The Matabele Campaign (1896)
Colonel R. S. S. Baden Powell

Baden-Powell in South Africa, 1896

CHAPTER I. OUTWARD BOUND.

2nd May to 2nd June.

An attractive invitation accepted—Voyage to the Cape on the R.M.S. Tantallon Castle—The mounted infantry—Cape Town-Mafeking—Coach journey through Bechuanaland Protectorate—Rinderpest rampant —Captain Lugard en route to new fields of exploration—Khama and his capital‑Coaching compared to yachting—Tati‑Mangwe Pass—theatre of war.

WAR OFFICE, S.W., 28th April, 1896.

SIR,
Passage to Cape Town having been provided for you in the s.s. Tantallon Castle, I am directed to request that you will proceed to Southampton and embark in the above vessel on the 2nd May by 12.30 p.m., reporting yourself before embarking to the military staff officer superintending the embarkation. 

You must not ship more than 55 cubic feet.

I am further to request you will acknowledge the receipt of this letter by first post, and inform me of any change in your address up to the date of embarkation.

You will be in command of the troops on board.

I have the honour, etc.,
EVELYN WOOD, Q.M.G.

What better invitation could one want than that? I accepted it with greatest pleasure.

I had had warning that it might come, by telegraph from Sir Frederick Carrington, who had that day arrived in England from Gibraltar en route to South Africa. He was about to have command of troops in Matabeleland operating against the rebels there. His telegram had reached me at Belfast on Friday afternoon, when we were burying a poor chap in my squadron who had teen killed by a fall from his horse. I had a car in waiting, changed my kit, packed up some odds and ends, arranged about disposal of my horses, clogs, and furniture, and just caught the five something train, which got me up to town by next day morning. At midday the General sailed ‘for South Africa, but his orders were that I should follow by next ship; so, after seeing him off, I had several clays in which to kick my heels and live in constant dread of being ran over, or otherwise prevented from going after all. But fortune favoured me.

2nd May.—Embarked at Southampton in the Tantallon Castle (Captain Duncan) for Cape Town. On board were 480 of the finest mounted infantry that man could wish to see, under Colonel Alderson; also several other 11 details." Then, besides the troops, the usual crowd of passengers, 200 of them‑German Jews, Cape Dutch, young clerks, etc., going out to seek their fortunes in El Dorado. (You don’t want details, do you, of this, my fourth voyage to the Cape?)

4th May.—Perfect weather, palatial ship and fast. Delightful cabin all to myself. Best of company. Poorish  and a very good time all round.

6th May.—Madeira. You know. Breakfast with fruit at Reid’s Hotel. The flowers and gardens. Scramble up on horses to the convent, up the long, steep, cobbled roads, and the grand toboggan down again in cars. How I would like to live there for —a day!  Then back on board, off to sea by eleven. Dock loaded up with Madiera chairs and fruit skins.

8th May.—Daily parades, inspection of troop decks, tugs of war, concerts on deck, and gradual increase in personal girth from sheer over‑eating and dozing. Our only exercise is parade for officers at seven every morning in pyjamas, under a sergeant‑instructor, who puts us through most fiendish exercises for an hour, and leaves us there for dead.

We just revive in time so put the men through the same course in their turn, stripped to the waist, so that they have dry shirts to pat on afterwards. "Knees up!" I’d like to kill him who invented it,—but it does us all a power of good.

10th to 13th May.—Hot AND MUGGY off the coast of Africa from cape DE Vera to Sierra Leone, though out of sight of land. Not many weeks since I was here, homeward bound from Ashanti‑same old oily sea, with rolling swell, and STEAMY, hot horizon.

Britannia

At the fancy dress ball on board the belle of the ship appeared as Britannia. The only incongruity was the helmet, whose peak did not agree with the wearer’s nose; the hat had therefore to be reversed, and the back-peak was bent for additional comfort.

14th May.—A passenger, who so far had spoken little except to ask for "another whisky," found dead in bed this morning, and buried overboard.  Poor chap! He had opened a conversation with me the night before and seemed a well‑intentioned, gentle soul, although a drunken bore.

Now was the best part of the voyage as far as climate went‑bright, breezy days and deep blue sea, and the ship just ripping along perfection.

15th to 18th May.—Athletic sports, tableaux, concerts, ‑and the fancy dress ball, and oar dinner party to the captain.

The ball was interesting in showing the diverse taste of diverse nationalities. Four Frenchmen and one lady so prettily and well got up. The British officer, save in one or two instances (of which, alas! I wasn’t one), could not rise to anything more original than uniform. An ingenious young lady put us all to shame, appearing as Britannia, "helmet, shield, and pitchfork too," all complete. (Nose and helmet didn’t hit it off‑at least—yes—the nose did hit it (the helmet) off, and the hat had to be worn the wrong way round to allow more room.)

19th May.—At 4 a.m. I Awake with an uncanny feeling. All is silence and darkness. The screw has stopped, the ship lies like a log, the only sound is the plashing of the water pouring from the engine, and occasionally sharp footsteps overhead.

And looking from my port, I see, looming dark against the stars, the long, flat top of grand old Table Mountain—its base a haze from which electric lights gleam out and shine along the water.

A busy day. No news except that Sir Frederick had gone on up to Mafeking, and I was now to follow.

General Goodenough inspected our troops upon the wharf among the Cape carts, natives, cargo, trollies (drawn by the little Arab‑looking horses), and the Cape Town dust. The. troops go off by train to Wynberg camp to await Sir Frederick’s orders.

Old Cape Town just the same as ever. Same lounging warders and convicts digging docks, Malays and snoek fish everywhere. Adderley Street improved with extra turreted, verandahed buildings. The Castle, venerable, low, and poky as of yore, and—of course—under repair. Short visits there, to Government House, and to that beautiful old house in Strand Street where one learns the Dutch side of the questions of the day.

By nine o’clock at night we are all aboard the train for Mafeking—a thousand well‑remembered faces seem to be there on the platform cheering us away as we steam out into the night.

Hard beds, cold night, bumpity flap we go.

20th May.—Rattling along over the Karoo. Stony plains with frequent stony hills and mountains. The clearest atmosphere, and air like draughts of fresh spring water. Up hill, down dale‑the train crawling up at foot’s pace with heart‑breaking, laboured panting of the engine, then down the other side rattling and swaying about like a runaway coster’s barrow.

Three times in the day we stop ‑at wayside stations where there’s a kind. of table d’hote prepared -‑ much as it is in India, only less so.

Very little life along the line, beyond an occasional waggon with its lengthy team of omen or of donkeys, creeping at its very slowest pace along the plain.

Our own pace, however, is not much to boast about; we don’t often stop to execute repairs.  go fast, and The scenery remains much the same, except that the stony plain gives place to white grass veldt sparsely dotted with little thorn‑bushes‑its only beauty (and that is matchless of its kind) the ‘wonderful colours of the distant hills, especially at dawn or sunset.

We pass by little groups of iron‑roofed houses‑sanatoria where people come to live‑or die‑whose lungs are gone.

Kimberley. Miles of mineheads, mounds of refuse, town of tin houses and dust, a filthy refreshment‑room,—ancient on we go.

22nd May.—At last, after three nights and two days jogging along in the train, we rattle into Mafeking at 6 a.m.

Into Mafeking? Well, there’s a little tin (corrugated iron) house and a goods shed to form the station: hundreds of waggons, and mounds of stores covered with tarpaulins, and on beyond a street and market square of low­ roofed tin houses. Mafeking: is at present the railway terminus. The waggons and the goods are waiting to go north to Matabeleland, but here they’re stranded for want of transport, since all the omen on the road are a) ‘in fast from rinderpest. However, every train is bringing up more mules and donkeys to use in their stead.

Near to the station is the camp of the 7th Hussars and mounted infantry of the West Riding and the York and Lancaster Regiments. These troops axe waiting here in case they may be wanted in Matabeleland.

Thus Mafeking is crowded.

Sir Frederick is here, and we, the staff, take up our quarters for a few days in a railway carriage on a siding. The staff consists of Lieutenant‑Colonel Bridge, A.S.C., as Deputy Assistant Adjutant‑General (for Transport and Supply), Captain Vyvyan, Brigade Major; Lieutenant V. Ferguson, A.D.C. my billet is Chief Staff Officer.

While here at Mafeking we axle the guests of Mr. Julius Weil, the genius in both senses‑of this art of South Africa. He works the machinery of transport and supply of le Chartered Company; his 11 stores " have in them everything that man could want to buy. "Weil’s Rations " are known. half the world over as the best tinned foods for travellers ; he owns the best of do s and horses; he is Member of the Legislative Assembly of the Cape: and withal he is young !

23rd May.—Our only news from Matabeleland is that Cecil Rhodes has safely got across from the East Coast, through Mashonaland to Bulawayo, with a column under Beal. And that Plumer’s force, specially raised here in the south, had got within touch of Bulawayo without fighting. Rhodes had. said the neck of the rebellion now was broken—and with it go the necks of all our hopes. But still we shove along.

Packed up our kits, and in the, afternoon embarked, the four of us (the General, Vyvyan, Ferguson, and self), in the coach for Bulawayo. The coach a regular Buffalo Bill‑Wild West‑Deadwood affair; hung by huge leather on a heavy, strong‑built undercarriage ; drawn by ten mules. Our baggage and three servant-soldiers on the roof ; two native drivers (one to the reins, the other to the whip). Inside are four transverse seats, each to hold three, thus making twelve "insides." Luckily we were only four, and so we had some room to stretch our legs. We each settled into a comer, and off we went, amid the cheers of the inhabitants of Mafeking. One, more eager than the rest,—a former officer of Sir Frederick’s in the Bechuanaland Police,—jumped on, and came with us for thirty miles, trusting to chance to take him back again.

Mafeking to Bulawayo Ten day and nights by coach.

That night we reached Pitsani, a single roadside inn,—the starting‑place of Jameson’s raid into the Transvaal. We stopped, and supped, and slept, and started on at daybreak. This stopping to sleep was but a luxury which we did not come in for afterwards along the road.

24th May.—Does it bore you, a daily record of this uneventful journey? Well, if it does, you easily can skip it, which is more than we could do, alas!

An day over a sandy track, on open, white grass veldt, which generally changed into hilly country, dotted with thorn‑bushes. All waterless.

The mules, of which we get a change every ten or twelve miles, in very poor condition—so our pace is ­very slow. Reached Ra­moutsa after dark, after 65‑mile drive. Tin hotel, and large native kraal town (said to have 10,000 inhabitants in its mass of beehive huts). Boyne living here; a well-known hunter on the Kalehari, and had shot with "Ginger" Gordon (15th Hussars). A native reed dance was going on in the "stadt" (as they call the native town),—every man blowing a reed whistle which gives two notes, and, played in numbers, gives a quaint, harmonious sound. The men dance in a circle, stamping the time; the women waggle round and round the circle, outside it. Altogether a very "or’nery" per­formance, especially as all were dressed in European store clothes.

25th May.—Struggling on with weak mules to Gaberones (18 miles in 5½ hours). And on again. Every mile now began to show the grisly, stinking signs of rinderpest. Dead oxen varied occasionally with dead mules—the variety did not affect the smell—that remained the same. Occasionally, we passed a waggon abandoned owing to the loss of animals.

The road at times was hard, but generally soft red sand. The scenery had a sameness of level, white grass land and thorn‑bush.

Reached a big kraal (Matchudi’s) of 700 inhabitants, at midnight. Deep sandy road. It took our fresh (!) team over half an hour to get us outside the village. Our pace was now so slow, and the whacking of the whip so painful merely to listen to (happily, the mules don’t seem to feel it half so much as we), that we did much of the journey walking on ahead. Sun baking hot, and flies as thick as dust, and that was bad.

27 May.—By walking with a gun we managed to get a good supply of  partridges and guinea‑fowl as we went along. To‑day we passed the downward coach, in which was Scott‑Montague, M.P. He gave us lots of information; and we felt we were not having the worst of the journey, when we saw him packed in with twelve other "insides," one of whom, a woman, and another her baby, which wasn’t very well!

Reached Pala—a group of stores—at midnight. Here were collected some two hundred waggons, stopped by loss of all their oxen from rinderpest. Three thousand two hundred beasts dead at this one place!

28th May.—We trekked along all day. Bush country; lots of partridges. One of our mules died on the road. Passed through Captain Lugard’s camp about 11 p.m. Only Hicks, his manager, awake. He had thirteen waggons, and nearly two hundred mules and donkeys. He is taking an exploring expedition of eleven white men to the Lake N’Gami district, prepared to remain away two years if necessary.

29th May.—Outspanned, 4.30 a.m., and had our first wash since starting, in liquid mud from water‑holes. The road was now through heavy sand. We walked over 20 miles of our journey on foot.

Reached Palapchwe (Khama’s capital) at midnight.

Found a dozen telegrams awaiting us, describing fights round Bulawayo, such as put some hopes into us again. Here we slept in beds!

30th May.—Before breakfast, who should stroll in, all by himself, but Khama! Thin, alert, and looking quite young, in European clothes.

He had not much to say. He knew me as George’s brother, and asked about the baby niece.

His town is certainly well‑ordered, and he manages everything himself.

There are three or four European stores; otherwise the town is an agglomeration of kraals, and this stands in several sections, each under its own headman. It is situated on an undercliff of a bush‑grown ridge; is fairly well supplied with water; and commands a splendid view over 100 miles of country. Khama had moved his people here only a few years ago, from Shoshong, which used to be his capital farther west. He rules his country effectively. No liquor may be sold, even among white men; and all along the road while in his country we found the rinderpest carcasses had been burned.

But he might with advantage do something for the road. Leaving Palapchwe at 10 a.m., we bumped and jolted down the stony hill in a manner calculated to mash up not only the coach and its insides, but their insides as well. Any person or persons afflicted with liver should go and live a week at Palapchwe, and drive down this hill daily‑once a clay would be enough!

And then beyond—across the plains, grown with mopani bush—the road was all deep sand. We merely crept along. But still we had broken the back of our journey

Mafeking to Palla…………………………………….. 225 miles
Palla to Palapchwe………………………………….. 110 miles
Palapchwe to Tati……………………………………. 107 miles
Tati to Bulawayo…………………………………….. 115 miles

Total………………………………………….. 557 miles

A certain sameness of scenery and want of water all the time, but compensated for by the splendid climate, the starry nights, and the "flannel‑shirt" life generally.

Every one of the few wayfarers, in waggons or otherwise, along the road was interesting, either as a hunter, gentleman‑labourer, or enterprising trader. they all look much the same: Boer hat, flannel shirt, and breeches—so sunburnt that it is hard at first to tell whether the man is English, half‑caste, or light Kaffir.

One we met to‑day, creeping along with a crazy, two‑wheeled, cart drawn by four donkeys. He himself had only been two months in South Africa: came from Brighton. Heard that food and drink were at a premium in Bulawayo; so had loaded up this drop‑in‑the‑ocean of a cargo of meal and champagne, and was steadily plodding along with it to make his fortune. We lightened his load by two pints and weightened his pocket with two pounds. And we afterwards heard he sold his whole consignment at a very good profit long before he got to Matabeleland.

31st May.—All day and all night we go rocking and pitching, rolling and "scending" along in the creaking, groaning, old coach: just exactly like being in the cabin of a small yacht in bad weather—and the occasional sharp swish of the thorn‑bushes along the sides and leathern. curtains sounds just like angry seas. Then frequently she heels over to a very jumpy angle, as if a squall had struck her. One of these days the old thing will go over.

Strange that in all this endless, uninhabited, and bushy wilderness there is scarcely any game.

We carry our own food, chiefly tinned things, with us, and at convenient outspans (when we are changing mules) we boil our kettle and have a meal of sorts and thoroughly enjoy it—especially the evening meal, under the stars.

1st June.—Reached Tati Gold Fields, 1 a.m. A collection of three or four tin stores, one of them an hotel, where we rolled into bed for a short rest.

We breakfasted with Mr. Vigers, the Resident Commissioner. Tati is a British Protectorate of older standing than the Chartered Company, and independent of it. It has its own administrative machinery,—a mining population of whites and blacks and "wasters," and yet not a single policeman! "Wasters?"—oh, it’s a South African word, and most expressive; applies to the specious loafer who is so common in this country,—the country teems with him in high grades as well as low, hinc multæ lacrimae? in the history of South African enterprises.

Twenty miles beyond Tati we crossed the dry bed of the Ramakan River, the border of Matabeleland. Close by the river stands the ruin of a "prehistoric" fort, built of trimmed stones. There are several similar forts about the country, offshoots of the famed Zimbabwe ruins near Victoria.

We nearly killed our General to‑day in crossing a dry river bed. The descent into the drift was so steep that the wheelers could not hold back the coach, so our drivers sent them down it at a gallop. Half‑way down there was a sill of rock off which the coach took a flying leap into the sand below. We inside were chucked about like peanuts in a pot, and Sir Frederick was thrown against the roof and his head and neck were stiff for some time afterward.

Had dinner(!) at a roadside shanty "Hotel," where the waiter smoked while he served us.

2nd June.—Signs of war and of colonization at last. We reached Mangwe, 6.30 a.m. An earthwork fort with a waggon encampment outside it. In this laager were all the women and children, chiefly Dutch, from farms around; the men acting as garrison under command of Van Rooyen and Lee,—two well‑known hunters, who were here in Lobengula’s time.

In the fort they showed with pride some half a dozen Matabele prisoners they had captured in a fight. I looked well at them, fearing that they might be the only enemy that I should see. Happily I might have spared my eyes.

We now went through the Mangwe Pass. The road here winds its way through s tract of rocky hills and koppies, which are practically the tail of the Matopo range, running eastward hence for sixty miles. It would have been a nasty place to tackle had the Matabele held it. They might easily here have cut off Bulawayo from the outer world, but their M’limo, or oracle, had told them to leave this one road open as a bolt‑hole for the whites in Matabeleland. They had expected that when the rebellion broke out, the whites would avail themselves en masse of this line of escape; they never reckoned that instead they would sit tight and strike out hard until more came crowding up the‑road to their assistance.

The scenery is striking among these fantastic mounts of piled‑up granite boulders, with long grass and bushy­ blades between. For ten miles the road runs between these koppies, then emerges on the open downs that constitute the Matabele plateau,—the watershed, 4000 feet in altitude, between the Zambesi and Limpopo.

Now we come to the forts every six or eight miles along the road for protection of the traffic. They are each manned by about thirty men of the local defence force,—men in the usual shirtsleeve costume, but fine, serviceable‑looking troops. Some forts are the usual earthwork kind; others are such as would make a sapper snort, but are none the less effective for all that. They are just the natural koppie, or pile of rocks, aided by art in the way of sandbag parapets and thorn‑bush abattis fences,—easily prepared and easily held. One we came to had been threatened by Matabele the previous night, and some rebels had been reported near the road this same morning, so things were getting a little more exciting for us.

By‑and‑by we met a troop of mounted men twenty‑five miles from Bulawayo. These had come out to act as escort. At first glance, to one fresh from Aldershot or the Curragh, they looked a pretty ragged lot on thin and unkempt ponies; but their arms and bandoliers were all in first‑rate order, and one could see they were the men to go anywhere and do anything that might be wanted in the fighting and campaigning line. However, we did not take them with us, Sir Frederick telling them to follow on at leisure, a couple of scouts from a fort being sent ahead of us at the worst part to see that the road was clear.

The coach in which Lord Grey, the Administrator, had come a short time before us had been seen and pursued by Matabele, but we had no excitement, and soon after midnight we rolled into Bulawayo.

	Colonel R. S. S. Baden-Powell. The Matabele Campaign 1896. Chapter II. State of Affairs in Matabeleland.
	The Baden-Powell Library. A Selection of excerpts from the works of Lord Baden-Powell and works relating to his life and career.
	Baden-Powell Photo Gallery: Early Years and Military Years
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