If he saw a number of the
enemy who were detached from the main body of their own force, and he
believed that they could be taken prisoner, he enlisted a number of the
burghers who were near him, and made an effort to capture them, whether
there was an officer close at hand or a mile distant.
No one was surfeited with orders; in fact, the lack of them was more
noticeable, and it was well that it was so, for the Boer burgher disliked
to be ordered, and he always did things with better grace when he acted
spontaneously. An illustration of this fact was an incident at the fight
of Modderspruit where two young Boers saved an entire commando from
falling into the hands of the enemy. Lieutenant Oelfse, of the State
Artillery, and Reginald Sheppard, of the Pretoria commando, observed a
strong force of the British advancing towards a kopje where the
Krugersdorp commando was concealed. The two men saw that the
Krugersdorpers would be cut off in a short time if they were not informed
of the British advance, so they determined to plunge across the open veld,
six hundred yards from the enemy's guns, and tell them of their danger. No
officer could have compelled the men to undertake such a hazardous journey
across a bullet-swept plain, but Oelfse and Sheppard acted on their own
responsibility, succeeded in reaching the Krugersdorp commando without
being hit, and gave to the commandant the information which undoubtedly
saved him and his men from being captured.
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