LETTERS FROM THE FRONT.

Evening Post, Volume LIX, Issue 11, 13 January 1900, Page 5

LETTERS FROM THE FRONT.

Trooper Dickonson has sent a letter to his friends in Canterbury from which wo make the following extracts: — In camp at Maitlaud we had the pleasure of drilling with the 12th Lancers, Scots Greys, and Inniskillings. Wo were greatly applauded on our discipline and on our horses, which are reckoned tho best ever seen with troops in Africa. lam out with a section scouting. We started at 2 o'clock in the night and rode away from camp in a, northwesterly direction for about seven miles, before daylight, then we lay down and crept along from scrub to scrub on the veldt. Our horses are loft in a deep creek which has enormous banks and plenty of grass, a luxury here. We have seen no enemy at present, and our backs ache with carrying ammunition. There is a parade of ours to-day by Major-General French, and if we prove pood enough to go to escorl the Royal Ilorso Artillery right into tho first line of fire. This is considered about the greatest compliment that can be paid to us. There are several of our fellows ill (seven I think), chiefly through accident, ono or two from fever. Everyone here wears kharki ; even our b:\yor.oi3, spurd, and bits sue painted that colour. The living is not at nil whnt I expected j

we have bully beef and biscuit and weak tea for dinner, biscuit and tea for tea, beef, biscuit, and weak coffee for breakfast. Africa is very different from what I thought. We are about 400 miles up, and it seems to be all rough broken stone, without a blade of grass, but covered with small scrub something like manuka, only about 2ft high. It is reported that when the war is over we arc to go to England to receive our medals and bars, and to be presented as the first colonial force ever at the front, but I do not know how true it is. Each man has a tin of extra rations! in case we get cut off from our camp. These tins are abou£ five inches long, oval shaped, and when you open one, two tins come out, one of compressed beef and one of compressed cocoa; these are estimated to keep us for thirtybix hours, and with what we have in our haversacks we can live for forty-eight hours, so we are pretty safe. . . . The New Zealand regiment tried a bayonot charge mounted (the firot ever tried by any force in the world). General French was very pleased with it, and told our Major that we were a wild lot and would not be in front of us unless he were on a thoroughbred horse, as he did not think that horses could be pulled up (when going at such a pace) so quickly. The other day when I was out on cossack post I came to a farmhouse in which lived an old man with two awfully pretty daughters who made mo at home in no time when they discovered that I was a New Zealander, as they came (from Taranaki. Was it not funny to meet them out here 600 miles up in Africa? This place is very hot in the daytime and very cold at night. . . . You have no idea how safe wo feel. Ido not think any more about danger here than I did in New Zealand, though we never go out without fifty rounds of ammunition and our carbines loaded. Trooper Mitchell, of Hawera, now with the New Zealand Contingent, says in a letter to a friend: — "At present it is reckoned there are 100,000 British^ troops in South Africa, with 10,000 more to arrive. The management of the troops is first-class, and everything runs as smoothly as possible. Land here can be bought for 2si an acre, and horses, cattle, and sheep seem to fatten, but it takes more than an acre to keep one sheep. All the transports here are owned by two men, and they will make a big fortune; they receive £4 10s per day for each team. The conductors get £20 per month, and the darkies £4 10s and found. Three languages are spoken by the transport drivers — Kaffir, Dutch, and English. Of course you will understand each man doesn't speak three tongues. Arundel is the place we are to be sent to ; about 15 or 20 miles from Naauwpoort." Trooper Sounders, of the Southland Mopnted Rifles, writing to a friend in Invercargill from Naauwpoort, under date 4th December, states that he has been promoted to staff mounted orderly to Captain Ward (late A.D.C. to Lord Ranfurly) who has been attached to the Contingent as staff officer, and consequently sees a good deal more of the country than many of the others. We are (he says) receiving praise on every hand, and have been attached to the Fh'st Cavalry Brigade, under General French. HOW T. ATKINS GETS HIS LETTERS IN WAR TIME. At one time it was impossible for our troops engaged on active service in a foreign land to receive and despatch letters. But now (says the Daily Mail) all that is changed ; and no matter where he goes, or in what numbers, "Tommy" is almost certain of receiving his letters as you are here in England Every non-commissioned officer and man in the 24th Middlesex Rifle Volunteers is ! a postal employee, most of them being I sorters or postmen in the London postal districts, each district having its own company. The Army Post Office Corps are the M Company of the 24th. The L Company are the' Field Telegraph Corps attached on active service to the Royal Engineers. About 200 men are already on their way to the Cape, and more will follow if required. It was in the Egyptian campaigns of 1882-85 that the War Office authorities urst made use of these London volunteers for active service. And ever since the manoeuvres were commenced on Salisbury Plain the 24th have always done the -field postoffice work, as well as attending to the volunteer training camps at Aldershot, Shorncliffe, etc. When a camp is moved the post office is always one of the first away, and the first thing 'Tommy" does on arriving on the camping ground is to look for the red and white flag showing the position of his post office, the great link that connects Jiiin with his dear ones at home. One can -easily picture the grimy, powder-blackened, perhaps blood-stained soldiers storming their post office 'after some bloody battle, anxious to inform those at home of their safety or the death or disablement of a chum. The Post Office Corps is very popular with "Tommy Alkins," who looks upon them as the only means of relieving the mental anguish of a dearlybeloved mother, wife, or sweetheart. The quantity of postal matter foi the troops is already enormous and to an ordinary observer it would seem impossible for a hundred men or so to deal with it ; but so skilled is your London sorter or postman that it only requires some six of them to look after seven or eight battalions. Besides, ea,ch man is a highly efficient soldier, and the London pa-ess was unanimous in its praises of the 24th Middlesex as the steadiest and most efficient of the whole hfty-one battalions of infantry present at the Royal review in Hyde Park. On foreign service the men wear the Engineer uniform; at Home the same as the Rifle Brigade. The full strength of the corps is about 1200 men, under the command of Colonel Raffles-Thompson. Captain Treble, of the M Company is 'tho Postmaster- General of the British Army operating in South Africa. THE PLUCKY TRUMPETER-BOY. A letter from the boy who shot three Boers, Trumpeter Shurlock, of the sth Lancers, has been published in the Aldershot News. It was written in high spirits on the eve of Eland's Laagte, when he had just been congratulated on his revolver practice. "All the other boys," writes the little trumpeter, aged 16, "ore left behind at Maritzburg, but I am a trumpeter and have to go up with my squadron. I am just enjoying myself all right up here. I went to revolver practice the other day, and the ser-geant-major said I was very good for the .first time, and I bet I will shoot some of the Boeys down if I get the least chance." His chance came, and he was as good as his word, for next day he shot three Boers in the cavalry charge at Eland's Laagte. JOTTINGS FROM VARIOUS SOURCES. A Kaffir who escaped from the Boers to >looi R,iver said that General Joubert has four sons with his commando. Extortionate prices are being asked for provisions at Mafeking. Potatoes that cost £1 before the siege now fetch £2. "There is one thing that upsets the Boers," writes a Gordon from Ladysmith, "they don't like us moving in the night." In looting the ' Boers' oamp at Elands Laagte one soldier got 100 sovereigns. Another ireceived a cheque for £li>o for helping v wounded man down tue hill.

According to the Petit Bleu, the ladies of Pretoria were surprised to see that the 18tb Hussars were hardened warriors; they thought all the English soldiers were young recruits. One of the Boers killed at Elands Laagte was found to be an English soldier, as he wore three British medals. Perhaps he was the English ex- colonel who was forcibly commandeered by the Boers. Some Ladysmith ladies cycled out of town to witness the Battle of Reitfontein, and one shell dropping near them, they pedalled further away. Up to Ist December 2058 siiells had been nYed into Ladysmith, and the total casualties had numbered 83. Several of the correspondents say tha< the Boers have used explosive bullet* in all the battles. Colonel Scott-Turner 1 * death, in a sortie from Kimberley, was caused by an explosive bullet. It is stated that the disloyalists with the Boer army wear the Bed Cross badge in order to escape being made pris oners in the event of defeat, as they greatly fear severe punishment for rebelling. The Boer commander in. the Battle oi Belmont reported that only hiteen were killed, whereas the British collected more than eighty of their dead. Influential Danish merchants, desiring to make some useful gift to the British troops, decided on forwarding 60,000 bsoxes of their best butter.