Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900): Letters from the FrontHales, A. G. (Alfred Greenwood)
History
Campaign Pictures of the War in South Africa (1899-1900): Letters from the Front
Hales, A. G. (Alfred Greenwood)
South African War, 1899-1902 -- Personal narratives
One pound of raw flour, which the soldiers have to cook after a hard day's
march, is served out to each man every alternate day. The following day he
gets one pound of biscuits. In this country there is no fuel excepting a
little ox-dung, dried by the sun. If a soldier is lucky enough to pick up a
little, he can go to the nearest water, of which there is plenty, mix his
cake without yeast or baking-powder, and make some sort of a wretched
mouthful. He gets one pound of raw fresh meat daily, which nine times out
of ten he cannot cook, and there his supplies end.
What has become of the rations of rum, of sugar, of tea, of cocoa, of
groceries generally? Ask at the snug little railway sidings where the goods
are stacked--and forgotten. Ask in the big stores in Capetown and other
seaport towns. Ask in your own country, where countless thousands of
pounds' worth of foodstuffs lie rotting in the warehouses, bound up and
tied down with red tape bandages. Ask--yes, ask; but don't stop at
asking--damn somebody high up in power. Don't let some wretched underling
be made the scapegoat of this criminal state of affairs, for the taint of
this shameful thing rests upon you, upon every Briton whose homes,
privileges, and prosperity are being safeguarded by these famishing men.
The folk in authority will probably tell you that General Rundle and his
splendid fellows are so isolated that food cannot be obtained for them. I
say that is false, for recently I, in company with another correspondent,
left General Rundle's camp without an escort. We made our way in the
saddle, taking our two Cape carts with us, to Winburg railway station;
leaving our horseflesh there, we took train for East London. Then back to
the junction, and trained it down to Capetown, where we remained for
forty-eight hours, and then made our way back to Winburg, and from Winburg
we came without escort to rejoin General Rundle at Hammonia. If two
innocent, incompetent (?) war correspondents could traverse that country
and get through with winter supplies for themselves, why cannot the
transport people manage to do the same? These transport people affect to
look with contempt upon a war correspondent and his opinions on things
military; but if we could not manage transport business better than they
do, most of us would willingly stand up and allow ourselves to be shot. We
are no burden upon the Army; we carry for ourselves, we buy for ourselves,
and we look for news for ourselves; and we take our fair share of risks in
the doing of our duty, as the long list of dead and disabled journalists
will amply prove.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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