Jump to content
 

South African Railways at the time of the Boer War


Tim Lewis
 Share

Recommended Posts

Bit of a long shot, but who knows........

 

A friend of mine is very interested in the Boer War and has researched various aspects of it over the years.  He is currently trying to find railway timetables from just before the outbreak of the war (11 October 1899 apparently).  He believes that the railways essentially "stopped" at the outbreak of war (presumably he means as a public service, as I would imagine that they were put to military use during the war?), but that mail trains may have got through to Cape Town and Pretoria for another couple of days.  He has tried Googling but without success (I don't have the details, but he says that several of the websites listed were now inactive) and has tried a couple of contacts in South Africa, but with no joy there either.  I have tried a quick Google myself: I managed to find a timetable from 1882, but nothing else, but I don't really know where I should be looking.

 

Does anyone on here have any information on this, or could suggest websites or other potential sources of information?

 

Like I say, it's a bit of a long shot, but I never cease to be amazed by the collective knowledge on RMWeb!

 

Hopefully I'll hear back from someone!

 

Cheers for now.

Link to post
Share on other sites

A fascinating subject.  I don’t know about timetables, but the railways were certainly of strategic importance during the war.  The British built blockhouses (some of which survive) to protect the railway lines in their areas of control, and used trains to move their troops around the country.

 

South Africa didn’t become a “Union” until later (1910).  At the outbreak of war, the railways of the Transvaal (Boer republic) belonged to a separate entity (ZASM) but (along with the OVGS in the Orange Free State) were absorbed  into the Imperial Military Railways as war progressed.

 

Winston Churchill’s capture and escape are well-known from his autobiography, but includes an ambush on an armoured train, and stowing away on an eastbound coal train after getting away from imprisonment near Pretoria (or North Wales, according to the film “Young Winston”).

 

Most of the reference material I’m aware of is geared towards locomotives and their development.  There are South African railway interest groups on IO Groups, whose membership includes some of the leading historians (or used to, they may be no longer with us).

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

Interesting topic indeed. I have no timetables, I'm afraid. 

 

I attach an article entitled "The state of the Railways in South Africa during the Anglo-Boer War 1899-1902".  I assume your friend will know it, but for anyone else it provides an interesting (though possibly biased?) introduction.

 

From what it says about the military damage, I do wonder whether passenger operations would have been possible.

 

1595753148_143746-ArticleText-381526-1-10-20160912.pdf

  • Like 1
  • Informative/Useful 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

I can't help with timetables or specifics, but the author Martin Meredith has written extensively on this era, I recall snippets about goods and materiel in the text so there may be links to sources in the bibliographies.

 

Not sure about your friend's contacts in RSA, but would suggest looking at some of the South African model railways groups and model shops. A short list http://www.northstarrailway.com/model-railway-clubs/ albeit some of the links are dead, but you/your friend may  find the successors on Facebook. I have also been to https://modeltrainshop.co.za/ where the owner may have some knowledge.

 

Good luck: I have the pleasure of living a little further north in the region, and can fully appreciate the difference made by having access to rails and steam engines rather than relying on horse and oxen.

 

 

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

https://www.sahistory.org.za/francofrescura/postal-history-colonial-post-diary.htm  includes this: 1899, October 12: Outbreak of hostilities on the Cape’s northern borders. An Army Post Office was established on the third floor of the GPO building in Cape Town, under the management of the Cape’s PMG, Somerset French.

The paper also says this: 1899, November 24: Delivery of mails suspended between the Cape and the Boer republics of the ZAR and the Orange Free State.  It looks as if post continued for a month or so.

 

https://repository.up.ac.za/bitstream/handle/2263/26503/03chapter7-9.pdf?sequence=4&isAllowed=y  might also be worth looking at:  it includes a brief history of the Cape Government Railways and the formation in 1900 of the Imperial Military Railways:  it's possible that there are records referring to the outbreak of hostilities in its archiives - if they exist!

 

Kit PW

Edited by kitpw
spelling again!
  • Informative/Useful 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • 1 month later...

Thanks to all those who replied.  Apologies for the delay in responding - I've been distracted by other things (including going on holiday!).

 

I'll pass the information on to Alan (my friend), hopefully it will be useful for him.

 

Thanks again.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

Now, this won't be much use - but for what it's worth - relatives of mine were living there then, as a great-great something of mine was a railway engineer involved in building railways. Read on...

 

Many of the lines which later became part of the SAR weren't built, so research is needed in relation to the opening date of any you have in mind. There is an EXCELLENT website called "Soul of a Railway", all about the SAR - I would class it as a definitive overall history, but with much personal input from the several guys who collaborated in putting it together.

 

These men are now very elderly - but the thing to remember is that if you were looking at any European railway, those who recall lines newly built or under construction are long since pushing the daisies up. Many South African lines were only opened in the 1910-30 period, and were steam to the end in the 1990s, so the experiences of these writers is gold dust.

 

So, back to MY relative. All I know is this; they moved about continually, following the construction wherever it was. And WITHIN that scenario, while that war was in progress, all I can say is that they confirmed that massive disruption took place, at one stage involving my relative having to supervise the reconstruction of a bridge somewhere in the south. At this stage, one might read a number of reasons into this, but it tends to amplify any theory about disruption, thus it seems reasonable to assume that services did not just continue as normal on at least SOME lines.

 

Hope that helps; but look up that website. Among many, many photos invaluable to modellers and general interest in South African Railways, where each (and every!) line is dealt with, opening dates are given, so that you can at least establish whether a particular line even existed at the time of the war. Many didn't.

Link to post
Share on other sites

  • RMweb Gold

Some interesting sidelights into the railways in the Boer War can be found in this pdf, including the less successful aspects of the armoured trains and the interruption to mail services. There seems to be a fair amount of information on the armoured trains and this often covers wider railway matters.

https://www.rpsl.org.uk/rpsl/Displays/Handouts/DISP_20201015_002.pdf

  • Informative/Useful 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...

Apologies for the delay in posting this.

 

My friend Alan has asked me to thank all of you who kindly contributed to this thread.  He still hasn't managed to find exactly what he was looking for, but has a few new leads to follow up.

 

Thanks again.

  • Like 1
Link to post
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...