On getting into touch with Clements, Paget sallied out from Lindley, leaving the Buffs behind to garrison the town.  He had with him Brookfield’s mounted brigade one thousand strong, eight guns, and two fine battalions of infantry, the Munster Fusiliers and the Yorkshire Light Infantry.  On July 3rd he found near Leeuw Kop a considerable force of Boers with three guns opposed to him, Clements being at that time too far off upon the flank to assist him.  Four guns of the 38th R.F.A. (Major Oldfield) and two belonging to the City Volunteers came into action.  The Royal Artillery guns appear to have been exposed to a very severe fire, and the losses were so heavy that for a time they could not be served.  The escort was inadequate, insufficiently advanced, and badly handled, for the Boer riflemen were able, by creeping up a donga, to get right into the 38th battery, and the gallant major, with Lieutenant Belcher, was killed in the defence of the guns.  Captain FitzGerald, the only other officer present, was wounded in two places, and twenty men were struck down, with nearly all the horses of one section.  Captain Marks, who was brigade-major of Colonel Brookfield’s Yeomanry, with the help of Lieutenant Keevil Davis and the 15th I.Y. came to the rescue of the disorganised and almost annihilated section.  At the same time the C.I.V. guns were in imminent danger, but were energetically covered by Captain Budworth, adjutant of the battery.  Soon, however, the infantry, Munster Fusiliers, and Yorkshire Light Infantry, which had been carrying out a turning movement, came into action, and the position was taken.  The force moved onwards, and on July 6th they were in front of Bethlehem.

The place is surrounded by hills, and the enemy was found strongly posted.  Clements’s force was now on the left and Paget’s on the right.  From both sides an attempt was made to turn the Boer flanks, but they were found to be very wide and strong.  All day a long-range action was kept up while Clements felt his way in the hope of coming upon some weak spot in the position, but in the evening a direct attack was made by Paget’s two infantry regiments upon the right, which gave the British a footing on the Boer position.  The Munster Fusiliers and the Yorkshire Light Infantry lost forty killed and wounded, including four officers, in this gallant affair, the heavier loss and the greater honour going to the men of Munster.

The centre of the position was still held, and on the morning of July 7th Clements gave instructions to the colonel of the Royal Irish to storm it if the occasion should seem favourable.  Such an order to such a regiment means that the occasion will seem favourable.  Up they went in three extended lines, dropping forty or fifty on the way, but arriving breathless and enthusiastic upon the crest of the ridge.  Below them, upon the further side, lay the village of Bethlehem.  On the slopes beyond hundreds of horsemen were retreating, and a gun was being hurriedly