Chapter 37
The Crater settled into a routine, the months passed into years. Susan gave birth to a son christened Guy Ramage.
Martin and Jill had a daughter the same year, Barbara.
Sulkie and Tana had foals, and Zeus was trained to the saddle.
By the start of 1899 there were over 260 horses and foals out in the crater, and over 300 cattle and calves.
People from the surrounding area would come to buy horses or cattle, mainly the Jersey's for their own dairy needs.
Susan had started a school, where her son and Barbara along with the children off the Gurkhas and Matabele came to be educated. Jill and Martin helped out by taking some off the lessons.
But whilst everything in the Crater prospered out in the world, there were rumblings of war.
The gold that had been discovered at Whittwaterrand, in the Transvaal, and diamonds at Kimberly, resulting in a gold and diamond rush into the Boer held lands.
President Paul Kruger, tried to stem the tide off foreigners now entering his country by imposing conditions and taxes.
The situation had reached a state where there were more foreigners than Boers living in the Transvaal.
The British Government had been content to let the Boers of the Transvaal and Orange Free State, look after themselves after the disaster of the 91 war. But the discovery of gold and diamonds in such large quantities changed their views.
In the bars of Nairobi views differed, dependant on whether you were a native white off East Africa or a newly arrived farmer from England.
Stanley summed it up when an argument had flared up in the bar one day.
"I know the Boers, I've lived with them, and fought with them in the Zulu wars. Their farmers and ranchers, they don't want their country ripped up by get rich quick merchants, and then leave when it's all gone.
Their all God fearing men, who will defend their land with the last drop of their blood, has all you farmers would do, if someone tried to take your lands.
"So you agree with them" someone in the crowd yelled.
Stanley looked sadly at them.
"I left England when I was 17 years old. My parents had 9 children, 5 died before they were four years old, and my parents died of cholera from polluted water. So I ran away, and landed up here. But although I'm English by birth, I'm White African by choice; this land has been good to me and my family. So yes, I would defend my way of life. All I will say is, if England is so good why are you here?"
His comments left the bar in silence.
Later David asked Stanley if he thought there would be a war.
Stanley nodded "The bankers can smell money, they'll push the Boers into it. They tried once before in 91 and got a bloody nose, which they seem to have forgotten. But they won't be up against spears this time, as they have had in other colonial wars. And the poor bloody British soldier won't know what's hit him. It won't be fought like the Crimea or Waterloo.
But by men who know every inch off the land their fighting over, each man a marksman and expert rider. Oh the British will win, but thousands will die before hand."
David rode back to the crater deep in thought.
That night sat out on the stoop with Martin and Jill he talked about what had been said.
Martin puffed on his pipe before replying "Six years ago I had never thought off Africa has such. But now I regard it has my home, for me and my family"
The girls nodded, Susan looked at David "would you go to fight?"
He sat still, thinking before replying, "If I was still a serving soldier I'd go because I was ordered too. Has an officer I never thought beyond the next order. But Kana taught me to think beyond orders, to view the bigger picture.
The politics that create, the orders.
Britain is a greedy bully; the Empire is founded on greed. It would be understandable if that greed benefited the nation has a whole, but sadly it doesn't.
Eight tenths off the wealth off the country is controlled by less than two tenths of the population. You only have to see the poverty off the working classes in the inner cities to realise that. So to answer you darling, I would not fight for a bully."
The other three looked at him and nodded in agreement.
They heard the news at the start off November. Kruger had declared war with Britain, news slowly filtered up to East Africa,
The Boers off the Transvaal and the Orange Free State had successfully besieged Mafeking, Ladysmith, and Kimberly.
A relief column under General Sir Redvres Henry Buller had been dispatched to break the besieged towns.
"It will all be over now" one of the farmers said in the bar.
He was sat with Stanley and John another professional hunter.
"But for who?" Stanley murmured.
Martin brought the newspapers he had bought in Nairobi, the English ones were a month old, but he also had papers published in Capetown.
They presented grim reading.
A number of battles had been fought, the Boers winning most of them it seemed, although the papers were careful not to say has much. Rather that the Army had made strategic withdrawals, but the casualty figures presented a different story. Over 3000 men had lost their lives or wounded. Lord Roberts had replaced Buller, and fresh troops were being sent from England.
In the bar in Nairobi the talk was all about the war.
One off the railway porters was telling of a story he had heard in Mombasa from a seaman from one off the ships.
"They brought the wounded on to the ship to take them home" he explained, "The seaman said the soldiers were angry at the Officers. It seemed there had been a number of blunders. In one battle outside off Kimberly the General had ordered the men to move forward in column during the night. Most of them were from the Scottish Regiments. The troops stumbled into wire that alerted the Boers. They opened fire at 400 yards from trenches dug into the base off the hill. They had Mauser rifles he said, over 700 were cut down in less than five minutes.
The survivors were trapped out in the open for over nine hours being picked off. In the end a lot of them just ran.
At another battle at Colenso, they did the same thing again trying to cross the river. Buller was in charge. The men marched has if they were on parade. The horse artillery dismounted on one side off the river. The Boers let them set up the guns, then opened fire from the other side off the river at less than 500 yards, with those Mauser rifles they didn't miss, the seaman had said. Most off the artillerymen were killed or wounded, Buller sent more men to try to bring back the guns. That's when Lord Robert's son was killed. They lost fourteen guns to the Boers that day, along with over 1500 men killed or wounded.
Then at Spion Kopp, the army moved to take a hill at night, they advanced in mist, when they got to the top they tried to dig in, but the ground was too stony and all they could do was create a shallow hole about eighteen inches deep.
But when the sun came up they realised they wasn't at the top at all, and the Boers were looking down on them. It was a massacre one off the wounded told the seaman. If you moved you were dead, most off those killed were shot through the head."
David was sat at a table with Stanley, John and Ray listening, after the railway man had finished talking,
Stanley shrugged his shoulders, "The Army is learning off a new way off fighting, or at least it should do."
"You've fought with them Stanley, what are they like?" Ray asked.
"I rode with a commando, during the Zulu war. A commando is raised from local communities, comprising off men between the ages off fifteen and sixty. They elect their own officers.
Each man brings his own rifle and horse. These men are trained from the age off ten to fire and ride a horse.
The boys are sent out to hunt at an early age, they learn how to use the country for concealment, to shoot knowing that the first shot must kill or scare away the game. By the time they are fifteen they are all crack shots and able to live off the land.
Most know nothing off Waterloo or the Crimea and the set pieces used by the army.
They have an ability to look a piece of land and know instinctively how best to defend or attack from it. Something the British High Command has yet to learn."
"I've heard Kruger bought not only Mauser rifles but Krupp field guns and Nothenfelt quick firers, all modern weapons," Ray added.
"There'll need them, in the days ahead" David murmured.
"Why do you say that David?" Stanley asked.
"The British public will scream for vengeance, they won't care about them invading the country now. They'll only care that British soldiers have died. The Government will flood South Africa with troops now."
Chapter 38
The war dragged on into its second year, the besieged towns were liberated at a high cost of life. The war developed into hit and run by the Boers up against nearly 200,000 British and Dominion soldiers.
A knock on effect off the war was beef prices rocketed, and David was sending thirty head off cattle every three weeks to Mombasa for shipment down to Cape Town.
By the end of the second year, the British changed their tactics to that off the Boers, using mounted infantry and cavalry. Horses were needed, the ones sent out from England suffered by not being allowed to acclimatise to the African weather or fell fowl off AHD. Thousands died within a few short weeks.
Then one afternoon, a cart bearing a British Major and a civilian drew up at David's house. David was standing on the stoop watching them has the portly Major climbed from the cart. He waited until they stood at the bottom off the steps leading up to the house. The Major brushed the dust from his uniform before addressing David.
"Good day Sir, I'm Major Bambridge of Her Majesty's Procurement division, and I'm here to buy your horses."
David smiled, "Good day Major, I'm Colonel Ramage retired, and just how many horses do you need?"
The Major's face flushed at the mention of David's rank, he puffed out his chest before continuing, "Colonel, I'm entrusted to pay £30 a head for all your horses."
There were over 300 horses grazing out in the pasture, many with foals.
