Note Back to Main Text — Chapter XXV

Owing to the efforts of the Quartermaster-General's department of the War Office, a steady stream of supplies had, since the beginning of the war, been poured into the country, and had removed all anxiety as to the possibility of food or forage running short at the coast. The difficulty was the transmission of these up country simultaneously with the troops and their equipment. Arrangements were made by the railway staff which enabled sufficient quantities to be forwarded from the sea bases and to be accumulated at Orange River, De Aar, and at depôts between the Orange and Modder rivers. For the forward move into the Orange Free State two days' supplies were to be carried by the men and two days' in the mule-transport allotted to brigades; the brigade supplies were to be filled up from convoys moving in rear of the troops, and for this purpose some five hundred ox-wagons, carrying ten days' rations and forage, were assembled.[303]