THE IMPERIAL YEOMANRY

The volunteers came mainly from the middle and working classes although some were traditional territorials with existing yeomanry regiments contributing to the establishment.

The Yeomanry had existed in Britain as a volunteer organization for over a century but in December 1899, the war office decided to allow a contingent of volunteer forces based on the standing yeomanry regiments. The birth of the Imperial Yeomanry was as a result of a Royal Warrant issued on Christmas Eve 1899 when the existing Yeomanry regiments were asked to provide service companies each with 115 men. The Imperial Yeomanry was raised on a county basis, the core being men from existing volunteer units, with others recruited from volunteers which meant that men from all around the country served.

Although its purpose was to strengthen the forces in the Second Boer War, it was not disbanded until 1908 when the individual Yeomanry regiments became part of the Territorial Force. The Imperial Yeomanry was instigated because of military disasters during December 1899 at which point an extensive mounted force was judged essential to overthrow the Boers.

By the time the Second Boer War ended, around 35,000 volunteers had been recruited; its structure consisted of both companies and battalions. The existing yeomanry was asked to provide a trained nucleus on which the force could be expanded.

Primarily, the Imperial Yeomanry was set up as unit in its own right and was completely separate from the home-based force. The first contingent comprised of just over ten thousand men. Some of those who joined the first contingent built on their experience from serving in home yeomanry regiments and undertook a further three months training to hone their horsemanship and weaponry skills before embarking for South Africa.

The need to strengthen our regular fighting force  against the Boers in the Dutch Cape Colony is what prompted the addition of the Yeomanry force. The Dutch Cape colony was originally administered by the Dutch East India Company and they sold it to the British in 1815 which added the territory to the British-administered Cape Colony.

The Dutch settlers, the Boers, were unhappy with British controls so they established the Transvaal and Orange Free State as their own. In 1881 these two areas were recognised by the British after the Boers won the First Boer War. In 1886, the gold rush commenced in the Transvaal but the way the Boers treated the prospectors resulted in greater British government involvement, thus reviving the original conflict, ultimately leading to the Second Boer War in 1899.

The Boers were mainly farmers and were heavily outnumbered by the British army but they organised themselves into groups of mounted commandos and were experts at long-range rifle fire. Their logistics were highly effective against the British army and in December 1899, the British were defeated in three specific battles which came to be known as black week.

As a result of these defeats, it was apparent that the British needed to be significantly reinforced. This reinforcement was to be in the form of a volunteer Yeomanry force. Although the original proposals were initially declined by the war office, they relented after a request from the Commander-in-Chief of the British army in South Africa for a strong mounted infantry force in the light of the major defeat at the Battle of Colenso. The existing British yeomanry force was restricted in operation by legislation and was in any case only a home defence force so was prevented from serving in South Africa anyway.

The First Contingent

The first contingent of Imperial Yeomanry went to South Africa during early 1900 and they were first involved in the Battle of Boshoff in April when two of its battalions defeated a contingent of Boers who were supported by European volunteers. This success did not continue because in May 1900, the Imperial Yeomanry surrendered to 2,500 Boers at Lindley with a loss of eighty men and more than 500 being taken prisoners.

Within a year of their actions in South Africa, the Imperial Yeomanry lost around three thousand men; they were either killed, injured or taken prisoner. However, most of the deaths resulted from illness and disease rather than being killed in battles. The remainder of the first contingent were gradually sent home to be replaced by the arrival of a second contingent of sixteen thousand new yeomanry recruits.

The Second Contingent

With the second contingent, the original intention was to train new recruits for two or three months before sending them to South Africa; but Lord Kitchener decided that they should be trained as they served in action so they were sent to Africa immediately after they were recruited, despite the fact that many had no prior experience of horses or weaponry.

The sudden enlistment of raw recruits resulted in only around 650 of the original contingent electing to remain which represented a significant loss of experience, added to which many of the domestic yeomanry officers seconded to provided leadership proved to be of poor quality. The second contingent saw action for the first time Vlakfontein in May 1901.

Due to the yeomanry's inexperience in both defence techniques and convoy protection, they became a sitting target for the Boer attacks. At Rustenburg in September, the Boers inflicted a huge number of casualties and killed or wounded virtually all of the yeomanry's horses. In the Battle of Groenkop in December the Boers overwhelmed the Yeomanry’s 11th Battalion resulting in 289 being killed, wounded and captured. At Yzerspruit in February of the following year, a convoy comprising of both Yeomanry and regular infantry was attacked by a strong Boer force. They had no option but to surrender with the further loss of sixty-two men either killed or wounded; some 170 horses were lost as were hundreds of rifles and loads of ammunition. The defeats continued and at the Battle of Twee Bosch in March when 300 men from the Imperial Yeomanry together with the regular army personnel were involved in the action, they suffered huge losses with 189 killed or wounded and 600 taken prisoner.

The Third Contingent

Later in 1901 a third contingent consisting of seven thousand Imperial Yeomanry was raised. However, these men underwent three months of thorough training in England before being sent to South Africa with regular army officers allocated to the contingent. It arrived in South Africa in the closing months of the war so saw little action. The number of casualties, if any, Is difficult to ascertain.

In total the Imperial Yeomanry suffered 3771 casualties during the war with more than fifty per cent of the casualties as a result of enemy action. Members recruited from the domestic yeomanry returned to their home regiments and some went in to the regular army on demobilisation.