Thus once more unable to overcome concentrations of armed Batswana in open battle, the Boers remained largely confined within their heavily defended laagers while their farms continued to be pillaged by increasingly emboldened raiding mephato. Before his death, on the July 23, 1853, Pretorius must of wished he was once more fighting the Amazulu, who a decade earlier had bravely but hopelessly charged the Boer laagers in tight formation armed only with their long shields and assegai.
The hit and run tactics of the gun-wielding western Batswana were slowly but surely undermining his dream of leading a united South African Republic. In the aftermath of his commando’s failure to defeat Montshiwa’s Barolong at Mosite the wounded, ailing Transvaal Boer President Pretorius became increasingly anxious, if not depressed, about his people’s future. Addressing his Volksraad or “Peoples’ Assembly” he bitterly complained that it was Boer disunity, as well as Batswana guns, that were making it impossible to stem the latter’s raids into the Marico District. An extract from his statement:
