It
Was Hoped That The Blockhouses On The Railroad Would Have Held The
Enemy, But They Slipped Across By Night And Got Into The Steynsburg
District, Where Gorringe's Colonials Took Up The Running.
On August
18th he followed the commandos from Steynsburg to Venterstad,
killing twenty of them and taking several prisoners.
On the 15th,
Kritzinger with the main body of the invaders passed the Orange
River near Bethulie, and made his way to the Wepener district of
the Orange River Colony. Scheepers, Lotter, Lategan, and a few
small wandering bands were the only Boers left in the Colony, and
to these the British columns now turned their attention, with the
result that Lategan, towards the end of the month, was also driven
over the river. For the time, at least, the situation seemed to
have very much improved, but there was a drift of Boers over the
north-western frontier, and the long-continued warfare at their own
doors was undoubtedly having a dangerous effect upon the Dutch
farmers. Small successes from time to time, such as the taking of
sixty of French's Scouts by Theron's commando on August 10th,
served to keep them from despair. Of the guerilla bands which
remained, the most important was that of Scheepers, which now
numbered 300 men, well mounted and supplied. He had broken back
through the cordon, and made for his old haunts in the south-west.
Theron, with a smaller band, was also in the Uniondale and
Willowmore district, approaching close to the sea in the Mossel Bay
direction, but being headed off by Kavanagh.
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