Out of Africa

[Guymullins]

It is good to see that some things of lasting value have come from South Africa. The Boy Scouts movement, which appears to have a strong following here, came from Mafiking, a small town in the Northern Cape Province. It was held under siege during the Boer War when 75 000 Boers kept an army of 450 000 British at bay for two years. Lord Baden Powell, a British officer in Mafeking founded the Boy Scouts in order to get essential tasks done during the siege and also to keep the youngsters from becoming idle and bored.
This is fairly common knowledge, but what isnt well known, is that the British Commandos, and by extension, your US Rangers have their origins here as well. The Boers ran their volunteer army as a system of Kommandos, a force originating from a single geographic area, commanded by a Kommandant, or Lt. Colonel. These Kommandos were the inventors of modern guerrilla war in that they pioneered the hit and run tactics that tied up hundreds of thousands of British troops using a handful of irregular Boer soldiers. The Boers also invented trench warfare. The British were so impressed by the Kommandos, that Winston Churchill, who had been captured by the Boers during the war, decided that they would call their new WW2 special forces , the Commandos, in emulation of their warlike spirit and unconventional tactics. When the US Rangers were established, they merged with the British Commandos and other SF units. Today, the marching tune used by the Marine Commandos is Sarie Marais, an old Afrikaans folk song. Small world isnt it?

[Dusty]

That's some cool history. I know the Boers could shoot.

[Guymullins]

Yes Dusty, they were people, much like your frontiersmen, who shot for the pot on a daily basis. City slickers from London or Manchester couldnt compete with that, but it must be said. The Boers had far superior rifles to the British. The Mauser compared to the Martini Henry was balistically and powerwise light years ahead.

[ZonieDiver]

The Boers also invented trench warfare.

I'm not sure I agree with you a hundred percent on your police work, there, Lou.

I guess it may all depend upon how one defines "trench warfare"! However, I'm pretty sure Vauban would disagree, as would the American Civil War soldiers at Petersburg.

[Guymullins]

Originally Posted by ZonieDiver

I guess it may all depend upon how one defines "trench warfare"! However, I'm pretty sure Vauban would disagree, as would the American Civil War soldiers at Petersburg.

Zonie, I have probably overstated the case there. It has probably been known since the Spartans, but the Battle of Modder River was the first time the British had encountered trench warfare. The Boers dug proper slit trenches and strung trip wires with empty stone filled cans on them to warn of a night attack. A little later, at the Battle of Magersfontein, the Boers survived a massive artillery barrage completely unscathed in their trenches, then wiped out several crack Higthland regiments in the battle that followed.

[Sigaba]

Originally Posted by Guymullins

The Boers also invented trench warfare.

Those damn American Democratic Party liberals screwed the CSA by using a method of warfare that had not yet been invented.

And those damn revisionist historians, at it again. And again. And yet still again.

[Guymullins]

At the start of the Boer War, our General Koos De La Rey was certainly unaware of the innovations of the American Civil War. His only reading matter was the family bible and that didnt feature any Yankee know-how. The British were also blissfully unaware of trench warfare as it took them some considerable time to adapt their tactics to minimise the damage they suffered because of it. So, it was not known to the worlds greatest Empire at the time, and it was" invented" in ignorance that it had been used on the other side of the world. As I said earlier, I overstated the case, but in our hemisphere, it was a new new deadly thing thought by an unschooled farmer turned reluctant General.

[ZonieDiver]

Originally Posted by Guymullins

At the start of the Boer War, our General Koos De La Rey was certainly unaware of the innovations of the American Civil War. His only reading matter was the family bible and that didnt feature any Yankee know-how. The British were also blissfully unaware of trench warfare as it took them some considerable time to adapt their tactics to minimise the damage they suffered because of it. So, it was not known to the worlds greatest Empire at the time, and it was" invented" in ignorance that it had been used on the other side of the world. As I said earlier, I overstated the case, but in our hemisphere, it was a new new deadly thing thought by an unschooled farmer turned reluctant General.

I'm pretty sure the British had some vague ideas about trench warfare, since a variety had been used by the French in sieges of fortresses, and British military schools undoubtedly studied it at some point.
http://www.fortified-places.com/sieg...richt1673.html

They also had "observers" during, as some say, "The Late Unpleasantness" here in the USofA, and were probably aware of such things. Adapting to them is another matter, as WWI demonstrated.

[Richard]

As far as the UK's Commandos go, it seems to me as if it had more to do with the German formations than the Boers - at least in Churchill's mind.

The Army Commandos were formed in June 1940, at a time when the British Empire no longer had a single ally in the field, and when the British Army had been compelled to quit the continent of Europe as a result of the disastrous campaigns in Norway and the Low Countries. While the germ of the idea had originated in the brain of Lieut-Colonel Dudley Clarke R.A., as early as 4th June 1940, it was Winston Churchill himself who, not content with a purely passive defensive, actually ordered their formation. In a minute of 18th June, 1940, he wrote: "What are the ideas of C,-in-C., H.F., about Storm Troops? We hae always set our faces against the idea, but the Germans certainly gained in thee last war by adopting it, and this time it has been a leading cause of their victory. There ought to be at least twenty thousand Storm Troops or 'Leopards' drawn from existing units, ready to spring at the throat of any small landings or descents. These officers and men should be armed with the latest equipment, tommy guns, grenades, etc., and should be given great facilities in motor-cycles and armoured cars." The first Commando raid took place only five days later.

http://www.commandoveterans.org/site...&id=79&Itemid=

And from Wordorigins.org:

The sense of the word commando, meaning an elite soldier, appeared during the Second World War with the raids on occupied France by elite British forces of that name. Winston Churchill wrote to General Ismay on 2 July 1940:

If it be true that a few hundred German troops have been landed on Jersey or Guernsey by troop-carriers, plans should be studied to land secretly by night on the islands and kill or capture the invaders. This is exactly one of the exploits for which the Commandos would be suited.

But the word is much older and is South African, or Afrikaans, not British, in origin. It is a borrowing from Portuguese meaning a military command and used specifically to denote a party of men conducting a military raid or expedition, especially one by European colonists in southern Africa against native Africans. From G. Carter’s 1791 Loss of Grosvenor:

“A colonist,” says he, “who lives...up the country...intreats a commando, which is a permission to go, with the help of his neighbours, to retake his property.”

Afrikaans took the word from the Portuguese using it in the phrase on commando, referring to militia service. From William J. Burchell’s 1824 Travels in the Interior of Southern Africa:

The master himself was at this time absent on the Commando, or militia-service, against the Caffres in the Zuureveld.

The word again rose to prominence in the 1899-1902 Boer War, when it was used to refer to Boer militia units fighting the British. From the Westminster Gazette, 11 November 1899:

The President...has the right of declaring war and calling up one or more commandos.

(Source: Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd Edition)

http://www.wordorigins.org/index.php/more/233/

You might consider doing a bit more research on the Boy Scouts, too, while you're researching those slit trench histories you seemed to have pulled from Wikipedia.

Richard

[Sigaba]

Originally Posted by Guymullins

At the start of the Boer War, our General Koos De La Rey was certainly unaware of the innovations of the American Civil War. His only reading matter was the family bible and that didnt feature any Yankee know-how. The British were also blissfully unaware of trench warfare as it took them some considerable time to adapt their tactics to minimise the damage they suffered because of it. So, it was not known to the worlds greatest Empire at the time, and it was" invented" in ignorance that it had been used on the other side of the world. As I said earlier, I overstated the case, but in our hemisphere, it was a new new deadly thing thought by an unschooled farmer turned reluctant General.

Are you saying that Great Britain did not have any observers in the United States during the American Civil War?

Is it your argument that, in the decades following the American Civil War, there was not an international dialogue about that conflict and future wars? A dialogue that saw military observers from a variety of nations going on tours to see the battlefields of wars currently in progress and to discuss recent conflicts?

(Do you have any actual historical evidence to establish what GEN Koos de la Rey did or did not know? You know, stuff like a catalog of the books he owned, an analysis of the marginalia in those books, letters/articles/press clippings, comments about warfare that he made either contemporaneously or after the fact?)

[Pete]

Let's not forget Crimea. Of course it was mostly artillery doing the digging.

Thin Red Line and all, what, what!

And by Spion Kop time it shows the British troops were just as brave and the Army Leadership just as dumb.

14 years later the British Generals were still 50 years behind technology.

[Guymullins]

Originally Posted by Richard

As far as the UK's Commandos go, it seems to me as if it had more to do with the German formations than the Boers - at least in Churchill's mind.



http://www.commandoveterans.org/site...&id=79&Itemid=

And from Wordorigins.org:

The sense of the word commando, meaning an elite soldier, appeared during the Second World War with the raids on occupied France by elite British forces of that name. Winston Churchill wrote to General Ismay on 2 July 1940:

If it be true that a few hundred German troops have been landed on Jersey or Guernsey by troop-carriers, plans should be studied to land secretly by night on the islands and kill or capture the invaders. This is exactly one of the exploits for which the Commandos would be suited.

But the word is much older and is South African, or Afrikaans, not British, in origin. It is a borrowing from Portuguese meaning a military command and used specifically to denote a party of men conducting a military raid or expedition, especially one by European colonists in southern Africa against native Africans. From G. Carter’s 1791 Loss of Grosvenor:

“A colonist,” says he, “who lives...up the country...intreats a commando, which is a permission to go, with the help of his neighbours, to retake his property.”

Afrikaans took the word from the Portuguese using it in the phrase on commando, referring to militia service. From William J. Burchell’s 1824 Travels in the Interior of Southern Africa:

The master himself was at this time absent on the Commando, or militia-service, against the Caffres in the Zuureveld.

The word again rose to prominence in the 1899-1902 Boer War, when it was used to refer to Boer militia units fighting the British. From the Westminster Gazette, 11 November 1899:

The President...has the right of declaring war and calling up one or more commandos.

(Source: Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd Edition)

http://www.wordorigins.org/index.php/more/233/

You might consider doing a bit more research on the Boy Scouts, too, while you're researching those slit trench histories you seemed to have pulled from Wikipedia.

Richard

Richard, Afrikaans is one of the youngest languages and is entirely made up from borrowed words. Mainly Dutch in origin, but with a strong French influence from the Huguenots who fled France for Africa. There are many Portuguese words too, because they were neighbors on both east and west sides. There was German from German SW Africa, another neighbor and of course English due to being an English Colony for some time. So, when someone say an Afrikaans word, it could have come from almost any language originally.
What exactly is your problem with the Boy Scouts? Dont tell me they were actually invented by Davy Crockett and Mr Bowie at the Alamo?

[Sigaba]

Originally Posted by Guymullins

Dont tell me they were actually invented by Davy Crockett and Mr Bowie at the Alamo?

It is interesting how you attempt to draw comparisons between the history of SA and U.S. history--but quickly come to mock the latter when your understanding of either is questioned.

[Richard]

Originally Posted by Guymullins

What exactly is your problem with the Boy Scouts? Dont tell me they were actually invented by Davy Crockett and Mr Bowie at the Alamo?

Sarcasm noted.

I was a Scout as were my sons, one of which achieved the rank of Eagle.

This is what the BSA says about its founder and their history.

http://www.scout.org/en/about_scouti...t_of_the_world

Originally Posted by Guymullins

Today, the marching tune used by the Marine Commandos is Sarie Marais, an old Afrikaans folk song.

And an even older CSA tune.

Granted, the "Sarie Marais" was a Boer song about the Boer War, but the tune was originally called "Ellie Rhee" and it comes - ironically - from the Confederate States of America.

"Ellie Rhee" tells the story of a Tennessee slave who runs away from his master but now wonders if the price of his new-found freedom (the loss of his one true love) was too high to pay.

Although the song never enjoyed enormous popularity here, it certainly has as the basis for "My Sarie Marais Is So Ver Van My Hart."

And so it goes...

Richard

[Dusty]

The Boers were outstanding warriors.

The Scout thing's moot if they go gay; then, nobody will claim lineage.