This much, however, became clear, that a main communication road of the enemy ran past Mbozi from Fife via Rwiba to New Langenburg. On this road we captured a lot of stores and several supply columns on the march. The existence of this road showed that a large English depot must lie in the neighbourhood of Fife. It would probably be possible to capture this by swift action, before stronger enemy forces arrived there. On the morning of 31st October a fighting patrol was dispatched against Fife. On the evening of the same day natives and patrols reported the advance of strong enemy forces on the New Langenburg-Rwiba road. In the early morning of the 1st November I moved off with the whole force, advancing in the first instance towards Mount Rwiba. There the track showed that a strong enemy column had passed the Rwiba hill shortly before us, in the direction of Fife. This enemy force had not been observed by a German fighting patrol that had been sent out to Mount Rwiba. CHAPTER VIII THE ADVANCE INTO BRITISH RHODESIA THE second patrol dispatched by us on the 31st October towards Fife had halted at Mount Rwiba. I had now to advance with the whole force towards Fife, in order to reach it before the enemy, or to attack if our first patrol should prove to be engaged there. The ten-hour march (actual marching time) from Mbozi to Fife was a tremendous strain on the force, but the reports of our patrols, the track of the enemy, and his notes found on the trees, proved beyond a doubt that the enemy was doing everything possible to reach Fife on the same day, the 1st November. The great distance which they, too, had to march justified us in assuming that our patrol, which I expected would reach Fife on the 31st October, or at the latest on the 1st November, would be equal to preventing the enemy occupying the depot at Fife on the 1st. In the course of the afternoon we fired on several patrols, without halting in our advance. Late in the afternoon weak enemy detachments in the hills near Fife were quickly thrown back. I myself, with Spangenberg’s detachment, which had moved off the road to the right, advanced along a mountain ridge on to a point where we judged that Fife would lie.