Episode 112 - Kekewich’s bloody battle against General de la Rey where Boshof crawls to his death

The first week of November 1901 shipping records published in the Times of London featured regular updates such as this one: “The Armenian left Port Natal for Bombay on Nov 3 with Boer prisoners, 36 officers and 981 men. They were escorted by the following: 67 th Battery RFA – Major Manifold, Captain Tapp, Lieutenant Sheppard, 2/Lieutenants Newland, Russell and 157 men 69th Battery RFA – Captain Belcher, Lieutenants Clark, Herbert, 2/Lieutenant Shaw and 156 men The Times continues to list a contingent of 350 men to guard just over a thousand Boers. Then the report states: “The Menes has arrived at Gibraltar, from Alexandria, bringing 109 officers and men of the 1/Derbyshire Regiment for South Africa. They will wait at Gibraltar for the Manhattan, which will take these troops to South Africa.” Still they came, thousands of troops from across the empire, many serving more than one tour in Africa. And through late October and into November 1901 that the English press began to paint the war in South Africa as never-ending. The editorials for most part up until this period in the conservative press in particular had been in full support of the Anglos fighting the Boers - but a series of embarrassing reports from South Africa led to a reappraisal of both the strategy, and the tactics at times. It was Bakenlaagte where General Louis Botha had decimated Lieutenant Colonel Benson’s mounted column leaving the British with almost 350 casualties and the Colonel dead. There was General Jan Smuts who cornered a company of 17th Lancers killing or wounded almost the entire unit of 167. These figures shocked the public back home who had believed the final phase was under way, where a handful of bandits as they were known who were hiding in the vast veld would be tracked down and killed or imprisoned. The bitter end of this war is upon us. And it was troops like those on the Mendes who still faced a focused enemy in the Boers who had no-where to go and were fighting for their survival. Another battle that had shaken the British resolve back home involved Robert Kekewich. If you remember our previous podcasts, Kekewich made his name during the siege period at the start of the war in 1899 through to the second quarter of 1900. He was officer in command at Kimberley - remember his to-and-fro with the arch imperialist, Cecil John Rhodes? Yet, for all the bad blood, Robert Kekewich was a hero in the eyes of the English back home. As the hours of daylight shortened back home, as the Autumn dappled dark light settled into the grey of winter, the gloom quickened when it came to citizen’s perceptions of the South African war.