Black & White Illustrated Budget

BLACK AND WHITE TRANSVAAL SPECIAL : No. angloboerwar.com CAPTAIN RALPH NESBITT, V.C., the first officer wounded in the present war, received the Victoria Cross for his bravery in rescuing- the Mazoe refugees in the early part of 1896. He was educated at St. Paul's School, joined the Cape Mounted Rifles in 1883, and became an officer of the British South Africa Company's Police, serving with the Pioneer Expedition. He joined the Mashonaland Mounted Rifles in 1893, as sub-inspector, and in 1895 became inspector. His conduct in the punitive operations against the Rhodesian rebels won him great credit and the greatly desired V.C. And, now, in attempting to run the Boer gauntlet with an armoured train, he has been severely wounded. Good luck and a speedy recovery to this gallant young officer ! BLACK AND WHITE NOTA BENE. BLACK & WHITE has always made a feature of its War Correspondence. On the present occasion it will not be behind its reputation for dealing promptly, fully, and accurately with the events of what promises to be the most important war of the century as far as the British Empire is concerned. Four Special War Correspondents are representing BLACKangloboerwar.com& WHITE in South Africa— Mr. Rene Bull, who has acted for us in the Turco-Greek War, the Tirah Campaign, and the last two Soudan Campaigns, being again our chief representative. Photographs of actual fighting will be the main feature provided. BLACK & WHITE, every Friday, Price SIXPENCE. The panoraim of Cape Town is Our Portrait ol Mr. Chamberlain on t' e cover is rem a photo by Messrs. Gunn and Stuart, Richmond. \f is by i run. iiy ,.; two by Messrs. Elliott and ry ; and one by Messrs. G. W. Wilson and Co., Ai.erdeen ; seven viewfs are Messrs. Gregory and C Southsea. TRA NS VA A L SPECIA L THE BRITISH FLAG IN SOUTH AFRICA. Ouk story this week commences with the Ultimatum, that monumental piece of insolence in which for the first time Uncle Paul showed his hand to everybody. Ever since 1878 he had worked for the complete independence of the Transvaal. Even at the time of the .Annexation, when the Boers practically called in British protection to save them from the blacks, Mr. Kruger hated the British, and intrigued against their supremacy. Taking advantage of our too humane concessions, he secured for himself the angloboerwar.com COLONEL BADEN'-POWELL, COMMANDING AT MAFEKING Presidency and a magnificent income, together with considerable hopes of a German alliance and of a recognised position at all the Courts of Europe. But Mr. Chamberlain began to get too clever for him, began to make him stick to Ins word and give up the shuffling diplomacy which had hitherto baffled Radical statesmen. And Uncle Paul, finding himself in a corner, and fearing that British demands supported by a British army would go a {bar}g!) longer way than suited his convenience, threw off his polite manners and flung his glove in the face of his Suzerain. On Wednesday, October nth, at tea-time fas the Times humorously put it), war broke out between Great Britain and the Transvaal. For two days there were rumours of marching armies, of laagers, and of " driving the English into the sea." British gold in the Transvaal was seized, trade definitely came to an end, refugees from Johannesburg and Pretoria trooped over the border with empty pockets and marks of Boer brutality on their bodies. The passes leading into Natal from the Orange Free State and the Transvaal were occupied by Boer commandos, Mr. Schreiner shuffled about and looked unhappy, trains were seized and attacked in Natal and on the way from Kimberley to Mafeking, and the 4 BLACK AXD WHITE excitement all throughout South Africa was intense. Thursday, October 12th, was the date of the capture of Captain Nesbitt and his armoured train. Two days afterwards we had our revenge. An armoured train proceeding from Kimberley came upon some Boers and killed a few, then retired and returned to kill a few more. Meanwhile at Mafeking itself Colonel Baden-Powell gave Cronje a lesson that he will not forget in a hurry. He had posted Colonel Hore with four hundred men in a strong position among some hills. Then he pretended to give battle, retreated, and drew the Boers right across Colonel Hore's line of fire. Needless to say, the latter made splendid use of his opportunity, and mowed down the too confident foe to the tune of 300 men. At Dundee, Glencoe, and Ladysmith, in the North of Natal, the Boers were awaited by the forces under Sir George White. They advanced in three columns through three passes, and evidently meant to cut off the communications between Dundee and Lady- smith. Sir George endeavoured to draw one of these columns (the Free State Boers) into an engagement, but failed. Skirmishing then took place at Besters and Acton Homes, a British train with officers and a few men were captured, then our outposts were attacked, and eventually a general engagement took place, which resulted in a great victory for our arms. On Friday morning, October 20th, the Boers commenced shelling Glencoe camp with big guns. They numbered about 9,000 men, and evidently expected to sweep us out in no time. But our guns soon replied, and in twenty minutes every Boer gun was silenced. Then, under cover of a hot fire, the Dublin Fusiliers and the King's Royal Rifles went for the foe, carried the position, and captured five guns. Well done, Fusiliers ! Perhaps there won't be much need of the Army Corps after all. It was undoubtedly a time of great excitement ; but, then, South Africa is the place for excitement. The following article shows how the Transvaal has from the very beginning been in a perpetual hum. Let us hope that after our final victory things will settle down a bit. angloboerwar.comFROM THE "GREAT TREK" At the seat of war we move forward, solemnly, slowly, irresistibly, in harmony with our high traditions ; and during these moments of suspense a glimpse at the history of that region known as the Transvaal may not lack readers. Indeed, a brief chronicle of those events lying between the exodus of 1833 to 1837, and the present time, is worthy of perusal. Until the first date mentioned, history has no concerns with the Transvaal, but from 1833 began that tremendous influx of the Cape Colony Boers— an exodus known as the " Great Trek." From the first it was the Boer spirit in practice that accounted for their northward movement ; from the first their ignorance and cruelty prompted to differences with the more enlightened government of the Ruling Power in Africa ; for upon a question of the liberal Transvaal they treatment of native races they finally broke away ; and with them to the carried their inconquerable qualities—the worst that have ever made any community sprung from Furopean stock an object of distress to civilisation. By 1836 many thousand Boers " had already crossed the Vaal, or reached "Transvaal country ; and during 1637, to avenge the massacre of various emigrant bands, the new settlers attacked Moselekatze, a sovereign Zulu chieftain who held high sway in the Transvaal until their advent, and defeated his force; at Mosega. The Zulu prince fell back beyond the Limpopo and founded the state of the and present Matabele ; while his defeat and departure left all that region between the Vaal the Limpopo in the hands of the Trekking party. In 1838 the emigrant Boers sustained a complete reverse at the hands of the Zulus, but Andries Pretorius turned the tide and crushed the fiery Dingaan and his black legions in two successive encounters. Upon the death of this great Zulu, Dingaan, the Boers proclaimed Natal a part of their new Republic, but the occupation of that territory by the British in 1843 rendered their contention vain, and they withdrew across the Drakensberg in two large com- panies. Of these, one division founded the Orange Free State ; the other passed again into the Transvaal, and stopped there. Thanks, however, to eternal bickerings between the leading Boers, Pretorius and Potgieter, no regular system of rule could be determined upon until 1852, when Pretorius induced the British Government to sign the Sand River Convention. A period of internal peace followed, but the seed of death was already sown deep in the Boer character, which has invariably shown itself as ooposed to progress as a ragged cliff-face to the advances of the sea. It is, however, the blind cliff that suffers. By their continued and brutal refusal to treat TRA NS VA A L SPECIA L angloboerwar.com General Buller going on board " Dunottar Castle," October 14th, on his way to ta'te command at the Front 6 B LACK AND WHITE the natives with common justice, the Boers were unconsciously forging their own chains. In 1S54 Potgieter fits was murdered; while the "Apprentice Law" soon followed his death, and practically established slavery; and, during 1858, the " Grond " " " " Wet or Fundamental Law appeared — an enactment declaring that the people wi 1 admit of no equality of persons of colour with the white inhabitants, either in st.ite or church." This benighted policy was not confined to the " persons of colour." A fanatic hatred, doubtless bred from uneasy suspicion of their own ignorance and barbarism, induced the Boers to view all oth;r men with dist.'ust and dislike. For their superiors, as well as their inferiors, they had ample store of hatred and suspicion.

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