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Military History – South Africa – Europe – England 19th Century
.Article – Online Historic Information | Military
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Blake, J. Y. F., A West Pointer with the Boers (Boston, Angel Guardian Press, 1903); Hall, Darrell,
ed. Fransjohan Pretorius and Gilbert Torlage, The Hall Handbook of the Anglo-Boer War
1899–1902 (Pietermaritzburg, University of Natal Press, 1999); McCracken, Donal,
MacBride’s Brigade: Irish Commandos in the Anglo-Boer War (Dublin, Four Courts Press,
1999).
Blockhouses
Fortifications built by the British to defend lines of supply and to create barriers to the free movement
of Boer commandos. They were usually about 1,000 yards (910m) apart and, by the end of the war,
their lines stretched over some 3,700 miles (6,000km). The 8,000 or so blockhouses were manned by
approximately 50,000 British and 16,000 black African troops.
The first blockhouses were built in March 1900 to protect the railways and, in particular, the
bridges, as the Boers had initiated a programme of destroying the tracks and blowing up the bridges.
This resulted in actions such as Roodewal, when Christiaan De Wet made off with substantial
supplies stockpiled because of a blown bridge. At first substantial towers were constructed, some 35
feet (10.6m) high and suited to a garrison of two dozen men. They were expensive and took a long
time to build, so a more modest, rectangular, one-storey blockhouse was made with a stone wall
topped with a double-skinned corrugated iron upperwork, with rubble in-filling between the two
layers of iron. Even these took too long to make and, when Lord Kitchener became Commander-inChief and wanted to speed up the programme, he asked Major Spring R. Rice, Officer Commanding
23 Field Company, Royal Engineers to find a solution.
The “Rice” blockhouse was actually one of two designs the engineer produced. It was circular
in plan with a corrugated iron double skin on an earth-filled caisson, the whole set on a mound or
surrounded with sandbags and topped off with a broad roof. It was quick to build; the record time
was three hours and it rarely took more than a day. It was surrounded with a barbed wire enclosure
and a barbed wire fence ran between each of the blockhouses. A non-commissioned officer and six
men formed the garrison and patrols, often of black Africans, kept nightly watch on the intervals
between the blockhouses. Major Rice also designed an octagonal structure and men in the field
conjured up their own designs as well.
Railway stations were also fortified by reinforcing the original buildings and adding
blockhouses. Attention was paid to planning lines of fire and vision and to clearing scrub that could
provide an attacker with cover.
As protection for the lines of supply, these structures were of undoubted use. To catch Boers,
however, more was needed and “sweeps” or “drives” were undertaken to trap the commandos
between the fixed lines and the British troops. The Boer commander Christiaan De Wet was
contemptuous of the system. He pointed out that, on 27 February 1902, the British captured a great
number of Boers and cattle by surrounding them
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