by Geoff Lawson
vehicle that could steam around imperviously, harass the
enemy whenever possible and gather intelligence on his
whereabouts. I had heard of one that was built in Natal called
Hairy Mary. They had covered it with thick dangling ropes
which were supposed to deflect the bullets of rifles. Personally,
I didn’t think much of its chances.
This particular locomotive had been covered with sheets of
wrought iron and was hardly a thing of beauty. It was
essentially a big, ugly, metal box with a smoke stack
protruding from it. Even the wheels were covered to within
19
inches of the ground, creating an effective barrier to shell
splinters and small arms fire. In front of the engine was a high-
sided wagon equipped with a Maxim gun, while a long-range
navy artillery piece was mounted on the flat-topped wagon that
came along behind. “Lady Randolph Churchill” had been
painted in large white lettering on the flat-top’s sides, she
being the popular American wife of Lord Churchill and mother
of the celebrated journalist, Winston Churchill.
To the rear of the engine were more wagons with built-up
sides. The first contained an extra-large quantity of coal and
water to extend the vehicle’s range, while the last wagon of the
group was equipped with a Maxim gun that was mounted
facing rearwards. In addition, the sides of the wagons had
numerous vertical slits cut for the firing of rifles, giving the
entire assembly a very grim and fortress-like appearance.
That afternoon, I was summoned with two other non-
commissioned officers to a meeting in Matlock’s tent, where
we were introduced to Major Kieran Conrad-Jones from the
Royal Corps of Engineers. He was a dapper, hardy-looking,
small-framed man of about forty, with a pleasant social manner
and unwavering, pale-blue eyes that left you in no doubt that
he was a capable individual. His impressive service record
included the Ashanti war, various Afghan revolts that extended
back several decades and Kitchener’s campaign to Khartoum
in ’98, where he was employed to supervise the fitting of
armour plates and artillery guns on a fleet of Nile river
steamers; effectively creating the water-borne equivalents of
the armoured train.
“Well lads,” he said after introductions, “the situation is
this.” He unrolled a linen map from a leather container on the
desk in front of us, placing an inkstand on one corner and a
silver cigarette case on another.
“A few days back, one of our routine military trains was
extensively fired upon in this region here, between Albert
Station and Burghersdorp. As you can see, this area is
perilously close to Orange River, which is the border between
Cape Colony and the Republic of Orange Free State; in fact,
the very next place of any consequence is Betherlie, just over
there on the Boer side of the river.”
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As he spoke, he pointed at each spot on the map with a
drill cane that featured a lavish German-silver cap which
portrayed the emblem of the Royal Corps of Engineers.
“Since this incident, telegraph communications with this
region have stopped and it is certain that the lines have been
cut. Our main concern is the safety of the station staff at Albert
Junction and the eighty men of the Dublin Fusiliers who are
guarding it, so we propose to add forty of your men to the
garrison of the armoured train and do a reconnaissance of the
railway at least as far as there. As we go, we will check the
telegraph and the railway for sabotage and repair what we find
if we can. We will need two more wagons added to the train to
accommodate the station staff and the Fusiliers, which we’ll
add once we get to Burghersdorp. We will assemble at the
railway station at 0100 hours tonight and shall be on our way
forthwith. Each of you will be assigned a squad and a wagon,
which you will be in charge of. Any questions?”
This was something different and not a horse in sight.
Chances are it would be a routine reconnaissance and we’d be
back for tea in a couple of days. We should be pretty safe in
that iron-plated juggernaut and unless we were derailed, or
attacked by artillery, we wouldn’t have a thing to worry about.
The briefing over, the men filed out; leaving me behind
with Matlock and Conrad-Jones, who smiled cryptically as he
passed me an envelope.
“None of what I’ve just said will apply to you, although
you will join the train with the others. Inside the envelope
you’ll find written orders that have come direct from the
Intelligence Bureau. We will be making an unscheduled stop
along the way, so you can rendezvous with a task force with
whom you will be working. Good luck!”
By daylight, we reached Burgersdorp and stopped to water
and coal up. Burgersdorp was a sleepy little town with a
population of around a hundred Boer and English residents, the
majority of its buildings being single storeyed and either of
sun-baked mud brick or paint-peeled corrugated iron. The
Boers were typically large in stature and their features were a
deep brown from a life lived outdoors. There was a leisurely
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air about the way they did things and the way they dressed,
with rumpled, wide-brimmed felt hats and well-worn coats,
corduroy trousers and dark brown shoes.
After breakfast, the officers and NCO’s assembled on the
station platform to receive the day’s orders and as the Major
spoke, two more wagons were added to the train. Since
coaling-up and re-filling the water tanks had been completed,
we clambered back on board as soon as the meeting ended.
Slowly, we accelerated to a leisurely speed and settled
ourselves in for what promised to be a long, warm day. We
were now entering no-man’s-land, so additional lookouts with
binoculars were posted to scan the tracks and look for any sign
of commandos that may be lurking in the surrounding
countryside. Bordering the tracks was an undulating plain that
stretched off into the distance towards a horizon streaked with
purple and blurred in shimmering haze. Like a lot of rural
Africa, it always impressed with its vastness and the feeling of
emptiness to the eye of the beholder.
Hours later, we came to a small, rural station and stopped.
This was apparently where I was supposed to get off, so I
swung down onto the platform and as Conrad-Jones gave me a
farewell wave I watched the train slowly accelerate away.
There didn’t appear to be another living soul here. I kept
watching the train recede, until eventually it disappeared into
the distance, at which point I took stock of my surroundings. It
was apparent that this was a long, long way from anywhere. I
was totally alone.
There were a couple of small two-roomed houses just past
the station itself, both of which were shuttered and vacant,
whi
le beyond them on the other side of the tracks was a siding
with cattle pens and a chute for loading stock. I spun around,
my eyes lingering over the station building, the principal
building of the group. Everything appeared dusty and unused;
doors were locked and windows barred. The place was
abandoned and the silence was deafening.
I wandered back and forth, checking what there was to see
and eventually decided to sit under the water tower, where its
open construction allowed a breeze to go through that cooled
the shade it provided. The tower itself loomed large above me
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and stood on top of hardwood columns that were strengthened
by thick, hardwood braces, the whole joined together by
fishplates of iron and large threaded bolts.
At the bottom of the tower and facing the tracks was a
long, tapering, leather hose mounted on a boom that could be
lowered and swung back and forth, for the pouring of water
into the tanks of locomotives. Removing the envelope that
contained my orders, I read through them again and folding
them, returned them to my pocket. I was supposed to wait here
for the arrival of a group of agents who were to fill me in on
whatever it was that I was sent here to do.
The hours dragged by. All I had was my carbine and the
uniform on my back, so if no one turned up I wouldn’t exactly
be able to ride away from here. I know it was silly, but sitting
here like this among all this emptiness made it hard to believe
that anyone would ever come along and rescue me.
By mid-afternoon, I had climbed the ladder up the side of
the tower and discovered a wonderful vista of the surrounding
plain. As I sat on the roof I spied a group of horsemen a long
way off and patiently watched them come closer and closer,
until some hour or so later I could see that there were three of
them, each trailing a packhorse or two. Was that all? Only
three? Well four I suppose, including myself; to capture a
villain in all this expanse of country? Surely we would need
more of us to do that? When I returned to the ground I
continued to sit and watch for them, for there was nothing else
to look upon and all the while I wondered what the hell I had
gotten myself into.
It was late afternoon by the time they arrived and I could
see that the leading horseman was nearing fifty years of age.
He sported a neat moustache that gave his face an aristocratic
appearance, although in every other way his appearance was
anything but that of an aristocrat. He was tall with the lean, flat
muscles typical of horsemen and he moved in the saddle like
he had been born on a horse.
Approaching within a few feet, he pulled up and swung
slowly and fluidly down with a grace that belied his age.
“Hello there, young fella.” He spoke with a silky,
masculine voice and we shook hands. On his head was a low
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crowned hat with a wide brim, such as a stockman might wear,
but with a fancy hatband of tooled leather around the crown.
He also wore a tan leather vest over a striped collarless shirt
and pale brown riding breeches were tucked into knee length,
lace-up boots. It was his face though, that I noticed the most; it
was thin and hawk-like with a slightly hooked nose. His deeply
tanned skin stretched across prominent cheekbones and his
mouth had what seemed to be a perpetual half smile; such as
only the wise and supremely confident have. His eyes were
hooded slits which never seemed to blink and appeared to
pierce me through and through. Instinctively, I knew they were
the eyes of a gunfighter; a professional man hunter.
“I’m Colonel Walter James Anderson and you are Richard
Wilson, I presume.”
“Yes sir.”
“Good lad. Don’t call me sir, call me Walt.” His steely eyes
softened as he turned towards his companions with a sweep of
his arm. “This is Ambrose Floyd and Harold Potts.”
His companions climbed down from their horses and we
shook hands. I noted that they were also dressed in civilian
clothes and both were capable looking individuals, although in
completely opposite ways.
Floyd was about my age. Athletically slim and sharp-eyed,
he also radiated the ambiance of someone who had spent his
life outdoors. Potts was heavier and at least twenty years my
senior. His florid townie face was getting rounder with age and
he had a broad nose that had seen a few fights in his time. He
also had dark brown eyes that challenged from above the odd
scar and bushy sideboards that crept all the way down his face.
He wore a dark brown suit and townie hat with white spats
over brown shoes, while exuding a toughness that ruled out the
possibility that he might be a businessman, although that was
difficult to say. Whoever he was, he had the air of someone
who was accustomed to giving orders and being obeyed.
There was nothing about any of them that would indicate a
military involvement and equally odd, they were of distinctly
different origins. I divined that Floyd was Australian from the
way he talked and the Colonel could have been Canadian or
24
American. Potts, on the other hand, appeared to be more local;
perhaps a South African of English ethnicity, or a Rhodesian.
The Colonel pulled a pipe from an upper pocket of his
waistcoat while fishing with his other hand for matches and a
pouch of tobacco.
“Welcome to the group. We’ll have to get you out of them
army clothes. For the time being you are going to be a
civilian.” At this point Potts tossed me a carpetbag.
“You are now Richard Wilson, out from England these last
three months and the agent of a consortium of investors. We
seek to buy land in South Africa for the purpose of establishing
a ranching enterprise.”
I was more than a little surprised. I had never been in the
land grab business before.
“Wouldn’t it look a bit odd – investors tromping around the
countryside and constantly in peril, just to buy some land that
could wait for some better time?”
“Not at all, lad. Because of the war there is a distinct lack
of buyers. That means anyone who wants to sell and leave will
have to accept what they can get, so prices will never be lower;
a perfect opportunity for buyers that are prepared to take some
risk.”
At this point Potts cut in.
“Inside the bag you’ll find safari clothes and evening wear
as befitting a gentleman such as yourself.” At this point, Floyd
and Potts were smirking.
I opened the bag to see if this was true and sure enough,
there was at least one summer-weight suit, safari kit, riding
boots and a pair of black shoes that I presumed would go with
the suit.
“And you’ll need this,” added Floyd, passing me a pith hat
while assuming an affected tone.
“Can’t have a fine young chap like Mr. Wilson wea
ring a
battered ol’ army thing now, can we?”
Removing my campaign hat with one hand and accepting
the pith hat with the other, I placed it lopsidedly on my head.
Now was the time for some big questions of my own.
“So. What is this about? What are we attempting to
achieve?”
25
“We’re looking for spies and saboteurs that have wrought
havoc with our railway.” By now, the Colonel had his pipe
smoking satisfactorily and removed it from his mouth, emitting
a small stream of smoke in the process. He seemed to be
studying me with those hooded eyes, no doubt trying to gauge
my worth. I hoped he liked what he saw.
“We heard about that Hun you ran into. I guess that makes
you pretty unique among the agents we have.” As he spoke, the
Colonel evinced a twinkle in his eye. “Not one other living
soul can honestly say they’ve had the pleasure of that and
those few unfortunates that inadvertently have are no longer
with us to tell any tales.”
“I’m not an agent, am I? I’ve never worked for the
Bureau.”
“You sure do now!” came the amused reply.
“Is all this cloak and dagger justified?”
“Afraid so,” stated Potts, taking the helm. “These bombers
are wary. As soon as any army presence materialises they go to
ground and resurface somewhere else. The army can’t turn up
without being noticed by all and sundry and neither can they
guard every single mile of track, so we’ve decided we’ll try
another tack.”
“That’s why we are posing as agents for a company of
investors, which shouldn’t spook our boy should we cross
him,” added the Colonel. “We’re employed by an investment
group called the ‘British South Africa Cattle Company’ an’
that’s what you tell any that ask.”
“So Eric von Smidt is our man then?”
“Yes. We thought his handiwork was the actions of Boer
Commandos or disgruntled Boer citizens. Since commandos
were the obvious culprits, we couldn’t understand why the
trains were being sabotaged where no commandos had been
reported. Recent information tells us that he’s working hand in
hand with Shaun Blainey, an English-Irish dissident who is
predisposed to despise his English ancestry.”
“I presume then, that they are dangerous and I don’t see
any of you packing arms. How are we to make an arrest should