MOUNTED MEN v. INFANTRY.

Otago Witness, Issue 2401, 8 March 1900, Page 28

MOUNTED MEN v. INFANTRY.

A gentleman in Sydney has received an interesting letter from, a gentleman long resident in Maritzburg. In the course of it he remarks: — "To give you 'an idea of how little use infantry are against mounted Boers, imagine a series of stony ridges. In. the hollow of the v first ridge the Boers' horses are held hi readiness for tlie Boera. The British infantry advance and charge the ridge, losing heavily in doing so. On reaching the top tlie Boer fire ceases and the infantry cheering, reach the crowa only to find Mr Boer galloping like mad tor theiiext ridge. Their losses [ are few, they take up> a position iust as good as the first one, and are just as ready to let tbat be taken and retire, as for e% cry man he- lo a cs lie accounts, for four or five of his enemy. Now if our men; were mounted quite a different state o£ things would exist. One of the causes which, in addition \,n the loss of the guns at Colenso, helped lh» Boers in repulsing General Bailer's forces v, &i that the Kaffirs in, charge of the oxen drawing the raval gun 1 ran away directly tho Boer shells started to burst around them. The Naval Brigade had to haul the guns themselves, and arrived in position too lute to support the infantry as intended. A friend of mine, mlio is a trooper in TlioruyPTof t's- Mounted Infinity 1 , fays they were asked to do an impossibility in the Colenso battle. First, they had to approach the Boer position across open ploughed fields which border the. Tugela. The banks on each side dropped 15ft to the water. Barbed wire was lai-l in the rh er and along t;:e banks on the Boer s'.de, whilst the Boers were entrenched in position* which commanded tlie whole advance. They attempted to rush Ihs banl«, but were met by such a hail of bullets that they were forced to lie down in a ploughed field, and the Eoers, thinking them all shot, reserved their fire until a man moved, which a few did. and were promptly filled with 1 bullet?. I could tell you numberless instances 1 of men being led into positions where they had no chance of doing anything but get shot, 1 and if the Boers could only shoot as well as our men there would have been thousands killed on our side that clay. Tltornycroft's men declare that had they been allowed to advance at night and entrench themselves under cover of darkness they would have been able to accomplish something."