MacKenzie of the Bambatha 1906 Rebellion and 'C' Force S.W.A. WW1.
These 7 pages are the last of the Bambatha rebellion material. I am sure it is in MacKenzie's handwriting and shows the thoughts of officialdom around that time.
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Last 3 pages.
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This is the first of three letters (that I have photostats for) that McKenzie sent to his wife in London. It is far more important than I thought previously as it describes the trip down to Cape Town and the fact that one of the trains carrying troops for SWA crashed on route. Is the crash recorded elsewhere? I took a national gold for my collection of SWA WW 1 but had no idea about this incident.
Note. In this letter McKenzie mentions 'Cotswold'; this was the name of his house in Pinetown, Durban.
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This is the second of 3 letters to McKenzie' wife. I have translated the best I can. there are a couple of nice facts like dates of landing and the name of ships. I think McKenzie got the one name wrong - please check if you are able. He also mentions the horses of which he had not only a military interest but I also know from reading through the original box that he owned most of the wagon transport traveling from Durban up to the old Transvaal and down through what is now the Kruger National Park (Jock of the Bushveld territory) to Delagao Bay (L.M. now Maputo) in Mozambique. In his papers there were documents relating to compensation for oxen that had died through ill treatment. I also have good news in that I have found another letter from McKenzie which was in the photostats of my old SWA WW1 collection which I will post when the time comes. The sad news is that I have been informed that Nigel Maclain died about 5 years ago.
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I have translated the letter as best I can. while doing so I could not help but wonder what 'Dunk's' wife was thinking when she tried to read and to decipher the contents. There doesn't seem to be much in it for a wife living away from her husband (or for the historian).
What interested me were the words "If you have time bring me out....". Does that mean that his wife actually went out to S.W.A. during the war?
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This is the last of the photostats that I have of the McKenzie letters. this is one of the ones I bought and later sold but I found this in my old records. As far as I remember I never had the cover.
Reading my old translation I can see why I bought the letter at the time. But can't understand why I ever sold it! It is not every day that you can read about the capture of a count!
I hope you have enjoyed this exercise as much as I have!
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