The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-04-30
EITCHHNHR'S BOLD MOVE
Cut Loose From His Base of Sup.
plies to Crush cronje.
Furnished the British Army With
Twenty Days Rations for It's
That He Could Transport His Ncn
Without Depending on Railroads.

NEW YORK, April pa correspondent
of the Sun" who is with General Rob
erts' army, writing from Bloemfontein
under date of March %, says: / will try
to tell the story of an uncommercial risk.
Even in this country at this time 1t would
not be an exact description to call II a
war risk, for all the calculations turned on
beef and biscuits and forage and OK and
mule transport at one end and at the other
on engineering work and iron Orders and
pontoons and trestles of crossed railway
sleepers. Ordnance and ammunition were
not discussed as the most important fac
tors, SO that the best title for the enter
prise is to call it an monumental risk
undertaken on a large scale.
Lord Kitchener was the underwater and
the cargo was Lord Roberts South African
field force, numbering 10000 men. The
risk was taken up at place called Poplar
Grove on the Modder River, fifty miles
west of this place. The date-which is
important-was March S, just a fortnight
ago. We had arrived at Poplar Grove on
the previous afternoon after the most pc
culiar military performance l have yet
seen as the days work of two opposing
armies. Lord Roberts moved his various
units into the lines of position he had Sc
lected with the hope of outfanking the
Beers. General French brought his di-
vision of 5000 cavalry from the north TO
the south of the river on the previous
night and moved at dawn to the extreme
south of the British position. The infan-
try divisions OF General Colville and Cen
eral Kelly-Kenny moved along eastward
to the left Of the cavalry. on the north of
the river bank, where the Beers were TO
be cut off should they run up country from
French. The other infantry division, Cen
eral fuckers, was twenty miles south to
see that re-enforcements did not reach
the Beers. 1t should have been a bad
time for Commandant Christian De Wet.
who was TO have been the victim of STRAIT
egy and big numbers. But in vain the net
is spread in the sight of any Boer. Chris
tan De Wet had seen too much and he
conducted a successful retirement at a
range of 1900 yards from the British ar
tillery. The infantry had no part in the
performance and the cavalry found their
stern chase unproductive. 1t was after
this great and bloodless operation-like a
champion prizefight, where the combat
ants carefully keep the entire diameter
of the ring between them-that We rested
at Poplar Grove and Lord Kitchener to
outwit the Boer, took up an monumental
risk.
The Mistake Cronje Made
Cronje was captured because he refused
TO allow that British army could feed
Itself away from a railway. He was wrong. |
Even the sacrifice of 200 odd wagons aden |
with supplies weighing more than a mil
lion pounds, which were let go to the |
Beers at Waterfall Drift with scarcely |
struggle rather than leopard the converg- |
ing movement on CTonje, did not prevent |
the British from sitting and getting food |
by transport until they tired out the |
Eoers after ten days of the appalling |
nausea Of their Paardeberg lager Could |
another great Boer force be caught out
right by undertaking British ability to
feed a large army mostly moving slowly
on foot in foreign country?
The British troops were getting rather
too far from their railway bases at Mod
der River TO Kimberley. They had to keep
open lines of communication over forty
miles on the veldt TO Poplar Grove. and
the Beers knew this difficulty must in
crease the nearer the British approached
Bloemfontein. Until February S the sup
plies for the invading field force had been
brought up slowly but regularly by con-
voy. Lord kitcheler's monumental risk
was to lay in supplies for twenty days
for 10000 men; to drop all conveys and
lines of communications with bases at the
rear; and to give the army the twenty
days TO take Bloemfontein. repair all the
railway south into Cape Colony. rebuild
The bridge at Norvals Point on the Orange
River. and draw their regular supplies by
rail from the great main depot at De Aar.
The first risk was leaving the railway.
The next was cutting the painter abso-
lutely.
Preparing for the Advance
So confident was Lord Kitchener in his
estimate. or so clearly did he see that IL
failed through rains or Beers or any risk
IN the veidt, his presence on a derelict in
nidoeean of sand and sparse shrub could
lot save 1t, that he went with a few of his
tan officers that day March 8, to Kimber-
ey by road, took train for De Aar. came