at Slingersfontein, where a stand was made which did much to atone for the humiliation of Dowling's defeat at the same location a month earlier.
At daylight on 9 February a troop of W.A.M.I. under Captain Moor, and a squadron of Inniskilling Dragoons moved out from their camp on recon
naissance. Almost immediately the force made contact with a Boer commando
of 300 to 400 men. The regular cavalry took up a defensive position and the
West Australians *>Tere ordered to the flank, where they made a stand on a
kopje which stood at the entrance to a horseshoe formed by a string of other
kopjes. In an endeavour to turn the British flank, the Boers attacked the
West Australian position from the hills on three sides. From sunrise to
sunset the little band of twenty men defied a force of several hundred. As
the day drew to a close the enemy came close enough to call on Moor to
surrender, but although the troop had lost one man dead, one mortally wounded, and five otheis wounded, the answer from the colonials was a defiant display
of bayonets and a challenge to come and get them. The troop eventually
retired in twos and threes, running a gauntlet of fire as the daylight faded.53 General Clements recognised the value of the West Australians' stand in a
brigade order:
The General Officer commanding wishes to place on record his high appreciation of the courage and determination shown by a party of 20 men of the Western Australians, under Captain Moor ... By their determined stand against 300 or 400 men they entirely frustrated the enemy's attempt to turn the flank of the position.54
Rolling up the flanks of the tenuous British line became a major Boer objective, and it led to the other significant episode involving Clements'
Australians. The engagement at Pink Hill was the logical outcome of the
j3 Reay, Australians in War3 pp. 163-5.
shaky strategic position of Clements’ force, combined with Australian cock
iness. Pink Hill was a diminutive Anzac. It was a defeat which led to a
major withdrawal from the area; it involved high proportionate casualties;
and it was praised as a great display of Australian courage and honour in war.
On 12 February, the Boers attacked both British flanks. Situated
on the extreme left, at Pink Hill, were 75 Victorians, 20 South Australians,
50 Inniskillings, and 50 Wiltshires. Major Eddy had assumed command of the
post that morning from an Imperial Officer, who had moved off with the
artillery to another position. The enemy attacked in considerable numbers
just before noon, and for two hours Eddy's force defended grimly from among
the rocks of Pink Hill. It soon became obvious that the position could not
be held and the Wiltshire infantry were evacuated first, with the mounted
men remaining to cover their retreat. Throughout the battle, Eddy had moved
among his men, encouraging them and directing their fire, but no sooner had he given the order for the final retirement when he fell with a bullet
through the head. The Australian casualties were severe: 6 killed and 23
wounded, of whom 10 were taken prisoner.55
The right flank having also been turned, Clements withdrew his wings to the centre and fell back upon Arundel, where he assumed a defensive position until Boer pressure was relieved by Roberts' move on Bloemfontein. An Australian war correspondent regarded 12 February as "a calamitous day
for the British cause" and "a glorious but a fatal day in the history of the Victorian contingent".56 The official report acknowledged the value of the "assistance rendered to their dismounted comrades of the Wiltshire
Regiment by the Victorian Rifles",57 but other views of the minor engagement
5 5 5 6 5 7 ibid, pp. 169-73. ibid, p. 169. ibid, p. 181.
were less restrained. The Argus called for "a beautiful and stately
monument" to the gallant dead, which would "tell to all future generations of Victorians the story of a deed which they could never surpass but from the heroic measure of which they must never decline".58 The Advertiser stated that Australians would be proud that they had not looked in vain to their representatives on the field of battle for a display of the highest military qualities, and added, "Plainly wool and wheat are not our greatest products!"59 The Times History, not given to high praise, noted, "As an exhibition of resolute courage on the part of comparatively untrained troops,
this performance of the Australians is worthy of mention".60 The highest
praise came from the pen of Arthur Conan Doyle, a fervent imperialist whose
popular history speaks only good of loyal colonials. He wrote that the
Australians "proved once for all (sic) that amid all the scattered nations which came from the same home there is not one with a more fiery courage and a higher sense of martial duty than the men from the great island continent".61
But amid all the praise for the Pink Hill defence, which even more than Sunnyside was taken as marking the "arrival" of the Australian soldier, there were critical murmurings that perhaps reputation had been achieved at
the expense of unnecessary life. It was considered that Eddy should have
given the order to retire much earlier. But caution was not part of the
make-up of the former school teacher who had found soldiering so attractive
that he had made it his career. The night before he fell, Eddy had stood on
the very spot where he was to die the next day and had remarked to friends that the position was superb for a last stand and that he would, in fact,
58 21 February 1900, p. 6. 59 21 February 1900, p. 4. 6 o 61 6 ? Vol. Ill, p. 466.
The Great Boer War, p. 188.
like to make a last stand there.63 Add to this heroic inclination Eddy's great contempt for the Boer,64 and we have a situation where discretion was unlikely to be regarded as the better part of valour.
Whether or not Major George Albert Eddy did aspire to glory, he achieved it in the short-term, for flags few at half-mast in his honour in allthose Victorian towns that had some claim to him.65 And although his body, together with those of his comrades, was to lie among the blood-stained rocks of Pink Hill for three weeks, he was eventually buried in a manner befitting a hero. Because of the British withdrawal from the area, no action had been taken to inter the dead, but there was supposedly an understanding between British ambulance men and the enemy that the Boers would bury the fallen on Pink Hill. This had been done in an inadequate way, although in a manner in which the Boers often disposed of their own dead, the bodies being roughly covered with boughs or rocks to keep away the scavengers of
the veldt. When it was heard that the Victorians had not been properly interred a burial party went to the scene. Major Eddy's was the first of five Aust
ralian bodies to be honoured in Christian burial. Chaplain Wray, clad in full clerical vestments, conducted the service and the members of the burial party raised a huge mound over his grave. A simple head-board served to identify the lonely tomb of a man who had fought beyond doubt with defiant
66
courage.
While the Australian Regiment was being put to the test on the hazardous field of Colesberg, elements of the second contingent were arriv ing in South Africa. Most colonial units moved up to join Roberts' invasion force at various points on his drive to Bloemfontein, but the units from Victoria and Tasmania were directed to the Colesberg area. But before they
63 ibidj p. 185. 64 ibid 3 p. 178. 65 Argus3 17 February 1900, 66
made contact with the Australian Regiment, Colonel Tom Price of the Victorians was accorded an honour, however brief, that was denied all other Australian officers throughout the war. He was given a command of his own. The
Victorians and Tasmanians had been de-trained at Hanover Road while en route from Cape Town to Naauwpoort, and were brigaded with several units of British regulars and South African irregulars to form the Hanover Road Field Force under Price. The objective of the hastily organised force was to protect Hanover Road from a Boer commando reported to be in the vicinty. Despite the alarms the enemy did not appear, and Price went forward with the mounted section of his command, about 350 men, to join Clements at Arundel. Here he fought an engagement that he later recounted with pride. The objective was Kuilfontein kopje, a position crucial to Clements' march on Colesberg. On the left of the advancing British force was Colonel Page Henderson of the
Inniskilling Dragoons, on the right was General Clements himself, and in the centre was Tom Price and the H.R.F.F. But most flattering of all was the presence of Kitchener as an observer.
The fight was sharp but unsuccessful despite the extensive use of British artillery, and the attackers retired. Two days later Price led his force in another assault on the kopje and took it without opposition. The Boers had begun their withdrawal to meet the main invasion threat, and the entire Colesberg force moved slowly behind them towards Bloemfontein. By this time, however, Price's command had been narrowed down to the Victorians only. Fven that was something of a distinction, for the remaining Australian units moved north under Imperial officers. Price regretted the limiting of his command but the fact that he was the only Australian officer honoured with a separate command during the war remained a great source of pride to him. He was inclined to attribute the reluctance of British authorities in this matter to the existence of intercolonial jealousies. Perhaps Price had
a point, because the bickerings of colonial officers at Enslin would not have been lost on British authorities.67
On the day that the Colesberg force began its withdrawal to Arundel,
the invasion of the Orange Free State began. Roberts had gathered together
near Enslin an army of 45,000 combat troops, made up of four infantry divis ions and one cavalry division, each of 7,500 men, and a force of 3,600
mounted infantry. Servicing the whole was a transport wing of 4,000 drivers,
11,000 mules and 9,600 oxen. Included in this formidable array of British
military strength were about 500 Australians, men from the Q.M.I.,the N.S.W.M.R., and the Lancers, all of whom were merged with French’s cavalry division.6 8
Roberts’ plan was to move to the Modder river and then strike east
towards Bloemfontein, but before doing this he wanted to use French to
relieve Kimberley. A morale booster was needed both in the field and at
home, for Buller had blundered again in the tragic battle of Spion Kop in
Natal. Roberts was also aware of ’’the disastrous political effect" which
the fall of Kimberley would have, so he placed great importance on the relief
of the diamond town. The brief campaign by which this was achieved was
quite spectacular, and must have been a source of great pride to the small group of Australian citizen soldiers who were privileged to ride with men
of illustrious Imperial regiments. To begin with, there was an inspiring
address by the revered "Bobs" himself, who spoke after the fashion of a