MR. W. T. STEAD'S "OPEN LETTER." "BLACK WEEK."

Evening Post, Volume LXXVI, Issue 106, 31 October 1908, Page 5

MR. W. T. STEAD'S "OPEN LETTER."

"BLACK WEEK."

BRITAIN'S ONLY SECURITY. THE KAISER DEEPLY HURT. LONDON, 30lh October. The Daily Mail publishes an "open letter" by Mr. W. T. Stead, editor of the Review of Reviews, to the Kaiser, ! and says that if His Majesty intended to destroy the arguments of opponents of the two-battleships-to-one building programme, he could not have succeeded more completely. Mr. Stead comments on the campaign plan of the Kaiser and his staff, prepared for English use at a moment when th=>. whole of the people of Germany believed that Ihe Boers were being attacked unjustly, and adds : " Britain's only security against some possible warlike Impulse of a future • Kaiser or the present Kaiser lies in our immediate beginning with the construction of six Dreadnoughts." [ The Standard's Berlin correspondent states that the Emperor is deeply hurt and keenly disappointed at the unfavourable reception of his interview by British i people.

CONSTERNATION IN PARIS.' LONDON, 30th October. Consternation is expressed in- official circles in Paris at tho action of tho Kaiser in revealing the purport of diplomatic communications made to the German Chancellery. KAISER'S STATEMENTS DEPRECATED IN VIENNA. RESENTMENT IN RUSSIA. (Received October 31, 8.3 a.m.) LONDON, 30th October. The Kaiser's statements, made during the interview, are deprecated in Vienna and resented in Russia, whose "correctness" towards Great Britain during the war is loudly affirmed. THE AUTHORSHIP IN QUESTION. SIR F. LASCELLES'S DENIAL. GERMAN PRESS CONDEMNATION. KAISER'S THEATRICAL METHODS LONDON, 30th October. Sir Frank Lascelles, British Ambassador to Germany, denies that ho was the one who interviewed the Kaiser, I and declares that ho doea not know who it is. Most of the German newspapers deplore the Kaiser's indiscretion, and many condemn his autocratic, theatrical methods. Reuter's Berlin correspondent learns that the Kaiser gave permission for tho publication of the interview, with a view to removing British misunderstanding. He left tho date of publication to the discretion of the interviewer. DID LORD ROBERTS ADOPT KAISER'S ADVICE? IT IS THOUGHT NOT. LONDON, 30th October. The Times Paris correspondent recalls the fact that Lord Roberts did not act on the Kaiser's well-known aphorisms, but stood his ground in Natal and Cape Colony, so as not to allow the Boers a chance of overrunning South Africa and proclaiming a Republic, then demanding European recognition. A PAPER CONJURES, UP A PICTURE. YELLS FROM SOUTH AFRICA. LONDON, 30th October. The newspaper Taglisehe Rundschau, the Kaiser's favourite paper, pictures yells of rage from ths South African Dutch over the disclosure, of the Kaiser's campaign plan. "The disclosure is worth for England its weight in gold," says tho paper, "since it must for ever terminate South African sympathies for ' Germany."

THE STORMfcERG DISASTER. The "Black Week" referred to by the Kaiser commenced on 10th December, when a catastrophe was sustained by General Sir William Gatacre's column, moving from Queenstown. He attempted a night march, and an early morning inarch on the Boers in a fortified position at Stormberg, was misled by guides, miscalculated the distance, neglected to send scouts ahead, and so took his men to the very muzzles of waiting guns. From the storm which then opened on them there were more than 500 who did not escape. Besides the dead and wounded, many went as prisoners to Pretoria. MAJESFONTEIN. On "the next day the forces under General Lord Methuen met with a terrible repulse, at Majeafontein, where the Boers were in force behind fortified lines which extended, some six miles in length, on the hills between the place named and Spytfontein. Tho Highland brigade, advancing in the darkness, before daybreak, was in the midst of the enemy's entrenchments before it knew them to be near, and was horribly cut to pieces, losing 53 officers, including its commander, General Wauchope, and 650 men. The British fell back to Modder River, leaving not less than 1000 men behind. COLENSO. Before xhe week of these defeats had reached its end, another, far worse, had been added in the Natal campaign. General Sir Redvers Buller, appointed to the chief command in South Africa, had arrived at Capetown on the last day of October, and, after some general study of the field at large, had taken, personal direction of the operations in Natal, for the relief of Ladysmith. His movements were undoubtedly hurried by urgent appeals from General Sir George White. On the 15th December he felt prepared to attempt the passage of the Tugela River, near Colenso, and did so with his full force, at two drifts, or fords, some miles apart. Like Methuen and Gatacre, he seems to have been strangely misinformed as to the location and strength of the entrenchments of the Boers. The latter had succeeded again and again h? concealing lines of deadly rifle pits and batteries until their as&ailants fairly stumbled against them within fatally close range. This happened at Colenso, as at Stormberg and Majesfontein, and what has been described as " the ill-managed attempt to begin an advance upon Ladysmith" cost 165 men and officers killed, 670 wounded, 337 prisoners and missing, besides 11 guns.. j LORD ROBERTS TAKES COMMAND. Field-Marshal Lord Roberts, with Lord Kitchener as chief of staff, In January, 1900, took command, and for a month he was engaged in organising in preparing for new movements in the field. Meanwhile, fresh troops by the thousand were being sent from England, and it is estimated that Lord Roberts had something like 200,000 men under his command when decisive British successes began to be heard of.