rebels, de Villiers
Theunissen, who denied that the accused ever
told the burghers at Lindley to go into one of the
stores and help themselves. General Smuts, the

Union Minister of Defense, next described how
on August 5, it became known that the war
against Germany had been declared, and how on
August 10, the Union was ready to invade
German South West Africa. It was, however,
necessary to consult Parliament, as it was an
urgent matter. The decision to seize the German
colony was taken before the incident at Nakob
Frontier Post, and the resignation of General
Beyers and General Kemp on September 13,
1914, came as a complete surprise to him. From
the dock de Wet, who had been rather subdued
through the first few days of the trial, now
listened with great attention. He seemed cheerful
but kept chatting with his advocates. The
examination of General Smuts was becoming
acrimonious until the judge-President interposed:

"The court is dealing with a case of high treason;
there is no need to introduce so much politics."

"My Lord", answered Dr. Krause, "the whole
case rests on politics." When the actual incidents

of the Rebellion were being analysed, General
Smuts declared: "De Wet was greatly embittered
through the death of his son. I cannot say who
fired the first shot at the Battle of Doornberg. It
was an unfortunate affair. When it was found
how deep the feeling was, commandeering did
not take place in the Orange Free State, but there
might have been cases before. Those men who
were called together at Bethlehem and Winburg
could not have been under the impression that
they were called to go to German South West
Africa." He told the judge-President that the
original order to Maritz had been to support
General Lukin in an expedition against the
Germans on the Cape border. His most important
remark came at the end of his two hours in the
box. "There is no evidence", he said, "that de
Wet was in communication with the Germans."

Dr. Colin Steyn recounted how he acted as a
messenger between the opposing parties, being
followed by General Hertzog. He described the

anger of de Wet when he heard that Beyers had
been driven into the Bushveld. "It seems to me",
the accused had said, "they want me to leave my
commando in order to attend this meeting. I
cannot agree to the war continuing; and I will not
now go to Steyn." General Hertzog also
disclosed that de Wet felt a grievance, because
he believed that the Cape rebels, who had gone
to German South West Africa after the South
African War, had been left in the lurch. Finally,
he referred to the visit which he had received
from Mrs. Maritz on October 10, the day before
de Wet was to go to President Steyn. She asked
him, "What will happen to my husband if he has
acted as reported?" "I said he could be shot, but I
had no information about the facts, and had
actually only met Maritz once in my life, in
December, 1914."

Every day the crowds at the Bloemfontein court
house increased, till they reached their maximum
on June 17, when Christiaan de Wet himself was

sworn in. "With a wealth of quiet gesture", as an
eye-witness said, "he told his own story." He had
first heard of the South West expedition when
the Government mobilised the Defence Forces
and sent them to the Cape frontier. There was a
catch in his voice as he spoke of the death of de
la Rey, "one of the dearest friends I ever had on
earth" and when he spoke of the funeral. He had
stayed behind at Lichtenburg to prevent excesses
among the 6,000 to 7,000 people present. When
General Liebenberg had made a violent anti-
Government speech, he had protested, and when
someone had hoisted the Republican flag, he had
demanded its removal. Loud laughter went up in
court as Oom Krisjan told of the Potchefstroom
meeting, and of a solitary bad egg aimed at him,
which missed its mark. "I persuaded the burghers
not to use force, to pay no heed to the behaviour
of slum-dwellers. I told them that if decent
gentlemen were present they would be ashamed
of their behaviour." At Vrede his only reason for
sending for Mr. Fraser was because "the district

had become demoralised since this magistrate
went there." Unfortunately for the historian, the
judge-President stopped his explanation of the
reasons for the famous "Five Shilling Rebellion",
saying "that it had nothing to do with the case."
De Wet claimed that he had never interfered with
the British flag at Vrede or anywhere else.

Counsel and prosecutor examined him carefully
in regard to the allegation of treachery at
Doornberg. "Had there ever been a white flag?"
"I could not be certain", admitted de Wet. Now
he talked of Mushroom Valley, and of the time
when they had been driven to Vet River, the
horses being in so bad a way that he told the
burghers to turn back. "I would push on with a
small force to Maritz. My arrest, however, was
not immediately due to weakness of the horse,
but to the treachery of those on whose farm I
rested for a day. Had the horse been in good
form they would never have caught me. I would
not have been betrayed." In reply to Dr. Krause,

who wanted to know whether he had planned to
haul down the Union Jack at Pretoria, and hoist
the Republican flag, the General answered: "I
did not mean to do so immediately; only if other
hopes failed. I knew that every Afrikaner still
burned for the Afrikaner flag, however loyal he
might be to the flag that he has taken over. I defy
anyone to prove that I have ever been disloyal to
the Treaty of Vereeniging, but if the Government
would not agree to revoke the German South
West African decision, then I would go to the
extreme of hoisting a Republican flag."

Mr. de Jager did not take up much time with his
cross-examination. Upon the Attorney-General
asking whether he approved of the recent violent
policy of the Rand strikers, he said: "No, I object
to the action of the strikers, but there is a great
difference between the grievances of the strikers
and those of the rebels". He began to speak
angrily of the mines, the capitalists and Dr.
Jameson until he was stopped by the Judge-

President, who said that no political speeches
were allowed. The entire day was taken up with
legal arguments, which bored the General
exceedingly. The Crown particularly stressed the
high status and great following enjoyed by
Christiaan de Wet.

Not until June 21, 1915 did the court pronounce
judgment. Dr. Krause's speech was as skilful as
the circumstances would allow. He accused the
Government of mismanaging the situation and of
being too autocratic. He pointed out that de Wet
was touchy and that he had never had any
dealings with the Germans. He emphasised the
essential honesty of his client. But it was an
impossible case to win.

"You are a recognised leader of the people",
began the Judge-President. "You were a General
in the forces of the Republican Government
during the late war, and you were during that war
at one time Acting President of the Orange Free
State. Some time after the war you were a

Cabinet Minister under Responsible
Government. You were then the presiding
member of the Executive Council and must have
taken a special oath of loyalty to your Sovereign.
You were a most influential man in the Orange
Free State, and looked up to by the people. In
view, therefore, of your position it was
incumbent upon you to be extra-cautious about
misleading people whom you so greatly
influenced. It is safe to say that, had it not been
for you and some of the others associated with
you, we should have heard nothing about the
Rebellion in this country, and you therefore bore
very heavy responsibilities on your shoulders
when you entered on Rebellion. The excuse
offered in justification was that you and the
people who followed you were greatly opposed
to the Government's policy in engaging on an
expedition to South West Africa, but that policy,
as you knew at the time, had been approved of
and ratified by the Union Parliament. You
apparently contended, as it was set forth in the

Lichtenburg resolution, that this policy, though
approved of by Parliament, was an illegal one,
and contrary to the provisions of the Defence
Act. Even assuming that was so, it did not justify
you in stirring up a rebellion and attempting to
upset the Government, as your Counsel himself
admits."

Guilty!

That was the verdict of the three judges. The
court was crowded, as never before, on June 22.
"We shall take into consideration", said Mr.
Justice Lange, "that you are a man advanced in
years, the position you held among the people,
that you acted, not from ambition or personal
motives, but on some fanatical idea, based
probably on your religious views - 1 say this with
all respect - and the dictates of your conscience".
De Wet, who had sat through the dreary days in
court, seemed quite unmoved. Once he even
smiled to some friends, but he was attentive,
even courteous, and nodded as the judge, who

referred to him as an "old warrior", mentioned
the seven months he had already spent in prison,
which would be set off against the sentence. Six
years' imprisonment; with hard labour, and a fine
of £2,000. The interpreter began to put it into
Afrikaans. Then an incident of his childhood
came back; the occasion when his old school-
mistress had hit him till she got tired. Speaking
in English, he looked at the judges and said: "Is
that all?"

Chapter 31
Under Sentence

In the early morning men and women stood
waiting outside the newspaper offices in
Bloemfontein, in Cape Town, in Pretoria, and in
other towns - wherever a journal was published
in Afrikaans. They took their turn at the counter -
tendering half-crowns. Steadily, day by day, the
money was arriving that would pay the fine of
General Christiaan de Wet. Sixteen thousand
half-crowns had been asked for by Het Volksblad

on June 25, 1915. On July 13, 6,945 of these
had been paid and on July 23, scarcely a month
after the old man had been sentenced, the total
was 14,388. Like an avalanche the subscriptions
continued to arrive, and when the statement was
issued in October, 1915, that sum was doubled.
The surplus, amounting to nearly £3,000, was
used to pay the fines imposed on some of the
other rebels.

Meanwhile Christiaan de Wet sat in the prison at
Bloemfontein. Fortunately a precedent had just
been established in the case of Dr. W. P.
Steenkamp, who was arrested in the North
Western districts of the Cape and, on the strength
of this, the rules were sufficiently relaxed to
make it unnecessary for Christaan de Wet to
shave off his hair and beard. He personally
demanded no treatment different to that of other
offenders.

His wife had been waiting to see him, but
received a shock when she was told that as he

was now convicted, she could see him only once
a month. She asked that this rule should be
waived and the Government agreed. "I told
Christiaan", she said afterwards, "that he must be
careful to let his soul suffer no injury and that he
must cling to his faith."

News came that all the rebel prisoners were to
return to the Fort in Johannesburg. The General
was a sick man when he came back to the
Witwatersrand, and it was in the middle of the
South African winter.

Even his iron constitution was now beginning to
give way. Mr. Oast describes how, on a bleak,
rainy morning, he saw de Wet taking exercise in
a stone-paved yard, and how he discovered that
the old man was suffering from fever. He went
and fetched a blanket, and reported it to the
warders. Food, though nourishing, was no
different from that of ordinary prisoners: bean-
soup, bread and a little meat. De Wet, Wessel
Wessels, General Conroy, Rocco de Villiers, N.

W. Serfontein and J. van Rensburg are said to
have refused to eat it, and to have sent a letter to
the Director of Prisons, claiming that they should
be treated as political prisoners, as Dr. Jameson
and his men had been. For four days, said Dr.
Kestell, their hunger-strike continued, till they
were allowed to order their own meals.
Immediately every kind of Afrikaner delicacy
was forthcoming from sympathisers in
Johannesburg. Besides fruit, pipes, tobacco, etc.,
Bibles and other books were sent in and there
were daily religious services in the cells, in
which de Wet participated. Curiously enough,
when Dr. Preller examined the sick register in
the prison, he could not find any note that de
Wet had been ill, but Dr. Slater, the gaol
physician, had entered up that "the prisoner is
taking his sentence badly", and that de Wet was
under the impression that he was suffering from
melancholia, a view with which the medico did
not agree. Preller states: "From General de Wet
himself no public or other complaint is known to

me, concerning unsatisfactory treatment, save for
a letter sent shortly after his arrival at the Fort in
Johannesburg, asking for food from outside,
because the prison diet did not agree with him
and yet he had several opportunities after his
release and even during his detention, to express
his dissatisfaction ... All the other allegations, for
instance, that General de Wet, while suffering
from influenza, was obliged to stand for hours in
the rain, are assertions for which, as far as I
know, we have never heard anything during the
General's lifetime."

Time passed slowly in the prison. The men kept
themselves occupied with hobbies, and the
Johannesburg papers reported that de Wet had
become quite an expert carpenter. Others were
carving walking-sticks, or making tea-trays and
similar trifles. First one letter, then three letters
could be written weekly and, by special
permission of the Superintendent, the number
could be increased still further. More and more

captives reached the Fort. In November the
number was given as 225, who were divided up
into groups of fifty. "De Wet", said the
Johannesburg Sunday Times, "has already made
a substantial -looking suite of furniture." "The
gaol authorities have stored it for me", he told a
reporter. "When I leave I will have it in my
parlour." Doughty General Kemp was knitting
socks. Captain Normand, Superintendent of the
Johannesburg Fort, said later: "General de Wet
was a favourite with the staff; and he never
encountered any rudeness. Ill-treatment was
entirely out of the question. Everybody respected
him, and many little tributes were paid to him,
which he appreciated highly. Apart from the fact
that General de Wet took his sentence badly, he
had the misfortune to lose his youngest daughter
while he was in prison, a loss which he felt very
deeply, and which I think had much to do with
his depression. On many occasions he expressed
himself to me as pleased with his treatment.
When he reported himself unwell - this was on

the occasion of Dr. Slater's first visit - he was
given the room reserved for gaol officers, and
there he enjoyed more than usual attention.
When he was released he personally expressed
his thanks to me for numerous little favours; and
some time after he actually visited me at the
prison, in order to renew the acquaintance."

In November, 1915 a slight break in the
monotony occurred when he gave evidence in
the Johannesburg Magistrate's Court in a civil
lawsuit. "He looked in the pink of condition",
said the Sunday Times, "and walked with a
brisk, firm step, allowing just the shadow of a
smile to cross his face as he entered. Keeping his
eyes on the packed public section of the court, he
brought his hand to his shoulder as though he
actually intended a military salute. Significantly
enough, everybody rose as he came in."

Rumours went about that van Rensburg had just
had another vision, involving the trumpeting of
an elephant, which he interpreted to mean that

his release from gaol was imminent. But Oom
Krisjan looked dubious. Every word of news
from the Fort was being snapped up, and
subscriptions for comforts were now averaging
£163 a month. At an Auckland Park wedding a
congratulatory message from de Wet was read
which created great joy: "The ladies cried and
the gentlemen sang the 'Volkslied'."

Chapter 32
Released

A strange procession entered the great stone
amphitheatre that forms the central portion of
South Africa's capitol, the Union Buildings,
Pretoria. In plumed hats and in close-fitting
toques, in hobble-skirts, and in feather boas, as
the fashion of 1915 dictated, thousands of
women stepped along to interview the
Government of their country. It was exactly one
year since the Great War had commenced. The
gravity of the times was reflected in the faces of
those wives and mothers who, belonging to

every class of the community, from the farms,
from offices and from comfortable city homes,
had decided that they must support the great
demonstration to secure the release of Christiaan
de Wet. Eight abreast, the procession marched
through the tree-lined suburbs of Pretoria, along
Church Street and up through the gardens
adorning the lower slopes of Meintjes Kop. Each
province kept its representatives together —those
of the Transvaal had rosettes of white and green,
those of the Cape white and blue, those of Natal
white and red, and those of the General's own
Orange Free State of white and orange. At the
very head of the invaders walked an old lady
dressed in sober black, as is the custom of Boer
housewives - Mrs. Christiaan de Wet.

In a panelled office, designed by the great Sir
Herbert Baker, sat Lord Buxton, Governor-
General of the Union of South Africa and, while
the women waited on the cold stone seats of the

amphitheatre, their deputation presented their
petition.

"We, the undersigned mothers, approach Your
Excellency with the request to forestall still
greater sorrow from following on the recent
distress which afflicts the wives and daughters of
South Africa. We approach Your Excellency, as
representative of the South African Sovereign,
with the humble and seriously-considered
request to exercise mercy towards him who is the
darling of his nation, and the hero of many an
honest and chivalrous fight - to the grey-headed
General Christiaan de Wet and likewise to his
fellow-prisoners. It is not our purpose here to
adduce reasons which may go towards
modifying the sentence or justifying their actions
or to make excuses. That would not only be
foreign to our feelings as women and to the
position which we occupy in society, but also is
subordinate to the overwhelming feeling which
brings us today before Your Excellency.

"When sorrow is to be undergone, suffering and
pain to be endured, it is always the women who
suffer most. Heavily though the men have
undoubtedly suffered, what is their sorrow
compared to the grief which for months past has
filled the hearts of their children? What is their
punishment compared with the want and distress,
which so many of those nearest to them must
endure?

"As mothers, who have suffered themselves, and
who know sorrow from their own experience,
and who are oppressed by the misfortune which
has afflicted our nation, our hearts go out to them
who are suffering today and their grief is our
grief.

"For the sake of peace in our nation, for which
all of us pray so intensely, for the sake of the
future and for mutual understanding in this
country in which we live, and in which our
children will live after us, we approach Your
Excellency, in all humility, to ask for the

suspension of the punishments that have been
imposed.

"Further, we ask Your Excellency, as soon as the
court shall have pronounced sentence, to grant a
pardon to those upon whom sentence has not yet
been passed.

"Not alone those who sign this petition, and the
thousands whom we directly represent under
letters of authority, but our whole nation will
owe thanks to Your Excellency."

Politely, but cautiously, the grey-headed English
peer listened to the words as they were
interpreted to him, and also to the letters from
the wife of President Steyn in which she said:

"No one has ever shown more veneration and
respect towards the Afrikaans women than
General de Wet. It is therefore only fit, in his
hour of trial, that we should raise our voice in his
favour, respectfully but unmistakeably. I am
convinced that His Excellency will not lend a

deaf ear to the thousands of Dutch-speaking
mothers and daughters in their plea for one of
Africa's greatest sons."

"I must submit this to my Ministers", said Lord
Buxton to the ladies, and with this decision they
had to content themselves.

Through the dreary months Christiaan de Wet
had sat in gaol in Johannesburg. Despite all his
strength of mind the confinement was wearing
him down. He, who had found the whole of the
Orange Free State and the Transvaal too small
for him, was now fretting away within a cell and
a small paved yard. Privileges might be granted
to him by sympathetic officials, yet what were
they compared to freedom. He sturdily, however,
refused to ask concessions himself. The editor of
Die Volkstem was rung up by the gaol
superintendent after de Wet's arrival, asking him
to forward him this newspaper daily. The
General had said he could not do without it, and
when he was at liberty again he personally called

on the editor to express his thanks. Five callers a
week were allowed to him and the regulation
prohibiting visits by ex-prisoners was waived.
Smoking was also authorised and the demands
concerning fingerprints and photographs were
abandoned.

The year drew to a close, but no official answer
had yet been received from Earl Buxton. When
the November session of Parliament began,
rumour had it that the Government was
considering the question of an amnesty. De Wet
was not advised of the truth of these reports.
Along with his friends, Harm Oost and Carl van
Duchteren, he decided to set down for future
generations the facts of the Rebellion as he knew
them. Illness was to carry off van Duchteren and
the scheme never developed, save that Mr. Oost
preserved a great deal of valuable material.
Officials called on de Wet, instructed by the
Premier, General Botha. They asked whether he
was prepared to sign "an undertaking of good

conduct", on the condition that he would refrain
from taking part in politics, and in public
meetings, and not leave the district where he had
his home, until the war ended. Christiaan de Wet
agreed and on December 20, 1915, he was set
free.

Chapter 33
Sunset Years

It was a much older man who looked down
on Johannesburg from the entrance to the
Fort on Hospital Hill than the de Wet who
had gone in - so long, long ago, as it seemed.
Friends in numbers were there to welcome
him, but he did not want to talk. The busy
city streets, with their motor-cars and tram-
cars, disturbed him as nothing had in his cell.
He longed to get back to his farm at
Allandale, where his wife was waiting for
him. Moreover the place was much
neglected, and of the 450 head of cattle
which he had formerly possessed, he could

now only trace fifty. Fortunately he still had
some sheep, and with these he began to
rebuild his fortunes. In terms of his parole he
was not allowed to move away without the
permission of the magistrate of the district.
When General Smuts happened to be in the
neighbourhood he succeeded in obtaining an
interview with his old comrade in arms.
Eagerly he pleaded for his friends who were
still in prison, and his arguments contributed
much towards the policy of leniency which
the Government gradually adopted. Many of
the rebels came to him on his farm to talk
about the future. One of them arrived and
spoke at length of his hopes and doubts.
"What do we do now?" he asked Oom
Krisjan.

"Preach peace again." The man took his leave
and, as he was moving away de Wet, with a
whimsical smile called after him in

Afrikaans: "When the cow calls the calf
comes running up."

He was poorer now than he had been for
many years and he could not even keep a
servant. Visitors described the simple
suppers, at which they and the youngsters
would assist in washing-up. Within the last
four years he had lost three children. All
kinds of schemes were afoot, mostly
dependent upon the outcome of the overseas
conflict. There were long discussions in the
living room, with references to Afrikaans
newspapers to bear out the facts.

Early in 1916 a letter arrived in Pretoria. It
was from General Botha, and read as
follows:

"I beg to inform you that the attention of the
Government has been called to certain
utterances by yourself of a political nature,
and of reports of demonstrations by various

people, at which you were presumed to be the
central figure. My Ministers desire to call
your attention to the fact that any
participation in such meetings or speeches by
you is a breach of the conditions under which
you were released. The large deputation
which saw His Excellency the Governor-
General in reference to your release, and
many speeches in Parliament report that such
a step would have a calming and pacifying effect
on the public. Although you were the most
important leader in recent Rebellion, the
Government decided upon your conditional
release, not only out of personal consideration
for you, but in the sincere hope that the
conditions of release accepted by you would be
carried out in letter and in spirit. Speeches made
by you since your release, at Johannesburg,
Germiston, Heidelberg and Dewetsdorp, are,
however, calculated seriously to disturb large
sections of the public, and unrest and excitement
are already appearing as a result of public reports

of these utterances. My Ministers are confident
that on consideration you will realise the grave
harm which will be done to our country should
the people be kept in a state of excitement and
unrest by such action, and trust you will realise
your responsibility in the matter, and will do
your utmost do discountenance all
demonstrations and meetings of this nature. The
Ministers must issue a warning to you of the
serious consequences which may ensure, should
this action be continued, and the terms and
conditions of your release not be strictly adhered
to."

On January 18, 1916, de Wet forwarded his
answer:

"I have the honour to acknowledge receipt of
your letter of the 12th instant through Mr.
George Nussey. I was surprised to see that the
Government had taken it the wrong way. I was
kindly permitted by Government to visit
Dewetsdorp in order that Mrs. de Wet might see

her parents, who are in their old age, and I was
bound to let them know, in order that they could
come and fetch us. But I did not expect the
concourse of people, who came of their own
accord. Even then I was astonished at the quiet
and orderliness which reigned there. It is true
they gave Mrs. de Wet and myself a few
addresses, wherein no single word of politics
occurred, nor was there the slightest political
speech made. In my speech of thanks, I kept
away from politics. It is true I did say the people
must make themselves ready for great things,
which I believed God would give us in this year.
I said that in the hope that God would end the
bloody war this year, and who may doubt that
God may give us our freedom back this year,
without force (zonder geweld)? I am powerless
to accede to the request of the Government that I
should prevent such concourses of people, but
the Government possesses the power to do it,
and to prevent me attending such meetings. To
any such order I will strictly attend."

Still General Botha was not satisfied. He
followed up the answer on January 19:

"The Government does not wish to make any
conditions and stipulations other than those to
which you are now bound. When you were
released on probation, you gave several promises
strictly to carry out the following conditions: i.e.,

(a) That you would not take part in any
political meetings;

(b) that you would not take part in any public
meeting or gathering;

(c) that you would not leave your district
without first obtaining permission of the
Minister of Justice.

"These promises and the terms of your release
are very simple, and you can thus not have the
slightest doubt as to their meaning. Under
condition (b) it is a breach of the conditions and
your pledge for you to attend any public meeting

or gathering, whether in your own district or
elsewhere; and the Government must therefore
request you strictly to adhere to the conditions.
Your sense of honour must show you the
direction in which you must go to carry out your
solemn promises."

This correspondence had the effect of keeping
the old General very quiet for many months, and
he was at pains to show that his word had not
been idly given. Actually the meetings to which
Botha had referred had been very tame affairs,
but in those days misinterpretations were easily
made. With one man, however, he was anxious
to maintain contact, and that was President
Steyn. That venerable statesman was visibly in
his decline. Although his brain remained
unclouded, seventeen years of illness were
having their effect and the end was obviously
near. The Orange Free State's Women's
Association had invited the statesman to address
them on November 28, 1916, but that very

morning, while in the middle of his speech, he
suddenly collapsed, and was carried out dying.
His affectionate Free Staters chose their most
sacred spot to bury the President, at the foot of
the Bloemfontein Monument to the mothers and
children who had died in the concentration
camps. Here an English woman, Emily
Hobhouse, was to find her last resting place and
here the General himself was one day to be
interred. Hostilities and politics were forgotten
for a time. Louis Botha came down from Pretoria
and his main antagonist in Parliament, General
Hertzog, the leader of the Opposition, stood by
his side. So did the other Free State President, F.
W. Reitz; and so did Christiaan. The special
permission that had been given to him to come
went far in healing the spirit of bitterness that
still survived. Eloquent though the speeches
were, reference need only be made to that of de
Wet.

"Dear Mrs. Steyn, beloved brothers and sisters",
he began, "my old heart is growing very weak
lately, so that I no longer have the voice which I
had when we were last here together. 8 My heart
is sad, is weak, and what has happened here is
enough to affect one's nerves.

All the burghers who are present know that in
the last war, Martinus Steyn was the father of
Christiaan de Wet. The burghers know me; they
know that I am but a hasty-tempered man, but
for President Steyn I always had the greatest
respect and veneration, because he was worthy
of it. It was the respect of a child for his father.
Now that he is gone, let us not mourn as if we
had no hope. Yes, let us mourn, but let it be the
mourning which one must feel when such a
husband, such a father, and such a statesman is
taken from us. His example and work will not

8 A reference to the ceremony when the
Monument was consecrated, three years earlier.

perish and so long as this survives, he will still
live among us. He was in the real sense of the
word 'a man of the people'. In the difficult times
through which we passed he sacrificed
everything for his nation. Even with his last
words he tried to help his people and to raise
them, and it is as though to-day we hear a voice
call: 'Work while the day lasts, make the people
of South Africa great - it does not matter what
their descent is, as long as they regard South
Africa as their country.' These were the feelings
of the great statesman whom we have come to
mourn to-day. My friends, we are now passing
through a critical period. We stand at the point of
either becoming a great nation, or ceasing to be
one. Let us therefore work while there is time.
Let us build up our people. Once more I say:
'Work while the day lasts'."

The silent thousands watched the old man under
the hot sun, standing beside the marble shaft of
the monument. They knew that they might not

have many more opportunities to hear him speak.
His eyes were still sharp and piercing, but he
now looked more than his 62 years.

The urge to trek was upon de Wet again and he
decided to buy another farm. He sold Allandale,
seeking a warmer district, which he found in the
neighbourhood of Reddersburg, where he owned
a bleak property, known as Puntjesfontein.
Erysipelas began to trouble him and, when the
close of the Great War brought with it the world-
wide influenza epidemic he fell a victim. For
many days there were doubts as to whether he
would recover, for double pneumonia had set in.
His English doctor, a good friend in whom he
firmly trusted, managed to pull him through. To
obtain better nursing he was brought to
Dewetsdorp and not until March, 1919 was he
pronounced cured. He obtained yet another farm,
"Klipfontein", and by a strange chance it was
within a short distance of Nieuwejaarsfontein,
where his boyhood had been passed.

At long last he was a free man again with the end
of the war his parole had expired. Members of
the Provincial Council of the Orange Free State
in their capacity as electors of the South African
Upper House, asked him to come forward as a
candidate for the Senate of the Union. Rightly
regarded as a haven for elderly statesmen, it was
thought the proper position for him, but neither
he nor his wife felt that his strength would allow
for the frequent travelling, and the long debates.
Among many addresses to his fellow-Burghers
from time to time his most characteristic
message was dated September 23, 1919, soon
after the Treaty of Versailles:

"To my people:

"In the last four years I have repeatedly had
influenza: twice during the last six months, so I
feel very weak. It is my desire to address a word
to my Afrikaner people, including any whites
who regard South Africa as their fatherland, for
they belong to us.

"Peace has been signed in Europe, but we must
not think that peace is a sign that everything is
now over, and we can go to sleep. The jackal is
lying in ambush for the lamb, in order to murder
him, and we must be awake in order to preserve
the treasure we have inherited, as was done by
President Kruger, President Brand, President
Reitz and by the last President of the Free State,
President Steyn, who did so much for his nation.
I address a strong appeal to every Afrikaner not
to let the spirit of freedom die."

The General urged his listeners to remember
"how the nation of Israel has remained standing
to the present day".

"The fiery test through which we have passed
and which we are still undergoing, must serve to
weld us all closer together. The time has come
for the Afrikaner people to live peacefully
together in one kraal". He warned the Afrikaner
people against neglecting their language and
tradition, for, said he, if they did so, "the nation

stands on the edge of the grave, and will finish in
it:"

"I will further like to ask my people with
particular emphasis to support Nationalist
papers. They are worthy of being read, so that
we can learn truth and justice. It is the lack of
news of what concerns us which makes it easier
for our nation to be kept from the right path. We
can thank God that we have such steadfast,
competent, reliable men to defend our cause in
all four provinces. Even if our party is in the
minority in Parliament, this does not mean that
our party, which stands on a firm foundation,
will remain in the minority. My prayer for my
people is to strive unitedly for the good fortune
for which our ancestors suffered and fought, and
for which they died! "

Obviously the spirit of discontent was by no
means dead in Christiaan de Wet, and his
mixture of arguments, ranging from the Bible to
local newspaper did not contribute much towards

re-popularising him with the Government. At the
same time he was left in peace, and those who
visited him declared that he bore no personal
animosities. One curious present which he
received and kept on show in his dining room
was a painting by a local Hollander, showing
General Botha waving a flag and holding a
sword dripping with what was presumably
blood of the Afrikaner. Yet such a sturdy
political opponent as Colonel Deneys Reitz
confirms that he regarded the canvas more as
a decoration than anything else, and had no
serious anger against the man whom it
represented.

As South Africa slowly began to settle down
again, to what it hoped would be peace-time
conditions, signs appeared that de Wet was
trying to revive his friendship for the English.
Of this fact striking evidence was given at a
lecture on the history of the South African
Dutch Churches by the Reverend A. Dreyer

on September 17, 1920. Ex-President Reitz
was in the chair and after the close of the
principal address, de Wet stood up in the body
of the hall, where he made a few remarks,
entirely extempore.

"I think", he began, "we ought to thank the 9
Reverend Dreyer - for his work, which I hope
the nation will value properly. This evening
my heart is so full that I hardly know where to
begin, for it sometimes happens that I begin to
put the cart before the horse. A gathering such
as this is of educational value, and for me it is
a great pleasure to see our beloved old
President again among us. The time for
violence", he continued, "is past. We must set
to work with a deliberation. I think that
England later on will be so proud of us that
she will decide that we Afrikaners and

9 The Rev. Dreyer was the official historian of
the Dutch Reformed Church.

Englishmen are proved worthy to be
independent. Our liberty shall then prevail
from the Cape to the Zambezi, but if we want
this to happen, we must not sit quiet with
folded arms. Let us take care when the time
comes that we are all together, Englishmen as
well as Boers. In the old days, those of any
other nation who came to settle here were
free: their language and customs were
respected. What we ask is that at least this
right should be granted to Afrikaners."

During the same year South Africa had her
first post-war General Election and de Wet,
who was taken so ill again that he thought his
end was near, prepared two messages, one to
the Nationalists under General Hertzog and
the other to the members of the South African
Party under General Smuts, (successor after
the death of General Botha in 1919.) The
messages, not published at the time, were
given to a restricted audience after his death.

"To the Nationalists:

"Tell my brother Nationalists in Parliament
that if the worst should happen, I shall go in
peace, for I know that the future of my own
people is saved, and that our people will
govern. I cherish the welfare of my nation in
my heart, and there was a time when I was
troubled about the future; but day has broken,
and I see clearly that the awakening has
arrived and when I turn away I am convinced
that there are men in Parliament who are able
and who possess the necessary patriotism and
love of the people to guide the nation on to the
right path, and my advice to them is to continue
on the path they have taken till our cause has
triumphed."

A shorter message to his political opponents bore
the same stamp of his personality:

"Message to my brothers who belong to the
S.A.P.: "Tell them that I know it is human for

every man to endeavour to keep his party in
control. My advice to them is however that they
must open their eyes before it is too late. The
door is open for them to come back. My wish
and prayer is that our nation will soon be united
again."

"We can trust General Hertzog in the dark", was
one of de Wet's favourite sayings. He did not
live to see the passing of the Statute of
Westminster, which laid down for all time that
"the Crown is the symbol of the free association
of the members of the British Commonwealth of
Nations, who are in no way subordinate to each
other." His old friend was responsible for having
that recognition of South Africa's freedom
embodied in the law.

Chapter 34
The Last Trek

Oom Kri sj an Sat on the stoep of his homestead,
deep in thought. His mind was far away as he

talked to his companion, a young Jewish artist,
who was leaning over a lump of clay set on a
sculptor's mount. Moses Kottler had come to
Klipfontein to make a bust of the old General for
the students and professors of the Afrikaans
University of Stellenbosch. It was not the first
time that he had posed for a sculptor. Joseph
Mendes da Costa, the renowned Hollander, had
made a bust of him at the time of the Boer War,
which was later set in the National Park near
Arnhem, and of which a duplicate is on the
Kroller-Muller collection at The Hague. He had
also sat for Therese Schwarze, and someone had
made a likeness in bas relief. The great Russian
sculptor, Aronson, had modelled his head, but
only from photographs. Anton van Wouw had
sketched him and now another artist was to make
a bronze. "I hope I will live till you finish it", he
said to Mr. Kottler. It was just before Easter,
1921. The old man looked poorly; his neck was
swollen, he wore slippers and at times his
memory failed him. "I have gone through a lot",

he told his guest. "When there was a battle, I
always felt strong, but the gratitude of the People
- that is what takes it out of me." In spite of this
the old liveliness and magic of his personality
had not disappeared. Although he could only sit
for a short time, the head was still magnificent,
with its white beard and hair still black, save for
a few silvery patches.

"He spoke to us in English", Mr. Kottler told me;
"and it was quite evident that he bore not the
slightest personal animosity to those who were
not Afrikaans. When his English doctor came
over from the neighbouring village of
Dewetsdorp and discussed his illness in
Afrikaans, de Wet, with his, unique courtesy,
insisted on replying in his medico's own
language. He always chose his words carefully. I
would not call his speech perfect, but it was good
to listen to, with his fine deep voice, already
affected by throat trouble, and with his neat
expressions. By day he usually felt so

uncomfortable that he spoke little and was
restless, but at night he seemed to recover, to
collect his wits, and for many hours we would sit
together - he talking, and I listening. He needed
only a few hours sleep."

The house possessed but little furniture, and
there was hardly a tree between his front door
and the distant hills. Only his wife and youngest
son now lived with him, but the number of
visitors was greater than ever. Dozens of men,
women and young people called during the
fortnight that Kottler was on the farm and were
received with the same invariable dignity and
politeness. When a party of students arrived, he
would say to them: "I am always fond of young
folk and good horses." Many of his guests were
old fellow-fighters, including Commandant
Theron, and there were endless talks about the
campaigns of yesteryear: De Wet's eyes lit up
again while the excitement of his past stirred his
bones. With typical Boer hospitality he and his

wife asked their callers to stay to meals, and
often even overnight. There was not much to
distinguish his style of living from that of other
farmers. The General, wearing glasses, would
read the Bible at daily prayers; there was meat
three times daily but few vegetables and the
doctor warned him that this was bad for his
heart, like the quantity of strong coffee which he
drank.

Several times during the artist's stay he had
attacks, and there were anxious hours, when the
family sat up, awaiting the worst. His iron
constitution still triumphed, and his eyes again
became shrewd and wide awake, as he lay in his
bed, while someone read the Bible to him. There
were other books in the house, sent to him by
people in many parts of the world, but he rarely
looked at them. Through ill-health too stacks of
letters remained unopened. Sitting up in the
watches of the night, Christiaan de Wet revealed
his true nature to Moses Kottler, as he had rarely

done to anyone. He talked as a philosopher, and
gave his views about his beliefs, about events
and places and, more rarely, about people.
Tolerance was the keynote of his inner self.
Often he miscalled the artist by the name of a
young Russian Jew who had been his secretary
for a while during the Boer War, and who had
been killed. "The bravest man I knew", said the
old General. Then he would talk about an old
Russian Jewish storekeeper and particularly
about the old wife who had given him shelter
during the Rebellion. When Mrs. de Wet said
anything derogatory about the English he
flared up: "Don't say anything about them.
Who treated me badly? My own people."
Another time he declared: "It is my own people
who have given me trouble. I have no trouble
with the English. The English are here to stay."

"He gave me a message", said Kottler, "which
I never published because I felt people would
not believe it, and I myself was too

unimportant a person to convey it. Today there
is no harm in repeating it: "Tell the people",
said the General, "that what we want is peace.
If we have our equal language rights and other
freedom, we want no more." But the most
impressive incident of the sculptor's stay
occurred when a deputation of no fewer than
forty-six Dutch Reformed Church clergymen,
accompanied by several women, waited upon
de Wet to tell him that they were praying for
his recovery, and referred to him as a national
hero. "I wish I could give verbatim that
wonderful impromptu reply", said Mr. Kottler.
"It was a masterpiece. Amongst other things he
declared: 'I do not want to be referred to as a
national hero. I am a sick old man, a nobody,
but fond of my own people.' What he told
them of true religion was worthy of a Tolstoy.
There was a wonderful depth and sweep of
thought about what he had to say, and when it
was over, the people were crying."

There was no pose about all this. At heart he
was not genuinely interested in soldiering; it
was a job necessary for the sake of his country.
Even the making of the bust was distasteful to
him, though he regarded it as something to be
undergone. "His clear, metallic voice and his
strong personality no one could ever forget,
and whenever the sickness came on again, and
he felt his way along the walls with his hands
he still held himself upright as usual. I could
not help feeling the pain of it; he was like a
wounded lion." In spite of all ailments Kottler
contrived to convey the true de Wet of an
earlier day in a way that was truly masterly,
and the bronze likeness of the old man,
proudly exhibited at the Stellenbosch
University, is something that South Africa will
always cherish.

About this time unusual visitors came to him.
Michael Collins, the "Irish de Wet", as he had
been called, the first Prime Minister of the new

Irish Free State, had sent him his sincerest
greetings from Dublin. Led by its Vice-
President, the Irish Republican Association of
the Orange Free State called upon him at his
farm. "You were right to accept the Treaty",
said Oom Krisjaan. "Freedom will enable you
to become strong and organise yourselves. A
nation which, after 700 years of English
occupation can still remain Irish and produce
men like Alderman McSweeney is
unconquered. I could always tell in the Boer
War when I was brought up against an Irish
regiment, from the way in which it was fought.
The Irish people have my best wishes in the
Irish Free State."

And so time went on, and the unconquerable
commander was glad to wander round his farm
and talk with native herd-boys. Somewhere in
the desk was the beginning of a book on
scouting which he was fated never to finish.
His family had entered upon another

generation. Of his eight sons and eight
daughters, only six were living: Kotie, was still
on the farm, Isak, a civil servant, and the
others, Christiaan, Johannes, Piet and Hendrik
were all farming in various parts of the
country. There were twenty -three

grandchildren and several great-grandchildren.
Like the true Boer patriarch he had already
chosen a place where he wanted to be buried,
somewhere on the farm. "That is where I want
to lie", he said to his wife, but she answered: "I
tell you straight out that your place is next to
the Monument." He said: "Oh, well, I live for
my people, and am willing to die for them and
if they want me after my death, they are
welcome, as long as you don't mind."

He decided to draw up what he called his
political testament and sent it to his old friend,
Harm Oost:

"I feel my end is coming. It is as the Lord
wishes. Be just, but remain Afrikaners. If only

I could unite my people and all who are with
us in spirit, though they may be Englishmen,
then we will put our arms around them in
friendship, as though they were true
Afrikaners.

Christiaan de Wet."

Now it was 1922: it could only be a matter of
weeks, perhaps of days. General Hertzog and
Senator Brebner came to visit the old man and,
to his own intense surprise, his bitterest
political opponent, Deneys Reitz, received a
message that Oom Krisjan would also like him
to come. "I went to the farm", Colonel Reitz
told the writer. "He was sitting at his table,
with a picture of General Botha and the sword
hanging above him. His legs were very
swollen, his boots unlaced, and he held his
head in his hands. It was clear that he was
going soon. He could not remember what he
wanted to tell me. 'There is no chance for me',
he said, 'beyond the mercy of God'." On

Friday, January 14, his wife found him lying
on the floor. Next day he felt slightly better
and struggled to walk about. Then came
Sunday. Mrs. de Wet took prayers at family
worship instead of her husband and read to him
from the Bible. She wanted him to eat
something, but he said: "You should know that
death is not far off now", and he lay down
again. For the next few days he managed to
spend a few hours, sitting round, and then,
alone with his wife on the Tuesday, he said
good-bye to her. "Don't worry about me", she
said, and he answered: "I am not worried - but
this does not change the fact that when I am
gone there will be an empty place."
"Certainly", said Mrs. de Wet, "but the Lord
will provide", and those were the last words
they exchanged after forty-eight years of
marriage.

Another week was approaching its end. It was
Friday, February 3, 1922. In the streets of

Bloemfontein people stood together in groups -
the natives said that old General de Wet had
died. Everybody knew that it might happen any
time, that the family had been sent for, but
when his friends tried to telephone to
Dewetsdorp, the line was out of order and had
been so for some time. Later in the day the
newspapers carried the news. "General de Wet
died at eight minutes past two this afternoon."
By some mysterious African means the natives
in Bloemfontein had known it eight minutes
after the event." 10

Chapter 35

At the Monument

Rebel though he was, Christiaan de Wet was
to have a State funeral. From Pretoria, General
Smuts, the Prime Minister, who had been so
largely responsible for his capture, now

10 Dewetsdorp is 42 miles distant from
Bloemfontein.

telegraphed his widow: "A prince and a great
man has fallen to-day." On all public buildings
the flag flew at half-mast. From far and near,
from Europe and America the tributes of the
world to this old farmer flowed in. There was
general approval when in due course it was
announced that Mrs. de Wet was to receive a
Government pension, which she lived to enjoy
for another fourteen years. It was decided that
the General must lie at the foot of the
Memorial to the Women and Children, next to
President Steyn and Emily Hobhouse. Political
opposition was forgotten, and the English
newspapers vied with those in Afrikaans in
praising the departed. The Friend, in
Bloemfontein, paid its tribute "in affectionate
memory".

Never had the Orange Free State seen such a
funeral as began on February 7th, 1922. He
had lain in state for nearly a week in the
memorial hall of the Dutch Reformed Church,

when tens of thousands of his fellow-burghers,
their wives, their sons and daughters, filed past
the impassive face. Across his body lay the
flag of the dead Republic, for which he had
fought so long. It was a blistering hot South
African summer's day. Smuts, Hertzog,
President Reitz, Dr. Kestell, General Wessel
Wessels, General Kritzinger, A.W. McHardy,
friend and foe walked in that procession.
Commandos of burghers bearing the Free State
banner followed the police and the Defence
Force units. Something glistened on the coffin as
the hearse went by - a sword of honour, given to
him in Germany during the Boer War, and the
only bit of military trappings which they could
find in his home. "The greatness of de Wet", said
General Hertzog, "is recorded in history for all
time, no less in the history of Great Britain than
in that of South Africa." A burgher blew the Last
Post.

Nothing is more typical of true English ideals
than the fact that the Dictionary of National
Biography contains a long article on Christiaan
de Wet. He who had fought harder against the
Union Jack than any other man, who had lived to
be one of its Cabinet Ministers, and again to be a
rebel, is counted today among the heroes of the
British Commonwealth of Nations.