GENERAL CARRINGTON CRITICISED ADVERSELY.

Greymouth Evening Star, Volume XXXI, 18 April 1901, Page 4

GENERAL CARRINGTON CRITICISED ADVERSELY.

The ' Rhodesian Times' gives a full account of the failure to relieve the Elands Elver garrison and tho subsequent cvacuatio of Zeerust by General Carrington as told by several of the men serving in the lihodesian Regiment. They all reflect severely upon the action of the general. The ' Rhodesian Times, ' referring to these statements, says:—" The particular events narrated in the following columns are the gallant defence of Elands River by some 400 Rhodesians and Australians on August 3 and succeeding days, together with the lamentable failure of General Carrington to relieve the post, and the shameful evacuation of Zeerust, with the consequent breach of faith to surrendered neutrals and to British loyalists. The whole story has never been fully told before, and in order that free and fair statements might bo obtained each of tho four who have contributed a statement has been interviewed separately and had no ids a that anyone else had been consulted. There are therefore four independent accounts, each man telling all he could and believing he was telling the whole story. Mere heresay statements have been eliminated as not being evidence, otherwise tho accounts aro in the narrators' own language. Yet ihe stories are practically identical, and it seems to be a fact that a British general, with a complete, well-equipped force of 1,200 men, suffered himself to bo driven backward, fled in such haste that he never knew how weak his enemy was, and then evacuated a fortified defensible position thirty-six hours before the first small body of tho enemy appeared. It is a piiiful tale; shameful and disgraceful. It has caused tho shedding of an infinite amount of blood, and prolonged misery to thousands, both of British and Boor families, by encouraging tho Boers in their futile resistance. Tno o )ly relief in tho story so far as this country is concerned is tho gallantry of the Rhodesians, who, under Captain "Sandy" Butters declined to surrender, and with the cry "Bhodesians never surrender," held tho advanced post at Elands River, and made the defence of tho whole camp possible, until Kitchener's welcome relief came." [Sir F. Carrington has left South Africa for England.—Ed.]