The Boers in Sport and Pastime 

Athletic sports, concerts and boxing were other distractions which helped to dispel the dullness and monotony to be expected in a prisoner-of-war camp. There were at least four men amongst the Boers reported to have been able to hold their own in any company at the 100 yards hurdles, half mile, and the mile; and these races were consequently classed as events which were well-worth seeing. But what was described as “the cracker” of the meets was a mile race for boys under 21, for which there were generally about 30 entrants who were able to go a mile as if it were a 220 yard race. Most of them ran bare-footed, their occupation before the war having been the driving of ostriches out to their pasturage, 20 miles off in the morning, and bringing them back at a hand gallop in the evening.

The fun of the day was provided by the Veteran’s race, for which a noble array of plethoric old champions usually turned out. None had perhaps run on a racing track, but there were not a few amongst these old’uns who had done record time over the veldt from a wounded lion or rhinoceros. Household names theirs are in Boer homes, and many a stirring tale they told of “moving accidents by flood and field” in the day when Paul Kruger was still a mighty lion hunter.

The Boer colony possessed two exceedingly skilled pianists, one of whom was said to be the finest in Ceylon in those times, and that easily. Among other unique souvenirs of the Boer concerts, is a programme of one which was organized by the Hollanders to celebrate Queen Wilhelmina’s birthday, described as “the first during her loyal Colonials’ captivity in Ceylon.”

Source: Boere Krygsgevangenes in Ceylon