Siege of Ladysmith Postcards
The new South African Postcard Interest Group (SAPIG) held a Zoom Meeting on Tuesday 25th March 2025 in which John Handman in South Africa presented Siege of Ladysmith postcards. These were printed in Ladysmith during the Siege (2nd Nov 1899 – 28th Feb 1900). They are generally attributed to Earl Robert who arrived in SA in 1892. Robert is known to have been the illustrator of The Ladysmith Bombshell siege newspaper.
This Zoom meeting resulted in long unseen examples of Siege postcards coming to light. John described various red postcards and one black example. He said that a blue one was known but that he had not seen it. Nick Harris of the Anglo-Boer War Philatelic Society was unable to join the Zoom meeting but afterwards generously shared his remarkable collection with us. As coincidence would have it, his offerings included the only known example of the seldom seen ‘blue’ postcard, (more dirty grey), another advertising the postcards for sale at 6d each, again the only one known, the earliest known LADYSMITH RAIL postmark (‘DE 27 99) and two examples of the dated LADYSMITH SIEGE POST OFFICE canceller. All can be viewed in the two PDF files below.
You can see John Handman’s Zoom Display here.
View it as a PDF file.
You can see Nick Harris’ material also.
View it as a PDF file.
AngloBoerWar.com, a site that makes available information on the Anglo Boer War and other South African conflicts in the period 1779-1906 has some fascinating information in the section ‘Christmas Cards and Christmas Gifts’.
Background to the Siege of Ladysmith: 2nd Nov 1899 – 28th Feb 1900
The South African War (Anglo-Boer War) began on 11th October 1899.
The fighting centred around the railway leading into the OFS and ZAR.
Realising that negotiations with the British were going nowhere and knowing that a large British Army was en route to South Africa by sea, the Republican governments of the ZAR (South African Republic aka Transvaal) and the Orange Free State, under the leadership of their respective Presidents, Paul Kruger and Martinus Steyn, declared war on the British Empire. They hoped to gain an advantage from a decisive pre-emptive attack on British forces in the British colonies of the Cape and Natal who were gathering to invade their republics.
Presumably the building with the clock tower is the Town Hall.
British General Sir George White arrived in Durban on 7th October to command the British forces in Natal. General Sir Redvers Buller was appointed overall Commander-in-Chief of British forces in South Africa, a position he held during the early months of the conflict before being replaced by Lord Roberts.
White correctly believed that he should withdraw from north-western Natal, but was dissuaded not to by the Natal governor, Sir Walter Hely-Hutchinson, who feared the political consequences. He was supported by General Sir William Penn Symons who believed that a small force based at Glencoe, north-east of Ladysmith, would be enough to deter the Boers. It was agreed that Symons would garrison Glencoe while White made Ladysmith his base.
General Piet Joubert, the Republican commander, established his HQ on Bulwana Hill.
This view is looking to the south-east. In the centre left is the railway yard.
Some 21,000 Boers advanced into northern Natal from the OFS and ZAR. Being too close to the borders, White’s forces were exposed in the triangle of land lying between the two Boer republics. Penn Symons’ force at Glencoe and nearby Dundee fought and won the Battle of Talana Hill on 20th October. However, Penn Symons was mortally wounded and died later in Dundee. He was succeeded by General James Yule. After the Boers captured the railway station at Elandslaagte and severed communications with White, the Battle of Elandslaagte was fought on the following day, the 21st October.
White ordered Major General John French and his cavalry to clear the railway line and restore telegraph communications at Elandslaagte. French’s cavalry were victorious but gained no strategic advantage from the engagement at Elandslaagte. Fearing a further invasion of Boers from the Orange Free State, White decided to withdraw all his forces to Ladysmith. When Yule learned of the situation at Elandslaagte he abandoned Dundee and Glencoe on 22nd October and retreated post hast to Ladysmith in order to avoid being encircled and to reinforce White. Yule’s men reached Ladysmith on 26th October.
The clock tower was not repaired until the late 1920s.
The Republicans slowly began to surround Ladysmith. In response White ordered a sortie by the Ladysmith garrison on 30th October against the surrounding Boer forces with the aim of capturing or destroying the Boer artillery. The resulting Battle of Ladysmith was a demoralising British defeat for the town’s garrison. In what would be a feature of the siege as illustrated on the Siege of Ladysmith postcards the first of many Boer heavy artillery shells from ‘Long Tom’ on Pepworth Hill landed in the town, causing some panic.
Powerful provided Scott with four 12 pounder guns. She also ferried them to Durban.
With two of Terrible’s 4.7″ guns they reached Ladysmith on the last train in.
The British Army’s field artillery was outgunned by the Republican’s French 155 mm Creusot heavy artillery, nicknamed ‘Long Tom’. Fortunately, Captain Percy Scott of HMS Terrible in Simonstown had had the foresight to prepare carriages for naval guns in case they needed to be used to counter the superior Boer heavy artillery in the field. When the order came Scott had guns removed from his HMS Terrible and also HMS Powerful. Within days they were en route to Durban at full speed ahead. They were immediately unloaded and railed to Ladysmith with limited ammunition on the last train in.
Attributed to Earl Robert, illustrator of The Ladysmith Bombshell siege newspaper.
This was almost certainly produced after the siege was lifted.
The gun barrel references HMS Powerful.
The Naval Brigade arrived in Ladysmith to serve the two powerful 4.7″ naval guns and four 12 pounders. They arrived during the Battle of Ladysmith and the 12 pounders immediately went into action to counter ‘Long Tom’s’ fire which they temporarily suppressed. However, White’s advancing British infantry were mauled by Republican field artillery and driven back into Ladysmith with 400 men killed or wounded. A detachment of 800 men on Nicholson’s Nek were isolated and forced to surrender.
Although the butt of Army humour, the Naval Brigade gallantly aided the Army.
The Republican noose closed and Ladysmith endured 118 days of siege. As the Boers had no appetite for a frontal assault the British were given time to improve their defences.
During the siege there would be only one serious Boer attack on Ladysmith’s defences. Generally, given their smaller numbers, the Boers preferred to fight defensively from behind entrenchments and or cover. In this conventional stage of the war it was the larger, professional British Army who generally attacked and took the fight to the enemy. The Devonshire Regiment won a notable victory during the Sierge of Ladysmith at Wagon Hill on 6 January 1900, driving stubborn Boer resistance off the hill at bayonet point.
Transitted via PIETERMARITZBURG ‘4 MY 1901’ and COLOMBO, Ceylon ‘MY 28 01’.
Conditions within Ladysmith were bearable at first but grim by the time the siege was lifted on 28th February 1900. There was an eventual shortage of food. The lack of clean water lead to enteric fever. By January 1900 only 9.500 out of a garrsion of 13,500 men were fit for duty. In February horses were slaughtered for food as there was no fodder available. Soup from horse extract was known as ‘chervil’. The garrison was too weak to take offensive action even with the imminent arrival of Buller.
General Buller, the British commander in South Africa made several failed attempts to cross the Tugela to relieve Ladysmith. He was decisively beaten back by General Louis Botha at the Battle of Colenso during Black Week, (three British defeats at Stormberg, Magersfontein and Colenso between Sunday 10 December – Sunday 17 December 1899.) With Lord Roberts en route to SA to replace him, Buller finally crossed the Tugela to relieve Ladysmith on 28th February 1900, thereby restoring his reputation to some extent. Roberts would defeat the Republicans in the first conventional phase of the war but after capturing Pretoria he yielded command of the British Army in South Africa to General Kitchener for the more difficult and costly second phase of guerilla warfare.
(SECD – Sallo Epstein Co., Durban).
Both White and Buller were criticised for their lack of military success. White was faulted for retreating to Ladysmith. However, the siege did tie up large numbers of Boers who would have served the Republican cause better elsewhere. Arguably the greatest failure of the siege lay with the Republican leader, General Joubert, whose caution deprived the Boers of victory. His reluctance to release his commandos against White’s forces as they streamed in disarray back to Ladysmith was regarded by Louis Botha, the Boer’s best general and Joubert’s successor, as the most significant Republican failure during the invasion of Natal.
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