Qualla: Siege of Kimberley https://qualla.com/siege-of-kimberley en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:25 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/k/d/c/s/siege-of-kimberley-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Siege of Kimberley https://qualla.com/siege-of-kimberley Siege of Kimberley: Introduction https://qualla.com/siege-of-kimberley/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. George Labram was an engineer, not a soldier. But in the besieged city of Kimberley, during the summer of 1899-1900, the distinction hardly mattered. Working in the De Beers workshops, Labram designed and built a rifled artillery piece from scratch -- a 100mm gun the defenders christened Long Cecil. It could hurl a 13-kilogram shell six thousand meters. Within weeks of its first firing, the Boers brought in a far heavier gun to silence it. On 9 February 1900, a shell from that gun killed Labram in the Grand Hotel. His funeral, held after dark for safety, was interrupted by Boer shelling -- guided by a traitor inside the town who lit a flare to mark the procession.

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Image: Unknown author | Public domain

]]> Mon, 09 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/k/d/c/s/siege-of-kimberley-wp/kdcs-siege-of-kimberley-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Siege of Kimberley: The Diamond Trap https://qualla.com/siege-of-kimberley/ Photo credit NJR ZA, CC BY-SA 3.0. Kimberley in October 1899 was the second-largest city in the Cape Colony and the source of 90 percent of the world's diamonds. Its population of 40,000 lived just a few kilometres from the borders of two hostile Boer republics. When war broke out on 11 October, the town was almos...

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Image: NJR ZA | CC BY-SA 3.0

]]> Mon, 09 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/k/d/c/s/siege-of-kimberley-wp/kdcs-siege-of-kimberley-the-diamond-trap.mp3 0:06 2 full Siege of Kimberley: Ingenuity Underground https://qualla.com/siege-of-kimberley/ Photo credit Unknown author, Public domain. The siege began in earnest on 6 November 1899, when Boer forces under Commandant Cornelius Wessels demanded surrender and began shelling the town. Their strategy was not to storm the defenses but to starve and bombard the garrison into capitulation. Kekewich's engineers answered ...

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]]> Mon, 09 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/k/d/c/s/siege-of-kimberley-wp/kdcs-siege-of-kimberley-ingenuity-underground.mp3 0:06 3 full Siege of Kimberley: The Hardest Toll https://qualla.com/siege-of-kimberley/ Photo credit Medal created and awarded by the Mayor of Kimberley in 1900, image created by Col André Kritzinger, Public domain. Rationing tightened as weeks became months. The garrison eventually resorted to horse meat. Vegetables were nearly impossible to grow without adequate water, and the scarcity fell hardest on Kimberley's most vulnerable: the 15,000-strong indigenous population and the migrant mine...

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Image: Medal created and awarded by the Mayor of Kimberley in 1900, image created by Col André Kritzinger | Public domain

]]> Mon, 09 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/k/d/c/s/siege-of-kimberley-wp/kdcs-siege-of-kimberley-the-hardest-toll.mp3 0:06 4 full Siege of Kimberley: A Cavalry Charge Through Crossfire https://qualla.com/siege-of-kimberley/ Photo credit Hainer, Paris, Public domain. The first relief attempt, under Lord Methuen, stalled at the battles of Modder River and Magersfontein in December 1899 -- part of the string of disasters the British called Black Week. For two months, 10,000 British troops sat within 12 miles of Kimberley, unable to break throug...

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Image: Hainer, Paris | Public domain

]]> Mon, 09 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/k/d/c/s/siege-of-kimberley-wp/kdcs-siege-of-kimberley-a-cavalry-charge-through-crossfire.mp3 0:06 5 full Siege of Kimberley: What Remains https://qualla.com/siege-of-kimberley/ Photo credit F.H. Hancox, Public domain. The Honoured Dead Memorial stands in Kimberley today, a sandstone monument commissioned by Rhodes and designed by Sir Herbert Baker. Twenty-seven soldiers are entombed within it, built from stone quarried in the Matopo Hills of what is now Zimbabwe. It bears an inscription by Rud...

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Image: F.H. Hancox | Public domain

]]> Mon, 09 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/k/d/c/s/siege-of-kimberley-wp/kdcs-siege-of-kimberley-what-remains.mp3 0:06 6 full