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From: "Ellen Stanton" <>
Subject: South Africa Magazine: Domestic Announcements 17 February 1900
Date: Mon, 10 Oct 2005 23:30:16 -0500


This is a transcription of a column in South Africa Magazine, February 17, 1900, titled Domestic Announcements:

(Announcements inserted under this heading are charged for according to length.)

BIRTHS

BENSON, Mrs. H., Durban, January 13, a daughter.
BORAIN, Mrs. J. E., Durban, January 17, a son.
DALTON, Mrs. E. J., Port Elizabeth, Jan. 7, a son.
DASHWOOD, Mrs. J., Durban, December 28, a son.
DAUGHERTY, Mrs. T. E., Durban, January 11, a daughter.
DAVIES, Mrs. E., Port Elizabeth, January 4, a son.
DOUGANS, Mrs. J. E., Addington, January 12, a daughter.
DOWIE, Mrs. J., Port Elizabeth, January 17, a son.
DOWLING, Mrs. F., Verulam, January 6, a daughter.
EDLMANN-On February 12, at Hanover, Cape Colony, the wife of Robert Elliot Edlmann, of Schuilhoek, Cape Colony, and Kent House, Leamington, England, a son.
FLEMING, Mrs. M., Queenstown, Jan. 3, a daughter.
FOX, Mrs. G., East London, January 7, a daughter.
GARBUTT, Mrs. P. F., Umgeni, January 17, a daughter.
GORDON, Mrs. G. W., Greyville, January 11, a daughter.
GREENE-On February 1, at Oakdene, Crescent Road, Kingston Hill, the wife of E. M. Greene, M.L.A., of Pietermaritzburg, and Lieut.-Colonel of Natal Carbineers, of a daughter.

MARRIAGES

ADAMS, C.-HUGHES, H. L., Tarkastad, January 13.
BROWN, W. M.-CHADDOCK, E. A., Durban, January 15.
GANDIE, W. L.-GALLOWAY, J., Durban, January 6.
GOLDBY-WHEELWRIGHT-On December 26, at St. Michael's, Eshowe, province of Zululand, Natal, by the Right Rev. the Bishop of Zululand, Walter E. Goldby, Auditor-General, Natal, youngest son of the late Major W. Goldby and Mrs. Goldby, Wimbledon, Surrey, to Eva Gertrude, second daughter of W. D. Wheelwright, Esq., J.P., Eshowe.
HARRISON, J. W.-PATTERSON, V. O. M., Port Elizabeth, January 10.
HOLMES, Rev. F.-EDWARDS, E. A. S., Graaff-Reinet.
HUMPHERSON, S.-ELLERD, J., Durban, January 16.
LAVENSTEIN, A.-COWEN, L., Port Elizabeth, January 12.
PASCOE, W. H.-CLARKE, M. J., Queen's Town.
WATSON-CARMICHAEL-On January 23, at the Presbyterian Manse, Woodstock, Cape Colony, by the Rev. W. E. Robertson, Walter Watson, to Isa, daughter of the late Duncan Carmichael, Glasgow.

DEATHS

BLEKSLEY, F. C., Cape Town, January 19, aged 27.
BROWNE, W. A., East London, January 9, aged 56.
CARBUTT, Miss M. C., Ladysmith, January 9.
CHEESEMAN, Dr., Pearston, January 16.
COOKE, T. R., Kuil's River, January 12, aged 54.
COTTON-On January 29, at Ladysmith, Wellington Robert Paul Stapleton Cotton, Lieutenant 19th Hussars, eldest son of Colonel Hon. Richard Stapleton Cotton.
CURRAN, E. J., Grahamstown, January 16, aged 57.
DE WET, J. S., Worcester, January 4.
DICKINSON, Miss S., Port Elizabeth, Jan. 18, aged 65.
DICKSON---On January 24, killed at Spion Kop, Francis Herbert Dickson, Sergeant in 2nd Battalion Royal Lancaster Regiment, only son of the late Rev. F. J. Dickson, Rector of Ribchester, Lancashire, aged 25.
EKERMANS, A. J., Rondebosch, January 16, aged 57.
ELLIOTT-MACONOCHIE-On February 9, at St. John's Church, Greenhill, Harrow, by the Rev. Thomas Smith, M.A., Richard Lowens Elliott, eldest son of the late W. R. Elliott, Esq., of Enfield, to Mimi Moore Maconochie, eldest daughter of Mrs. J. R.
KNIGHT-On February 12, at his residence, Horner Grange, West Hill, Sydenham, William Knight, aged 56.


Miscellaneous articles on the same page:

POTGIETER'S DRIFT

BRIDGEHEAD SECURE DEBOUCHES BARRED

EXCESSIVE ARMY BAGGAGE

Mr. W. S. Churchill describes General Buller's dash for Potgieter's Drift in his letter to the Morning Post, and he makes the following instructive remarks:--"Let me make an unpleasant digression. The vast amount of baggage this army takes with it on the march hampers its movements and utterly precludes all possibility of surprising the enemy. I have never before seen even officers accommodated with tents on service, though both the Indian frontier and the Soudan lie under a hotter than the South African sun. But here today, within striking distance of a mobile enemy whom we wished to circumvent, every private soldier has canvas shelter, and the other arrangements are on an equally elaborate scale. The consequence is that roads are crowded, drifts are blocked, marching troops are delayed, and all rapidity of movement is out of the question. Meanwhile, the enemy completes the fortification of his positions, and the cost of capturing them rises. It is a poor economy to let a !
soldier live well for three days at the price of killing him on the fourth."

Mr. Churchill went with the mounted forces to Springfield. "Tiny patrols-beetles on a green baize carpet-scoured the plain (he writes), and before we reached the crease-scarcely perceptible at a mile's distance, in which the Little Tugela flows-word was brought that no Dutchmen were anywhere to be seen. So we come safely to Springfield-three houses, a long wood bridge erected by public subscription at a cost of £4300'-half-a-dozen farms, with their tin roofs, and tree clumps seen in the neighbourhood-and no Boers. Orders were to seize the bridge; seized accordingly; and after all had crossed and watered in the Little Tugela-swollen by the rains to quite a considerable Tugela, eighty yards wide-we looked about for something else to do. Meanwhile more patrols came in; all told the same tale: no Boers anywhere. Well, then, let us push on. Why not seize the heights above Potgieter's? If held they would cost a thousand men to storm; now, perhaps, they might be had for nothing. Ag!
ain, why not? Orders said, 'Go to Springfield'; nothing about Potgieter's at all. Dundonald reflected, reflected again, and finally resolved. Vorwarts! So on we went accordingly. Three hundred men and two guns were left to hold the Springfield Bridge, 700 and four guns hurried on through the afternoon to Potgieter's Ferry, or, more properly speaking, the height commanding it, and reached them safely at six o'clock, finding a strong position strengthened by loopholed stone walls, unguarded, unoccupied. The whole force climbed to the top of the hills, and with great labour succeeded in dragging the guns with them before night. Then we sent back to announce what we had done and to ask for reinforcements.

"The necessity for reinforcements seemed very real to me, for I have a wholesome respect for Boer military enterprise; and after the security of a great camp the dangers of our lonely, unsupported perch on the hills came home with extra force. After an hour's study my feeling of insecurity departed. I learned the answer to the questions which had perplexed the mind. Before us lay 'the devilry' the Boers had prepared, and it was no longer difficult to understand why the Springfield Bridge had been spared and the heights abandoned. The ground fell almost sheer 600 ft. to the flat bottom of the valley. Beneath the Tugela curled along like a brown and very sinuous serpent. Never have I seen such violent twists and bends in a river. At times the waters seemed to loop back on themselves. One great loop bent towards us, and at the arch of this the little ferry of Potgieter's floated, moored to ropes which looked through the field glasses like a spider's web. The ford, approached by!
roads cut down through the steep bank, was beside it, but closed for the time being by the flood. The loop of river enclosed a great tongue of land which jutted from the hills on the enemy's side almost to our feet. A thousand yards from the tip of this tongue rose a line of low kopjes crowned with reddish stones. The whole tongue was virtually ours. Our guns on the heights or on the bank could sweep it from flank to flank, enfilade and cross fire. Therefore the passage of the river was assured. We had obtained what amounted to a practical bridgehead, and could cross whenever we thought fit. But the explanation of many things lay beyond. At the base of the tongue, where it sprang from the Boer side of the valley, the ground rose in a series of gentle grassy slopes to a long horseshoe of hills, and along this, both flanks resting securely on unfordable reaches of the river, out of range from our heights of any but the heaviest guns, approachable by a smooth grass glacis, wh!
ich was exposed to two or three tiers of cross fire and converging fir
e, ran the enemy's position. In technical language the possession of the heights virtually gave us a bridgehead on the Tugela, but the debouches from that bridgehead were barred by an exterior line of hills fortified and occupied by the enemy."

KIMBERLEY GARRISON EATING HORSE FLESH

HEAVY INFANTILE MORTALITY

The issue of the Cape Argus of January 24, received in England this week, contains a letter from Kimberley, dated the 13th of that month, in which the writer (the Argus special correspondent in Kimberley) says:--The siege of Kimberley is now beginning to be acutely felt by the inhabitants. In my last letter I mentioned that our meat rations had been cut down to a quarter of a pound per diem for adults, and from Monday last (8th) the bulk of the meat served out has been horseflesh, the proportion being about one-fourth ox-meat to three-fourths horseflesh. To the male portion of the community, and even those of the opposite sex, there is little or no hardship in having to eat the flesh of man's best friend, and on the Continent, even in the best restaurants, "Potages du chevaux"(!) forms just as much a staple item on the menu as does roast beef in England. The majority of people, unless they were told, would never know the difference. It is slightly darker in colour, and a lit!
tle sweeter in taste, otherwise it closely resembles beef. To most of the women, and practically all the children, however, the mere thought of eating horseflesh is repugnant, and rather than consume it they have done without animal food altogether. With the supply of tinned meats pretty well consumed, the dietary of these unfortunate people is necessarily a limited one.

From today a proclamation has been issued raising the price of beef to 1s. per pound, and horseflesh to 9d. and it is also notified that though all efforts will be made to continue the daily version of a quarter of a pound of meat, a full supply cannot be guaranteed.

The health report of the medical office of health for December was published yesterday, and throws some important sidelights on the siege. The population is estimated at 14,000 white and 19,000 coloured, the latter including those in the compounds convict station, and gaol. The deaths for the month were 70 white and 219 coloured, a rate per 100 living of 60 white and 138.3 coloured. The death rate during the whole of 1898 was 21.7white and 53 coloured. The infantile death rate (under one year reached the extraordinary figures of 671.1 per 1000 white and 912.7 coloured per 1000.

Time hangs on one's hands dreadfully, and it was a good idea of some of the churches here to arrange organ recitals in their churches at night, these forming a most welcome diversion.

A Glasgow gentleman wrote to Dr. Hendrick Muller, the Envoy Extraordinary of the Orange Free State at the Hague, asking him what amount of truth there was in reports with respect to the nature of the ties which bound the Orange Free State to the Transvaal. He received in reply a letter, containing the following: "I have no objection to reply to your question whether there is any truth in the rumours spread in England pretending that the Free Staters are abandoning the Transvaalers and are giving up fighting, or intend to do so. These rumours are altogether false. On the contrary, the Jameson raid had already brought the two Republics together, as it had shown the designs of the present British Administration as regards the independence of the two South African Republics. And now this war is making one nation of the two States and brothers of their burghers, who before were treating each other as cousins."

Regards,
Ellen Stanton
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