War and the Arme Blanche

899, to Feb

of these events may be

ial awakening to the gr

rd Roberts to the suprem

ments of regular troops of al

ers of additional mounted troops.

, improvised by abstraction from every Infantry battal

teer mounted riflemen; from Great Britain (in the shape of 10,00

mounted riflemen, including a local militia for the defence of Cape Colon

al change of military theory. There was a general impression abroad, first, that this was a "peculiar" war demanding peculiar expedients; second, that it was a comparatively simple and easy matter to improvise mounted riflemen. The first proposition was a misleading half-truth, the second a profound fallacy, but the net r

East London railway-line. The latter advance was the more serious in that it endangered, not only Methuen's communications with the south, but the whole of the railway system from our two major ports, Cape Town and Port Elizabeth, with its three cardinal junctions-De Aar, Naauwpoort, and Rosmead. The three serious defeats of mid-December, and especially that of Gatacre at Stormberg, increased the danger. At least six weeks must elapse before sufficient reinforcements co

d a multitude of small schemes and enterprises, which it is impossible for me to recount in detail. I can only sketch h

o Arundel, then to Rensburg, then to a line immediately threatening Colesberg, all the time widening his protective net to right and left over the adjacent country. His system was to harass, surprise, impose upon the enem

or active operations rose from about 1,200, mainly Infantry, on November 20, to 2,000, half of them mounted, in the second week of December, and to 4,500 in the second week of January, 1900, when all immediate danger to the Colony was at an end, an

y, and week to week, with the energy or indifference of the burghers. But it is fairly safe to say that at the outset they outnumbered the British force by nearly two to one, held a distinct though lessening supe

e Colesberg operations proved the value of the training peculiar to Cavalry-that is, in the arme blanche. Mr. Goldman, for example, in the course of a con

bres, even in pursuit. The 10th Hussars and a squadron of Inniskilling Dragoons, with two horse batteries, were engaging a force under Piet de Wet, which had just failed 89in a surprise attack on an Infantry position. Suddenly the Boers lost heart, and bolted across the

ics. In the same way the regular Mounted Infantry would have done better if in peace they had been regarded, not as a cross between Infantry and Cavalry, but as fully-fledged mounted troops, capable, with time and the proper education, of being of as much general practic

emarks upon the Co

l these small encounters down to those of patrols, the rifle, not the steel, governed tactics. If only those of our present Yeomanry officers who are asking for the sword, not so much for shock action on a big scale as f

in character. This was exactly what French, with his composite force, did. Besides assisting to cover the rear of an existing force-Methuen's-he was in the position of covering the front of a hitherto partially mobilized and unconcentrated army. At first most of the army he was screening was still in England, his and its primary base. Gradually it collected in force behind him, at the Cape Peninsula or

troops, but particularly mounted troops, simply because they possess horses-the spirit of aggressive mobility, backed by resource, stratagem, and dash. In French this spirit, not only now but throughout the war, was

unted work at the same period. The best mounted enterprise done by Methuen's troops during the long halt at the Modder was Pilcher's Sunnyside raid of January 1, 1900

ef of Ki

which French had been containing, from a strength of 2,000 to 7,000; elsewhere they had stood in an attitude of passive defence. Cronje had sat in his trenches at Magersfontein facing Methuen at Modder River. The Stormberg force, facing Gatacre, had been almost inactive, and behind Cronje the sieges of Kimberley and Mafeking had been carried on with no

the new army had been steadily collected. At the beg

bility combined could not have availed to counteract the numerical superiority which we had now gained, and were increasing daily. Our strength on paper in South Afri

men" in Cape Colony alone, given by Roberts in his despatch of February 4 as 51,900 (exclusive, as he said, of the garrisons of Mafeking and Kimberley and of seven militia ba

h, would have involved a grave loss of prestige, and Ladysmith was hard pressed. Kimberley, in a far from heroic spirit, was actually threatening surrender, if not relieved immediately. Roberts had to operat

th Brabant's Corps of 3,000 Cape Colony mounted volunteers; and, with the bulk of his own army, to march by the western flank on Bloemfontein

regular Mounted Infantry, together with Colonial mounted contingents, were to b

army of 45,000 men and 118 guns[23] had been collected behind the Modder, of whom 37,000, represe

strength of 8,000 men and 42 Horse Artillery guns, was divided into four brigades-three consisting of regular Cavalry, one consisting of regular Mounted Infantry and Colonial mounted

t the force had at last been given the outline of a regular organization, and was now distributed in eight battalions of 450 each, grouped in three divisions, under Colonels Alderson, Hannay, and Ridley. Roberts 95had intended all of these to form part of the independent mounted force, but this plan, through lack of time, proved not to

nted) part at least of the Kimberley garrison. In respect of mounted men, if all Cronje's troops, including the Kimberley investing force, had been mounted, and all available for purely combatant duties, they would have been barely more than equal, numerically, to the mounted troops under Roberts-that is to say, to the Cavalry divis

more than a quarter of his burghers were well enough mounted to perform long and rapid marches; about half were poorly mounted, and the rest were actually on foot. Regarded as a

raid. The weather was very hot, water scarce, and the conditions exceedingly trying. The horses succumbed in hundreds, mainly from unpreventable causes. But we have to recognize a preventable cause. We may pass over the vexed question of overloading. Most contemporary critics seem to have agreed that the horses of all our mounted troops were overloaded; but the light load is a counsel of perfection exceedingly difficult to work out in practice. I refer to faults under the heading of horse management, which was admittedly not up to t

he included the immediate, physical relief of the town in his scheme of attack on Cronje, asked the Cavalry Division to perform the task, and was enthusiastically and energetically obeyed. We must remember, however, that under normal conditions the situation could scarcely have arisen. Faced by 45,000 men, of whom, guns apart, a fifth were mounted, Cronje must have raised the siege, and, if he risked a battle, have concentrated every man for it. Even

rail from the Transvaal-that is, from the north-Cronje himself was now based by road on Bloemfontein, nearly 100 miles to the east-towards his left flank, that is-a thoroughly false and dangerous strategical position for the Boer leader. It lay with R

f that he was to be attacked in the Magersfontein trenches, which he had defended so successfully two months earlier. When threatening symptoms appeared to his left front, he did his best to watch this quarter by despatching successiv

march brought French to the Modder, with his troops and gun-horses already much spent. According to the "Official History," forty horses were dead and 326 unfit to march. There had been barely more than a show of opposition at the crossing of the Riet and the Modder. De Wet, if he had chosen, might have done more to

n and 2 guns, under Froneman and 99De Beer, who were joined by 100 men under Lubbe, to oppose him. French, on the morning of the 15th, after a day's rest, swept this little force

je. With the Cavalry division added there were now at Klip Drift some 13,000 men and sixty-two guns. Cronje's communications with the east were definitely severed, the point of severance was held in force, and French was free for his independent spring on Kimberley. As it happened, Cronje on the same afternoon, dimly alarmed, had moved h

two converging ridges, between which ran an expanse of open ground about a mile in width at the narrowest point, and gently rising to a "Nek." Both valley and Nek were good galloping ground, without wire or obstacles of any kind. Very few Boers were on the Nek-p

ted by two batteries of the Infantry division and two naval guns-fifty-six guns in all-had opened on the two ridges and the devoted pair of Boer guns, and had temporary silenced the latter. It was now that French ordered the charge, and while it lasted, all but two horse batteries, which were kept in reserve, continued to bombard the Boer positions. Gordon's brigade, less two squadrons, which were engaged on the flanks, led the way, deployed in extended order-eight

yet few fell. The extended formation, the pace of the charge, and thick clouds of dust, puzzled the burghers, while the supporting fire of the batteries shook their aim." The Nek was reached and won, the burghers who held it fled, only a few remaining to "be struck down or made prisoners." (The Times History says about a score were "speared

, not to defeat these Boers. With that end in view, he ran the gauntlet of fire, pierced the Boer line, 102and proceeded. There was no possibility or intention of producing shock, for the leading brigade charged with files eight yards apart, a formation which excludes anything approaching shock. Nor had the result anything to do with the steel weapon: necessarily not, for shock is the only real raison d'être of the steel weapon. The threat of any weapon would have served to drive the handful of Boers from the Nek in the face of such a deluge of horsemen. Their actual losses were as insignificant as our own. There was no pursuit of any part of the Boer force, for, as the Official Historian dryly remarks, "The British troopers, riding seventeen stone, and mounted on weak and blown horses, had no chance of catching an enemy ridi

y after the repulse, and took up an entrenched position north of the sixth division, where they curtailed the reconnaiss

s modified by the modern magazine rifle? These are the questions of really serious interest to students of mounted action. It must be admitted that Klip Drift by itself does not afford much foundation for argument. With every Boer rifle on the field reckoned as an effective factor, the disparity in the size of the forces engaged was so abnormal as to preclude far-reaching conclusions. O

. With the eastern or right-hand ridge it was different. This was the more strongly held, and ran parallel to the line of our advance; but here, too, the average range must have been great, for the Boers (as on the western ridge) lined the summit, not the slopes, 104and (according to the official map) only the northerly half of the ridge directly overlooked the narrow part of the valley, or, rather, the exit from the amphitheatre. What was the width of this valley or amphitheatre? Again we are left i

of the ridges, the range was at no point less than 1,100 yards, and averaged about 1,300 from first to last, while the number of rifles brought into more or less effect

nder which the Boer fire was delivered? Let us note three main circumstances

men, must have rendered accurate and steady shooting almost impossible. The German historian quotes a Boer present as sa

nted on by any leader of horse who plans a mounted movement under fire. In l

ual force is one thing, and surprise supported by the numbers at French's command another. Most of the Boers present seem to have taken to their horses precipitately before the charge was over-and no wonder! The first brigade was backed by three others; these were ba

rtain circumstances, a large body of troops on horseback, boldly and skilfully led, could face rifle-fire with impunity. But Klip Drift does not stand alone. It is only one-and by no means the most interesting-of a great number of episodes illustrating the same problem, and proving that, under far less favourable conditions-whether of numbers, ground, dust, or surprise, and without support from Artillery-mounted men not only

requisite for that orderly deployment and swift united movement which were exhibited at Klip Drift, and which are the essential characteristics of any charge, under fire or not under fire, by whomsoever made, with whatsoever weapon, and for whatsoever purpose. Unique as the conditions were at Klip Drift, it seems strange that the true lesson did not enter the minds of French and the other Cavalry officers present. They cannot have imagined that shock had anything to do with success. The widely extended formation deliberately ad

on prevalent at the time of this charge, that it was an extraordinarily perilous and daring performance. Why perilous and daring if the Cavalry, with their steel weapon, are superior to mounted riflemen? If these Boer mounted riflemen had been

et us turn to the German official critic's remarks on Klip Drift, remembering the praise which has been showered upon his work, and that it is Germany which, ev

large a body of Cavalry, and its staggering success shows that, in future wars, the charge of great masses of Cavalry will be by no means a hopeless undertaking, even against troops armed

safely on these horses, and a number of them soon returned on these same horses to fulfil the vitally important function of masking the flank march of their own main body. Meanwhile, few as they were, they had compelled the Cavalry to conform to conditions imposed by the rifle and to take the line of least, not of most, resistance. If they had been German Cavalry of that date, trained primarily for shock, with poor firearms and little practice in skirmishing, they would not, in the first place, have had the confidence to take up the extended position which these men took up, unsupported and facing an army. And if they had taken it up, th

that unfashionable type, the mounted rifleman, is in question, particularly if he is an "irregular"? Let the reader only take the trouble to substitute the words "mounted riflemen"

d been, there might be some ground for the tameness and caution of the German inference-namely, that in future wars such charges will be "by no means a hopeless undertaking"; an inference further qualified by the remark (perfectly true) that this was only a case of "breaking through small and isolated groups of skirmishers," by a whole division, be it remembe

l analysis of the physical and moral factors, it describes the charge as the most "brilliant stroke of the whole war." Such indiscriminating extravagance of praise does a world of harm. The critic, in his hazy enthusiasm, mixes up two distinct aspects of the attack-its strategical and its tactical aspects. On the assumption, upon which French acted and was compelled to act, that Kimberley needed relief, and that it was worth while to wreck the Cavalry horses and neglect Cronje's main force in order to effect this relief, he may truly be said to have carried out his strategical task brilliantly, even with allowance for the numbers under his control and for the co-operation of the Infantry. Tactically, too, upon the same assumption, he did the right thing promptly and

lly the whole division was acting as a unit for one purpose. In the whole of the Crimean, Franco-Prussian, and Austro-Prussian Wars of the last century, there is not, so far as I am aware, a single instance of a division of Cavalry charging as one homogeneous unit. Rare were the charges of more than one regiment; rarer still those of more than one b

ad felt what the training-book calls the "magnetism of the charge," the exhilaration of swift, victorious onset under fire-sensations which they had always been taught to associate solely with the steel weapon and solely with the arm of the service to which they were proud to belong-the Cavalry. The old tradition, 112somewhat shaken by months of bickering with firearms and for the most part on foot,

mounted riflemen. But their hearts were never wholly in it. There were arrières-pensées; vain longings for situations which obstinately refused to recur; a tendency to throw the blame on the horses, on the higher