Boer burghers

Illustration of Cornelia Diederik and Susara Pienaar of the Johannesburg Commando at Komatipoort in September 1900. By that date, many of the Transvaal commandos, Johannesburg included, had retreated with the Transvaal government to the northeastern border town of Komatipoort, the last stop of the Pretoria-Delagoa Bay railway line before it crossed over into Portuguese Mozambique. With the twin Boer capitals of Bloemfontein and Pretoria under British occupation and the conventional phase of the war over, the remaining commandos in the Transvaal concentrated at the Komatipoort railway terminus to prepare themselves for the guerrilla phase of the conflict. While the Boer generals and government officials hammered out a unified strategy for continued resistance, the thousands of burghers encamped by the railway availed themselves of the vast stockpiles of supplies, munitions, arms, wagons, livestock, and foodstuffs that had accumulated at this major transportation hub during the Boer retreat from Pretoria. What could not be immediately consumed or carried away by the burghers and the local native population was put to the torch to deny its use to the British armies, resulting in a vast orgy of destruction that took many days to burn out. Supply dumps were torched, artillery guns dynamited, and train engines intentionally rammed into one another at top speed. By the time President Paul Kruger and the gold reserves of the Transvaal treasury went aboard the last train to Delagoa Bay and subsequent exile in Europe, the Transvaal commandos had left Komatipoort a smoldering wreck of demolished railyards and ruined warehouses. Thus replenished by the riches of goods they had carted away from the doomed stockpiles of Komatipoort, the Boer commandos dispersed into the veld, steeling themselves for the coming years of bitter guerrilla war.

The Johannesburg Commando in particular would make good account of itself during the guerrilla phase of the war despite the undeservedly poor reputation that burghers of the booming mining town initially possessed in the eyes of many compatriots. With its multitude of saloons, music halls, gambling houses, and brothels, Johannesburg was seen by the religiously conservative backvelders and trekboere as an unholy den of sin totally corrupted by the insidious foreign influences of so many Uitlander miners and laborers, and the city was derisively referred to as "Jewburg" by both Boers and British during the period in reference to the city's powerful Uitlander mining magnates and capitalists. However, as with other burghers drawn from the towns and urban centers of the Boer republics, the Johannesburg Boers proved themselves the equals of their backveld cousins, aptly mastering the saddle and rifle to such a degree that they were regarded by the British and foreign military observers as an elite force among the Transvaal commandos. Some of this praise is, however, misplaced as the British and foreign officers often confused the entire Johannesburg Commando with the Zuid Afrikaansche Republiek Politie (ZARP), the Transvaal's uniformed mounted police force, which combined traditional Boer horsemanship and marksmanship with modern European military discipline and professionalism. The ZARPs were primarily stationed in and recruited from Johannesburg during peacetime and they fought alongside the burghers of the Johannesburg Commando at several points during the retreat from Pretoria, but ultimately they were a distinct body of professional troops separate from the rest of the traditionally levied Boer commandos. Maybe ZARPs will be subject for a future illustration, but for now I will suggest any interested in the experience of an ordinary burgher of the Johannesburg Commando to find a copy of R.W. Schikkerling's "Commando Courageous".

Both Boers illustrated are mounted on Basuto ponies with saddles, saddlebags, and bed rolls in a typical configuration. Both riders are also equipped with arms typical of Boer burghers at the end of the conventional war or beginning of the guerrilla war.

Cornelia Diederik brandishes a standard model 1895 Mauser carbine chambered in 7mm Mauser. With the exception of a shortened barrel and an optional bent bolt handle, the 1895 Mauser carbine was identical to the standard long rifle variant most common among the Boer commandos. The shorter length of the carbine made it far easier to handle on horseback and the bent bolt handle was less likely to catch on vegetation while riding through the bush than the standard straight bolt. Due to the shorter barrel, however, the carbine did have a slightly slower muzzle velocity and shorter effective range compared to the long rifle Mauser. Nevertheless, for its ease of stowage, it was favored by the professionally trained artillerymen of the Transvaal and Orange Free State, and a Mauser carbine featuring ornate decorative carvings was the rifle famously wielded by the energetic and dynamic Louis Botha, the hero of Spion Kop and the commandant-general of all the Transvaal commandos for the tail end of the conventional war and the entire duration of the guerrilla war.

In contrast, Susara Pienaar is armed with the venerable Martini-Henry rifle, a single shot breechloading blackpowder rifle that was an enduring Boer favorite despite its obsolescence on a battlefield dominated by magazine loading smokeless powder rifles. Despite immense efforts to ensure that every burgher was armed with a modern smokeless powder rifle through large European arms shipments and generous subsidies for individual burghers to purchase modern rifles, many older burghers and rural backvelders rode to war in 1899 with the same Martini-Henry rifles they or their fathers had wielded two decades earlier during their victorious 1881 war with the British. Since the 1870s, Boers of both republics had imported the British Martini-Henry from the Cape Colony and Natal or European copies of the same rifle in great numbers to replace the obsolete percussion and flintlock guns of their Voortrekker forbears. The Martini was valued by the Boers for the heavy round it fired, providing immense stopping power that was just as effective against the wild beasts and big game of the veld as it was against native warriors and British redcoats. However, by the 1890s, the Martini was being decisively outperformed by modern rifles like the Mauser, Krag, and Lee-Enfield/Metford, all of which enjoyed faster muzzle velocities, softer recoil, and flatter bullet trajectories compared to the Martini thanks to the winning combination of smokeless powder and smaller diameter rounds. While the new rifles were undoubtedly easier to shoot and absolutely superior in every way to the Martini, the older burghers often preferred the old Martini and indeed could make surprisingly effective use of the blackpowder rifle even on the modern battlefield. Whereas many Boers went to war with brand new Mausers that they had barely testfired on the range, their comrades armed with the Martini often enjoyed the benefit of years or even decades of sporting, hunting, and combat experience with the Martini.

Against the British, the mix of Martinis and Mausers proved a surprisingly complementary and effective combination. When defending a kopje or hill, burghers armed with the Martini-Henry often fired from cover behind hilltop boulders while Boers with Mausers fired from concealed trenches at the base of the hill. Advancing British troops would observe the conspicuous clouds of smoke rising from the blackpowder Martinis and thus direct the weight of their rifle and artillery fire at the hilltop. Once they had drawn the bulk of British fire, the hilltop burghers would retreat down the far side of the hill, misdirecting the British into focusing their fire on a deserted hilltop while completely missing the majority of the Boers entrenched at the foot of the hill, whose position was not betrayed by their smokeless powder rifles.

During the guerrilla war phase of the conflict, the Martini found new demand among Boers as the trigger mechanism for improvised explosive devices (IEDs) employed in train-wrecking operations. A loaded Martini with barrel and stock sawed off would be buried beneath a length of railway track, the underside of the track resting against the trigger of the Martini. The muzzle of the Martini would be attached to a charge of dynamite or blasting powder, so that the weight of a train passing over the buried Martini would depress the trigger and set off the main explosive charge, blowing up the track and derailing the train.

Ultimately the Martini was fielded by the Boers in considerable numbers throughout the entire length of the war. It was the personal favorite of Piet "Slim Piet" Joubert, the great hero of Majuba in the 1881 war and the commandant-general of all Transvaal commandos in the 1899 war from the invasion of Natal until his replacement by Louis Botha. Joubert was such a believer in the merits of the Martini that on the eve of the 1899 war, he even convinced the Transvaal government to place an order of 10,000 Martinis from Westley-Richards, the famous London gunsmiths. These Martinis, manufactured in Belgium, were among the last to reach the Transvaal before the outbreak of war and undoubtedly saw good service in the following years.