Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 21, Number 65, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 May 1900 — BURGHERSSLIPAWAY [ARTICLE]

BURGHERSSLIPAWAY

ESCAPE ROBERTS' TRAP NEAR WEPENER AND FLEE. Trek for the North After Freeing Wepener—British Net to Entrap Entire Army Useless—Disaster in Pretoria Arsenal—Ten Workmen Killed. South Africa advices say that after heavy fighting, Wepener has been relieved and the all-day artillery battle at Dewetsdorp Wednesday resulted in the occupation of that point by the British troops. Between Dpwetsdorp and Thabanchu Gens. Pole-Carew and French have been driving the Boers before them, Gen. Roberts’ army is now deployed along an extended line, with Gen. French apparently repeating rhe tactics which resulted so successfully at I’aardeberg. There is nothing in the dispatches that indicates the Boers are thinking of retreating northward, even though the field were open. Instead they are fighting along the entire; fine. 1 The British hope of conclusive results seems slim at present, the Boers escaping unbeaten and having accomplished an immense amount of damage. They clung to their positions as long as it was safe to do S<>. and then slipped off to hold . the HAj.xt commanding ridge through a broken country admirably suited for a ' rear guard defense. Dispatches from Aliwal North, under date of Wednesday, say the Boers left Wepener so hurriedly that many of the dead were left in the trcncbejmnburied. Commandant 8. Ctotije is reported to have been killed. According io advices from Bloemfontein, the attempt of the Boers at Brandfort to get in touch with the command at Thaba Nelin was frustrated by a force dispatched by Gen. Tiickel from Glen. Apparently, howqVer. the ttde, after a momentary delay, is again setting, toward the British side, though so far as reported the engagements, lieyond the relief of Wepener, are scarcely of sufficient importance to warrant so sweeping a generalization. In one respect only can the movement against WcpeneL.be regarded as a Boer success. By making this diversion and by the renewed activity in Natal, where the Boers are massing at Tintwa pass, thus menacing Buller’s army, the invasion of the Transvaal has again been indefinitely delayed. A dispatch to the London Daily Mail from Lourenco Marques, dated Wednesday, says that a daring attempt was made Sunday niglit to destroy the bridge at Komatipoort, the terminus of the Delagoa Bay Railway in the eastern part of Portuguese, East Africa . The attempt • failed by the merest accident, kaffirs giving the alarm. The Boers have consequently increased their force on the frontier and the hills are lined with riflemen, the burghers suspecting that the British are advancing upon the Transvaal by some.mysterious route. Every approach to the bridge is guarded by barbed wire. The correspondent does not indicate who it was who attempted to destroy the bridge.Part of the Begbie shell factory at Pre? toria blew tip the other night. Ten men were killed and thirty-two wounded. They were mostly French and Italians. No cause of the explosion is assigned, but it is not believed to be due to treachery. The factory has been working double time for weeks. Most of the important machinery was saved.