| A Herbivore Too Far: The Collapse of the Rhino Rebellion |
| By Neville Austin Makepeace |
| In the annals of military history, there are some few instances of man and beast acting in harmony to achieve greatness: Hannibal crossing the Alps with his elephants in the Second Punic War, the charge of the Light Brigade in the Crimean War, and of course, the Rhino Irregulars of the Orange Free State. |
| These last have been neglected or maligned by historians, but their story is one of courage, valour, and the vain attempt to triumph over nearsightedness. |
| The Rhino Rebellion of 1901 was an offshoot of the Boer War, and was fought against the backdrop of Queen Victoria’s death and the ending of the era of expansionist colonialism which bears her name. The British Empire faced many foes in the latter decades of the nineteenth century, from the Zulu warriors and the Arabs of Khartoum, to the Indian Rebellion and the Thugee Cult, and the Rhino Irregulars deserve their rightful place among them. |
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| Petroglyph discovered during 1837 Windhoek Expedition. Believed to be from Tuesday, April 5, 1251B.C. |
| The roots of this Regiment of predominantly Scots and Afrikaans cavalry can be found in the early struggle by the Boers of the Orange Free State for freedom from British rule. Dutch farmers from the Cape Colony established themselves in the valley of the Orange River in the 1820’s, and were later reinforced by Scotch émigrés. Fiercely independent, these settlers abhorred foreign influence, and determined to rely on native animals for transportation and communication, rather than allowing British entrepreneurs to import horses into the region. The local White Rhinoceros, a megaherbivore well suited to the rolling plain of the Veldt, was utilized for everything from plowing and harvesting, to the early postal system. |
| Although criss-crossed with rivers and streams, many of the Orange Free State’s waterways are dry creek beds in summer, and even those that boast year-round irrigation have deep, steeply sloped banks and are navigable only for short stretches. Rhino Express Riders became a familiar sight on the dusty trails, their ponderous, lumbering gait affording ample opportunity for fellow travelers to get out of the way before being trampled by the nearsighted beasts, who cannot spot an immobile object more than 100 feet away. |
| It was President Kruger of the neighboring Afrikaans state of the Transvaal who first suggested the formation of the Rhino Irregulars, albeit back-handedly. Upon the conclusion of his state visit to the capital of Bloemfontein in 1897, Kruger slipped and fell on a pile of rhinoceros dung, dropped by one of the fiercely territorial beasts that had formed a Guard of Honor for his departure. |
| Rising from the stinking mass, Kruger proclaimed that, thus protected, the Orange Free State would surely maintain its independence forever. Unremarked in the audience on this occasion was Colonel Angus MacDougal, a discontented Scots émigré who had formerly served with a cavalry unit under Gordon of Khartoum. In the twinkling of an eye, the Rhino Irregulars were born in his imagination. |
| Colonel MacDougal enlisted the enthusiastic support of his superior officer, Major General Ian McNutt, another naturalized Scot, and together they approached President Steyn with the idea of creating the first-ever African Rhinoceros Cavalry (a similar attempt in the 1870’s in the region of Bombay with Indian Rhinos had proven largely unsuccessful). Thus, in February of 1898, the Rhino Irregulars of the Orange Free State were born. |
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| MG Ian McNutt |