Guerrilla Warfare: The Second Phase

Abstract

Although the Syferfontein war plan had failed, the Boers nevertheless still intended to implement it one way or another. After March 1901 there was, however, no opportunity to do so and the Boers had to concentrate on small-scale guerrilla warfare. In May 1901 de Wet wrote to Commandant Kritzinger, who was still in the Cape Colony: ‘Here, [as] in [the] Transvaal skirmishes still regularly occur, although no large battles. Nevertheless the losses of the enemy continue much as earlier. Railways are being destroyed more than ever, as are trains being derailed’.¹