1900 - Diary of the siege of Mafeking by Edward Ross
Thursday, 22 March
Absolutely not a single Big Ben shell fired at us today. Something seems to have gone wrong in the Boer camp: they can be seen very busy with scotch carts and mule waggons, travelling backwards and forwards from the big gun, and other places.
The larger part of the western laager has certainly been removed, and the main laager at McMullen’s seems to have been increased by about 50 waggons, so by this they must have gone round in the night and joined.
Four runners in today, but they only bring confirmation of previous news, with the exception of a Reuters’ message stating that troops had left Kimberley for the purpose of relieving us, and that they expect to be here early in April.34 That is not very long to wait if it is true.
The natives swear our troops are already at Pokwani.85 That means they are about 150 miles off, but also means they are this side [of] the big Vaal river bridge, the place we thought the Boers would occupy and defend, and retard the progress of any relief column. It is an exceedingly [good] bit of news if true.
The Colonel has now finished the sketch for the f 1 note, so expect to be hard at it tomorrow printing positives.
