TOPIC:

I have acquired a ABW/WWI group to a Cpl Dirk Johannes Oberholster (Oberholzer elsewhere on this site)

Referring to the attached Vorm C, he appears to have been WIA on 11 May 1901 at Zout.....? (the writing is difficult to interpret)

Could anyone tell me in what action he would have been wounded and what the nature of his wound was (I can't make it out from the form)





Regards

Rory

Hi Rory,

Yes very challenging; I would guess Zoutpansburg. There were a lot of skirmishes around that period and in that area.

For example Fort Hendrina was still in the town of Louis Trichardt and was captured by the British on 9 May 1901.

I see he was with the Lichtenburg Commando and was at Kraaipan which is neat in itself.

Rory, Sturgy possibly Sandriver (Zant rivier). There were quite a few POW's taken on 10 and 11 May there. (1900 but his handwriting is difficult to decipher. His 1899 for example looks like 1901)

I read the place name as 'Zoutpannen" and the wound as "Been af", i.e. leg had to be amputated.

Thanks Arthur - I also see it that way which makes the chap all the more remarkable as he went through the German South West Africa campaign in WWI with the Mounted Brigade!

It was speculated that this could be father/son but I have verification that they are the same man.

Regards

Rory

I might be about to write some double Dutch, as we English say.

The British Newspapers of the day do not appear to mention Zoutpannen. However in early April 1901 they mention an attack on a Boer Laager between Brandfort and Salt Pan in which 60 Boers were captured. An easy to read clipping and a difficult to read clipping below, the latter adds that 2 Boers were killed.

Reading Mercury 6 April 1901


Bristol Times 6 April 1901


Wrong date but is the date correct on the Vorm C?

The man with the blotchy pen who filled out the Vorm C appears to include two other dates – October 1911 and 30 May 1912 (could alternatively be 1902). I also think the faint official stamp could bear the year 1920. Thus, if I am not writing double Dutch, the Vorm C was completed some time after the event (possibly 19 years later) which gives plenty of time and possible opportunities for the event date to have been mis-recorded at some stage.

Regards, David.