What exacytly was the Boer War?
The Boer War South Africa, 1899-1902 The year was 1899. Queen Victoria had recently celebrated her Diamond Jubilee. The British Empire was at its zenith in power and prestige. But the High Commissioner of Cape Colony in South Africa, Alfred Milner, wanted more. He wanted to gain for the Empire the economic power of the gold mines in the Dutch Boer republics of the Transvaal and the Orange Free State. He also wanted to create a Cape-to-Cairo confederation of British colonies to dominate the African continent. And he wanted to rule over it. To do this, Milner precipitated a war with the Boers. As always, over-confident generals and politicians predicted the war would be over ‘by Christmas’. And again, as frequently happened with the British in their colonial wars, they only win one battle – the last one. But they would have to wait two and a half years for that. Until then, disaster was piled on disaster, military careers were destroyed, 22,000 Tommy Atkins are laid to rest in ‘some corn
