The Albany News. (Albany, Tex.), Vol. 17, No. 28, Ed. 1 Friday, November 9, 1900 Page: 5 of 10
This newspaper is part of the collection entitled: Texas Digital Newspaper Program and was provided to The Portal to Texas History by the The Old Jail Art Center.
Extracted Text
The following text was automatically extracted from the image on this page using optical character recognition software:
THE PARTING.
\
Two, here, side by side,
Two that tarry the tide.
Give us your hand, my boy;
Grasp we warm and long.
1 hanks lor the day when our hearts had Joy,
Our feet jiad speed and our lips a song.
The sails aje filling-^give us your hand!
Two and two,
And their hearts were true-
Here's to us both, one left on the strand;
One off in the bark comes never to land.
Two, here, side by side,
Two that tarry the tide.
Give us a kiss, my girl;
Life and love arc all.
Thanks for the glance mid the dance's whirl,
For the smile and the sigh and the sweet lids'
fall.
The sails are filling—one more kiss!
Two and two,
And their hearts were true—
Thanks for the heart a heart can miss.
Here's to us both, the end of the bliss!
—John Vance Cheney in Cosmopolitan.
heroine
at lydenberg.
An Episode In th.e
Transvaal War of
1880-1.
BY W WILMOTT DIXON.
♦
*
♦
*
♦
i
One forgets many things in IS years,
and probably the story which 1 purpose
retelling here is forgotten by all except
the surviving actors in it and their im-
mediate friends. But the memory of
such a signal instance of British pluck
should not be allowed to die.
On Sunday, the 5th of December,
1880, the little town of Lydenberg, in
the Transvaal, was in a state of un-
wonted excitement. The whole popu
lation was out in its Sunday best to
give a hearty send off to the Ninety-
fourth regiment, which had been quar
tered there for many months and was
now ordered to Pretoria. Both officers
and men had made themselves ex
tremely popular with all classes, and
the expressions of regret at their de-
parture were universal. Numbers of
the inhabitants accompanied the regi
ment on its way for five or six miles.
One lady and gentleman—Lieutenant
Walter Long, the junior subaltern of
the Ninety-fourth, and his pretty young
wife—rode out as 'n* ?s 15 miles. The
colonel had paid £ lieutenant the
f£$).)iQnor |if leaving him in sole com-
of the troops left behind, a re
jble position for a youngster of
two and twenty.
taiTeutenant and his wife turned
Morses' heads and bade farewell
iir comrades Colonel Anstruther
out:
"Goodby, Mrs. Long! Look after
Long, and mind you're a good little ad
jutant. Ooodby, Long! Look after
my garden for me; remember, I expect
to find it in as good order as I leave it."
Both the colonel and the lieutenant
were enthusiastic gardeners.
As the regiment tramped past Mrs.
Long cried out:
"Goodby, Ninety-fourth! God bless
you!"
And the men shouted back:
"Goodby, our lady! God bless you,
Mrs. Long!"
It was a last farewell for many of
them, though they little thought it, for
a fortnight later Colonel Anstruther
and more than half his men were killed
at Broukhorst Spruit.
Out on the open veldt, about half a
mile from the town, were eight mili-
tary huts, each 50 feet long by 18 feet
wide, built two 'abreast, with an inter-
vening space of 30 feet, the whole
forming a parallelogram 78 yards in
length by 20 in breadth. At the first
rumor ojf disaffection among the Boers
Lieutenant Long resolved to withdraw
his men into these huts and throw up
some kihd of shelter round them, for
up to this time they stood without the
slightest inclosure and utterly unpro-
tected. The force under his command
consisted of 50 privates and three non-
commissioned officers of the Ninety-
fourth, seven privates and a sergeant
of the Royal engineers, three privates
and a conductor of the army service
corps—in all. Including Dr. Falvey of
the army medical department and
Lieutenant Long himself, GG officers
and men.
Mrs. Long, who had been living with
her husband in a pretty little cottage
embowered In roses and fruit trees at
the lower end of the town, without a
moment's hesitation decided to leave
her comfortable home and take up her
quarters with her husband, tier many
friends in Lydenberg tried in vain to
dissuade her from the step. She .was
offered a warm welcome in half a doz-
en houses, but the brave little woman
said that her place was beside her Jius-
band. So the soldiers brought her be-
longings frdm the pretty cottage to one
of the hntsjand showed their admira-
tion for bear njuck by taking the great-
est painsi .aking her quarters as
tasteful :l^_l>infortabIe as possible.
There but scant accom-
modation fcStSady In the hut assigned
to her, which sheltered under its roof
three horses (whose every movement
was distinctli' audible), besides herself
and her busbLnd.
On the KitB of December they began
Throwing "p'works of defense round
t-e b::ts. Long delighted the
men by worl ing as hard as any of
tbem. On tin 23d of December the ap-
palling news eached them of the mas-
figcre of the tNinetv-fniirUi at Bro&k-
horst spruit. But, stunned though
they we* by the terrible tidings, they
set to work more vigorously than ever
fro complete their defenses. When the
tiny fort was finished, it was christen-
ed Fort Mary, in honor of Mrs. Long,
and Father Walsh, a Roman Catholic
priest who had elected to cast in his
lot with the little garrison, formally
blessed it.
An envoy from the Boers, Dietrick
Muller, appeared on the 27th of Decem-
l>er with a proposal that the garrisoD
should surrender and accept a safe
conduct into Natal. His surprise at
the youthful appearance of the com-
mandant of tlii> fort was great. "Dat
younker!" he exclaimed in contempt.
But'"dat younker" was not so green as
Mr. Muller imagined. He suggested
writing to Pretoria for instructions.
Muller consented, and Lieutenant Long
thus cleverly gained a delay of five
days, which he utilized in very mate-
rially strengthening his defenses.
On the 4th of January the Boers ap-
peared in force, some 700 of them, and
formally demanded the surrender of
the fort, to which summons the young
subaltern returned the spirited reply,
"It is inconsistent with my duty as a
soldier to surrender my trust." An
urgent appeal was once more made by
Mrs. Long's friends in the town to in-
duce her to quit the fort and take up
her residence in one of the many
homes placed at her disposal. But she
stoutly refused.
Two days afterward the attack com-
menced. For three hours and a half
700 Boers kept up a continuous rifle
fire upon the little fort at a range of
500 yards. In her own charmingly
modest and simple narrative, Mrs.
Long thus describes her feelings when
she first found herself under fire:
"I must humbly confess that during
the first hour of the firing I was dread-
fully frightened and took refuge under
a table for its imaginary shelter. Fa-
ther Walsh entering the hut at that
moment with his breviary in his hand
to look for me, and, uot finding me, as
ho expected, called me. I lifted the ta-
ble cover and poked my head out, say-
ing, 'Here 1 am, father!' My position
struck me as so ludicrous that I burst
into a hearty fit of laughter. Not till
4 p. m. was I able to ascertain that,
notwithstanding the terrible fire of the
last four hours, not a man had been
wounded. My husband, knowing how
anxious 1 should be as to his safety,
looked in as often as he could to cheer
me."
But she very soon overcame these
natural terrors and got so used to the
firing, even when the Boers brought a
couple of cannon to bear on the fort,
that she frequently slept right through
the tannouade.
What with tending the sick and
wounded and making sandbags, some-
times turning out as many as four
dozen of them in a day, Mrs. Long's
time was fully occupied. Think of
her there, one woman, little more than
a girl, alone among GO men fighting for
their lives against ten times their num-
ber! What wonder that the men fought
like heroes with this daintily bred Eng-
lish lady sharing all their dangers and
setting them an example of patience
and courage and cheerfulness. She
admitted that at first she felt the ab-
sence of any of her own sex keenly.
But the soldiers were so devoted to
her, so delicate in their solicitude and
consideration for her, that she soon
lost the sense of loneliness.
One day a strange messenger ar-
rived, a little black and tan terrier,
with a piece of paper folded in a rag
tied round its neck. It was a commu-
nication from some friendly townsfolk
informing them that the Boers were
quarreling among themselves, furious
with Dietrick Muller for being such a
fool as to allow the English those five
days to complete their defenses and
adding as a hint that the defenders of
the fort were firing too high, which
hint, I need hardly say, was quickly
taken.
The gayrison had nothing in the
shape of a gun with which to meet the
fire of the two G pounders that the
Boers had in position. But one day
Mrs. Long suggested to one of the
army service men that the "monkey"
of an Abyssinian pump which they had
might perhaps be utilized. The idea
was promptly seized upon and ingen-
iously carried into execution, and the
Boers were very much amazed when a
cylindrical shot weighing two pounds
six ounces, formed of round crowbar
Iron cased in lead, came crashing in
among them. "Mrs. Long's gun," as it
was christened, proved a very valuable
addition to the armament of Fort
Mary.
The huts were riddled through and
through with round shot and rifle bul-
lets, and the escapes from death were
so miraculous that Lieutenant Long
twice had the men 'assembled for a
special thanksgiving service conducted
by Father Walsh. On one occasion a
cannon shot struck the wall within an
inclV of Mrs. Long's head and covered
her *ith dust and debris.
Anflfher time the but in which she
ame down about her ears, and
ape from being crushed in the
.•as marvelous. But she must
womanlike, go back to rescue
ugs" and expressed truly fem-
rrr-'v to find her best bonnet
) ab iiat as a pancake and only
two saucers and a couple of
eft of all her cherished crock-
Meanwhile the men kept up their
spirits with music and dancing. "Hold
the Fort," with a strictly local applica-
tion, was a favorite chorus, and the
men invented a version of the famous
jingo song:
We don't want to fight, but, by jingo, if we do,
We've got the pluck, we've got the men and am
munition too!
We've fought the Zulu king and Sekekuni, too,
And the Boers shall never get into Fort Mary.
And they never did, though they tried
their utmost to drive out the gallant
defenders with cannon and rifles, and
what was worse, "Greek fire" shot in
metallic tubes into the thatch of the
roofs. Perhaps if the Boers could only
have summoned up courage to make
determined assault while the huts were
blazing and half the garrison occupied
in putting out the flames they might
have captured the fort. But they did
not care to meet the stubborn defend-
ers of Fort Mary hand to hand. So they
contented themselves with potting at
the gallant fellows who fearlessly ex-
posed themselves in their efforts to ex<
tinguish the fire. Those efforts were
successful, though they cost the lives
of two brave men who could ill be
spared.
But the garrison were uot content
With standing only on the defensive.
They made plucky little night sorties,
which scared the Boers considerably
and caused them some loss. Twice
Conductor Parsons of the army serv-
ice corps sallied out alone in the dark
and pitchec1 hand grenades in among
the enemy, which produced a perfect
panic among them. There were vigor-
ous sapping and mining, too, on the
part of the Royal engineers, who made
things very lively for the besiegers.
Then the water ran short—a pint a
day for each man was all that could be
spared, and this, though supplemented
with a pint bottle of ale from the
stores, was terribly short rations of
drink in the hottest month of an Afri-
can summer. Plucky Mrs. Long found
the privation of water for washing
more trying than even the thirst, and
her joy was intense when, after many
days of this privation, she discovered
a big bath sponge in its oilcloth case,
still damp. One daily wipe she and
her husband allowed themselves as a
luxury and then lockod the sponge up.
At last the rain, which for many
weary hours they had watched delug-
ing the hills around, condescended to
visit them, and then they had rather
more water than they wanted, for, the
huts being ail roofless since the fire,
there was no shelter from the pitiless
downpour. The soldiers, always eager
and anxious to protect Mrs. Long, rig-
ged up a tarpaulin screen to shield her
from the rain when sleeping, but de-
spite their care she often woke up
drenched.
The news of the disasters at Laings-
nek and Majuba Hill was, of course,
promptly communicated to them by the
enemy, accompanied by a peremptory
summons to surrender. But Lieuten
ant Long, though badly wounded him
self, lying helpless, with his faithful
wife nursing him night and day, seut
back the curt answer, "I shall hold out
to the last." And the men, looking at
that brave woman, so patient and
cheerful under her terrible load of anx
lety, set their teeth hard and swore the
Boers should never have Fort Mary
while there was a man left to handle a
rille.
"And ever on the topmost roof the
old banner of England blew." At first,
indeed, it was but a merchant ship's
ensign. How they hoisted a real union
jack I will let Mrs. Long tell in her
own words:
"Our ship's ensign .had become, what
with the wind and what with the bul-
lets, a perfect shred. Moreover, we
were anxious to hoist a real union jack.
A Geneva flag was discovered, but,
though sufficient red and white were
forthcoming to complete the crosses,
no blue was to be found. Nothing
daunted, the men came to me to in-
quire if I possessed such a thing as a
bit of dark blue for the new flag, and,
to their delight, I gave them a serge
dress of the desired color. A beautiful
union jack was very soon made and
hoisted instead of the first. Our ship's
ensign, though exchanged, was not dis-
carded, for under its tattered shred our
brave fellows were carried to their
graves."
On the 29th of March the Boers kept
up a furious cannonade and fusillade
all night. But the next morning, to the
surprise of the" garrison, a white flag
was hoisted over the enemy's lines, and
under its protection Lieutenant Baker
of the Sixtieth rifles brought them the
humiliating news that peace had been
concluded with the Boers. So the gal-
lant defenders marched out from the
riddled and battered little fort which
for S4 days they had held against ten
times their number.
Mrs. Long was so thin and pulled
down that^her friends in Lydenberg
hardly knew her. The Boers cheered
her heartily as she passed them on
her way into the town, and their com-
mander, Piet Steyne, treated her with
the utmost courtesy. Indeed such a
chivalrous gentleman was this gallant
Boer that he sentenced one of his men
to 25 lashes for shouting out during
the siege: "Come out. Mrs. Loug, and
make us some coffee. We are so cold."
At the same time he threatened double
the penalty if any further insuit were
offered to the English lady.
Lieutenant Long and his men were
publicly complimented in a general or-
E. E. WHITNEY.
Dealer in
Staple and Fancy
The
stock;
choicest always in
quality and price will
bear your inspection,
me your produce,
your trade.
Bring
I want
McCOMBl
S have a nice line of Fur-
niture, Harness and :
Saddlery, which S desire
Yo<^w?ect- J- S. McCOflB.
Albanj', Texas.
■BBl
HHH
you your
rTCM
With our til most twenty years'
• ' #/
experience in the grocery
business in your midst, we
are able
and at
feel confident that we
to supply your wants
the present time we.Yirein bel-
ter shape to serve "you than
ever before. Respectful 1 v.
] ).(). Me Rimmon & Co.
uer -ior tneir successful and heroic
defense." But I am disposed to think
that the largest share of the praise was
due to the brave woman who set them
so noble an example.-—Chambers' Jour-
nal.
Used by British Soldiers
in Africa.
Capt. C G. IVninson is well
known all over Africa as com-
mander of the forces that cap-
tured the famous rebel (xalishe.
| Under date of Nov. 4, 1897,
from Vryburg, Bechnanaland,
writes: ''Before starting on
California's Demands.
California first invented a serious
need of steamboats in the United
States and for a generation practically
monopolized them. By a poetic injus-
tice she has to this day very nearly
the worst steamboats. She invented
long distance railroading—indeed, one
may probably say the American rail-
road system. There was uot nor lias
beet) any other reason for mileages
over 3,000. California called for a rail- t
road three times as loug as the world I plaint, and had given to my
had ever seen and, getting it, gave! men, and in every case it prov-
ck the sinews to vein the east with p(| nlost beneficial." For sale
railroads—the sinews and the impetus. :T r \v \f.
It is hardly necessary to remark that j J "• * • •farming,
transcontinental railroading is a tech- 1
nic by itself, and that precisely as
j lie
the last campaign I bought a
quantify of Chamberlain's
Colic, Cholera and Diarrhoea
Remedy, which 1 used myself
I when troubled with bowel Corn-
American methods actually direct con-
tinental ones, so the long, lean, single
track, sand ballasted railroads across
our continent are still tutors to the
short, fat, perfected roadbeds of the
narrow states.—Harper's.
Some of our
that calves
blackleg.
ranchmen say
are dving-from
RAG CARPETS.—Mrs. Fan-
nie Campbell. Eolian, Texas, j
will weave them for Von. Seel
.VI. W. Biggs at Gonrad &
Rai ties'.
Win. Broyles and Mart Cau-
fipld spent Monday in Albany.
Bp*.
mmm
m
Iter
4
npd spent Monday l
Histletoe! Jlistlet^oe!!
I will take all the mistletoe
full of berries, delivered, to me
at, the depot in Albany, Texas,
between December 8th and
20th, 1900. Want large bun
dies. For further information
se»- W. L. Field, agent T. C. R.
R. J. jV|. McReynolds.
oct29 w7 pd.
±
Yi
r
!*
f
/
■
Upcoming Pages
Here’s what’s next.
Search Inside
This issue can be searched. Note: Results may vary based on the legibility of text within the document.
Tools / Downloads
Get a copy of this page or view the extracted text.
Citing and Sharing
Basic information for referencing this web page. We also provide extended guidance on usage rights, references, copying or embedding.
Reference the current page of this Newspaper.
The Albany News. (Albany, Tex.), Vol. 17, No. 28, Ed. 1 Friday, November 9, 1900, newspaper, November 9, 1900; Albany, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth413614/m1/5/?rotate=90: accessed July 16, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting The Old Jail Art Center.