The War in South Africa Part 10

'We are quite a little Swiss colony here, and I don't know one of my countrymen who would not endorse every word of my statement.

'Many may have sympathies with the Boers, but in all justice they will always give credit to the British troops and their officers for the humane way this war is carried on, and for the splendid way in which Tommy Atkins behaves himself.'

With this was printed in the 'Gazette de Lausanne,' which inst.i.tuted the inquiry, a letter from Mr. Gray, Presbyterian minister in Pretoria, which says:

'A few days ago I received an extract from your issue of November 17 last ent.i.tled "La Civilisation Anglaise en Afrique." It consisted mainly of a letter over the signature of H. D. van Broekhuizen (not Broesehuizen as printed), Boer pastor of Pretoria. Allow me, sir, to a.s.sure you that the wholesale statements with regard to the atrocities of British soldiers contained in that letter are a tissue of falsehoods, and const.i.tute an unfounded calumny which it would be difficult to parallel in the annals of warfare. It is difficult to conceive the motives that actuate the writer, but that they have been violent enough to make him absolutely reckless as to facts, is evident.

'When I got the article from your paper I immediately went out to make inquiry as to what possible foundation there was for the charges hurled so wildly at the British soldier. Having lived in Pretoria for the last eleven years I am acquainted with many of the local Boers. Those of them whom I questioned a.s.sured me that they had never known a case in which British soldiers had outraged a woman. One case was rumoured, but had never been substantiated, and was regarded as very doubtful. Let it be granted that some solitary cases of rudeness may have occurred, that would not be surprising under the circ.u.mstances. Still it would not furnish a ground for the libelling of a whole army. The astonishing fact is, however, that in this country one only hears of the surprise everywhere felt that the British soldier has been so self-restrained and deferential towards women.'

To this M. van Broekhuizen's feeble reply was that there was no ex-consul of the name of Constancon in Pretoria. The 'Gazette de Lausanne' then pointed out that the gentleman was well known, that he had acted in that capacity for many years, and added that if M. van Broekhuizen was so ill-informed upon so simple a matter, it was not likely that he was very correct upon other more contentious ones. Thus again a false coin was nailed to the counter, but only after it had circulated so widely that many who had pa.s.sed it would never know that it was proved to be base metal. Incredible as it may seem, the infamous falsehood was repeated in 1902 by a Dr. Vallentin, in the 'Deutsche Rundschau,' from which it was copied into other leading German papers without any reference to its previous disproof in 1901.

Now we will turn for a moment to the evidence of Miss Alice Bron, the devoted Belgian nurse, who served on both sides during the war and has therefore a fair standard of comparison. Here are a few sentences from her reports:

'I have so often heard it said and repeated that the British soldiers are the dregs of London and the sc.u.m of the criminal cla.s.ses, that their conduct astounded me.'

This is the opinion of a lady who spent two years in the service of humanity on the veldt.

Here are one or two other sidelights from Miss Bron:

'How grateful and respectful they all are! I go to the hospital at night without the slightest fear, and when a sentry hears my reply, "Sister,"

to his challenge, he always humbly begs my pardon.

'I have seen the last of them and their affectionate attentions, their respect, and their confidence. On this head I could relate many instances of exquisite feeling on the part of these poor soldiers.

'A wounded English soldier was speaking of Cronje. "Ah, sister," said he, "I am glad that we have made so many prisoners."

'"Why?" I asked, fearing to hear words of hatred.

'"Oh," he said, "I was glad to hear it because I know that they at least would be neither wounded nor killed. They will not leave wife nor children, neither will they suffer what we are suffering."'

She describes how she met General Wavell:

'"You see I have come to protect you," he said.

'We smiled and bowed, and I thought, "I know your soldiers too well, General. We don't need any protection."'

But war may have brutalised the combatants, and so it is of interest to have Nurse Bron's impressions at the end of 1901. She gives her conversation with a Boer:

'"All that I have to say to you is that what you did down there has never been seen in any other war. _Never_ in any country in the world has such a dastardly act been committed as the shooting of one who goes to meet the white flag."

'Very pale, the chief, a true "gentleman" fifty-three years old, and the father of eleven children, answered, "You are right, sister."

'"And since we talk of these things," I said, "I will say that I understand very well that you are defending your country, but what I do not excuse is your lying as you do about these English."

'"We repeat what we are told."

'"No," I said, "you all of you lie, and you know that you are lying, with the Bible on your knees and invoking the name of G.o.d, and, thanks to your lies, all Europe believes that the English army is composed of a.s.sa.s.sins and thieves. You see how they treat you here!"'

She proceeds to show how they were treated. The patients, it may be observed, were not Boer combatants but Cape rebels, liable to instant execution. This is the diet after operations:

'For eight, or ten days, the patient has champagne _of the choicest French brands_ (her italics), in considerable quant.i.ty, then old cognac, and finally port, stout, or ale at choice, with five or six eggs a day beaten up in brandy and milk, arriving at last at a complete diet of which I, though perfectly well, could not have absorbed the half.'

'This,' she says, 'is another instance of the "ferocity" with which, according to the European press, the English butchers have conducted the war.'

The Sisters of Nazareth in South Africa are a body who are above political or racial prejudice. Here are the published words of the Mother Superior:

'I receive letters by every mail, but a word that would imply the least shadow of reproach on the conduct of the soldiers has never been written. As for the British soldier in general, our sisters in various parts of the colony, who have come a great deal in contact with the military of all ranks, state that they can never say enough of their courtesy, politeness, and good behaviour at all times.'

These are not the impressions which the Boer agents, with their command of secret-service money and their influence on the European press, have given to the world. A constant stream of misrepresentations and lies have poisoned the mind of Europe and have made a deep and enduring breach between ourselves and our German kinsmen.

The British troops have been accused of shooting women. It is wonderful that many women have not been shot, for it has not been unusual for farmhouses to be defended by the men when there were women within. As a matter of fact, however, very few cases have occurred where a woman has been injured. One amazon was killed in the fighting line, rifle in hand, outside Ladysmith. A second victim furnished the famous Eloff myth, which gave material for many cartoons and editorials. The accusation was that in cold blood we had shot Kruger's niece, and a Berlin morning paper told the story, with many artistic embellishments, as follows:

'As the Boer saw his wife down, just able to raise herself, he made an attempt to run to her a.s.sistance, but the inhumans held him fast. The officer a.s.sured him that she was shot through the temples and must anyhow die, and they left her therefore lying. In the evening he heard his name called. It was his wife who still lived after twelve hours'

agony. When they reached Rustenburg she was dead. This woman was Frau Eloff, Kruger's niece. In addition to the sympathy for the loss Kruger has suffered, this report will renew the bitter feeling of all against the brutality of English warfare.'

This story was dished up in many ways by many papers. Here is Lord Kitchener's plain account of the matter:

'No woman of that name has been killed, but the report may refer to the death of a Mrs. Vandermerve, who unfortunately was killed at a farmhouse from which her husband was firing. Mrs. Vandermerve is a sister-in-law of Eloff. The death of a woman from a stray bullet is greatly to be regretted, but it appears clear that her husband was responsible for the fighting which caused the accident.'

So perished another myth. I observe, however, now (Christmas 1901), a continental journalist describing an interview with Kruger says, 'he wore mourning on account of his niece who died of a gun-shot.' Might not his wife's death possibly account for the mourning?

And yet another invention which is destined to the same fate, is the story that at the skirmish of Graspan, near Reitz, upon June 6, the British used the Boer women as cover, a subject which also afforded excellent material for the caricaturists of the Fatherland. The picture of rows of charming Boer maidens chained in the open with bloodthirsty soldiers crouching behind them was too alluring for the tender-hearted artist. Nothing was wanting for a perfect cartoon--except the original fact. Here is the report as it appeared in a German paper:

'When the English on June 6 were attacked by the Boers, they ordered the women and children to leave the wagons. Placing these in front of the soldiers, they shot beneath the women's arms upon the approaching Boers.

Eight women and two children fell through the Boers' fire. When the Boers saw this they stopped firing. Yelling like wild beasts, they broke through the soldiers' lines, beating to death the Tommies like mad dogs with the b.u.t.t ends of their rifles.'

The true circ.u.mstances of the action so far as they can be collected are as follows: Early on June 6 Major Sladen, with 200 mounted infantry, ran down a Boer convoy of 100 wagons. He took forty-five male prisoners, and the wagons were full of women and children. He halted his men and waited for the main British force (De Lisle's) to come up. While he was waiting he was fiercely attacked by a large body of Boers, five or six hundred, under De Wet. The British threw themselves into a Kaffir kraal and made a desperate resistance. The long train of wagons with the women still in them extended from this village right across the plain, and the Boers used them as cover in skirmishing up to the village. The result was that the women and children were under a double fire from either side. One woman and two children appear to have been hit, though whether by Boer or Briton it must have been difficult to determine. The convoy and the prisoners remained eventually in the hands of the British. It will be seen then that it is as just to say that the Boers used their women as cover for their advance as the British for their defence. Probably in the heat of the action both sides thought more of the wagons than of what was inside them.

These, with one case at Middelburg, where in a night attack of the Boers one or two inmates of the refugee camp are said to have been accidentally hit, form the only known instances in the war. And yet so well known a paper as the German 'Kladderadatsch' is not ashamed to publish a picture of a ruined farm with dead women strewed round it, and the male child hanging from the branch of a tree. The 'Kladderadatsch'

has a reputation as a comic paper, but there should be some limits to its facetiousness.

In his pamphlet on 'Methods of Barbarism,' Mr. Stead has recently produced a chapter called 'A Glimpse of the h.e.l.lish Panorama,' in which he deals with the evidence at the Spoelstra trial. Spoelstra was a Hollander who, having sworn an oath of neutrality, afterwards despatched a letter to a Dutch newspaper without submitting it to a censor, in which he made libellous attacks upon the British Army. He was tried for the offence and sentenced to a fine of 100_l._, his imprisonment being remitted. In the course of the trial he called a number of witnesses for the purpose of supporting his charges against the troops, and it is on their evidence that Mr. Stead dilates under the characteristic headline given above.

Mr. Stead begins his indictment by a paragraph which speaks for itself: 'It is a cant cry with many persons, by no means confined to those who have advocated the war, that the British Army has spent two years in the South African Republics without a single case of impropriety being proved against a single soldier. I should be very glad to believe it; but there is Rudyard Kipling's familiar saying that Tommy Atkins is no plaster saint, but a single man in barracks, or, in this case, a single man in camp, remarkably like other human beings. We all know him at home. There is not one father of a family in the House or on the London Press who would allow his servant girl to remain out all night on a public common in England in time of profound peace in the company of a score of soldiers. If he did, he would feel that he had exposed the girl to the loss of her character. This is not merely admitted, but acted upon by all decent people who live in garrison towns or in the neighbourhood of barracks. Why, then, should they suppose that when the same men are released from all the restraints of civilisation, and sent forth to burn, destroy, and loot at their own sweet will and pleasure, they will suddenly undergo so complete a transformation as to scrupulously respect the wives and daughters of the enemy? It is very unpopular to say this, and I already hear in advance the shrieks of execration of those who will declare that I am calumniating the gallant soldiers who are spending their lives in the defence of the interests of the Empire. But I do not say a word against our soldiers. I only say that they are men.'

He adds:

'It is an unpleasant fact, but it has got to be faced like other facts.

No war can be conducted--and this war has not been conducted--without exposing mult.i.tudes of women, married and single, to the worst extremities of outrage. It is an inevitable incident of war. It is one of the normal phenomena of the military Inferno. It is absolutely impossible to attempt any comparative or quant.i.tative estimate of the number of women who have suffered wrong at the hands of our troops.'

Was ever such an argument adduced in this world upon a serious matter!

When stripped of its rhetoric it amounts to this, '250,000 men have committed outrages. How do I prove it? Because they are 250,000 men, and therefore _must_ commit outrages.' Putting all chivalry, sense of duty, and every higher consideration upon one side, is Mr. Stead not aware that if a soldier had done such a thing and if his victim could have pointed him out, the man's life would be measured by the time that was needed to collect a military court to try him? Is there a soldier who does not know this? Is there a Boer who does not know it? It is the one offence for which there would be no possible forgiveness. Are the Boers so meek-spirited a race that they have no desire for vengeance?

Would any officer take the responsibility of not reporting a man who was accused of such a crime? Where, then, are the lists of the men who must have suffered if this cruel accusation were true? There are no such lists, because such things have never occurred.

Leading up to the events of the trial, Mr. Stead curdles our blood by talking of the eleven women who stood up upon oath to testify to the ill-treatment which they had received at the hands of our troops. Taken with the context, the casual reader would naturally imagine that these eleven women were all complaining of some s.e.xual ill-usage. In the very next sentence he talks about 'such horrible and shameful incidents.' But on examination it proves that eight out of the eleven cases have nothing s.e.xual or, indeed, in many of them, anything criminal in their character. One is, that a coffin was dug up to see if there were arms in it. On this occasion the search was a failure, though it has before now been a success. Another was that the bed of a sick woman was searched--without any suggestion of indelicacy. Two others, that women had been confined while on the trek in wagons. 'The soldiers did not bother the woman during or after the confinement. They did not peep into the wagon,' said the witness. These are the trivialities which Mr. Stead tries to bluff us into cla.s.sifying as 'horrible and shameful incidents.'

But there were three alleged cases of a.s.sault upon women. One of them is laid to the charge of a certain Mr. E----n, of the Intelligence Department. Now, the use of Mr. and the description 'Intelligence Department' make it very doubtful whether this man could be called a member of the British Army at all. The inference is that he was a civilian, and further, that he was a Dutch civilian. British names which will fit E----n are not common, while the Dutch name Esselen or Enslin is extremely so. 'I have never been to the Intelligence Department to find out whether he really belonged to that Department,' said the woman. She adds that E----n acted as an interpreter. Surely, then, he must have been a Dutchman. In that case, why is his name the only name which is disguised? Is it not a little suggestive?

The second case was that of Mrs. Gouws, whose unfortunate experience was communicated to Pastor van Broekhuizen, and had such an effect upon him as to cause him to declare that 30 per cent. of the women of the country had been ruined. Mrs. Gouws certainly appears by her own account to have been very roughly treated, though she does not a.s.sert that her a.s.sailant went to the last extremity--or, indeed, that he did more than use coa.r.s.e terms in his conversation. The husband in his evidence says: 'I have seen a great deal of soldiers, and they behaved well, and I could speak well of them.' He added that a British officer had taken his wife's deposition, and that both the Provost-Marshal and the Military Governor were interesting themselves in the case. Though no actual a.s.sault was committed, it is to be hoped that the man who was rude to a helpless woman will sooner or later be identified and punished.