To be able to control the railway means everything to an army, especially when it is operating in a hostile territory. All things must be sacrificed to protect and maintain the line so as to allow the safe transit of trains; and to that problem the British were compelled to devote most of their attention; the burghers sought chiefly to destroy their plans, as they were not of sufficient force to control any great portion of the railways.
The defense of railroads did not enter into the Spanish-American War on either side, as the territory covered by the operations in Cuba was too small for them to be of vital importance; but owing to the vast territory under military operation in South Africa they have been a factor of prime importance. If the Boer commanders had had less respect for property, and had destroyed every piece of rolling stock that they could not use, they would have been more successful; but instead of that they usually abandoned it all, and allowed the enemy to take it, enabling him in every case to use it immediately for the transportation of supplies and troops. A torch would have prevented this many times, and would have been the proper and legitimate method to be used; but, thinking of the loss to some of their own people, they allowed the British to take everything. Some commandants even argued against blowing up the bridges. The Spaniards knew the value of the fire-brand at Daiquiri, for when General Shafter’s army was preparing to land and begin the advance on Santiago, the invaders on the transports saw the thick smoke of the burning buildings curling skywards; and when we landed, about two hours later, we found the station and engine-house a mass of smoking embers, surrounding the burned ruins of every engine at that end of the line. Had the Boers shown more inclination to do as the Spaniards did in this instance, they would have been far better off, and would not have left miles of railroad and thousands of pieces of rolling stock with which their enemies operated against them.
[Illustration: The old and the new military bridge at Modder River.]
The maintenance of the rail communication between the base of supplies at Cape Town and the head of the army was the most difficult problem that the British were called upon to solve during the South African War; and there was nothing more essential to the successful operations of the troops than the freedom of this line. It was the main artery from the heart, through which the life-blood of the army flowed, and to check it, even for a few hours, meant suffering and hardship to the troops at the rail terminus, while to break it for a week or more would have caused ruin to all plans of offensive campaign.