Chapter 36

The Crater settled into a routine and the months passed into years. Susan gave birth to a son christened Guy Ramage. Martin and Jill had a daughter the same year, Barbara. Sulkie and Tana had foals, and Zeus was trained to the saddle.

By the start of 1899, there were over two hundred and sixty horses and foals out in the crater, and over three hundred cattle and calves. People from the surrounding area would come to buy horses or cattle, mainly the Jerseys for their own dairy needs. Susan had started a school where her son and Barbara as well as the children of the Gurkhas and Matabele came to be educated. Jill and Martin helped out by taking some of the lessons.

But whilst everything in the Crater prospered, out in the world there were rumblings of war. The gold that had been discovered at Witwatersrand in the Transvaal, and diamonds at Kimberly, resulted in a gold and diamond rush into the Boer held lands. President Paul Kruger tried to stem the tide of foreigners now entering his country by imposing conditions and taxes. The situation had reached a state where there were more foreigners than Boers living in the Transvaal. The British Government had been content to let the Boers of the Transvaal and Orange Free State look after themselves after the disaster of the 91 war, but the discovery of gold and diamonds in such large quantities changed their views.

In the bars of Nairobi, views differed, depending on whether you were a native white of East Africa or a newly arrived farmer from England. Stanley summed it up when an argument had flared up in the bar one day. “I know the Boers. I’ve lived with them and fought with them in the Zulu wars. They’re farmers and ranchers. They don’t want their country ripped up by get rich quick merchants and then leave when it’s all gone. They’re all God fearing men who will defend their land with the last drop of their blood as all you farmers would do if someone tried to take your lands.

“So you agree with them?” someone in the crowd yelled.

Stanley looked sadly at them. “I left England when I was seventeen years old. My parents had nine children. Five died before they were four years old and my parents died of cholera from polluted water. So I ran away, and landed up here. But although I’m English by birth, I’m White African by choice. This land has been good to me and my family. So yes, I would defend my way of life. All I will say is, if England is so good why are you here?” His comments left the bar in silence.

Later David asked Stanley if he thought there would be a war.

Stanley nodded, “The bankers can smell money so they’ll push the Boers into it. They tried once before in 91 and got a bloody nose, which they seem to have forgotten. But they won’t be up against spears this time, as they have had in other colonial wars, and the poor bloody British soldier won’t know what’s hit him. It won’t be fought like the Crimea or Waterloo but by men who know every inch of the land they’re fighting over; each man a marksman and expert rider. Oh, the British will win, but thousands will die beforehand.”

David rode back to the crater deep in thought. That night as David sat out on the stoop with Susan, Martin and Jill he talked about what had been said. Martin puffed on his pipe before replying, “Six years ago I had never thought of Africa as such. But now I regard it as my home for me and my family.”

The girls nodded; Susan looked at David, “Would you go to fight?”

He sat still, thinking before replying, “If I was still a serving soldier I’d go because I was ordered to. As an officer, I never thought beyond the next order, but Kanda taught me to think beyond orders, to view the bigger picture ... the politics that create the orders. Britain is a greedy bully. The Empire is founded on greed. It would be understandable if that greed benefited the nation as a whole, but sadly it doesn’t. Eight tenths of the wealth of the country is controlled by less than two tenths of the population. You only have to see the poverty of the working classes in the inner cities to realise that. So, to answer you darling, I would not fight for a bully.” The other three looked at him and nodded in agreement.

They heard the news at the start of November ... Kruger had declared war with Britain. News slowly filtered up to East Africa ... the Boers of the Transvaal and the Orange Free State had successfully besieged Mafeking, Ladysmith, and Kimberly. A relief column under General Sir Redvres Henry Buller had been dispatched to break the besieged towns.