Hero of the Empire: The Boer War, a Daring Escape, and the Making of Winston Churchill (53 page)

He had even been among
: Spender,
General Botha
, 58.

“The Transvaal has done all it can”
: Meintjes,
General Louis Botha
, 27.

It was raining in heavy sheets
: Rayne Kruger,
Goodbye Dolly Gray
, 74.

“As far as the eye could see”
: Reitz,
Commando
, 24.

By the time they merged
: Amery,
Times History of the War in South Africa
, 2:58.

“Goodbye dear old lady”
: Quoted in Pakenham,
Boer War
, 120.

In Dundee, Penn Symons ran his brigade
: Ibid., 132.

“I feel perfectly safe”
: Rayne Kruger,
Goodbye Dolly Gray
, 76.

At 5
:00 on the morning of October 20: Meintjes,
General Louis Botha
, 33.

Penn Symons was just about to sit down
: Rayne Kruger,
Goodbye Dolly Gray
, 77.

Outraged by the Boers’ impudence
: Pakenham,
Boer War
, 155–56.

No man among them
: Ibid., 156.

“literally rising in dust”
: Ibid., 158.

“severely, mortally, wounded”
: Amery,
Times History of the War in South Africa
, 2:62–63.

Two days later, a Boer commander
: Rayne Kruger,
Goodbye Dolly Gray
, 80.

“He had already won confidence”
: Davitt,
Boer Fight for Freedom
, 241.

CHAPTER 7: THE BLACKEST OF ALL DAYS

“who should say what tidings”
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 10.

Desperate for news of the war
: Pakenham,
Boer War
, 190.

When the two ships
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 10.

“It was the most dramatic encounter”
: Atkins,
Relief of Ladysmith
, 34.

“Under Heaven”
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 10.

“it would only have taken ten minutes”
: Winston Churchill,
My Early Life
, 237–38.

“Man Who Knew”
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 12.

While his audience stood transfixed
: Ibid., 12; Atkins,
Relief of Ladysmith
, 37.

It was a stunningly long list
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 13.

Churchill had met Haldane
: WSC to Lady Randolph Churchill, March 7, 1898, CAC.

After that first meeting
: Ibid.

“I am entitled to a medal”
: WSC to Haldane, Aug. 11, 1898, CAC.

“We shall meet anon”
: WSC to Haldane, May 24, 1898, CAC.

“My idea is that my reputation”
: WSC to Lady Randolph Churchill, March 7, 1898, CAC.

“the picture of war”
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 13.

In the midst of the pomp and circumstance
:
Grantham Journal
, Nov. 4, 1899;
Sussex Agricultural Express
, Nov. 3, 1899.

In the month of October 1899 alone
: Mahan,
Story of the War in South Africa, 95
.

As, one after another, ships left Southampton
: Ibid.

“Knowing the meager way”
: Reitz,
Commando
, 32–33.

To carry all these supplies
: Pakenham,
Boer War
, 196; Mahan,
Story of the War in South Africa
.

In an attempt to keep them calm
:
Diamond Fields Advertiser
, Jan. 3, 1900; “Horses on Board Ship,”
Baily’s Magazine
, March 1903, 186.

Those that survived the journey
:
http://www.bwm.org.au/site/Horses.asp
.

The crowd in Cape Town watched in excitement
: WSC speech to Parliament, Jan. 1902;
Yorkshire Evening Post
, Oct. 16, 1899;
London Daily News
, Oct. 16, 1899.

he was surrounded by the hum of electric cars
: The electric vehicle was built in the United States in 1899, and only in 1899. It had an electric cab, front-wheel drive, and rear-wheel steering.

“It seemed half Western American”
: Steevens,
From Capetown to Ladysmith
, 5.

“not to be a young ass”
: Griffith,
Thank God We Kept the Flag Flying
, 97.

“Sir Alfred Milner told me”
: Quoted in Pakenham,
Boer War
, 191.

Slipping into the city with Atkins
: Atkins,
Incidents and Reflections
, 123; Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 16.

When the other journalists learned
: Winston Churchill,
My Early Life
, 241; Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 16.

CHAPTER 8: LAND OF STONE AND SCRUB

When Churchill awoke
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 16.

“It is only to the eye”
: Steevens,
From Capetown to Ladysmith
, 8.

“The scenery would depress”
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 16.

“horrible Antarctic gale”
: Winston Churchill,
My Early Life
, 241.

“most appalling paroxysms”
: Ibid.

“Here are wide tracts of fertile soil”
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 19.

In many ways, Shaka both
: Although he was the son of a Zulu chieftain, while he was still a child, he and his mother, an orphaned Langeni princess, were cast out of the tribe and forced to live with the Langeni, who did not want them and made their lives miserable. Shaka, who grew up to be a powerful and feared warrior, was filled with hatred and resentment and eager to exact his revenge. His chance finally came in 1816, when his father died. After killing his half brother, who had been the only real threat to his ascension, Shaka seized control of the Zulu military and, soon after, the throne.

Shaka also redesigned the most essential
: Morris,
Washing of the Spears
, 47.

“No fetters or cords”
: Quoted in Greaves and Mkhize,
Zulus at War
, 14–15. Shaka, moreover, had a long memory. As soon as he had risen to power, he had had everyone who had been abusive or cruel to his mother executed, impaling men on their own fences and burning down their villages. Several years later, when his mother died, the entire Zulu tribe, by then many thousands strong, were forced not just to mourn for weeks without relief, wailing and writhing, but to engage in wholesale massacre. At least seven thousand people were killed, for months filling the streams and kraals with rotting bodies. On the day of her burial, Shaka ordered twelve thousand men to guard his mother’s grave, and ten young women were buried alive with her, their arms and legs broken so they could not claw their way out.

“I was too late”
: Winston Churchill,
My Early Life
, 242.

“ ‘As far as you can’ ”
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 20.

“As I approached”
: Reitz,
Commando
, 34.

Because Buller had yet to arrive
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 23.

Even with this welcome addition
: Amery,
Times History of the War in South Africa
, 2:113.

“The enemy crouches”
: Atkins,
Relief of Ladysmith
, 60.

“It was a period of strained waiting”
: Romer and Mainwaring,
Second Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers in the South African War
, 15.

“We live in expectation of attack”
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 22.

CHAPTER 9: THE DEATH TRAP

“Fancy how lucky I am”
: Winston Churchill,
My Early Life
, 168.

“tiny tin township”
: Ibid., 242.

“of mean and insignificant aspect”
: Winston Churchill,
London to Ladysmith
, 22.

“exceedingly clever”
: WSC to Lady Randolph Churchill, Nov. 3, 1899, CAC.

The young reporter had watched
: Atkins,
Incidents and Reflections
, 112.

“most unusual young man”
: Ibid., 122.

“When the prospects of a career”
: Ibid.

“I don’t like the fellow”
: Randolph S. Churchill,
Youth
, 354. It seemed that wherever he went, from Harrow to Bangalore, Churchill was judged a little too clever, and far too confident. Bishop Welldon, who had been the headmaster of Harrow when Churchill was a student there, once told a friend of Churchill’s that he had been forced to whip him more often than any other boy and that “this obstreperous, irresponsible pupil had…even had the audacity to tell him how to perform his duties.”

Churchill had only been at the school
: Winston Churchill,
My Early Life
, 17–18; Amery,
My Political Life
, 39.

“outrage on my dignity”
: Amery,
My Political Life
, 39.

“for the first time meet”
: Winston Churchill,
My Early Life
, 243.

“I had an effective team”
: Amery,
My Political Life
, 115.

“could laugh at his dreams of glory”
: Atkins,
Incidents and Reflections
, 123.