Meanwhile, Roberts pursues Piet Cronjé's seven thousand-strong force, which has abandoned Magersfontein to head for Bloemfontein.

General French's cavalry is ordered to assist in the pursuit by embarking on an epic fifty kilometer (thirty-one mile) drive towards Paardeberg where Cronjé is attempting to cross the Modder River.

A pincer movement involving both French's cavalry and the main British force, attempts to take the entrenched position on February 17 a but the frontal attacks are uncoordinated and so are repulsed by the Boers.

Finally, Roberts resorts to bombarding Cronjé into submission.

Roberts now surrounds General Piet Cronjé's retreating Boer army.

It takes ten days to bombard the Boers into submission, and when the British troops use the polluted Modder River as water supply, typhoid kills many troops.

General Cronjé is forced to capitulate at Surrender Hill with four thousand men on February 27.