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Show I history of the j Late Boer War i 1 z : if I What Davitt Says of the Irish Brigades Boer Warriors j Legislating Oon Paul's Great Speech. f 7 j That the Doers, in their struggle for I liberty had the sympathy of many I Americans who still cherish f.?dom . I and independence is evident from the 7 f lact that a regiment of American vol- 1 unteers, commanded by John Franklin ?lake. an ex-West Point graduate and I iillicer, who won honors in the Sixth j United States cavalry regiment in Ari- j r.ona. After resigning from the I'nit- 1 (l States army he resided in Michigan 1 1 for a few years. The mining excite- I f ment at Uho lesia attracted his atten- ' j tion. and he went there to make his ! j fortune. The whole country taken I J from the Maccabees had been boomed as fabulously rich in silver, lead and I I other minerals. Rlake traveled over 1 I the entire country, studied its re- j I sources, and. finding the alleged mines ! j to be a mere bubble in flated by Cecil I ' Rhodes' agencies, he was not slow in i I exposing the fraud, both in the Amer- j j lean and London papers. ! Colonel Blake arrived in Johannes- burg before the Jameson raid. His ex- I -j-osure of the chartered company's I barren territory had preceded him in 1 Johannesburg and given him promi- . f nence. After the movement north J I from Bloemfontein was ordered by i General Roberts, the Irish brigade was ordered from Natal to Brandfort j 1 by General Botha, and, under com- ? mand of Blake, they took part in the , lighting that took place in the retreat I to Pretoria. Between Pretoria and I Dalmanutha, General Botha's army j -was recruited by Irishmen who materially ma-terially assisted the burghers in keeping keep-ing back the British forces along the Delagoa bay railroad. In his history, Michael Davitt says: ' "After the prolonged battle of Dal-manutha Dal-manutha the brigade disbanded, the 1 majority returninj.to America. Blake, ' however, remained behind, resolved to j see the conflict through to tjie end. He I has been engaged during the recent ! and pi'esent campaign r.f guerrilla war-I war-I - rare in work which appeals to his love I of daring adventure and contempt for I climatic difficulties, and the cheery, op- 1 timistic. warm-hearted cx-frontiers- I man will be found to be on of the ia-st j nun to lay down hi.-, arms against t Kngland while a shot can be fired or a I deed can be done in legitimate warfare against fie enemy of Transvaal and of Irish independence." The writer tclis that the work done In South Africa was not confined to - f Colonel Blake's brigade. In an inter- , view with President Steyn. Davitt wa-: I assured .that Irishmen were loyal tc j the federal cause. I "Theie were many more men of Irish Mood scattered through the Transvaal I and Free State commandos than were 1 included in Blake's corps. I have I found Irish names in the records of i almost all the engagements fought f over the wide field of the two Republics. Repub-lics. Pres':'ent Steyn told me that all the s and Irishmen of the Free Si-atv -ere loyally with the j federal ; if. from the beginning, i and 1 cm '..ctefore encouraged in. the 1 belief thai the number of my fellow- t countrymen who honored our race in i offering to shed their Wood for the ji freedom of two little Protestant lepuhlics is larser than the numerical I ; strength of Blake's and Lynch's bri- l gades would indicate." j Australia, which, from the beginning ft .i(.P,i its svmnathv with the mother I country, should be credited with the V noble work done by one of its native -1 fons Arthur Lynch. For the promi- ;r nent' part taken by him in the Boer j Avar he is now under arrest and await-f await-f I insr his trial in Ixndon for high trea-I trea-I I run. "What Davitt says of him: i .. pevond brigade was Tormed ,in f f January. 1000. by a few of Blake's f corps, in conjunction with Mr. Arthur Lynch, an Irish-Australian, who had I pone to the Transvaal as a war corre- I I spondent for Le Journal, of Paris, ff Like Colonel Maximoff and several f J American journalists. Mr. Lynch war j captivated by the heroic character of i I th Boer struggle against such cruel 1 odds, and he threw away the pen for a I I Mauser rifle. A few officers . of E ! Blake' corps were desirous of creating . f ! another Irish brigade, with, doubtless, f f the laudable ambition or increasing the number of bodies with Irish names I! in .so pood a cause, and Mr. Lynch J Was induced to join the enterprise. He t -,Vas elected to the post of colonel, and j being an able linguist, speaking 1 French and German with fluency, he 1 succeeded in inlisting about KiO V "Irishmen" from several European , nationalities, not hitherto reckoned as i subordinate members of the Celtic !1 racial familv. Colonel Lynch soon cirned such a reputation for capacity I and for looking carefully after the 1 comforts of his men that numbers of volunteers from other commandoes I -nere induced to join the second "Iiih" brigPde, which in this way became be-came at on- time as strong numerl- cally as thut organized by Major Mc- Bride. , , Colonel L"-nch is a younf man aged about 3.. t ill. handsome and accom-1 accom-1 nlished. He is a graduate of the Mel- bourn- university, and is in every sense phvslcally and intellectually, a j worthv representative of the Austra- h lian-born sons of Ireland. He proved himself to be an able commander, and onjoved the confidence of General I Botha, who spoke of him to me as I "one of the very best of my office. I Th0 parl xvbich the Second' Irish bng- i ade -played in the campaign is. I be- 1 lic-vo. to be toll by Colonel Lynch in a narrative of the war as he witnessed H lx)th as a war correspondent and Sas an officer, and I must therefore 'ave to his better informed knowledge the task of recording the full story of the .! w eorps which he commanded. THE BRIGADE MADE UP OF ALL NATIONALITIES.' The historian, after telling who Colonel Col-onel Lynch's chief officers were , next d.-s. ribes the component pai ts of tne brigade, and tells of his impression 1 I from a personal visit to their laager in May, 1S00. . j Colonel Lynch's chief officers were Major Mitchel, a Oahvay man. and Captain Oates of Kerry, whose fine boy, Tom. was killed at Modderspruit. In subordinate posts' this uniepje brigade brig-ade had representatives, of every European Eu-ropean ' country, with one or two Americans, completing the most thoroughly thor-oughly cosmopolitan body which was ever commanded by an Irish or any other officer. There was Ireland, America, Amer-ica, Australia, the Transvaal. Free State. Cape Colony. France, Germany. Holland. Italy, Austria, Russia. Greece and Bulgaria represented in this Second Sec-ond "Irish" x?orps, which, to complete its unprecedented representativeness, embraced a solitary Englishman, who fought for right and justice against his own country's forces. I visited Colonel Lynch's laager while in Natal early in May, 1300, and can bear testimony testi-mony to the true soldierly manner in which his well equipped camp was organized, or-ganized, and to his popularity as an officer among his continental and universal uni-versal "Irishmen." PEN PICTURE OF THE BOERS LEGISLATING. In the midst of battle the Boers found spare moments to meet and drscuss important im-portant questions and legislate for, the well being of the republic. Michael Mich-ael Davitt. describes the legislative hall as follows: "The scene in the Volksraad depicts strikingly the contrast between the Boer leaders on the field and assembled in legislative session. " 'Tiers of chairs were placed for visitors visi-tors on the floor, beyond to the" right and left of the 'Raadsleden,' and these were soon occupied by foreigners foreign-ers and others who were wishful to witness what looked likely to be the closing scene in the legislative life of the Transvaal parliament. " "It , was to me. a scene as pathetic as it was. in many respects, surprising. I fully expected seeing the members, almost, all of whom had been in the field for months, coming to'their legislative legis-lative duties with bandoliers and Mausers, Mau-sers, as if only on a burred leave from the. lines in front of Roberts' moving 'olumns, with a soldier's eagerness to get through with the needed speeches and resolutions so as to lose no time in returning to their commandoes again. But the Boers are in every thing a people apart, with their own methods and manners; whether in warfare or in law making. The members mem-bers assembled, all in a uniform black dress, including frock coats, tall hats, and' white ties. This was. it appears, the regulation costume prescribed by the sartorial rules of the assembly, and each conformed to the ordinary obligation of this rule oij this momentous momen-tous occasion. as if no war was being waged any nearer to the threatened capital of the South African republic than the Philippine islands. "The dress to me was painfully suggestive sug-gestive of a funeral ceremony over the body of what would soon be a slain republic." The members 'who were present are graphically described, also those who were former members of the Volksraad. but were either killed in battle or taken prisoners, and transported trans-ported ' from the Transvaal. . Special mcntlnn ie innrto nf T.Ollis Rotha and Jacob, "who had gone to the front seven months before from their parliamentary par-liamentary duties in the 'same chamber." cham-ber." These two members were fighting fight-ing for their independence at the time their brother members were considering consider-ing their country's future. OOM PAUL ENTERS. "Whilst the members were seated and discussing with foreign representatives what was the best policy to be adopted, Paul Kruger enters the council chamber. cham-ber. "What Michael Davitt says of him: ... "In the midst of these distributions of mutual praise. President Kruger enters from behind , the speaker's chair, and immediately all the members mem-bers and spectators rose as a mark of respect until the chief executive took his seat. Paul Kruger is not in any physical sense an impressive-looking man. He is massive in build, keenly ot-'ervant of everybody and everything every-thing around him, and naturally attracts attention through the rank he holds, but especially from the fact that he is one man in this generation who threw down the gage of battle to-the British empire. You cannot well picture pic-ture the man out of his fame, or you would regard him as a common-place individual, of rough exterior and markedly unpolished manners., who might pass for anybody in particular, from a prosperous farmer to a successful success-ful city merchant. But when you know that the man before you Is Paul Kruger that he has been through life the watchful and valiant defender of Boer liberties, and that he has within the previous few months startled the whole civilized world by his work, vou are compelled to beat back the prejudices of your eyes and do horn-, age instead to the man whose acts have made him great, as he rises in the assembly to which, in orattans language, lan-guage, he stood as oue . who had watched at its cradle and might mourn at its grav?. . , , "A silence as of a churchyard fell upon the whole assembly, and again the suggestion of a funeral service was forced upon the mind with the wreaths on the vacant chairs the dark costumes of the members, and the Jon prayer in which the proceedings had been previously opened. The raucous voice of the speaker sounded like the valedictory address of a minister committing com-mitting a body to the custody of a grave, and the suggestion was irresistibly irre-sistibly conveyed Uiat the president of the Transvaal was performing the burial service upon his oo JP; Soon, however, this n,Ja.r was dispelled. The president s voice at became clearer and the words more coherent: the address ringing out in a mingled strain of invective and do- ' fiance. It was the 'first time I had! heard him speak. His deficiency in in- i tellectual culture, his reputed ignor- j ancc, and all the other English kindly testimonies to his want of Anglo-Saxon I excellence, while read with some de- j gree of skepticism, invited doubt as I to Oom Paul's git's of eloquent deliv- j crance. He is. however, a natural orator: rugged in speech, la (.king in measured phrase and in logical balance: bal-ance: but passionate and eonvim-ing in the unaffected pleading of his earnestness earnest-ness which is joined to a happy command com-mand of the Boer tongue in all its native na-tive power of persuasive expression. The a-.-tion of the hands during the .delivery of the short presidental ad dress was in no way wanting in elocutionary elocu-tionary gesture, embracing as it did all the well known movements of finished platform sneaking. There were a few notes in the left hand, but. they were not once referred to. The speaker soon lost himself in the warmth of his subject, and he held his audience spellbound until his final sentence was spoken with its defiant ring and meaning. mean-ing. "I am standing alone! Joubert is dead. Koch is dead, AVolmarans is dead. I stand alone. But God is with us. Shall we lose courage? Never! Never! Never!" and at each utterance utter-ance of this word' the massive hand descended on the desk and made the chamber resound with the emphasis of the blow. It was in every word, j sentiment and action the speech of Paul Kruger." Noble, patriotic words from the president of a dying but not crushed republic. His memory will be ever held dear by all who love liberty. As an exile his only dream is to instill into the minds of the Dutch who fought for home and freedom that some spirit that animated those who laid down their lives during the war. His means are to be devoted to the perpetuation of the mother tongue, which is not to i be interefered with, according to the peace terms. With an assurance that his former subjectswill still speak the old Dutch, Paul Kruger, confiding in Providence and resigned to his present pres-ent late, will die peaceably in the hope that his country will in time be free and take its place among the nations of the earth. |