TOPIC:

Felix Allen Keit

Trooper, Johannesburg Mounted Rifles – Anglo Boer War
Trooper, Natal Police
Rifleman, 2ndSouth African Mounted Rifles (S.A.M.R.)
Private, 3rdSouth Africa Infantry (S.A.I.) – WWI

- Queens South Africa Medal with clasp Transvaal to 394 TPR. F. KEIT, JOHANNESBURG M.R.
- 1914/15 Star to RFM. F.A. KEIT. 2ND S.A.M.R.
- British War Medal to PTE. F.A. KEIT, 3RD S.A.I.
- Victory Medal to PTE. F.A. KEIT, 3RD S.A.I.

Most people have heard of the famous Botanical Gardens on Durban’s Berea. This veritable floral paradise came from very humble beginnings before blossoming into what it is today. Our story starts with Julius Wilhelm Keit who was born in Dresden in the state of Saxony on 1 May 1841. He was the son of a master soap-maker. His father died when he was young and Keit inherited a small sum with which he nurtured his love of gardening, working in nurseries throughout Europe. Having been offered the curatorship of the then fledgling Durban Botanical Gardens, Keit left Dublin where he had been working, on 25 September 1872, travelled to see his family in Dresden where he collected a small proportion of his legacy, and returned to England to take ship for South Africa.

Having persevered against almost insurmountable odds, Keit began to make a name for himself in Durban society, becoming engaged to Louisa Currie, the daughter of William Currie, a prominent Durban citizen and mayor of the town in 1879 and 1880. The couple were married on 9 September 1874 and were to have eight children. In 1876 he had bought a 2 ha plot adjacent to Berea Road, on this ground he built a home. With money left by his father-in-law he was also able to establish a nursery and small dairy there. He traded with overseas nurseries and, in 1883 he was appointed curator of Durban’s parks and gardens at a salary of ￡10 a month.

One of the 8 children was Felix Keit and it was in to this environment of work and enterprise that he was born on 7 August 1883, slotting into third spot in the sibling hierarchy behind Henry Edward and Sara Pauline and in front of Eva Louise, Max William, Norman Robert and Fritz Emil. Life for a young Felix would have been a blissful one – there weren’t money worries with which to concern himself and he would have enjoyed the companionship of his many brothers and sisters.

Just as he about to reach the age of 17 and having completed his schooling, Keit woke up one morning to find that the Colony of Natal in which he resided, along with the Cape Colony, were at war with the two Boer Republics to the north of them – the Orange Free State and the Transvaal. This was in October 1899 and patriotic fervour was rampant among the young men of the region, with many enlisting with locally raised regiments or aligning themselves with the long established regiments such as the Natal Mounted Rifles or the Durban Light Infantry, for service in the north of Natal where the Boer forces, having infiltrated the area, had placed Ladysmith under siege.

One can only imagine how bemused Keit must have been by all of this – he had no particular loyalty to England and the Empire, his father being German, but his mother was of British descent and that was what probably decided him to join the ranks of the Johannesburg Rifles after the war had been raging for quite some time. He was assigned no. 394 and the rank of Trooper.

The Johannesburg Mounted Rifles was founded on 12th December 1900, and soon two battalions were recruited. With the Transvaal capital, Pretoria, having fallen to the British in mid-1900, the troops were kept busy in what became known as the guerrilla phase of the war – no longer were set battles the order of the day but rather small skirmishes where Boer Commandos would harass the British supply lines and pray on small patrols, before galloping off to fight another day. For this reason, the greater portion of the corps was in the early part of 1901 stationed in the Springs district, where they always had the enemy near them and used worthily the opportunities they got. They had casualties at Springs on 6th January 1901 and on several other occasions during the three following months.

A press report, under the banner, “Boer depot Burned” stated that, on March 25, 1901 – A strong patrol of Johannesburg Mounted Rifles went out early yesterday morning to burn the Boschkop Hotel, which had been the resort of Boers, who have used it as a depot for months past. The Mounted Rifles found the enemy in force. And drove them from the locality. We lost two killed in the operations. Three men were missing after the attack, but have since rejoined. The Boer casualties were not reported the burning of the hotel was successfully carried out.”

In March and April two companies were in Colonel Colville's column, based on the Standerton line, and were said to have done good work particularly in an affair at Roberts' Drift. Both battalions afterwards did much column work. Early in 1901 part of the corps was sent to the Zululand border, a district in which they saw much arduous service.

It was here, near the Vryheid border with Natal, at a place called Waterval, that Keit got into a post of bother. According to press reports at the time, “Trooper Felix Keit was reported as Missing on 1 April.” On the same day Trooper Regan of the J.M.R. was severely wounded in what must have been the same skirmish – one can only assume that this was a clash of patrols or that the two were members of a party of scouts out on patrol. By this stage in the conflict, the Boers had no appetite of capacity to take and look after prisoners of war – instead they would keep them overnight, strip them of their uniform and accoutrements, and set them free in the veld to make their way back to their own side. The official records confirm that Keit rejoined his unit.

Towards the end of April 600 were with Colonel Stewart in a column working from about Volksrust. Colonel Stewart had also under him Gough's Mounted Infantry, 600; the Commander-in-Chief's Bodyguard, 1000; the 74th Battery Royal Field Artillery, and a pom-pom. In July 1901 the two battalions were put together, and under Colonel Stewart operated as a column, which did much trekking and skirmishing generally in the east of the Transvaal and about the Zululand border. A Standerton telegram of 5th August mentioned that by a night raid on Amersfoort the J.M.R. had captured a laager and 20 prisoners.

It is not known how long Keit remained with the J.M.R. – most attestations were for a period of six months – but he qualified for the Transvaal and South Africa 1901 clasps to his Queens Medal, which would suggest that he wasn’t with this unit after 1901.

Having played no further part in the Boer War, Keit returned home and to his normal civilian pursuits. Quite what he did with himself is a mystery and he took no part in the next conflagration to hit his native Natal in 1906 – the Bambatha Rebellion. The next encounter we have with him came on the 2 November 1908 when he enlisted for service with the Natal Police at Pietermaritzburg. Assigned no. 4232, he was posted to the far northern Natal town of Utrecht for service. As was customary, he was promoted to 1st Class Trooper on his first service anniversary but he got into hot water there on 2 October 1910 and was reduced to the rank of 2nd Class Trooper for “refusing to obey an order of Sgt. Kerrage.”

On 9 November 1911 he resigned from the Natal Police and was allowed to make his departure after serving one month’s notice with a service rating of “Good”. It wasn’t long before, inexplicably, he enlisted with the N.P once more, on this occasion on 1 October 1912 when he was assigned no. 4576. A year later, with the amalgamation of the various provincial police bodies into the South African Mounted Rifles, Keit found himself as a Rifleman with the 2nd S.A.M.R.

As he went about his daily tasks, Keit, like so many others, would have been blissfully unaware that the world stage was about to erupt into the greatest bloodbath known to man within a couple of years. The Great War or First World War commenced on 4 August 1914 and drew South Africa, in some cases reluctantly, into her warm and deadly embrace. Previously avowed foes, the Prime Minister, Louis Botha, threw his lot in with the British Imperial war effort, a decision that rankled with many of his Commando comrades with whom he had fought a mere 12 years earlier against the British Empire.

Keit, as a member of the S.A.M.R., was already in uniform and was obligated to join the fight. Still with the 2nd S.A.M.R, but with no. 1020, he was deployed from 18 August 1914 to help quell the internal rebellion which sprung up in parts of the Orange Free State and Western Transvaal – it was an unequal fight pitting poorly equipped Boer farmers against the organised and structured South African Defence Force. Having suppressed the rebellion with a great deal of blood shed, Botha and his Minister of Defence, Jan Smuts could now turn their attention to expelling the Germans from South West Africa.

To this end he embarked aboard the “Professor Woerman” on 14 May 1915 destined for the theatre of war. Having landed he was deployed with his regiment, to help push the Germans further north where, on 9 July 1915, at Otavi, they surrendered. Unlike most participants who were now free to return home, Keit and his comrades were required to stay on in German South West to keep the peace. Keit, frustrated by the inactivity such a role engendered, applied for his discharge from the force. His request was forwarded to the Inspector General of the Permanent Force in Pretoria on 2 November 1915, with the affirmative response coming on the 18th November, stating that he would be discharged “Time Expired” with effect from 1 December 1915.

The Record of Service accompanying his request confirmed that he had enlisted with the S.A.M.R. at Pietermaritzburg on 1 October 1912, that his character on discharge was Very Good and that he had 3 years 62 days service. Aged 33, he was described as being 5 feet 10 ½ inches in height with brown hair, grey eyes and a sallow complexion.

Having returned to the Union, Keit’s true intentions were made known – after a hiatus of 12 months he attested for service with the 3rd South African Infantry at Durban on 14 December 1916. This decision must have involved quite a bit of soul –searching. Durban, at this time, was virulently anti-German. As the casualties at the hands of the German Army on the Western Front mounted; more and more local boys, in the flower of their manhood, were mown down, never to return to their families. German-owned businesses, such as Baumann’s Biscuits, were raised to the ground and anyone with a German connection was ostracised and, in many cases, incarcerated for no reason.

Keit’s father, Julius Wilhelm, had many years before this, anglicised his name to William and, despite the great work he had done with the Botanical Gardens, and in his capacity as Head of Parks and Gardens, was victimised and hounded because of his antecedents. It could well have been this that led to his death on 27 August 1916. Felix would certainly have had plenty of food for thought whilst he pondered his next move.

Deciding that the cause was worth it he, as mentioned above, decided to continue the fight. His attestation papers confirmed that he was still single, his mother (of 211 Berea Road, Durban) was now his next of kin, and that he was a Clerk by occupation. no mention of his Boer War service was made but he confirmed his S.A.M.R. service as well as that with the Natal Police. Having being found Fit for service on 12 December (with the exception of deficient teeth which could be put in order within the specified period of six weeks from date hereof), he was assigned the rank of private and no. 10738.

After a 70-day period of training and orientation, Keit sailed for England and the Front on 22 January 1917 aboard the “Walmer Castle” from Cape Town, reaching his destination on 26 March after a 33-day journey. Having spent another 54 days in base, he was despatched to France on 21 May 1917 where he was to spend 1 year and 111 days in the firing line. Having joined his unit on 14 June 1917 he was soon promoted to Corporal and then Acting Sergeant in September 1917.

From the end of April to June 1917 1,448 new recruits and recovered wounded drafts arrive from England to bolster the Brigades many losses, since the last replacements arrived 9 months earlier. Keit was one of these fresh recruits. Preparations were now underway for the Third Battle of Ypres.

On 12th July 1917 the Battle of Messines ended and in August 1917 the S.A. Brigade prepared for Battle of Menin Road and the German “pill-box” threat. On 17th September 1917 they moved into front line, disposed as follows: 3rd Regiment on the right with the 1st Regiment in support, the 4th Regiment on the left with the 2nd Regiment as its support.

Four days later on 20 September, on a wet misty morning at 05:40 the Battle of Menin Road began. Due to careful planning the SA Brigade took all its objectives and the “pill-box” threat was largely diminished. The day was full of gallant individual exploits and the Brigades second VC was awarded to Lance Corporal W.H. Hewitt of the 2nd Regiment for an attack on a “pill-box”. The attack has been described as the “most successful achievement up to that date in the campaign”. This great battle came at a cost with 263 killed and 995 wounded or missing.

On 13-21st October 1917, the SA Brigade’s 2nd and 4th Regiments moved back into front line trenches, to be relieved, on the night of the 16th October by the 1st and 3rd Regiments, and for the next five days took part in no action but were bombarded constantly.

The struggle at Ypres came to a close on the 6th November, when the Canadians carried the last fragment of the Passchendaele Ridge. During late October and November 1917 more new drafts arrive to bolster the thinning SA Regiments.

December 1917 was spent preparing for the upcoming “Great German Attack” (Somme Retreat). On 3rd December 1917, the 2nd and 4th Regiments moved into the front lines on the east slope of Quentin Ridge extending from Gauche Wood, on the right to a point near the head of Flag Ravine. The 1st Regiment were in support and the 3rd Regiment in reserve. Heavy shelling took place during December on this area. Casualties during this time cost the Brigade an average of 30 men a day.

On 8th December 1917, during the night the 2nd and 4th Regiments were relieved by the 1st and 3rd Regiments with the 4th becoming the reserve and the 2nd the support regiment. After constant fighting, on 13th January 1918 the SA Brigade were taken out of the line for a ten-day rest.

On the 23rd January the 2nd and 3rd Regiments moved into the front line, followed by the 1st and 4th Regiments the next day, to be relieved on 31st January 1918 when all four battalions were granted a much needed month’s rest.

On 18th February 1918 the 3rd Regiment was disbanded, its remaining troops dispersed to the other three Regiments, the reason being that there were just not enough replacements coming through. This was mostly likely the reason why, on 2 March 1918, the 3rd S.A.I. was attached to the 20th Entrenching Battalion – this outfit was formed on 20 February 1918 at Sorel-le-Grand. Officers and men arrived from the 3/4th Queen’s, 8th and 9th Royal Dublin Fusiliers, 9th Leicestershire Regiment, 10th Yorkshire Regiment, 10th KOYLI, 14th Hampshire Regiment and 3rd South African Infantry before moving by train to Doingt where they worked with B Company, 7th Canadian Railway Troops at Quinconce (NW of Peronne). They were involved in the fighting against the German spring offensive:

On 23 March the battalion was ordered to move to the west bank of the Somme, south west of Peronne. Next day it moved off in the direction of Harbonnieres, with the Somme bridges being blown as they moved. Was engaged in a defensive action next day near Harbonnieres (no details remain). On 26 March was ordered to be absorbed into 16th (Irish) Division and moved via Bray to Etinehem. Next day, having taken up a position “on a bluff just outside … Morcourt” the battalion mounted a counter attack (again, no details remain).

On 28 June 1918, after a spot of leave at Havre, Keit rejoined his unit but it wasn’t long before he was in trouble – at a Field Court Martial held on 2 August 1918, he was charged under Section 40 A.A. – Conduct to the prejudice of good order and military discipline – “in that he at St. Omer on 12 July 1918, failed to keep proper supervision over prisoners under his charge.” This was a grievous charge and he was accordingly sentenced to be Reduced to the Ranks, promulgated on 5 August 1918. Given Keit’s German antecedents one cannot help wonder if this sentence was additionally harsh on him.

On 19 August 1918 he was returned to base as being “Unfit” – this was precursor to his imminent return to the Union. He sailed aboard the “Cawdor Castle” for South Africa on 16 December 1918, disembarking at Cape Town on 14 January 1919. His Proceedings on Discharge form credited him with 2 years 64 days service and gave him a Military Character of Very Good. Having suffered with Myalgia in the few months of his service, he was discharged as being permanently unfit for general war service, and returned home.

For his efforts he was awarded the 1914/15 Star, British War Medal and Victory Medal to go with his Queens Medal from the Boer War.
Felix Allen Keit never married and passed away at his residence at Hillcrest, outside Durban, on 20 February 1959, at the age of 75. His grandnephew remembers him as being a “difficult man” who didn’t talk much .

Great Sunday Morning Read...... Thanks for your research Rory......

Mike