The Portland daily press., 1899-12-15
OF ELANDSLAAGTE.
Private Letters which Escaped the Cen
sor Give Shocking and Pitiful battle
Pictures.
(From The London Mail.

A private In the First Kings Royal
Rifles, writes the battle Of Elandslaaste,
to a frisnd at Preston: ~ must give q
word OF praise to the cavalry, who per-
formed the finishing stroke / tell you
1t was a great, but terrible, sight to see
those horseuien hew their way through
the Beers with their swords Three times
they 70 10 right through the Beers, hack
ing, cutting, siashing. We had suffered
pretty severely, and SUI puse we got our
ta,ks up bit. Anyhow, we got even
with Jouubrst's men.
"Dear -, it's very terrible, Is this
war;" the litter proceeds. Il saw sew
eral Roers whose heads had been cut right
{ Fl ty our cavalrymen's swords. IL Is
CHASTITY, isn't it, But It's the plain truth
Some OF the Beers had died In pray ing
attitudes. Many. was told y q friend
In the Fifth Lancers flung down their
arms as soon as they saw the flash OF the
lances, and olasping their lands above
their beads begged for mercy. But they
hFd shown DO mercy to our men; some
day, II Pm spared, will tell you some
Incidents of Row the Beers behaved to
our me n-killing and aDmering our
wounded as they lay on the teld-and
this was our revenge.
ado you know what / should like more
than anything elsef' this Interesting let
ter c1ntinues. "well. that's q good stew
In a OF bath. And. oh. how nice 1t VIII
be to sIes p in a bed againi"
A pathetic Incident at Elandslaagte Is
dc scr bsu In letter from ono OF the bear
err Company 'we were out looking after
tbs wounded at night when the fight was
over, when / came across an old, white
bearded Boer. He was lying bebind q
bit of rock supporting himself on his
elbows. l was bit wary Of the old
fellow at first. Some of these wounded
Bcers, we've round, ara snakes in the
gre S. You go mp to them with the best
In tentiors, and tho next thing you know
10 that the man you were going to sucoor
is blazing at you with his gun.
$780," the letter goes on. al kept my
eye on the old chap. But when got
nearer l saw that he was too far gone to
raise his rifle He was gasping hard for
breath, and saw he was not long for
this world. be motioned to me that he
wanted to speak, and / bent over him.
He asked me to 60 and find his son, boy
Of thirteen, who had been nghting by his
side when he fell.
well, 1 did as he asked me" continues
the writer, "and under heap Of wound
ed found the poor lad, stone dead, and
carried him back to his father. Well.
you know I'm not chicken hearted sort
of fellow. ] have seen a bit Of lighting
in my time, and that sort Of thing
knocks ell the soft out of chap.
"But," this correspondent confesses.
al had to turn away when that old Boer
saw his dead lad He Rugged the body to
him and mosned over Ii. and carried on
In a way that fetched big lump in my
throat. Until that very moment never
thought how horrible war Is. i never
wanted to see another shot fired. And
when looked round again the old Boer
was dead, clasping the cold hand of his
des d hoy. haven't got that TO-
bacco promised to send me. Hopa
l shall have a good English smoke before
Chi stmas 1 found a little bag OF Cape
tobacco last night that some Poer had
dropped as he was running away. But
Ii doesn't taste like the stuff at home"