The Transvaal.

Manawatu Herald, 4 August 1900, Page 2

The Transvaal.

HUNTER'S GREAT CAPTURE,

Further and more detailed accounts have come to hand of General Prinsloo's surrender near Fouriesburg.

It appears that Prinsloo, Commandant Villiers and Crowther and gS6 men, chiefly belonging to Ficksbnrg and Ladybrand commandoes, with 1482 horses, 945 rifles, a Krupp nine-pounder and fifty waggons, were captured. Sir Archibald Hunter says that the scene recalled to those who were at Paardeburg the surrender of Cronje's laager.

The Boers liden with blankets and c.unp utensils, rode sullenly between two long lines of troops and threw down their rifles.

They were then placed under guards in their laagers. They declared that they would never have surrendered but for being surrounded.

Prior to the surrender some of the leaders were recalcitrant, and claimed to act independently of General Prinsloo. but Lord Roberts ordered a resumption of hostilities, and warned the leader that he would be personally responsible lor the delivery of every gun. Some of the Boers at Naauwpoort Nek surrendered to Major-General Hector Macdonald. The Harrismith and Vrede commandoes are still uncaptured. Large numbers escaped out of the Coledon Valley at night. BADEN-POWELL STILL BESET. Lieutenant-General Baden- Powell's force is still besieged at Rustenburg. Lord Kitchener has gone to Krugersdorp forty-five miles to the southward, in order to organise measures I for the relief. Lieutenant-General lan Hamilton's division, which had been engaged in the operations to the eastward against P.ot-ria, has marched back throup'Pretoria, it is supposed toward.} Kustenburg. FIGHTING ON THE RAILWAY. An engagement took place on Saturday near Heidelberg, on the Natal- Pretoria railway, between 250 of Lieutenant-General Clery's infantry and a strong Boer commando. The enemy were repulsed ten of their number being killed and twelve wounded. ' BOER MOVEMENTS IN THE WEST. Boers who lately surrendered at Rustenburg — the town where Lieut.General Baden-Powell's force is besieged, sixty miles west of Pretoria — are rejoining their commandoes, who are now threatening Zeerust forty miles north-east of Mafeking. LORD METHUEN IN ACTION. Lieutenant-General Lord Methuen's column in its advance into the disturbed country to the south-west of Johannesburg marched from Frederickstad to Potchefstroom on Sunday. , The column was fighting all along the route, but the casualties were few.

HUNTER'S PRISONERS INCREASING. The War Office has received the following cable dispatch from Lord Roberts : —

" Twelve hundred more Boers have surrendered to Sir Archibald Hunter who expects his tot^l to reach four thousand.

" Amongst those who surrendered are Commandants Roux, Fontenel, De Ploy and Joubert.

" Major-General Bruce Hamilton has collected twelve hundred rifles, six hundred ponies and an Armstrong gun.

" Commandant Oliver, with five gnns, broke away in the direction of Harrismith.

"The enemy removed the rails near Frederickstad, and a supply train was derailed in consequence.

" Twelve Shropshires and Light Infantrymen were killed and thirty men injured. " An inquiry is proceeding into why an order to patrol the line was not executed." KRUGER'S RETREAT. President Kruger is trying f n concentrate his commandoes at Lydenburg, which is in telegraphic communication with Nels Spruit. Many of the burghers, deaf to all entreaties, are surrendering at the British camps. Machadodorp, on the Delagoa Bay railway, has been evacuated by the enemy. BOERS ANXIOUS FOR PEACE. The Boers in the Middleburg district, on the Delagoa Bay railway, are said to long to surrender. They are only deterred from so doing by the menaces of irreconcilables and the extraordinary fabrication of President Kruger regarding British disasters. BRITISH PRISONERS. The Hon. George Wyndham, Parliamentary Secretary to the War Office, stated in the House of Commons that the health of the prisoners at Nooitgedacht was good. Their food supply was, however, insufficient, the allowance of meat being but lib weekly, and that salt. COST OF WAR. The Chancellor of the Exchequer (Sir Michael Hicks- Beach) informed the House of Commons last night that up to the present the Transvaal War had cost £42,000,000.