The victory, if such a word can apply to such an action, had cost some fifty or sixty of the cavalry killed and wounded, while it is doubtful if the Boers lost as many.  The finest military display on the British side had been the magnificent marching of Kelly-Kenny’s 6th Division, who had gone for ten hours with hardly a halt.  One 9-pound Krupp gun was the only trophy.  On the other hand, Roberts had turned them out of their strong position, had gained twelve or fifteen miles on he road to Bloemfontein, and for the first time shown how helpless a Boer army was in country which gave our numbers a chance.  From now onwards it was only in surprise and ambuscade that they could hope for a success.  We had learned and they had learned that they could not stand in the open field.

The action of Poplars Grove was fought on March 7th.  On the 9th the army was again on its way, and on the 10th it attacked the new position which the Boers had occupied at a place called Driefontein, or Abram’s Kraal.  They covered a front of some seven miles in such a formation that their wings were protected, the northern by the river and the southern by flanking bastions of hill extending for some distance to the rear.  If the position had been defended as well as it had been chosen, the task would have been a severe one.

Since the Modder covered the enemy’s right the turning movement could only be developed on their left, and Tucker’s Division was thrown out very wide on that side for the purpose.  But in the meanwhile a contretemps had occurred which threw out and seriously hampered the whole British line of battle.  General French was in command of the left wing, which included Kelly-Kenny’s Division, the first cavalry brigade, and Alderson’s Mounted Infantry.  His orders had been to keep in touch with the centre, and to avoid pushing his attack home.  In endeavouring to carry out these instructions French moved his men more and more to the right, until he had really squeezed in between the Boers and Lord Roberts’s central column, and so masked the latter.  The essence of the whole operation was that the frontal attack should not be delivered until Tucker had worked round to the rear of the position.  It is for military critics to decide whether it was that the flankers were too slow or the frontal assailants were too fast, but it is certain that Kelly-Kenny’s Division attacked before the cavalry and the 7th Division were in their place.  Kelly-Kenny was informed that the position in front of him had been abandoned, and four regiments, the Buffs, the Essex, the Welsh, and the Yorkshires, were advanced against it.  They were passing over the open when the crash of the Mauser fire burst out in front of them, and the bullets hissed and thudded among the ranks.  The ordeal was a very severe one.  The Yorkshires were swung round wide upon the right, but the rest of the brigade, the Welsh Regiment leading, made a frontal attack upon the ridge.  It was done coolly and deliberately,