[8] While dealing with the matter it is due to General Colvile to repeat the statement made by himself at the end of the year to a representative of Reuter's Agency:-- "I am accused of being chiefly responsible for the surrender of the Yeomanry at Lindley. In my opinion the primary cause of this surrender was the insufficient information given by the headquarters staff to Colonel Spragge and myself. Had I been informed of Lord Roberts's intentions and of the intended movements of Colonel Spragge, who was in command of the Yeomanry, and had Colonel Spragge been made acquainted with the orders I received from Lord Roberts, this disaster would never have happened. The following details will make it clear that the loss of the Yeomanry was primarily due to bad staff work. On May 20 I received a telegram from the chief of the staff ordering me to concentrate my troops, consisting of the Highland Brigade, the Eastern Province Horse, a field battery, and two naval guns, at Ventersburg on May 23, to leave that town on the 24th and to march to Heilbron, _via_ Lindley, arriving at Lindley on May 26, and at Heilbron on the 29th. I was informed that I should be joined at Ventersburg by the 13th Imperial Yeomanry and Lovat's Scouts. "On arrival at Ventersburg, finding that neither the Yeomanry nor the Scouts were there, I informed the chief of the staff by telegraph, but received no answer from him at the time, though his reply was handed to me more than a month later, among a bundle of undelivered telegrams. This telegram was worded as follows: 'May 24. Yeomanry are so late they cannot catch you at Ventersburg. You must march without them. They will join you later _via_ Kroonstad.' As I did not receive the telegram till the march was over it did not affect my action, but had I received it at the time its wording would have led me to suppose that the Yeomanry would join me at Heilbron, as was actually the case with Lovat's Scouts. At this time Lord Roberts's army was disposed roughly as follows: General Hunter's Division on the Kimberley-Mafeking Railway, Lord Methuen on the Vaal River, headquarters and General Pole-Carew's Division on the Bloemfontein-Johannesburg Railway, General Ian Hamilton's column at Heilbron, and General Rundle and Brabant to the south-east of me. It was, therefore, extended across the Free State, and I assumed that Lord Roberts intended to advance in this formation, sweeping all before him till he got within striking distance of the Vaal, thus forcing the enemy to extend, and that he would then select one point for forcing the passage of the river. I also supposed that Heilbron, which is the head of a short line of railway, would be the supply depot for the columns to the east, as Winburg had been.