The instant that the danger was realised Damant, his staff, and the forty Yeomen who formed the escort dashed for the crest in the hope of anticipating the Boers. So rapid was the charge of the others that they had overwhelmed the gunners before the supports could reach the hill, and the latter found themselves under the deadly fire of the Boer rifles from above. Damant was hit in four places, all of his staff were wounded, and hardly a man of the small body of Yeomanry was left standing. Nothing could exceed their gallantry. Gaussen their captain fell at their head. On the ridge the men about the guns were nearly all killed or wounded. Of the gun detachment only two men remained, both of them hit, and Jeffcoat their dying captain bequeathed them fifty pounds each in a will drawn upon the spot. In half an hour the centre of the British line had been absolutely annihilated. Modern warfare is on the whole much less bloody than of old, but when one party has gained the tactical mastery it is a choice between speedy surrender and total destruction.
The wide-spread British wings had begun to understand that there was something amiss, and to ride in towards the centre. An officer on the far right peering through his glasses saw those tell-tale puffs at the very muzzles of the British guns, which showed that they were firing case at close quarters. He turned his squadron inwards and soon gathered up Scott\'s squadron of Damant\'s Horse, and both rode for the kopje. Rimington\'s men were appearing on the other side, and the Boers rode off. They were unable to remove the guns which they had taken, because all the horses had perished. \'I actually thought,\' says one officer who saw them ride away, \'that I had made a mistake and been fighting our own men. They were dressed in our uniforms and some of them wore the tiger-skin, the badge of Damant\'s Horse, round their hats.\' The same officer gives an account of the scene on the gun-kopje. \'The result when we got to the guns was this, gunners all killed except two (both wounded), pom-pom officers and men all killed, maxim all killed, 91st (the gun escort) one officer and one man not hit, all the rest killed or wounded; staff, every officer hit.\' That is what it means to those who are caught in the vortex of the cyclone. The total loss was about seventy-five.
In this action the Boers, who were under the command of Wessels, delivered their attack with a cleverness and dash which deserved success. Their stratagem, however, depending as it did upon the use of British uniforms and methods, was illegitimate by all the laws of war, and one can but marvel at the long-suffering patience of officers and men who endured such things without any attempt at retaliation. There is too much reason to believe also, that considerable brutality was shown by those Boers who carried the kopje, and the very high proportion of killed to wounded among the British who lay there corroborates the statement of the survivors that several were shot at close quarters after all resistance had ceased.
This rough encounter of Tafelkop was followed only four days later by a very much more serious one at Tweefontein, which proved that even after two years of experience we had not yet sufficiently understood the courage and the cunning of our antagonist. The blockhouse line was being gradually extended from Harrismith to Bethlehem, so as to hold down this turbulent portion of the country. The Harrismith section had been pushed as far as Tweefontein, which is nine miles west of Elands River Bridge, and here a small force was stationed to cover the workers. This column consisted of four squadrons of the 4th Imperial Yeomanry, one gun of the 79th battery, and one pom-pom, the whole under the temporary command of Major Williams of the South Staffords, Colonel Firmin being absent.
Knowing that De Wet and his men were in the neighbourhood, the camp of the Yeomen had been pitched in a position which seemed to secure it against attack. A solitary kopje presented a long slope to the north, while the southern end was precipitous. The outposts were pushed well out upon the plain, and a line of sentries was placed along the crest. The only precaution which seems to have been neglected was to have other outposts at the base of the southern declivity. It appears to have been taken for granted, however, that no attack was to be apprehended from that side, and that in any case it would be impossible to evade the vigilance of the sentries upon the top.
Of all the daring and skilful attacks delivered by the Boers during the war there is certainly none more remarkable than this one. At two o\'clock in the morning of a moonlight night De Wet\'s forlorn hope assembled at the base of the hill and clambered up to the summit. The fact that it was Christmas Eve may conceivably have had something to do with the want of vigilance upon the part of the sentries. In a season of good will and conviviality the rigour of military discipline may insensibly relax. Little did the sleeping Yeomen in the tents, or the drowsy outposts upon the crest, think of the terrible Christmas visitors who were creeping on to them, or of the grim morning gift which Santa Claus was bearing.
The Boers, stealing up in their stockinged feet, poured under the crest until they were numerous enough to make a rush. It is almost inconceivable how they could have got so far without their presence being suspected by the sentries – but so it was. At last, feeling strong enough to advance, they sprang over the crest and fired into the pickets, and past them into the sleeping camp. The top of the hill being once gained, there was nothing to prevent their comrades from swarming up, and in a very few minutes nearly a thousand Boers were in a position to command the camp. The British were not only completely outnumbered, but were hurried from their sleep into the fight without any clear idea as to the danger or how to meet it, while the hissing sleet of bullets struck many of them down as they rushed out of their tents. Considering how terrible the ordeal was to which they were exposed, these untried Yeomen seem to have behaved very well. \'Some brave gentlemen ran away at the first shot, but I am thankful to say they were not many,\' says one of their number. The most veteran troops would have been tried very high had they been placed in such a position. \'The noise and the clamour,\' says one spectator, \'were awful. The yells of the Dutch, the screams and shrieks of dying men and horses, the cries of natives, howls of dogs, the firing, the galloping of horses, the whistling of bullets, and the whirr volleys make in the air, made up such a compound of awful and diabolical sounds as I never heard before nor hope to hear again. In the confusion some of the men killed each other and some killed themselves. Two Boers who put on helmets were killed by their own people. The men were given no time to rally or to collect their thoughts, for the gallant Boers barged right into them, shooting them down, and occasionally being shot down, at a range of a few yards. Harwich and Watney, who had charge of the maxim, died nobly with all the men of their gun section round them. Reed, the sergeant-major, rushed at the enemy with his clubbed rifle, but was riddled with bullets. Major Williams, the commander, was shot through the stomach as he rallied his men. The gunners had time to fire two rounds before they were overpowered and shot down to a man. For half an hour the resistance was maintained, but at the end of that time the Boers had the whole camp in their possession, and were already hastening to get their prisoners away before the morning should bring a rescue.
The casualties are in themselves enough to show how creditable was the resistance of the Yeomanry. Out of a force of under four hundred men they had six officers and fifty-one men killed, eight officers and eighty men wounded. There have been very few surrenders during the war in which there has been such evidence as this of a determined stand. Nor was it a bloodless victory upon the part of the Boers, for there was evidence that their losses, though less than those of the British, were still severe.
The prisoners, over two hundred in number, were hurried away by the Boers, who seemed under the immediate eye of De Wet to have behaved with exemplary humanity to the wounded. The captives were taken by forced marches to the Basuto border, where they were turned adrift, half clad and without food. By devious ways and after many adventures, they all made their way back again to the British lines. It was well for De Wet that he had shown such promptness in getting away, for within three hours of the end of the action the two regiments of Imperial Horse appeared upon the scene, having travelled seventeen miles in the time. Already, however, the rearguard of the Boers was disappearing into the fastness of the Langberg, where all pursuit was vain.