SECTION IV. The Last Phase

THE LAST PHASE

On the 19th of June Brigadier-General Brits, of the Northern Army, occupied Omaruru, on the Karibib-Grootfontein line. The enemy had retreated.

Nearly five weeks had passed since the Commander-in-Chief had officially proclaimed the capital. During this time much had happened. An abortive conference had taken place at Omaruru itself, the Germans, we were informed afterwards, asking for terms that we were in no mind to give them. The railway line between Swakopmund and Karibib, broken up by dynamited bridges, had been to a great extent repaired. The poorly rationed troops were now replenished. The horses, badly knocked up after the rush through to Windhuk, had had opportunity to mend a bit. General Botha had proclaimed the country; with refreshed troops and horses, he was setting out to attempt to spring a final surprise on the Germans. He had now the Aviation Corps in full working order--had aerial eyes wherewith to be guided through a subtropical bush country very full of possible dangers. He had ahead of him an enemy astonished, yet, if what was rumoured was true, prepared to make a series of fights and a big stand in country of his own choice. He had with him an army that had crossed a desert and, arriving in bush country such as you find in the Rhodesia "low" veld, knew the nature of it as only the South African can.

On June 24 Headquarters ran into Kalkfeld just after midnight. The enemy had retreated. It had been predicted with the utmost confidence that the Germans would here put up a fight. So confidently was this expected that the Commander-in-Chief would hardly believe it when the aeroplanes returned and reported that there were about half a dozen Germans left in the place. Yet that proved to be exactly the fact, and so greatly impressed was General Botha with the accuracy of the observations on this occasion that he emphasised that the skymen were to receive every possible assistance for the future.

On June 26 Headquarters arrived at Okanjande, and pushed through to Otjiwarongo, arriving there at 12 noon. The pace of the trekking was now becoming phenomenal, and though the country was quite good, water was as scarce as ever, the bush being intensely dense, with thick sweet grass as much as eight feet high in places. It was a country made for ambushes. In less than a week General Botha had trekked over one hundred and twenty miles, the distance from Karibib to Otjiwarongo. During this trek the army had had water only twice on the stretch from Omaruru. But delay of any kind was now highly undesirable: the columns could not afford to pause long owing to the consumption of rations. It was no part of the Commander-in-Chief's policy to make bases and await the arrival of large supplies; water was uncertain, and congestion of columns at the watering places had to be avoided as much as possible.

Near Okanjande the first great development in General Botha's final strategy occurred. The northern advance was being conducted as follows. Brigadier-General Brits, on the left, remained at Otjitasu, leaving it on June 30. General Botha, with his command, in the centre, was holding to the narrow gauge Karibib-Otavi-Tsumeb-Grootfontein Railway, and General Myburgh's column to the right. Brigadier-General Brits now branched away to Otjitasu, making for Outjo, Okanknejo, and across the Etoscha Pan to Namutoni. The other columns moved on, trekking night and day, as in the great advance across the Namib Desert.

Headquarters made Okaputa on June 29; paused the next day, and on July 1 the Staff, leaving Okaputa at 8 o'clock in the morning, reached Otavi and Otaviafontein at 4.30 p.m., close on the heels of an engagement at Osib between the Germans and Brigadier-General Manie Botha, who had pushed on with the Orange Free State Brigade at 6.30 the previous evening, June 30. This engagement took place in the now intensely thick bush country. In defeating the enemy, at a cost of a dozen casualties, Brigadier-General Manie Botha succeeded in securing the finest water supply the Union Forces had yet seen, and so swift and resolute was the fighting of the burghers that the enemy fled to their last strong-hold northward towards Tsumeb. Before striking the enemy in this action the Free State Brigade, and their accompanying batteries from the 2nd South African Mounted Riflemen, had trekked forty-two miles in sixteen hours without halt for any kind of a rest. Behind them, in support, came the force, consisting of the 6th Mounted Brigade, with the 1st South African Mounted Riflemen Batteries, who did a similar trek, through thickest bush, covering almost fifty miles in twenty hours. And the animals had come through from Karibib--almost two and a half degrees of latitude south.

At the same time as Brigadier-General Manie Botha had left Okaputa, Brigadier-General Lukin, with the 6th Mounted S.A.M.R. Brigade, had left Omarasa. We had therefore a perfect network of highly mobile forces advancing on the German position somewhere north. Away on the right, from Windhuk and Okahandja through the Waterberg, was Brigadier-General Albert's column. On his left was Brigadier-General Myburgh. Nearer the railway was Brigadier-General Manie Botha. Next came the Commander-in-Chief with Headquarters Staff and Bodyguard; and, further, General Lukin. For the time being Brigadier-General Brits, on the extreme left, had disappeared.

Brigadier-General Manie Botha now advanced right into the bush, supported by Brigadier-General Lukin, who occupied Eisenberg Nek, on the right flank. Brigadier-General Myburgh, trekking by forced marches, in the course of his flanking movement on the right cut the line between Otavi and Grootfontein, and, swerving north, encountered the enemy at Asis and Gaub. This column, having captured seventy Germans, marched straight on to Tsumeb, the extreme northerly limit of the railway, forty miles north of Otavi. Here the enemy was attacked so resolutely that they surrendered with all arms and four field guns, and the Union prisoners of war were released. And great was their rejoicing, too. Other columns marching north had now reached Rietfontein and Grootfontein.

It so arose now that General Myburgh, having got for a brief space out of touch with the Commander-in-Chief, was not aware that the Germans had opened, on July 5, negotiations with General Botha. General Myburgh was at once communicated with. As a fact, at the time he entered Tsumeb, a conference was on hand farther south.

Why did the German forces in the Protectorate surrender without making the big stand they threatened? If any proof be needed that they did intend to make a stand it is necessary only to glance at the plan of their final dispositions. And that is just where General Botha and his forces had done their work. There is not the least doubt, not the very least, that von Franke might have made a stand. It would have been nothing more than a quixotically honourable waste of life ending in one only possible way.

He was surrounded before he knew it.

So neat and swift had been the scheme prepared by the Commander-in-Chief that the German was incredulous--until his scouts kept coming in and telling him what the real state of affairs was. For Brits, after a two hundred mile detour through the wildest country had swept right north to Namutoni on the Great Etoscha Pan, had released more prisoners and was swerving further out. Myburgh was in Tsumeb. Both these generals were behind the Germans, ready to strike out forthwith; and von Franke was cut off from all his supplies. He had simply been caught--caught by remorseless forced marches and strategy as neat as a trivet--in a great fork with bent prongs. On the sketches in this little book, to which I have sacrificed everything possible for clearness, the general simple scheme of the campaign may be apparent. The final position on July 5 was something like the diagram on page 61 .

Even guerilla warfare is an unattainable luxury when you are surrounded.

At kilometre 500 on the line between Otavi and Korab, at 2 a.m. on the 9th of July 1915, von Franke, the German Commander, and Dr. Seitz, the Imperial Governor of South-West Africa, discreetly surrendered to Louis Botha, Commander-in-Chief and Prime Minister of the Union of South Africa.

APPENDIX

THE TERMS OF SURRENDER

PRETORIA, July 10.

The terms of surrender of the military forces of the Protectorate of German South-West Africa, as agreed to by the Government of the Union of South Africa, and accepted by his Excellency Dr. Seitz, the Imperial Governor of the Protectorate of German South-West Africa, the commander of the military forces, which was signed on the 9th of July, 1915, are that--

(1) The military forces of the Protectorate of German South-West Africa (hereinafter referred to as the Protectorate) remaining in the field under arms and at the disposal and the command of the commander of the said Protectorate forces, are hereby surrendered to General the Right Hon. Louis Botha, Commander-in-Chief of the Forces of the Union of South Africa in the field. Brigadier-General H. T. Lukin, C.M.G., D.S.O., acting on behalf of General Botha, shall be the officer in charge with arranging details of the surrender and giving effect to it.

(2) The active troops of the said forces of the said Protectorate surrendered in terms of paragraph (1) shall, in the case of officers, retain their arms and may give parole, being allowed to live each under that parole at such places as he may select. If for any reason the Government of the Union is unable to meet the wish of any officer as regards choice of abode, the officer concerned will choose some place in respect of which no difficulty exists. In the case of other ranks of the active troops of the said forces of the Protectorate, such other ranks shall be interned under proper guard at such place in the Protectorate as the Union Government shall decide upon.

(3) Each non-commissioned officer and man of the ranks last referred to shall be allowed to retain their rifles, but no ammunition. One officer shall be permitted to be interned with the other ranks of artillery, and one with the other ranks of the remainder of the active troops, and one with the other ranks of the police.

(4) All reservists (Landwehr) of all ranks of the said forces of the Protectorate now remaining under arms in the field shall, except to the extent as is provided for in paragraph (6) below, give up their arms upon being surrendered, in such formations as may be found most convenient, and after signing the annexed form of parole shall be allowed to return to their homes and resume civil occupation.

(5) All reservists (Landwehr and Landsturm) of all ranks of the said forces of the Protectorate who are now held by the Union Government as prisoners of war taken from the forces of the Protectorate, upon signing the form of parole above mentioned in paragraph (4), shall be allowed to resume civil occupation in the Protectorate.

(6) Officers of the Reserve (Landwehr and Landsturm) of the said forces of the Protectorate who surrender in terms of paragraph (1) above shall be allowed to retain their arms, provided they sign the parole above mentioned in paragraph (4).

(7) All the officers of the said forces of the Protectorate who sign the form of parole above mentioned in paragraph (4) shall be allowed to retain their horses, which are nominally allotted to them in the military establishment.

(8) The Police of the Protectorate shall be treated, as far as have been mobilised, as active troops. Those members of the Police who are on duty on distant stations shall remain at their posts until relieved by the Union troops, in order that the lives and property of non-combatants may be protected.

(9) Civil officials in the employment of the German Government of the Protectorate shall be allowed to remain in their homes provided they sign the parole above mentioned in paragraph (4). Nothing, however, in this statement to be construed as entitling any such official to exercise the functions of the appointment which he holds in the service of either of the Governments aforesaid, or to claim from the Union Government the emoluments of such appointment.

(10)With the exception of the arms retained by the officers of the Protectorate forces and by other ranks of the active troops, as provided in paragraph (2), all war material (including all field guns, mountain guns, small arms and guns, and small arm ammunition), and the whole of the property of the Government of the Protectorate, shall be placed at the disposal of the Union Government.

(11) His Excellency the Imperial Governor shall appoint a civil official of the Protectorate Service who shall hand over and keep a record of all Government property of the Civil Departments, including records which are handed over to the Union Government in terms of paragraph (10), and the Commander of the said forces of the Protectorate shall appoint military officers, who shall hand over and keep a similar record of all Government Property of the Military Department of the Protectorate.

Given under our hand this 19th day of July 1915.

(Signed) Louis BOTHA,

General Commanding-in-Chief of the Union Forces in the Field.

SEITZ,

Imperial Governor of German South-West Africa.

FRANKE,

Lieut.-Colonel, Commander of the Protectorate Forces of German South-West Africa.

The form of parole, shown as an annexure, begins--

"I, the undersigned, hereby place myself on my honour not to re-engage in hostilities in the present war between Great Britain and Germany."

TOTAL UNION CASUALTIES.

The official report shows that the total casualties of the operations in South-West Africa in connection with the Union Forces are approximately as follows--

Killed in action 88 Died of wounds 25 Wounded in action 263 Wounded and taken prisoners 48 Unwounded prisoners in hands of enemy 612 Total 1,036

Died of disease 97 Died through accidents and by mis-adventure 56 Total 153

TOTAL ENEMY SURRENDERS

Immediately after the capitulation of the enemy, Brigadier-General Lukin reported that he had satisfactorily completed the work of accepting surrenders. The total number of surrenders amounted to 4,410, made up as follows--

Officers of the Active Troops and Police 110 Officers of the Reserve 177 Rank and File of Active Troops and Police 1,548 Rank and File of Reserve 2,575

The Union Forces when at greatest strength numbered 50,000 men.

The Germans when at full strength numbered 9,000, but a proportion of these consisted of civilians, who eventually refused to serve.

AMENDMENT

In an official communiqué issued at the end of July, figures were given of the total number of the enemy included in the general surrender. The total then given was 4,410, and included the surrender of the main body at Korab, and also troops captured by Brigadier-General Myburgh at Tsumeb on July 6, the surrenders at Grootfontein, Otavifontein, Otavi and Tsumeb, and those who surrendered at Otjiwarongo.

The additional numbers captured or surrendered at various points since General Botha made his advance northwards after occupation of Windhuk are--

To Brigadier-General Myburgh's force, mostly at Gaub 105

To Brigadier-General Manie Botha's force between Okaputa and Otavifontein 50

To Brigadier-General Lukin's force 12

To Brigadier-General Brits' force, mostly at Namutoni 163

Total 330

Thus the total number of prisoners taken during the last stage of the campaign, viz. from June 18 to July 9, was 4,740.