Only two years after the Anglo-Zulu War two of the soldiers who had saved themselves from the massacre at Isandhlwana, others who had survived the defence of Rorke's Drift, plus soldiers who had escaped from the near British defeat on Hlobane mountain and a significant portion who had participated in the final victory over the Zulus at Ulundi, were besieged in another military engagement - detailed in the new Greenhill book A Rain of Lead - the siege of Potchefstroom. Ian Bennett writes: “I first came upon the story of this siege when researching the life of Colonel Walter Alphonsus Dunne, CB, which was published as Eyewitness in Zululand. He had been one of the defenders of Rorke's Drift who had been recommended for the Victoria Cross, but less than two years later was in another tight corner at Potchefstroom. The tale of the siege appeared to have all the ingredients of the kind of patriotic military drama so beloved by the Victorians: the gallantry and fortitude of the soldiers and the womenfolk, colourful reports of Boer atrocities, spies publicly executed under fire from their own unwitting comrades. I was curious to discover why the incident had never captured the contemporary interest one would have expected. The siege of the fort at Potchefstroom is now unlikely to enter the realms of military mythology along with Rorke's Drift and the Alamo, although Lady Florence Dixie, special correspondent of the London Morning Post, was inspired to write on 28 July 1881: ‘Potchefstroom of all others held out the most gallantly, and under circumstances of privation and hardship which while the annals of glorious deeds and heroic actions last, must ever be remembered.’ Only by piecing together elements of all the eyewitness accounts is it possible to appreciate fully the appalling conditions endured inside the fort during endless days and nights under fire: heat of 30 degrees centigrade and more, but with incessant rain during the wettest summer season for thirty years; everywhere mud and stinking filth, and no shelter except for the women and the wounded, the latter lying on the wet floors of bullet-holed leaking tents. Eighty-five were killed, wounded or succumbed to disease, over a third of the garrison's strength. One hundred and four gunshot wounds alone were treated; dressings and medical supplies were soon exhausted. The troops possessed no garments to change for their often rain-sodden clothing, while the women and children only had the clothes they stood up in. Rations barely adequate at the outset of the siege were steadily reduced to starvation level. Regarded as of historical importance in South Africa as the First War of Independence, in Britain the Anglo-Boer War of 1880-81 has long since faded into obscurity and with it the story of events in a then remote corner of the Transvaal. Although completely overshadowed by the far greater war that began in 1899, it was this conflict beginning at Potchefstroom on 16 December 1880 which set in train the course of events that shaped the history of South Africa for over a century, indeed until the day in 1990 when Nelson Mandela was released from imprisonment.” After the siege the survivors of Potchefstroom were lost to the public eye as they trudged 200 miles across the empty veldt of the neutral Orange Free State with their sick and wounded. Not for thirty-eight days did they reach Ladysmith in Natal where their arrival went virtually unremarked. In fact the Anglo-Boer War of 1880-81 was the only war fought by the Army during the reign of Queen Victoria for which no campaign medal was given, despite pleas from General Evelyn Wood. Nowadays if the story of such a siege were published and, after the heroism exhibited, it was revealed that the soldiers had received no recognition, and indeed the story itself had not been told in the media, it would be regarded as being a cover-up and quite scandalous. In fact the cover-up would be regarded as something sensational. Back to Greenhill Military Book News No. 107 Table of Contents Back to Greenhill Military Book News List of Issues Back to Master Magazine List © Copyright 2001 by Greenhill Books This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com