But there was a desolation over the scene very different from the stir and bustle of a racecourse. Our troops had been penned up in a barbed-wire enclosure that included the paddock, stands, and a bit of the course itself. Most of the buildings had been utilised as hospitals, and where or how the poor devils who hadn’t enteric or dysentery or pleurisy or rheumatic fever existed, Heaven alone knows. The N.C.O.s had the privilege of sleeping on the steps of the grand stand, and I suppose the others had to be content with the ground. Very quickly the accommodation at the racecourse had become inadequate, and the camp at Waterval was established, leaving only a hospital and a staff of orderlies. The result was a most woebegone place, littered with empty tins, rags, paper, and refuse of all sorts. We elected to occupy a row of horse-boxes facing the paddock. I’m sure no owner of racehorses would have allowed any of his string to enter these boxes, but we were only too glad to find a place wherein to lay our heads. After a long delay they brought us rations of sorts—the potatoes, I remember well, being little round things about the size of marbles and everyone gaily sprouting. For the rest we had ½ lb. of meat and a loaf of bread apiece, plenty of cold water, and the consolation of being told we had a great deal to be thankful for. While our troops had been confined at the racecourse some of the residents of Pretoria had been exceedingly kind in supplying them with what, to them, were great luxuries to help out the meagre fare allowed by the Boer Government. A much-appreciated but sticky delicacy was a considerable supply of golden syrup. In one little hut occupied by a mess of sergeants, twelve men used to sleep every night, packed as close as herrings. The morning following the day on which they had received their share of the golden syrup they found themselves all stuck together, and had to rise up in one piece like a row of toy soldiers.
Lieutenant Crane was taken off to the newly formed camp for prisoners on a barren hillside north of Pretoria, where nearly all officers had been confined within triple fences of barbed wire since their removal from the Model School. Non-commissioned officers and troopers of Lumsden’s Horse had to share the fate of other captive soldiers at Waterval on the high veldt outside the Magaliesberg, but luckily they were not among the number hurried away by retreating Boer commandos to distant Nooitgedacht when our troops entered Pretoria. At Waterval the daily rations were scanty enough, though luxurious by comparison with the meagre fare served out at a later date to prisoners in that place away eastwards with a name that bespeaks desolation. And by the kindness of the American Consul, Sergeant D.S. Fraser was able to obtain funds from India for himself and his fellow-sufferers. This enabled them to supplement the rough rations issued to them during their imprisonment at Waterval. To cover the advances made for this purpose Colonel Lumsden authorised a grant of 5_l._ each to the prisoners, being at the rate of 1_l._ per man per week for the period of their captivity. Thus the value of such a fund as had been raised in Calcutta before the corps left was demonstrated in an unforeseen way. By means of it Colonel Lumsden had been able to start with a treasure-chest of 1,000_l._ and a sufficient credit in the Standard Bank of South Africa to meet all emergencies.