THE CONGO AND BEYOND
Genius is rare, ivhile idiocy is commonplace.—Pieter Krueler
In mid October 1916 Pieter Krueler and his men had a full week of rest before he was summoned before a German captain. This officer handed him a handwritten order from Lettow-Vorbeck. Following his men being cleared by a thorough medical examination, fewer than half were fit. He was to take a small platoon of commandos, numbering some twenty men, and ride into the Congo basin. There they were to join a German unit that protected German river operations, as well as function as a riverine guerrilla unit attacking Belgian riverboats resupplying Allied troops along the vast river.
Five days later Krueler’s commandos rode out, and after two weeks of complete boredom they reached Kisserya, reprovisioned and rested from the long ride.
I felt that my ass was as tough as granite. I had many years in the saddle, and rode many thousands of miles during the previous war, but I was really done in. I told the men we would rest for a week. We needed it, for we had another good two weeks of riding ahead of us.
I had absolutely no idea about how to run river operations. I had no experience and no real orders explaining my mission in any detail. I was just expected to apply “the Krueler magic” as one officer called it. I then stated that I needed at least three months of quinine for the men. Most of us had suffered malaria, I had been infected twice, and I went from weighing eleven stone [there are fourteen pounds in a stone] to seven stone, and I have never weighed more than nine stone for the rest of my life. After a couple of days of being told there was none to spare for “coloured troops” by an arrogant German sergeant, I had one of my more stealthy Askari slip in and take what we needed.
We crossed north of the small river estuary going around at night. The twenty men and I managed to move at night, hide by day, until after four days we reached a small village called Itumbi. We had to be careful due to the vast marshlands, with quicksand in the most unusual and unexpected places. The locals were quite polite once they realized we were not Belgians, and we were fed, watered, and then moved on to Makowo. After a day’s rest, we were then deep into enemy territory, and we entered thick brush, which then turned into jungle. The men had to dismount and lead their horses on foot, navigating through the dense foliage.483
The Krueler commandos managed to meet with a South African lieutenant (unofficially promoted to first lieutenant by Wintgens, who had no such authority), one of the few Boer officers Krueler met, who was the intelligence officer monitoring the enemy river traffic for Wintgens. Krueler learned that the Boers who joined the German army and police units before the war received their commissions through the colonial governors, approved by Berlin. After hostilities began, this part of the war was completely unknown to even most of Germans and their allies, and was basically a backwater of little significance in the minds of most officers.
The Germans had very good intelligence on the Belgians through the network of tribes who detested their colonial masters. At least the Germans paid them for their work and information. The Belgian colonial army, called the Force Publique, drafted their Askaris at gunpoint, often threatening their families if they did not come willingly. This may sound like propaganda, but the reader who knows their African history may recall the “hand tax” of just a few decades earlier.
Belgian officers commanded the groups, and their enlistment periods were for seven years with low pay and severe discipline: flogging for even minor infractions was the standard. There was a persistent rumor that the Belgians even recruited from some of the more primitive tribes that practiced cannibalism. There seems to be some truth to this assertion. Due to the problem of mass desertions, the British sent five thousand Ugandans to the Belgians, “but many of these deserted, convinced that if food ran short they would be fed to the Belgian Askaris.”484 The term “heart of darkness” seemed quite appropriate, if one may steal from Conrad.
Lettow-Vorbeck knew that his rear area was in grave danger from the Belgians, and knew their ability to interdict German operations as well as river traffic, allowing them to send in troops and materiel with sheer impunity. Krueler was there to see if it could be halted. In discussing the operations in general, Krueler explained one of his operations and situation:
Well, the Germans had riverboats, but they were unable to go very far without being detected, so we once decided to dress as Belgian soldiers, use a stolen boat and ride up and down the river. We would usually move at night, land the boats along the shore and steal fuel, weapons and whatever else we could find. There was not really much fighting. Most of our work was appropriations and intelligence gathering.
Once we did get involved in a serious fight, when a Belgian officer wanted to board our boat. The German officer with us thought that taking him prisoner was a good idea. As soon as the Belgian major approached something happened, and he tried to run away. The enemy soldiers fired machine guns and rifles into us, killing their own officer and nearly sinking the boat. We all fired back, and this lasted for about twenty minutes.
The Belgians finally withdrew and we decided to leave quickly. Going further north would have been suicide; the enemy would surely report our presence. We had spent two months on the river up to that time. But the boat began to sink, and we did not have time or the material to repair it. We ran it aground and decided to head back southwest on foot. This was November 1916, and we had eighteen men [remaining]. When we finally arrived in Southwest Africa at the town of Kobib it was April 1917, and there were only eleven of us. The rest had died from fever, probably malaria, which I still have on occasion, and one man died from snakebite. We were not aware that our short adventure had thrown the entire Belgian Congo military command into a panic, and the German high command decorated all of us.485
By the end of the year Krueler and his men had sunk five Belgian riverboats, captured one steamboat, killed over thirty Belgians and an additional forty-four Allied troops, and captured many weapons, ammunition, and large stockpiles of rice and grain.
The best thing we liberated was a case of champagne. I never really liked the stuff myself, as I was always more of a good lager man. However, the Germans enjoyed it, and they placed the bottles in the river eddies to chill them. I had to moderate their intake, but we had weeks at a time where we could take a few days, relax, clean our gear, check each other for lice, and I personally administered the quinine.
We captured a large stock of [quinine] from a Belgian squad bringing supplies in at Kikondja on our way out of the country. We were so depleted and diseased, we were actually combat ineffective. We had no idea what was going on behind us in East Africa, so the best way to get back to friendly lines was to head to Southwest Africa. Looking at my map, I did not enjoy the thought of walking several hundred miles out of enemy territory, but we would have had to walk the same distance back. My men had had enough. I was taking them to safety, or so I thought.486
Following the operations on the Upper Congo (Lualamba River) Krueler’s men began to suffer from the elements. “Living on the veldt and in the desert was one thing, but the dense jungle environment was something else entirely. It rained almost daily in small amounts, until the early spring saw the seasonal torrential storms that created fresh water rivers that in turn created flash floods that sometimes swept men and material away. The horses eventually became food, one at a time.”487
By February 1917 their clothes had rotted away, boot leather was a molded patchwork, and the men were covered with rashes from a variety of diseases and infected insect bites. And once, Krueler vivdly remembered:
[They were attacked by a very large and very pissed off male gorilla, the first we had ever seen. He just ran right through us on the march. He came right out of the jungle, and we never heard or saw him until he was right upon us. No one was injured, but if there were any enemy troops in the area, we seriously compromised our location. Almost every single man fired at the damned thing. The amazing part of this was that no one hit it, although one of our men was [accidentally] shot, a flesh wound through the thigh. Now we had a wounded man, and were down to only fifteen at that time. If his wound became infected, there was nothing we could do.
Within three days of the gorilla incident the [wounded soldier’s] thigh wound became infected, and we had no astringents. In those days there were no antibiotics, no penicillin, we did not even have soap. I remembered that some of the commandos back home had learned from the Zulu about treating an infected wound, which was four inches long and opened up about half an inch wide. I had each man at various times urinate on the man’s wound. In today’s mindset this sounds disgusting, but uric acid actually cleans the wound. We allowed maggots to form, and bandaged him up with the small creatures in it. I had managed to sew the wound together. Despite a massive scar, he was to be all right.
By the time we reached German-held territory in April, this was 1917, we had covered some four hundred miles by land, and another three hundred, I believe, by water at various times. Once we were on a river estuary and several hippos took a great interest in us. We had managed to take four small paddleboats, and we spent two weeks going downstream, pulling onto the riverbank to make camp at night. I felt that we were the only people in the world, it was so isolated. The day we were encountering the hippos, a couple of the big bastards attacked the first boat. I was in the second, and we were afraid the boat would tip over. We shot those two hippos, and the rest seemed to have received the message. That same night we pulled the boats up on the riverbank, staked them to the ground, and then walked perhaps a hundred yards into the brush.
Whenever we set up a riverbank camp, I had the men clear all foliage away from the camp up to fifty feet from the fire, and then we all dug a six foot [deep] trench around us, which was about four to five feet wide. I did not want any repeats of unwelcomed reptile visitors, or anything else that could crawl in. We always erected one of the small tents that we still had, as the other two had been cut up for footwear or shabby replacement clothing.
I wore a half-assed poncho, my head sticking out and all. The canvas chafed, but it was better than hitting the bush and being totally exposed to the mosquitoes and flies. Once the sentry roster was established we went to 50 percent security, meaning half the men were on watch, the other half rested. Deep in the jungle the sunlight does not penetrate, so daytime is dim and night is pitch black, with the triple canopy jungle holding primates and birds of all kinds. If I were a dedicated naturalist, I could have lived there. However, all I wanted was something resembling civilization.488
One night during the riverine odyssey, the men had set up the standard camp, and while digging came across a pile of some thirty to forty eggs buried in the sand.
We could not believe our luck. I broke one open and the yolk was perfect. We made a fire and I took the one iron cooking skillet we had, and taking a little of the pork fat I always carried in a glass jar we made scrambled eggs. This was quite a bonus. We had been out of rations for weeks. We ate until we were stuffed.
One of the men decided he would go down to the river and wash the pan out. He was perhaps gone fifteen minutes when we heard a massive scream, and the sound of the water exploding. It was dark, but the moon was out, and we could see deep tracks in the mud along the riverbank. I knew then that a crocodile had taken him. The river had a fast current, and there was no way of knowing where his body would be. It was a stupid thought to look for him anyway.
Well, as you can imagine no one slept for the rest of that night, which was a good thing. I was dozing off even though I was on the second watch, and I heard something come out of the water. I immediately alerted all the men. Then it dawned on me. I must have been exhausted from malaria and nutrition deprivation, but the eggs we ate must have been a croc’s nest. Sure as hell this big, and I mean really large crocodile came walking into the camp. The glow of the fire illuminated the beast and my Askari Samuel fired three rounds into it. It measured about fourteen feet in length, and must have weighed well over fifty stones. Well, we lost an Askari, but we gained a month’s supply of meat if it did not spoil, and we had the hide.
I had the beast skinned and the hide cleaned. We all had new footwear after three days in the camp, and were eating the meat. Crocodile meat is greasy and tough, but very nutritious. I decided we would relax and rest up, and as I always did I personally took the rope we carried and placed a perimeter line about two inches off the ground, tied to metal cans that we had placed a few coins and stones in. If anything tripped the rope, we would hear it long before we probably saw it. Luckily, we had no further interruptions for the next three days.489
The men abandoned their boats in early March and continued on foot. Those who still had something resembling boot leather were fortunate. The others had made foot coverings resembling sandals out of dried and woven river grass, and some men even wrapped their feet with remnants of shirts or trousers. Most of the men were nearly completely naked, Krueler included.
Once they had the crocodile shoes and clothes, they all felt quite fashionable. The meat had been dried in a small makeshift smokehouse, where a hole had been dug out of the ground, the meat placed several inches above a charcoal heated pit, covered by banana and palm leaves, then covered by the canvas tent. After fifteen hours of drying per rack over three days the meat was dried and then packed away. Each man packed almost fifty pounds of meat along with his basic load, which had been lightened due to equipment loss or damage.
By the end of March the men made it to Lukengo, having crossed a river a few days earlier that was only chest deep. “I can tell you that after the hippo and croc experience we never looked at crossing water the same way,” Krueler said.
In fact, in conditions such as this I always sent a third of my men across first, and when they made it to the other side, they set up security, both to the front and also looking at the water. The second group would go in and cross, while the third group also covered them with rifles from behind.
Once both groups had crossed, one group maintained frontal security fifty yards [out], as the second group covered the water in a line formation, covering the third group crossing. I took no chances. By this time, I had eleven men. I had lost one man due to snakebite. He was dead within a few hours, and I will not describe what his death was like. All my men had died of disease or wounds, one to snakebite and one to the croc. I never lost anyone else to aquatic creatures. It really was not worth it for the small gains we made, in my opinion.490
Unknown to the Krueler group, the Germans had already lost Togoland on the West African coast, and strong Allied forces had almost removed the German presence in Southwest Africa from the coast to many miles inland.491 On July 9, 1915, the main garrisons had surrendered, with only a few holdouts to the north and east, but those were placed under great pressure from the South African units that operated from their country, with a secured supply line that stretched across the territory. Once the Royal Navy occupied the German ports, the remaining Germans surrendered for the most part. Krueler knew of some of the setbacks, but he did not know how disastrous the German defeats had been.
The German Empire had also lost Cameroon, where British and French diplomats carved up the territory in a mindless frenzy, with the French paying little attention to the political and economic infrastructure, hence sowing the seeds for future problems in their new colony.492 East Africa was being sealed up by a massive British presence drawing from its vast resources across the globe, cutting off German supplies by capturing or blockading all the usable ports.
Krueler and his lost commando had no idea where they were going, or who would be in charge when they got there. This experience would serve him well, as he would see the depths of the Congo many years later under similar circumstances. By June they had finally reached another lost group of Germans with their Askaris who informed them of the situation. Krueler made the decision to head back toward Uganda then back into the Tsavo region. He did not want to go back the same way they had come, so the next three months, while uneventful from a military standpoint, proved to be quite interesting.
In July 1917, Krueler lost another man, this time to malaria. He just sat down, shaking with chills, and then was very still. The dead man was his faithful crocodile killer and point man, Samuel. The ten remaining men said their prayers and buried him at Mabanga, along the shore of Lake Mweru, in Tanganyika. “The sad part was that his village was in Kirambo, on the shore of Lake Tanganyika. We were only a couple of weeks away, but we could not bring his body. I felt bad about that, and still do. It is strange how you can be around death and disease, even sitting and having a meal amongst the corpses, and have no thought of it. Then you have a single death, and for some reason it just impacts upon you. I can’t explain that.”493
The reader cannot underestimate the significance of disease in general, and malaria in particular as a contributing factor to the success or failure of a military force. As stated by Farwell:
Among Africa’s killer diseases, none was more prevalent than malaria. Almost every soldier who served in East Africa contracted some form of it… . The dreaded black water fever, the most dangerous complication of malaria, takes its name from the deep red or black color of the victim’s urine. It is usually sudden with temperatures climbing to 104° or 105° [40° or 40.6° C.], severe chills, nausea, headaches, and vomiting. Jaundice appears within a few hours and large amounts of hemoglobin are released; the body is dehydrated, increasing the chances of renal failure, which causes death in nearly half of all cases.494
There were other diseases inherent to any region, especially in a tropical or subtropical environment. Other illnesses included typhoid fever, sleeping sickness (from tsetse flies), Guinea worms (dracunculiasis from unboiled water containing flea larvae), amoebic and bacillary dysentery, elephantiasis, cholera, and fungal rot: Krueler saw it all and suffered himself from several of these maladies at some point during his career in Africa. In Africa, something as routine as appendicitis was usually fatal.
Men were not the only victims of disease. “Deneys Reitz was particularly affected by the loss of horses: ‘more than 30,000 of these dumb gentle brutes died here, and that part of me which loved and understood horses somewhat died too’.”495 Krueler also lost horses to the “sleeping sickness,” which also wiped out entire herds of cattle, as well as killing men. “The Germans had maps indicating the fly areas and the British were said to have seen these, but little use appears to have been made of them. Even today, at least half of Tanzania is infested with tsetse fly, mostly the Glossina moritans, the cattle killer, but other types as well.”496
In late August 1917 Pieter Krueler and nine other men without any horses managed to evade strong Allied troop concentrations for several weeks, and arrived at Lettow-Vorbeck’s HQ as it was being moved. Smuts was in Morogoro and was striking to take Dar-es-Salaam. “If we had boats, we could have paddled there, so long and hard was the rain, water everywhere was knee deep.” 497 Both sides were hungry, ill, worn out and demoralized.
Due to the condition of the men, Krueler’s group was ordered to rest, and they were given physical exams. The attending physician was shocked at the state of their health. “He said that if we were horses, we would have been shot as an act of compassion,” Krueler remembered.498 He remained off duty until the first week of December, so anemic and diseased as he was, and the order came from Lettow-Vorbeck personally. While convalescing, two more of his Askari died, probably from malaria, but given the many diseases they were exposed to, Krueler would never know the cause of their deaths for certain.
As the Germans relocated time and again, the ill and wounded were carried by the black Africans. Ironically, in Krueler’s case “they tended to argue who was going to carry me. They apparently liked me very much, even though I seemed to be getting a lot of them killed.”499 One memorable event was when Lettow-Vorbeck’s forces crossed the Rovuma River on November 25, 1917 and entered Portuguese-held territory.500 Krueler’s litter carriers tipped him over and he fell into the river, and being too weak to stand on his own almost drowned until they fished him out.
The fight that broke out was quick, but decisive. My understanding was that almost a thousand Portuguese soldiers were waiting for us, and only a couple of hundred [of them] survived. I heard the entire battle, but never participated. In my condition I would have probably shot my own men.501
Farwell’s book also gives these numbers. The Germans captured stockpiles of ammunition, weapons and food, thirty horses, medical supplies, and a looting spree broke out among the Askaris before the officers could intervene and restore order. The Portuguese Askaris were used as carriers for the German force. As the month wore on several other Portuguese installations fell to Lettow-Vorbeck, and the natives, tired of their Portuguese overlords, welcomed them as liberators.502
One benefit to operating in Portuguese Africa was that Governor Schnee could not issue his ridiculous mandates to Lettow-Vorbeck. Farwell remarked on the first six months of the war: “A Boer scout with Lettow-Vorbeck summed it up: ‘This queer war. We chase the Portuguese, and the English chase us’.”503 This scout was undoubtedly Pieter Krueler, as he was, according to Krueler himself, the only scout the general trusted implicitly.
Pieter Krueler was returned to duty in April at his personal request, once he was able to walk under his own power. The dysentery and fevers had passed, and he had responded to the large quantities of quinine he had been given. He had lost half his body weight and had ulcerated sores on his arms and legs that leaked a clear liquid and never seemed to heal.
In the first week of June 1918 the German force captured a Portuguese supply center and “a herd of pigs,” which fed the force on the move. During July 1–3 they captured Nhamacurra (also spelled Namacurra, and Namakura) and two field guns with ammunition, as well as a large amount of quinine when a British steamer landed at the river, along with a British doctor.504
British and Portuguese troops defending the nearby railway station lost 209 dead and 540 taken prisoner. Farwell related the event, which was also described by Krueler: “Many of the enemy troops tried to swim the river to escape capture. That was a bad choice, since the current was strong, and crocodiles took many. That was the kind of war we fought.”505
The Germans had made the largest stockpile capture of the war: “350 Portuguese and British rifles, 10 machine guns, 300,000 kilograms of food, and enough clothing for everyone, Askaris and carriers. There was also more wine and schnapps than could possibly be carried.” Part of their booty was a highly prized trench mortar.506
In late July, Krueler was again unleashed as a scout leader to take a commando on harassing raids, gathering intelligence, and disrupting the enemy wherever they could find them. After a month on patrol with his eleven men, many were ill. What Krueler did not know until years later was that the great influenza pandemic of 1918, which struck all over the world, killing tens of millions over the course of a year, had infected friendly and enemy forces alike, including the civilian populations. Men fell and died, only to be left on the ground. Most of the men still alive were either too ill, exhausted or too busy evading their pursuers to dig graves.
Krueler’s mounted patrol took him back into Rhodesian territory, where his men had one of the most frightening encounters of the entire war.
We had just set up camp, and the low fire was almost out, and the sentries had been posted. Two of my men got up and went to the holes that had been dug over fifty yards from the camp to relieve themselves. I was laying down when I heard screams and the sound of something coming into the camp.
I jumped up and grabbed my rifle when this huge rhino came charging through the camp. He hit one of my Askari head on, the man went flying into the air, and then the beast turned again, as sharp a turn as any I had ever seen, and then charged another man. Men were running everywhere, and several of us started shooting the damned animal. I fired all five rounds, and was reloading when it came towards me. I took aim and fired at the head, but it did not stop. I jumped out of the way and it ran by me, then slowed down, and stood there, snorting.
More rounds were fired into it, and then it just dropped to the ground. I looked around, and I had two men killed and three so badly injured they would have to be left behind. Understand, this was lion and leopard country. I had no choice. I ordered camp broken and we relocated. The sounds of our weapons would have alerted anyone within many miles that we were there.507
Krueler decided that, with his force depleted, it was best to return and reprovision. Not really knowing where the main force was, he sent three of his remaining men to different locations, and showed them his planned route of march. This way they would be able to ride to his checkpoints, and Krueler hoped to inform their sergeant of the main force’s location. Two weeks later one of the messengers returned, and he had a note from a staff officer addressed to Krueler.
The letter basically stated that we were tasked to ride west, toward the Ugandan border south of Lake Victoria and again disrupt the rail network. Considering the fact that we did not have explosives, and I had only four men with me, I was quite unsure how to do this. I decided to ride back to the Rovuma River, where we knew the main German force was headed.508
Krueler reached the river on September 27, a day ahead of Lettow-Vorbeck and the main force.
I met with Vorbeck on the 28th and we had a discussion on many subjects, but especially on the Northern Rhodesian front. His main concern was his rear, the western front of Uganda. He was paranoid of the railway there being repaired and the British sending more soldiers in from behind him. He ordered that I be given the demolitions and ammunition, and take a small squad on horseback and reconnoiter the area west, sending a rider back with intelligence.
This was when he told us, and I think there were seven of us in the meeting, of his plan to go into that territory. He also ordered the sick and wounded to be left behind before he headed into Northern Rhodesia, as they would only slow the march. I also met General Wahle, who was ill with malaria and would also be left behind. I also mentioned the fact that we did not have the proper maps of that area, since there had been no German mapping of it at all, and only the enemy had good terrain relief maps. That was when he said, “That will be your job. Make some good maps quickly, and send them back so I have those soon.”509
There were nine other Boers in the tent, pitched during a break in his march south towards Salisbury. Krueler explained the nature of the meeting:
We were told bluntly that we had the decision to remain or leave. He [Lettow-Vorbeck] was under no illusion as to where the war was going. He stated that he was quite certain the Germans and Askaris would be treated well.
However, given the fact that our country was on the Allied side, he was not too certain about our fates. He was quite certain that the British knew who we were; which meant Smuts, Botha and the rest knew. I felt confident that I would be fine, given my relationship to my former commanders. However, I then thought about the fact that the British were directing this war, and my former friends may not have much in the way of persuasion when it came to my case, or the fates of the others. I decided to leave when the time was right.
I had to wait until about October 12, and then packed up my paper and pencils, pens and ink, dynamite, bullets and dried meat with beans, and gathered my men. We were off to the same area again. Before I left I did draw a map from memory regarding the small area we had operated in, and I told [Lettow-Vorbeck] that it was pretty scarce with regard to enemy movement. I do not know if he ever used the information. I took off the next day and planned on operating back along Uganda, making the maps as best I could, using my compass to properly orient major terrain features and waterways. I always created my own legend and wrote distances using the pace-count method. Later the maps turned out to be pretty good.510
Krueler’s small force had recovered their last two cavalry messengers, and the last engagement of the Great War in Africa in which Pieter Krueler was involved took place in Lettow-Vorbeck’s tent.
I was ordered to take the remaining Boers and go west, do what damage I could, and then we were told to “go away.” I did not understand, and then he told us to do what we could, slow down any British and Allied reinforcements, and then disappear. I knew then that he was concerned about us should we be captured. To be honest, I was exhausted, and tired of the whole damned thing.
There were sixteen of us who mounted up with ammunition and explosives. I saluted the general (he had been promoted), and he extended his hand. I shook it, and it was one of the firmest I ever felt. “Good luck to you Krueler, God bless and live well young man.” That was it. I never saw him again, although we did have some correspondence after the war, quite a few times in fact until his death. The strange thing was that, after the war I became friends with old enemies as well, such as Meinertzhagen, whom I did not much care for when we first met at Tanga, and likewise on his part. After a hunting expedition together many years later, we came to understand each other. Strange the way life is, you think?511
Krueler’s mounted squad only consisted of Boers, leaving the Askaris behind, and they spent the next two weeks placing charges along the railways, and avoiding direct confrontation. After the last charge had been placed he disbanded the commando. Most of the men went with him back towards Southwest Africa, while others headed south, back to their homes in South Africa. “Because we Boers were virtually unknown to the Allies, we just melted away without being noticed.”512
For Pieter Krueler, the second great war of his life was over, and once again he rode off into an uncertain future. He did not know if was a wanted fugitive who could be tried for treason, or if he was just one of the thousands of men who fell from the pages of history, anonymous specters wandering the backcountry.
He and some of his men spent the next few weeks riding west until they reached Windhoek, which had a British garrison of sorts. Deciding to hide their weapons and ammunition, they established a camp in the hill country, shooting game and living off the land for several weeks. In late November one of the men managed to walk into the town, and reading an old newspaper, began asking questions. One of the British soldiers, apparently looking at him with some suspicion, told him the war had been over for three weeks. Playing ignorant, the man walked away, mounted his horse and rode back to inform his comrades.
Once I heard the war was over, I decided that I would have to get a real job, so I began thinking about going back to the mines. It was not great work, but it had paid well. I always thought about Koos Ley, and our days at Kimberley and other mines, the times we had since Spion Kop. I never really got very close to most people, but he was like a brother, as mine were dead. I was alone. I accepted that. It was just the way things were, really.513
Authors note: Krueler stayed in Southwest Africa until 1928, and these missing years he never discussed during the interviews or correspondence that we had. Outside of working cattle on occasion, his life from 1918 to 1928 was a decade completely lost and the issue was not pressed. He stated that he worked cattle again and a few farms, but nothing substantial.
Krueler went back to mining work in 1931 and maintained that employment until 1936, when he was injured in a premature explosion. The injuries were not serious, although he did have many months of occasional numbness in his legs from the blast, which had thrown him into the air. Landing on his back, he heard a cracking sound in his spine, and a sharp pain that felt like fire ran down his spine and legs. It took several weeks before he was able to actually walk without support.
To this day I sometimes have numbness, but it passes. I was told a few years ago that I had fractured three lumbar vertebrae, and they had healed on their own. Apparently, the calcium forming presses against the nerves. I decided not to have surgery, I have had worse. However, I did give up mining. There were more interesting things occurring during that time.514
During the 1930s Krueler did manage to meet and spend time with Jan Smuts, Deneys Reitz, and others with whom he had fought with, and then against. He wanted to know if there were any hard feelings. “I first saw Smuts since 1900 in 1935, and he told me that few Boers had suffered as much as I had, with my family killed, and my being so impressionable. He was the man in charge, and he gave me a pass. He had known me since I was a small one, and was great friends with my father and uncle. He had been the man I rode for, as well as the late Louis Botha. He even had me stay over at his home in Pretoria for a few weeks.
He had requested that Reitz come, and he did. We sat for several days discussing many things, and this was when I learned that De Wet had died in 1922, and Botha in 1919. I did not know any of this, as I was in Windhoek for several years. Smuts and Reitz were very interested in discussing my close working relationship with Lettow-Vorbeck, as he and Smuts became friends, and were still in touch with each other. This was when I obtained his address, learned he was a lieutenant general, and I sent him a letter. From that point on we had good communication until the Second World War broke out. I picked up communication with him again in 1951, I think, or thereabouts.
We discussed the activities in Germany and Italy, and I was updated on a decade of news that I was unaware of. I learned of the Bolshevik Revolution, the [Russian] royal family being killed, and the Japanese fighting in China, all these things. They wanted to know about the mining operations I had been doing, and I told them everything. I was still working there at this time.515
Krueler was lucky to have been the one-time enemy and lifelong friend of the future prime minister of South Africa, and he attended Smuts’s funeral in 1950.
It was a great event; thousands from many nations paid their respects. Lettow-Vorbeck sent his condolences, and I received a letter from him, inquiring about my health. I think that this fact alone is the true nature of the professional warrior. There is no room for hatred. That clouds your judgment. I have been proud to have old foes consider me a friend, and old friends value my life.516
Middle aged, diseased, wounded, and nearly crippled during his lifetime, Pieter Krueler’s life was not over. In fact, it was soon to take on a new chapter of high adventure.