An incident of the same fight was a duel between two captains of the opposing forces.  In the early parts of the engagement the burghers and the soldiers were so close together that many hand-to-hand encounters took place and many a casualty followed.  Captain Scheppers, of the Boer heliographers, desired to make a prisoner of a British captain and asked him to surrender.  The British officer said that he would not be captured alive, drew his sword, and attempted to use it.  The Boer grasped the blade, wrenched the sword from the officer’s hand, and knocked him off his horse.  The Briton fired several revolver shots at Scheppers while the Boer was running a short distance for his carbine, but missed him.  After Scheppers had secured his rifle the two fired five or six shots at each other at a range of about ten yards and, with equal lack of skill, missed.  Finally, Scheppers hit the officer in the chest and laid him low.  At the same time near the same spot two Boers called upon a recruit in Roberts’s Horse to surrender, but the young soldier was so thoroughly frightened that he held his rifle perpendicularly in front of him and emptied the magazine toward the clouds.

While the siege of Ladysmith was in progress, Piet Boueer, of the Pretoria commando, made a remarkable shot which was considered as the record during the Natal campaign.  He and several other Boers were standing on one of the hills near the laager when they observed three British soldiers emerging from one of the small forts on the outskirts of the city.  The distance was about 1,400 yards, or almost one mile, but Boueer fired at the men, and the one who was walking between the others fell.  The two fled to the fort, but returned to the spot a short time afterward, and the Boer fired at them a second time.  The bullet raised a small cloud of dust between the men, sent them back again, and they did not return until night for their companion, who had undoubtedly been killed by the first shot.  There were many other excellent marksmen in the Boer army, whose ability was often demonstrated in the interims of battles.  After 1897, shooting clubs were organised at Pretoria, Potchefstroom, Krugersdorp, Klerksdorp, Johannesburg and Heidelberg, and frequent contests were held between the various organisations.  In the last contest before the war E. Blignaut, of Johannesburg, won the prize by making one hundred and three out of a possible one hundred and five points, the weapon having been a Mauser at a range of seven hundred yards.  These contests, naturally, developed many fine marksmen, and, in consequence, it was not considered an extraordinary feat for a man to kill a running hare at five hundred yards.  While the Boers were waiting for Lord Roberts’s advance from Bloemfontein, Commandant Blignaut, of the Transvaal, killed three running springbok at a range of more than 1,700 yards, a feat witnessed by a score of persons.