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Frank Beers of the Artillery Troop, B.F.F. and the Natal Police 4 years 6 months ago #71219
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Frank Alfred Herbert Beers
Gunner, Artillery Troop, Bulawayo Field Force – Matabele Rebellion 1896 Trooper, Natal Police – Anglo Boer War - British South Africa Company Medal (with 1896 Rhodesia reverse) to GUNR. F. BEERS, ARTILLERY TROOP, B.F.F. - Queens South Africa Medal with Natal clasp to 2177, TPR. F.H.B. BEERS, NATAL POLICE Frank Beers was born on 22 November 1872 in Wakefield Lawn, Northamptonshire and baptised in the local parish church in Potterspury on 15 June 1873, the son of Francis Beers and his wife Sarah Ann, born Daniels. Beers senior was the Hunt Master of the district, in the service of the Duke of Grafton, and enjoyed an enviable reputation as being the best at his occupation in living memory. At the time of the 1881 England census the Beers family lived in Highfield Lane where, at the age of 8, Frank was the oldest of four children. He was followed, in quick succession, by Gertrude Ann (7), Henry Ernest (5) and Hector George (4). Bringing up the rear was 26 year old Housekeeper, Ann Rose Bettison and 20 year old servant girl, Rhoda Billingham. Mr. Beers was recorded as being a Huntsman to Fox and Hounds. Such was his renown that he was to be the inspiration for a published work entitled “The Hunting Diaries of Frank Beers a True Master Huntsman - Running the Grafton Hounds from 1870 – 1890.” Beers was provided with a very decent education – firstly at Magdalen College School in Oxford, where he was at the age of 12 in 1885. He was then sent as a pupil to Brackley’s Grammar School where he excelled at sports and was a regular in the school’s 1st XI in 1888 at the age of 15. The following year, 1889 saw him attending Wellinborough Grammar School, along with one or more of his brothers. That he was still in England and active in the sporting arena, was confirmed by a newspaper report dated 15 December 1894, which had him playing competitive football in Northampton where he was scoring goals with regularity. 1894 was to be a watershed year for the Beers family – Frank Beers senior, the patriarch of the family and the leading light in a Hunt-mad England, passed away in his 50’s – a few years earlier he had taken a nasty spill from his horse and had never fully recovered his strength. His probate left those who knew him astonished – his estate being worth in excess of £15 000 on his death. Perhaps it was his father’s death and the uncertainty that it brought to the family that decided Frank and his brother Henry to “fly the coop” and head off to South Africa and a new adventure. On 14 February 1896 he sailed into Durban harbour aboard the “Doune Castle”, where he was listed in the manifest as a Painter by occupation. Having landed in South Africa the brothers made their way north to Rhodesia – just in time to become embroiled in the Matabele Rebellion into which that country was about to be plunged. In those heady pioneering days that territory was sparsely populated and largely wild with teeming masses of game and little else populating the landscape. This was aside from the human inhabitants – comprised mainly of two tribes, the Matabele and the Mashona - Rhodesia had a large black population which busied itself in the main with subsistence farming and little else. Resentment among these black tribes started to grow commensurate with the influx of European pioneers who came up from the Cape with a speculators eye and a yearning in their heart for wealth and prosperity. These pioneers, it was felt in some quarters, began encroaching on the lifestyle of the black tribes and simmering tensions between the two finally culminated in the outbreak of the Matabele Rebellion in 1896 (there had been earlier trouble in 1893). Bulawayo, one of the only settlements with anywhere near a concentration of Europeans, was seen as a definite target by the Matabele and, along with their Mashona counterparts, was laid siege to. The settlers couldn’t afford to wait for the relieving columns being sent either from Beira or Mafeking to come to their aid and so created a Bulawayo Field Force which was raised on the 25th March 1896 and disbanded on the 4th July 1896. It consisted of the following sub units: Artillery troop, Engineer troop, Greys Scouts, Dawsons Scouts, Afrikander Corps and Giffords Horse. One of the first priorities for this small force was to ride out into the territory surrounding Bulawayo and bring into the laager that had been created, as many of the traders, farmers etc. and their families that they could get to safety. It was to the Artillery Troop that Frank Beers gravitated, from the onset of hostilities. On April 25, 290 white troopers and friendly natives under the command of Captain Ronald Macfarlane left Bulawayo to scout the Unguza. Supported by an artillery section consisting of a 1-pounder Hotchkiss gun and a Maxim, the patrol soon encountered several hundred Ndebele. A skirmish line of mounted scouts managed to draw the warriors into range of the two larger guns, and a fierce firefight erupted. ‘Bullets of all sorts came whistling along, from elephant-guns, Martinis, Winchesters, and Lee-Metfords, and for about an hour things were decidedly unpleasant, wrote Lieutenant Claude Grenfell. The Ndebele made two determined rushes to reach the Maxim gun, but were driven back with heavy losses. On 11 May, 1896, a column of about 42 officers and 613 men commanded by Colonel William Napier set out from Bulawayo with the object of opening the road to the Tchangani River where it was hoped to meet up with the relief column from Salisbury under Colonel Beal. Colonel Napier's force was composed of, among others, the Artillery Troop comprising four officers and 34 men under Captain Biscoe (of which Beers would have been one). They were armed with one 7-pounder, one 2.5 gun, one Hotchkiss, one Nordenfeldt and one Maxim. They saw much action against a Matabele impi formidable in size before returning to Bulawayo at the request of Earl Gray. As can be ascertained Beers, young as he was, saw plenty of action and, for his efforts was awarded the British South Africa Company Medal. (His brother, Henry, who had fought with the Artillery Troop of the Mashonaland Mounted Police Corps, earned the same medal as well). Deciding that life in Rhodesia was to his liking, Frank Beers joined the Matabeleland Division of the British South Africa Company Police on 3 December 1896 as a Trooper with no. 415. He served with them until taking his discharge, Time Expired, on 6 June 1898 whereupon he headed back into South Africa. The lure of a uniform proved too much for him and, on 9 July 1898, he joined the ranks of the Natal Police in Pietermaritzburg with the rank of Trooper and no. 2177. Beers was, most likely, blissfully unaware that he had swapped one conflict for another. The Anglo Boer War which broke out on 11 October 1899, would have come as a surprise to him and many others. Who, after all, would have believed that two Dutch-speaking Boer Republics to the north of Natal, in the form of the Orange Free State and the Transvaal, would have the temerity to wage war against the mighty British Empire? And yet that is exactly what they did. The Natal Police were split up into several sections on the outbreak of the war – some were sent to the newly created Natal Field Force and would see much fighting under Buller. Others, that had been stationed in upcountry Natal, were caught up in the Defence of Ladysmith; another section were required to continue with their normal policing duties, even though this might place them in the path of the fighting. Then there were those who were stationed at N.P. Headquarters in Alexander Road, Pietermaritzburg – this, it would appear, is where Beers found himself. Even in the face of war, the normalcy of life continued – Beers appeared in the Natal Police Daily Orders of 23 October 1900 as follows: “Trooper No. 2177 Beers will draw extra pay at the rate of 6d per diem from 13 October 1900, for proficiency in the Zulu language; in accordance with Paragraph 408 of the Rules and Regulations.” In all probability, Beers, with his level of education, was put to work as a Court Interpreter in and around Pietermaritzburg. The only other reference to him in the Daily Orders came on 9 August 1901 when it was stated that, “No. 2177 Tpr. Beers, having been discharged on the 9th August is struck off the strength of the Force from that date.” For his efforts in the war, Beers was awarded the Queens Medal with Natal clasp, issued to him off the roll at Pietermaritzburg, dated 8 September 1901. Having shed his uniform Beers looked about him for gainful employment. The war was still raging but he had had his fill of conflict. Turning his attention to affairs of the heart he wed Lorraine Grace Addams, the 26 year old widow of William Hudson Addams, who had died on 15 April 1900, in St. Cyprian’s Church on 10 July 1901. He was 28 at the time and, if the marriage certificate is to be believed, had secured himself employment as a Clerk. Beers marriage to Lorraine wasn’t to stand the test of time – the couple had moved to the Transkei after their nuptials and, in 1907, it all ended in tears with the Chief Magistrate of that territory, sanctioning a divorce between the two. Leaving her and the memory of his failed marriage behind (Lorraine was to marry twice more before passing away in Pretoria in 1929), Beers emigrated to Australia. The Electoral rolls for that country revealing, in 1913, that he was a Crown Lands Ranger in Roma, Queensland. The Voter’s Roll for the electoral district of Maranoa, Roma Division, contained the entry that Frank Alfred Herbert Beers was resident at the Grande Hotel, Roma, on 1 July 1912. On 3 September 1913, two months short of his 42nd birthday, Frank Beers breathed his last. There is every indication that he left no issue and died a lonely death far from those who knew and loved him. 
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Frank Beers of the Artillery Troop, B.F.F. and the Natal Police 4 years 6 months ago #71220
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Frank Beers of the Artillery Troop, B.F.F. and the Natal Police 4 years 6 months ago #71221
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Frank Beers of the Artillery Troop, B.F.F. and the Natal Police 4 years 6 months ago #71222
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Frank Beers of the Artillery Troop, B.F.F. and the Natal Police 4 years 6 months ago #71229
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Frank Beers of the Artillery Troop, B.F.F. and the Natal Police 2 years 7 months ago #84909
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