Boer Soldiers. Battle at Diamond Hill.

Heroes Remember

Boer Soldiers. Battle at Diamond Hill.

Transcript

Picture of six soldiers standing or on a fence.

Oh, I, I just forget but I'd imagine that the Orange Free State had an army of 50 thousand. And the Transvaal must of had an army of, oh, they had quite an army, and had quite a lot of artillery. They had quite a lot of heavy machinery, every, every... Interviewer: Where did they make their guns or where did they get their guns? Well, I think they got them from Germany. (From Germany) I think, they, they were a German, German made gun, the Snyder. They had the old Snyder. I remember it, you know it come back to me.

Soldier holding his rifle on horseback.

Interviewer: The one you couldn't remember a little while ago? Yeah, it was the old Snider. (And this was a good gun!) The Snider boy she'd, just like a cannonball, the bullet would come out of it. The bullet was about as big as your finger. You know, just that long. Interviewer: Now, so, well the impression that I got reading, reading these things is that these people were fighting a guerilla war that you... Well it was, it was a guerilla war, and yet not, it was a determined war, like a one armed force against another brought up. But then, when it got so that the armed force couldn't handle it, all the Bergers, they called them Bergers. That was the settlers there. All the Boers was, was a soldier.

Soldier posing with rifle slung.

Everyone from a boy about ten up. Interviewer: So you've got a nation in arms. They were first class shots, a boy of ten was as good as shot as, as some of the parents. (Well, well) And they were just as plucky as plucky, just as plucky. I went, oh, Bill Cameron, Ole Bill Cameron outside (inaudible). We surprised a Boer logger and scattered them. Scattered them, and we were scattered all over creation, between little, little creeks, and that running

Picture of a man standing and a woman sitting, holding flowers.

along on a kind of a marshy ground. And a little boy run and Bill Cameron, he was just ahead of me, and I was lay down and Bill was lay down, and Bill pointed his rifle, and Bill, I said, "Bill you can't shoot that little boy", and he says, "I'll stop the young devil". So he shot him through the leg and brought him down. Well, I ran out and I got him and dragged him in. So Bill says, "What, what did you want to run for" he says. Bill hollered to him to stop. There's your... Bill says "what do you want to run for". He says, "Father told me to run". You see the pluck in them. (I sure do. Yes I do.) He says, "Father told

Three Veterans standing in front of war memorial.

me to run". (So he ran). So he ran. But Bill only shot him through the leg and he wounded him, but he, he didn't break any bones, but, he brought him down just the same. And of course he was took prisoner, but you, you couldn't do nothing with a, with a boy. He was put with the, I think he was put in with the refugee camp, taken to the refugee camp. Interviewer: Now Mr. Weaver one of, one of the things that I've been wanting to ask you all afternoon is you said that you had captured the rifle of a (Commandant Wessels) Commandant Wessels

Boer War Veteran talking with current service men.

who was a commando leader... Yes, he was a leader of the Boer War, Boer, one of the Boer leaders. Interviewer: Could you tell me the story, please? Well a, the story that a, well I took a, I took that a,I got that rifle and I carried that rifle with me. I took it all apart the bolt the, the barrel and the stock. I took it all apart and bundled it up and put it in my knapsack and carried that around with me, all the time in me knapsack. And, when we was disbanded we, we would just, when we went back to Australia, we went back

Boer War Veteran sitting on a chair, holding a document.

to Brisbane. I took it back there with me and then when I left Brisbane, I took it back, took it over to the old country and from the old country I took it over to Canada here. And here I lent it to me son and, and that was the end that I got of it, now I've lost it. Interviewer: How did you actually capture the gun? How did you get it from him? Well now, well now I got it. Actually there was two of us, two of us involved in this, we were at this here place, where, I tell ya, Bill Cameron shot the little boy. Interviewer: What year was this in... was this in?

Picture of six soldiers standing or on a fence.

This was in 1902, beginning of 1902 and right in one of the trees this fella was up in the tree, we was gonna shoot him down, that's one of the New Zealanders and I was gonna shoot him down. And, he got down out of the tree and we stripped him, and took his sovereign belt of him. Do you know what a sovereign belt is? Interviewer: No, would you explain, please? Well a sovereign belt is, is a, is a belt that you put there around, underneath your shirt next to your skin with a little pocket right through the belt that you could put a sovereign in or half a sovereign in and slide them on down and carry a lot of small coins like that in this sovereign belt. Well, he had one

Soldier holding his rifle on horseback.

around his waist and one around his shoulder. Well we confiscated this and divided it up between us. And the Boer he got away from us and he got into a hole in the, in the little hill. Well, well the New Zealander he says, now you hold on he says and I'll go above there, he says, and you crawl up and take the rifle from him. He had the rifle right there poking out through this here, underneath this rock. So the New Zealand chap he went up around and he had his bayonet fixed and he went up over the top of this rock and he held the bayonet down over where the

Soldier posing with rifle slung.

fella was a, with the rifle, he could see it. And I walked up and clambered up and I got out of the rifle and I yanked it out of his hand. And then we stripped him and we stripped him right to his bare hide. So he didn't have nothing to cover up, and we took everything and then give him his clothes back. And, that's, that was how we got the rifle. That's were I hung unto it. Interviewer: And that was Wessel? That, that man was Wessel? That was Wessel. That was Wessel. Interviewer: What was he doing out there all alone? Well, well they were all alone, everyone was all alone, they wasn't all of the body. (I see.) One fella here and one fella there, you never knew where they was. Interviewer: So the war changed from the start to the end. In the start they had an organized army and in the end they

Picture of a man standing and a woman sitting, holding flowers.

were fighting in bits and pieces. It was a guerilla warfare. (By the end of the war.) The end of the war, it was just a guerilla warfare. That's, that's just what it was. They were plowing, they were plowing, they're raising their crops as you went along, right up till the end of the war. But when they, when they begun to destroy all their implements and destroy all their horses and all their, their cattle that they couldn't plow or do anything with. They were hampered. I've seen a coral where they keep their, that's the coral were they keep their cattle in and that. I've seen some of the British go up there, the troops,

Three Veterans standing in front of war memorial.

our own colonial troops going in there and shoot as much as a hundred colts. What a waste, hundred colts. And I've seen as many as a thousand sheep slaughtered and the next time you would come by you would just see a mass of wool. Interviewer: Well, the war lasted from 1899 to 1902. The first, the first year and a half of the war the Boers were winning. The British were getting their pants (They were winning, they) pants beaten off of them a... (Well, they knew the country, ya know) Yeah they knew the country and they were well organized, themselves. And they knew every hole there was in the place.

Boer War Veteran talking with current service men.

Interviewer: Now some of, some of the greatest defeats that the British suffered were at Calenso and Ladysmith (Biggersburg) and Mafeking. Well Mafeking wasn't much of a, they didn't have much trouble in Mafeking. Interviewer: Were you, were you at any of these places? No, no, no, we wasn't at Mafeking or Ladysmith. We wasn't even in Ladysmith, only (inaudible) that's right outside Ladysmith. Interviewer: Was there a time, when you were retreating and you felt that you were beat during the war.(We never had to retreat.) Interviewer:You never had to retreat?(No.) Must be a good feeling We never had to retreat because, because we never was in a pitch battle, what you call a pitch battle. Not a,where we

Boer War Veteran sitting on a chair, holding a document.

had to retreat. Diamond Hill was a bad affair and a... Interviewer: You were at Diamond Hill? Diamond Hill (Were you there?) And at Burk, Burkindale. Interviewer: You, you were at Diamond Hill, were you? (Diamond Hill) What was the battle like, could you describe to me (Well) When did it start? (What?) When did it start, what time of day did it start? Well now, just when did that start? I don't know whether that started the night before the big day or not, whether there was some skirmishes. I just couldn't remember, just a.. Interviewer: What was, what was your part in the battle, and what do you remember most about it?

Picture of six soldiers standing or on a fence.

Well, our part was most on the defense from a, from allowing any other any other, other reinforcements to join them. We were on the outskirts of the battle preventing any other, any other reinforcements to get to them. The same as, now all our, our body we was composed of about, I think we had twenty-five hundred, that's for action. About twenty-five hundred besides the rest of the columns. That was that you could put into action. Interviewer: Where would the Boer reserves be coming from? Well, they're anywhere, anywhere you could, you could almost pick up a Boer, a Boer body of five, ten, twenty, or that,

Soldier holding his rifle on horseback.

almost anywhere. They were all disorganized, ya see. They were picking up, you could pick up a few here and a few there and then you'd light on perhaps, five or six hundred. Then perhaps you'd light on a hundred and, and with their little cape carts, and their cape carts and perhaps a bullet wagon. But these that got away quick, the quick commanders, wouldn't, wasn't bothered with bullet wagon. They just had the cape cart and the, the mule, the mule wagons. Interviewer: Would you say, would you say that this disorganization was an advantage or a disadvantage to the Boers? Well, it was an advantage I'd say, because they could engage perhaps five or six hundred of the troops here, and perhaps they

Soldier posing with rifle slung.

could be reinforcing another body somewhere else on a smaller British end, annihilating them. It was quite an advantage to have these small Boer outfits, to the Boers. Interviewer: Then how was there a chain of command? But it wasn't a very, very, very satisfactory for us fellas where they got twenty-five or fifty here and twenty-five or fifty there. Where we've got two thousand five hundred here attacking only twenty-five. It didn't seem to make sense. What? (It doesn't, does it.) Interviewer: What happened at Diamond Hill? Well, Diamond Hill was quite a, quite a set too, there was three days, three days battle there and then Burkindale was that was a

Picture of a man standing and a woman sitting, holding flowers.

pretty hot, hot time too. There was shrapnel there. Boys it was frightful. Just like, just like a living hell. Interviewer: Could you describe the day? How did you feel? Well, I didn't feel at all joyful over it. I don't know that I'd want to go through it again. (No I don't imagine.) I don't, there was a lot of things that I wouldn't want to go through, a lot of it over there, and there's a lot of things over

Three Veterans standing in front of war memorial.

there that I wouldn't, I wouldn't have like to have missed. Interviewer: What was the outcome of the, of the battle of battle of Diamond Hill? Well, the Boers were defeated there. Interviewer: Badly, were they mutilated or enabled to retreat. Well, they lost, they lost quite a, they lost quite a few, the British lost quite a few, at Burkindale they lost, on both sides they lost.

Description

Mr. Weaver recalls Boer soldiers from as young as ten and up. He then tells the story of how he captured the rifle of Commandant Wessels and talks about the Battle at Diamond Hill.

Frank Weaver

Frank Weaver was born in England, April 7th, 1881 and moved to Canada following his service in the South African War. At the time of this interview Mr. Weaver was 97-years-old. This interview was recorded in Saint John, New Brunswick on August 13, 1971 as part of the Living History Project completed by students and faculty of Military and Strategic Studies, Department of History, University of New Brunswick. This interview is used with permission of the Provincial Archives of New Brunswick. Mr. Weaver's interview was taped outdoors. VAC apologizes for the sometimes poor audio quality of these clips.

Meta Data

Medium:: Video
Owner:: Veterans Affairs Canada
Duration:: 14:46
Person Interviewed:: Frank Weaver
War, Conflict or Mission:: South African War
Branch:: Army

Language selection

Boer Soldiers. Battle at Diamond Hill.

Heroes Remember