As a child, I was very lucky, as I now understand it, in the fact that I was born in a large old house built in 1882, and there was a huge one with him, a lot of all sorts of sheds, and there was so much in them. Old history textbooks, tied up in neat packs, magazines "Ogonyok" and "Tekhnika-youth" in 1943, behind the boards in the shed was found a bayonet-cleaver for the rifle "Gra" in 1874, the grandfather had a "Winchester" mod. 1895 In a word, for the boy it was a treasury. There were also very ancient things: kerosene lamps from the firm "Matador" with hoods made in the style of Bernard Palissy, "Bible in pictures by Gustav Dore" and many files of the magazine "Niva". It was from these publications that I learned to draw, but … not always successfully! I drew a battle from Dore, but the book - once, and disappeared somewhere. "Where is the book?" And they answer me that they handed it over to the Second-hand Bookseller, because “as you draw from it, you will explain to the children what you have drawn, they will tell you at home, and … people will say:“They read the Bible in the Taratynovs' family! And we have a family of communists! " My arguments were not strong, but I could draw as much as I wanted from Niva. However, as I grew older, at the same time I became more stupid, and I also passed all these thick volumes to the Second-hand Bookseller, although from childhood I was convinced that I would be a historian, “like a mother.”
This is what the British soldiers of the South African Territorial Forces looked like before the start of the war. As you can see, their uniforms largely corresponded to the theater of operations. That is, there was such a form in Africa. But in 1899, many British soldiers looked like this.
I would not pass it, I could not go anywhere now, but I would sit at home and take photos from there without any problems and read the most interesting articles and reviews. By the way, it was in "Niva" in 1898 that the novel "Resurrection" by L. Tolstoy was published for the first time, and then "The Island of Dr. Moreau" by H. Wells, and I read all this at a very early age.
Surprisingly, during the war, the British actively used the local population of Negro Bechuan, Kaffir and Zuluz against the Boers. But the Boers of the Negroes, for some reason, they could not or did not want to use against the British. One of the explanations is this: the painfully freedom-loving Boers brutally exploited the local aborigines, so much so that they perceived the British … as a lesser evil!
My favorite topic in the magazine of 1899 was the Anglo-Boer War, the knowledge of which I learned from the novel by Louis Boussinard "Captain Rip the Head". Oh-oh-oh, for a while it was my favorite book, and now live photos and graphics "from there" were added to it. True, the text did not contain exactly what was written in the novel, but in principle … the information did not differ so much. But what kind of illustrations were there. And now many, many years have passed, I read "VO" and write in it myself, and suddenly I come across material here about the Boer War. But it is one thing to read the "rehash" of dozens of authors, and quite another - fresh reports with "yaty", "fita" and other delights of pre-revolutionary grammar. But the main thing, of course, is the images. Therefore, when I had a free day, I went to the local museum and filmed "pictures" for two years - 1899 and 1900. For 1901 the magazine was absent, and 1902 was "occupied" by the museum workers. But somehow his turn will also come to him. So, let's look at the Anglo-Boer War as the readers of the all-Russian popular and accessible magazine "Niva" looked at it. By the way, it was then called "Anglo-Transvaal", after the name of the Republic of Transvaal.
Transportation of cannons by drills. Interestingly, the presence of gold mines and diamond mines allowed the Boers to acquire first-class weapons at that time: Mauser rifles in Germany, Le Creusot cannons in France, so it is not surprising that the British were very difficult to cope with them.
Departure of the British from Johannesburg. With the beginning of the war, the Boers laid siege to a number of English cities. Therefore, a general flight of the British began from the Cape Colony.
"Fight of the Boers with the armored train of the British." "Armored trains" the British entered the battle at the very beginning of the war.
"Attack of the Boers on the English convoy." As a child, I did not know how to draw horses, and I redrawn this picture many times, replacing horsemen with Indians and cowboys - all depending on which movie was in the theaters. "Sons of the Big Dipper" - and these were the Indians. "The faithful hand of a friend of the Indians" - cowboy bandits.
"Transportation of horses by sea from the metropolis to Africa." It's a pity for the horses, isn't it?
"They killed a Negro, killed a Negro, killed a Negro …" However, the journal's signature is different - "The Boer patrol is killing a Kaffir messenger in the service of the English army." Why not the other way around?
"Prayer of the Boers before the battle." Rice. E. Zimmer. It should be noted here that the photographs at that time in the magazine were printed with great difficulty. They were retouched several times. Therefore, sometimes it was easier to print a drawing made like a photograph. Louis Boussinard also emphasized the piety of the Boers.
"The Boers bury the slain Englishmen." A very good photo or drawing from the point of view of the PR. Here, they say, what they are, these Boers, good. Indeed, many people in Russia felt sympathy for them.
The Boers are pulling the Long Tom cannon up the mountain. Again, Boussinard has about this gun. What was she like? 155-mm cannon of the Le Creusot firm, with a high power, something like the Russian 152-mm cannon of 1877, but even more powerful. So is it any wonder that the British wanted to destroy this weapon with all their might.
“Transportation of cannons by bulls. Fig. from nature. It is interesting that our journalists worked in Africa and … they drew from life, and messages were sent from Natal by telegraph. And no one bothered them!
"Drill on horseback, fully armed." Another favorite drawing from Niva. And whoever he visited me - an Indian, and a knight, and a musketeer. But note that in his hands he is not holding a Mauser, but an English Martini-Henry rifle, rather old, single-shot and with a lead bullet from a Boxer cartridge in a paper wrapper.
"Reconnaissance of the British in the area of the Modder River." But Boussinard did not write about this, that the British used the latest technological advances and, for example, corrected the fire of their guns by telegraph from a balloon.
This "picture" managed to retain the original signature, but in this case the content itself is more important. Children bring cartridges to the boers! For that time, it was just an unthinkable level of heroism.
And here it is written about how our volunteers formed the Red Cross hospital and, together with the nurses, went to Africa. No, after all, our women are true heroines. The devil knows where to go, the devil knows who to look after and … why, by and large, take a hangover in someone else's feast? But… let's go! They considered it their duty! “Your lot is the burden of the whites, but this is not a throne, but labor. Oiled clothes and aches and itching!"
General Cronier is the "evil genius" of his fatherland. Well, the French Colonel Villebois-Murray told him: "The British will surround you." And he told him: "I was a general when you still did not learn to ride!" God punished him for his conceit!
"General Cronier's troops surrender to the British"
Bullets dum-dum. Everything seems to be clear, but … the British fired from rifles "Lee-Metford" - the magazine and the bolt of the James Lee system, and the rifling in the barrel of William Metford. The "Lee-Metford" rifles had shell bullets and did not unfold when they hit the target. Louis Boussinard writes about the same, calling the bullets contemporary to him humane. The dum-dum bullets are the bullets of the old Martini-Henry rifles. They were no longer in the linear units, but they were owned by parts of the Indian sepoys and parts of the colonial volunteers. But again, as an OL example, this is great information. The experts knew the truth, and “dum-dum” was presented to the general public. Moreover, the bullets of the Russian rifle Berdan No. 2 are also … "dum-dum". Any cylindrical lead bullet, when it hits the target, unfolds in this way! When during the First World War the Berdanks were taken from the warehouses, the Germans also raised a fuss in the press: “The Russians are shooting with forbidden bullets”. But at one time such bullets did not bother anyone for some reason.
And this is how our royal family looked at the turn of the century. Then it seemed to them that everything would be fine. They did not know their fate …
