Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World. Part 7Twain, Mark
General
Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World. Part 7
Twain, Mark
Equator -- Description and travel; Twain, Mark, 1835-1910 -- Travel; Voyages around the world
In the Boer loss, also, historical precedent is followed with sufficient
fidelity. In the 4 battles named above, the Boer loss, so far as known,
was an average of 6 men per battle, to the British average loss of 175.
In Jameson's battles, as per Boer official report, the Boer loss in
killed was 4. Two of these were killed by the Boers themselves, by
accident, the other by Jameson's army--one of them intentionally, the
other by a pathetic mischance. "A young Boer named Jacobz was moving
forward to give a drink to one of the wounded troopers (Jameson's) after
the first charge, when another wounded man, mistaking his intention; shot
him." There were three or four wounded Boers in the Krugersdorp
hospital, and apparently no others have been reported. Mr. Garrett, "on
a balance of probabilities, fully accepts the official version, and
thanks Heaven the killed was not larger."
As a military man, I wish to point out what seems to me to be military
errors in the conduct of the campaign which we have just been
considering. I have seen active service in the field, and it was in the
actualities of war that I acquired my training and my right to speak.
I served two weeks in the beginning of our Civil War, and during all that
tune commanded a battery of infantry composed of twelve men. General
Grant knew the history of my campaign, for I told it him. I also told
him the principle upon which I had conducted it; which was, to tire the
enemy. I tired out and disqualified many battalions, yet never had a
casualty myself nor lost a man. General Grant was not given to paying
compliments, yet he said frankly that if I had conducted the whole war
much bloodshed would have been spared, and that what the army might have
lost through the inspiriting results of collision in the field would have
been amply made up by the liberalizing influences of travel. Further
endorsement does not seem to me to be necessary.
Let us now examine history, and see what it teaches. In the 4 battles
fought in 1881 and the two fought by Jameson, the British loss in killed,
wounded, and prisoners, was substantially 1,300 men; the Boer loss, as
far as is ascertainable, eras about 30 men. These figures show that
there was a defect somewhere. It was not in the absence of courage. I
think it lay in the absence of discretion. The Briton should have done
one thing or the other: discarded British methods and fought the Boer
with Boer methods, or augmented his own force until--using British
methods--it should be large enough to equalize results with the Boer.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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