A Headache for the Hillman Brothers (9 of 10)

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NORVAL’S PONT VILLAGE JULY 1900: A HEADACHE FOR THE HILLMAN BROTHERS.

With the Burgher forces driven back across the Orange and the Union Jack once again fluttering over the village, Norval’s Pont Bridge was all hustle and bustle. For more than any other conflict, the Great Anglo Boer War depended on railways as had never been seen before. Troops on both sides were shuttled hither and thither along with the vast amounts of war material, horses, mules and all manner of military paraphernalia that this, now first of the “modern wars”, was consuming at an unprecedented rate.

As a rail head on the very limit of British territory, Norval’s Pont station (The Last Outpost indeed!), having only just recently supplanted the trek and transport wagon business as the main carrier of goods, now swelled to an undreamt of importance: the rail yard filled with the noisy marshalling of rolling stock and men working at the coaling and watering of the locomotives on their war-path North and receiving the carriages of the many hundreds of war casualties and refugees on their weary way South; Winter 1900 heralded heady days for this humble spot. So strategic had old John’s ferry point become, in fact, that maps drawn of the area for the war effort denote Norval’s Pont with a much grander and larger “dot” than was used to show the location of nearby Colesberg.

As I sit to write on this chilly June afternoon, a nice warm log fire throwing a warm glow into the bar where I have set up my laptop, I can think of how miserable was the life of a recently arrived Tommy to the village; perhaps sent to man the observation posts atop the nearby koppies after scaling their rocky, frosted slopes with a pack of ammo, rations and a weighty Lee Metford rifle and, perhaps, further burdened by the worry that the water in the field bottle that clanked against his webbing buckles, may well contain the dreaded enteric disease that has already carried off so many of his mates without so much a glimpse of battle, let alone a sighting of Johnny Boojer. It was a soldier’s life alright, but one with few comforts, particularly with the bar at the Glasgow Pont Hotel made “out of bounds” for all but a privileged few senior officers.

And then, around July, as the bitter westerly winds blew Kalahari dust through poor old Tommy Atkins’ tent flap, the most welcome comfort arrived from “who knows where?” clutching the implements of his trade and all his worldly possessions in a simple canvas bag, in the form of Mister G.R Thomas: The “Coolie Barber”.

Army bullsh*t and spit n’ polish is one thing, but a neat haircut and a barber shop shave is quite another! With a letter of permission to set up shop from the District Engineer at Naaupoort (Noupoort), Mister G.R Thomas was welcomed by the Tommies and the railmen with open arms. The station workers quickly had an old paint store in the sidings set up with a few boards to keep the weather out and a smart lick of paint and G.R Thomas’s Indian Barber Shop was in business in very short order. Off duty troops queued throughout the day and railway workers joined them at the end of their shifts. Finally, a home comfort and something that made everyone feel refreshed, fine and dandy was available at the Last Outpost! Not for Tommy Atkins the hairy features of his implacable enemy, but a pink, smoothly lathered and razored chin and cheeks rendered only as one would see in “The Empire”. Everyone was happy.

Or were they?

Next Time: A Close Shave for the Tommies!

Article courtesy of Rod Mann, Owner of the 'Pont, 2005 - 2010