The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1899-04-09
GENERAL in SKIRTS
WIFE OF THE COMMANDER OF THE
TRANSVAAL TROOPS A
SOLDIER
ACCOMPANIES HER HUSBAND

From the Days of Childhood Mrs.
JOubert Has Been Accustomed to
the Alarms of War, and in Many
Trying Occasions Has shown
Great COurage-EngIish Defeat
at Majuba Due to Her.
Since the days of Cleopatra the women
to actually take part in the conduct of
the wars of their respective countries
have been few. At the present day there
is only one woman, says Woman's Life,
who, with any justice, can be termed "a
general in petticoats,' and that is Mrs.
Joubert, wife Of Gen. Joubert, comman-
der-in-chief of the Transvaal forces Mrs.
Joubert has accompanied her husband
in all the wars he has undertaken. Her
CHEEKY face, almost hidden from view
under the folds of a huge black cappie
has become such a familiar sight with
the burghers that the incongruity of one
woman walking in and out among an
armed force of several thousand men
seems to be commonplace.
A REAL VETERAN
From the days of her earliest childhood
Mrs. Joubert has been used to wars
alarms. She can load and fire gun with
almost es much skill as "Slim Piet'
(Anglice, Clever Piet'o himself, and on
many occasions has shown the greatest
courage.
1t is not generally known that 1t was
to her that the great defeat of the Eng
fish at Majuba was greatly due. The
general considered the position unassail-
able, but Mrs. Joubert, her eyes affre
with patriotism, urged the attack, event.
ually conquering the scruples of her hus-
band and the other commandments. The
result is known.
Mrs. Joubert's last appearance at a
war occurred during the recent Magato-
land campaign, at the extreme north Of
the Transvaal. An artillery, burgher
and native force Of nearly 10000 men
were dispatched to the front to subdue
the rebel chief, M'Pefu, intrenched in a
series of rocky Businesses backed by the
Limpopo. Notwithstanding what was
feared would be the bloody nature of the
war the heat-over 100 degrees in the
shade-and the fever the plucky woman
joined the general a week or two after
his arrival at the Hoofd Lager, accom-
panied only by two or three little Kaffir
maids.
Finding Gen. Joubert in an anything
but comfortable tent, she routed him out.
erected a tent of her own, and installed
him amid all the comforts of home.
What was more, she reconstructed the
generals mess arrangements and cooked
his meals with her own hands. The wife
of the commanding general peeling po-
taroes was an ordinary sight any day
during the campaign.
KNOWS NO FEAR.
On one occasion during the war the
news came into camp that the general
had been taken i'll thirty miles away in
the midst of country full of hostile ma
tives and deadly with malaria. Without
hesitation Mrs. Joubert made prepara-
tons to go and join her husband. and
there is little doubt that she would have
accomplished her purpose had not more
reassuring news come to hand.
The war came to an early close, owing
to the military genius of Gen. Joubert.
and, it is not too much to say, his better
half. The plans of the campaign from
the time Mrs. Joubert arrived till the
camp was struck were talked over at her
dinner table, her sound advice and almost