As soon as it was dark rockets were fired to try and direct the four missing men into camp, but without success.

On the following day the battalion with the Australians marched down the steep Zaaiplaats Pass to Buffelsvlei, bivouacking for the night on the banks of the Buffelsvlei River.

On arrival there it was again found that the General had moved on to Rooi Plaats, and that the 2nd Rifle Brigade had proceeded by the Tautesberg road with prisoners and families and cattle to Wonderfontein on the railway line.

May 1st found the force at Rooi Plaats, and here a halt was made on the 2nd.  Two companies under Captain Bartlett were dispatched to Diepkloof and two companies under Captain Wren to Waterval in order to block the two roads to the north from the Botha’s Berg, and to stop the Boers breaking back.

On May 3rd the Regiment with the Australian mounted infantry reached Waterval, and on the following day proceeded to Blinkwater.  Two companies with two guns under Captain Ponsonby, R.A., were left behind to cover the retirement of some mounted infantry, with orders to rejoin in the evening.

General Blood, with the whole of his personal command, had left Blinkwater on the previous day for Middleburg, and on the 5th General Kitchener received orders to follow him.  The column marched that day to Rooi Kop, twelve miles distant on the Middleburg road, and on the following day two companies Devon Regiment, two companies Rifle Brigade, five guns and one howitzer, with the sick, the whole under Captain Jacson, left for Bankfontein, where they were joined next morning by the remainder of General Kitchener’s column.

At Bankfontein a telegram was received which announced that Major Davies had been promoted to the brevet rank of lieutenant-colonel, Major Curry granted a D.S.O., and Captain Jacson was to be promoted to the brevet rank of lieutenant-colonel on attaining the rank of major.

A halt was made at Bankfontein from the 8th till the 11th, when the force refitted, and on May the 12th the column marched to Rondebosch on the outskirts of Middleburg.

In the early part of May, 1901, a further drive on a large scale was organized by head-quarters.  This was intended to traverse the whole of the Eastern Transvaal south of the railway.  The columns were to be extended from Middleburg through Carolina up to the Swazi border on the east, and then, with a circling movement based on Middleburg, gradually to sweep the country through Ermelo towards Bethel.  Having rounded up all this country, the drive, extending from Bethel on the south to the Pretoria-Lorenzo railway on the north, was by a combined movement to the westward, to push all the Boers remaining in this part of the country with their cattle on to Johannesburg-Springs and the Pretoria-Standerton railway lines, which were guarded.  The movement was under the direction of Sir Bindon Blood, and his forces consisted of eight columns.