The 1st Battalion and the 3rd Militia Battalion served in South Africa in the Boer War. This soldier is in winter uniform which is khaki drill service dress having a stand-and-fall collar with regimental badges. Khaki trousers are worn with puttees and black boots. The equipment was the Slade Wallace straps with ammunition pouches on the front of the waist-belt, rolled greatcoat at the back with mess tins in a cover. He has a white canvas haversack, and a water-bottle on a narrow strap slung on the left shoulder. The khaki-covered foreign service helmet has a small red flash on the left side with KOSB in white.
The Maxim gun is on a tripod, a relatively new addition to the Battalion’s weaponry. It fired .303 ammunition fed into the gun on a canvas belt. It had a rate of about 400 rounds a minute, and a range of 1,100 yards. The training for this machine-gun was carried out at the School of Musketry in Hythe. An officer and 10 NCOs and men remained at Hythe until training was complete, and joined the 3rd Battalion KOSB on the Modder River on 18 April 1900.
The illustration is by Hiram Dunn, reproduced by kind permission from his book Borderers in Uniform from 1689 (Published 2018).
