A unique Boer War artifact, including a mid-1900 signature and image of Winston Churchill from his time as an itinerant soldier and war correspondent just before his final battle of the war, return to England, and first election to Parliament.
Transvaal Hotel, Pretoria, South Africa: 1900. This unique Boer War artifact includes a mid-1900 signature and image of Winston Churchill, dating from his time as an itinerant soldier and war correspondent in the waning months of Queen Victoria’s reign, just before his final battle of the war, return to England, and first election to Parliament.
Three separate items, all of which came to us together, are housed within a single archival frame. First is a single sheet of elaborately headed “TRANSVAAL HOTEL” stationery dated “June 9th, 1900” declaring a “Dinner of Correspondents” to be held “at the Transvaal Hotel on Monday evening next at 7:30”. Among the 26 war correspondents who signed their names was 25-year old “Winston S. Churchill” who inked his name at the bottom of the left column. Churchill was evidently among the last to sign; when the sheet was folded horizontally thereafter, the still-wet ink of Churchill’s signature transferred to the opposing top edge of the page.
To the right of the signed document is perhaps our favorite among the myriad photographs of Churchill, a full-length portrait of him in uniform and slouch hat standing in front of the overturned armored train where he had been captured by the Boers near Chieveley in November 1899. Churchill leans insouciantly on a cane but belies his own casual posture with his countenance, directly regarding the camera with confident intensity. The vintage gelatin silver image, attributed to the Daily News, Durban, came to us in the company of the signed document and is captioned at the lower left “MR. WINSTON CHURCHILL AFTER HIS ESCAPE FROM THE BOERS REVISITS THE SCENE OF HIS HEROISM – THE ARMOURED TRAIN DISASTER – BOER WAR 1899-1900”.
Affixed to the verso of the signed Transvaal Hotel sheet is an autograph letter on the stationery of “Military Attache, Legation of the United States of America, Lisbon” dated “Pretoria, June 13th”. The letter reads “My dear Captain I am very sorry but I must ask you to excuse me from my luncheon engagement today as we are all going out this morning with Lord Roberts [Field Marshal Roberts, 1st Earl Roberts, who led British forces during the Boer War] to view the battle from afar. Yours sincerely, S. L. H. Slocum, U.S. Army”
The signed Transvaal Hotel document measures approximately 8 x 10.5 inches (20.3 x 26.7 cm), the vintage gelatin silver print 6 x 7.5 inches (15.2 x 19.1 cm), and the letter from Slocum 5 x 8 inches (12.7 x 20.3 cm). The Transvaal Hotel document and image of Churchill are matted side-by-side, archivally framed in dark walnut measuring 18.875 x 14.375 inches (47.9 x 36.5 cm), set beneath an ivory mat and glazed with UV-filtering acrylic. The frame’s verso is matted and mylar-glazed to expose the letter from U.S. Military attache Slocum.
In October 1899, the second Boer War erupted between the descendants of Dutch settlers in South Africa and the British. Already one of the world’s highest paid war correspondents, the relentlessly adventure-seeking Churchill swiftly found himself in South Africa with the 21st Lancers and an assignment as press correspondent to the Morning Post. Not long thereafter, on 15 November 1899, Churchill was captured during a Boer ambush of an armored train – the very train pictured in the image. A month later Churchill made a daring and improbable escape, making his way to Durban via Portuguese East Africa with the Boers offering reward for his capture “dead or alive”.
Churchill entered Pretoria on 5 June 1900 with victorious British troops as a Lieutenant in the South African Light Horse. Four days later, on 9 June, he signed this document committing to join his fellow war correspondents for a dinner on “Monday evening next” – 11 June. It seems quite likely that Churchill missed dinner; on Monday 11 June 1900 Churchill fought at Diamond Hill – generally acknowledged as the turning point of the war - with what General Ian Hamilton called “conspicuous gallantry” as well as “initiative and daring” and, at a critical moment, a grasp of “the whole layout of the battlefield”. It was Churchill’s turning point as well. Diamond Hill was Churchill’s last military engagement until the First World War. By 20 July Churchill was back in England and on 1 October he was elected to Parliament.
Stephen L’Hommedieu Slocum (1859-1933) was assigned in 1899 to be the US representative to observe the Boer War. He would later be assigned to the US embassy in London during the First World War and was awarded the Distinguished Service Medal by his own nation and made a Companion of the Order of the Bath by the British.
The guest book of the Transvaal Hotel records among its bevy of noteworthy guests Winston Churchill, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Leo Amery, British commanders John Brocklehurst, Edward Brabant, Horace Smith-Dorrien and Herbert Plumer, Acting President of the South African Republic Schalk Burger, and the Boer Generals Christiaan de Wet, Louis Botha, and Ben Viljoen. In 1899, just before the outbreak of war, the hotel was upgraded and given a third story. Item #008183
Price: $12,500.00