Military: Samuel Pickles - Victorian Era & Boer War

Samuel Pickles was born in Leeds in 1867, and his father died when Sam was only 3 years old. His mother remarried and had several children with her second husband. By the time he was 14, Samuel was working as a coal miner. (For more information on Sam's non-military life, please see his story in the biography section.) Then on 14 July 1885, he joined the Prince of Wales Own (West Yorkshire) Regiment. Samuel would have turned 18 just two months earlier, and his service number was 1047. Without a formal education or an apprenticeship, the army may have been the best alternative to a coal mine.

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According to his service record, Samuel was only 5'4-1/2" at the time of his enlistment. He weighed 117 pounds and had a chest measurement of 33-1/2 inches. These measurements were recorded by the army for uniforms but also for identification purposes. Although it’s possible Samuel was still growing, the family was known to be short (my grandmother, his daughter, was 4'11" tall), so he may have remained that height for the rest of his life for all we know. Growing up in poverty may have meant Sam had poor nutrition, which may have contributed to his slight build. His complexion was 'fresh,' his eyes were grey and his hair was brown. Apparently ‘fresh’ simply meant healthy as opposed to dull, pasty or sickly. His religious denomination was shown as Church of England. Scars on his right knee and left calf were listed under distinctive marks (perhaps a result of working in the coal mine for several years). Sam's character was shown as good. His service record indicates that he was in the 2nd Battalion of the regiment.

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Samuel served at 'home' from 10 July 1885 to 21 February 1887 (1 year and 227 days). This would have covered his training period, but he also would have been deployed. "Home" could have been anywhere in the British Isles including Ireland, which was part of the United Kingdom at the time.

Samuel was then posted to India from 22 February 1887 to 9 February 1893. Different units of his West Yorkshire regiment served in different areas, but one battalion was sent to the ancient city of Mooltan, in the Punjab of India in 1878 and remained there for years. So when Samuel was arrived in India in 1887, he probably served in Mooltan (now called Multan in what is currently Pakistan).

Britain had had a presence in India from the mid 1700s. The British East India Company operated throughout the sub-continent and paid for the Indian Army to control their interests. After the Indian Mutiny in 1858, the British government sent in the regular British Army. The two armies worked along side each other, but they were completely different organizations. The British Indian Army was exclusive to India and consisted mainly of British officers with indigenous Indian enlisted men, mostly Muslims and high-caste Hindus. Samuel was in the British Army in India, which had British officers and British enlisted men and served all over the British empire. The two armies would have carried out campaigns together, however, they would not have lived together.

Photograph taken of West Yorkshire Regiment soldiers in India around the time Samuel was in army.

The nature of their service during this window centred on imperial policing, hard frontier training, and the brutal realities of the Indian climate. During the late 1880s and early 1890s, the 2nd Battalion was shuffled between several key military cantonments (garrison towns) across the Punjab, including Multan (Mooltan), Sialkot, Amritsar, and Nowshera.

This was the height of "The Great Game"—the intense, undeclared strategic rivalry between the British and Russian Empires over control of Central Asia. The Punjab garrisons were highly strategic. The West Yorkshires were positioned as a massive rapid-reaction force ready to move to the North-West Frontier if the border erupted or if Russian forces advanced through Afghanistan. But their day-to-day life involved maintaining local colonial law and order. This meant frequent detachments were sent to guard critical infrastructure, secure railway lines, and show a visible British military presence in major regional centres like Amritsar and Lahore.

Samuel’s service record notes that he forfeited his Good Conduct Pay twice while in India—first in September 1887 (just months after arriving) and again in August 1892. This is entirely typical of a British soldier stationed in the Punjab during this era.

Towns like Multan were widely considered some of the most punishing postings in the entire British Empire due to the climate. During the summer months, temperatures regularly breached a staggering 45°C (113°F). To prevent widespread heatstroke, the military high command severely restricted outdoor activities during the day. For months on end, Samuel and his fellow soldiers were confined to their shaded, crowded brick barracks from 8:00 AM until sunset.

Boredom led directly to drinking and minor infractions—such as missing roll call, drunken rowdiness in the barracks, or trading sharp words with a sergeant—frequently resulted in a soldier being hauled before the commanding officer and stripped of his coveted Good Conduct badges. When the weather permitted (predominantly during the cooler winter months), life transformed into a non-stop cycle of intensive tactical training. The British Army was obsessively shifting its doctrine toward rapid, accurate rifle fire. Samuel would have spent weeks on the cantonment rifle ranges firing his Martini-Henry (and later, early Lee-Metford) rifle.

To keep the men physically hardened, the battalion routinely conducted massive multi-day marches across the dusty Punjab plains, carrying full combat gear to simulate rapid deployment conditions. To keep morale high, sports were heavily encouraged.

Though the 2nd Battalion did not engage in any massive campaigns during Samuel's specific window, they still suffered significant casualties. The primary enemy in Victorian India was not a hostile army, but disease. Cantonments were frequently ravaged by outbreaks of enteric fever (typhoid), malaria, and deadly cholera. The regiment's medical officers fought a constant battle against contaminated water supplies and poor sanitation. A peacetime battalion in India would routinely lose dozens of men a year to the graveyard without ever firing a shot in anger.

When Samuel first enlisted in 1885, he signed a standard late-Victorian "Short Service" attestation. Under the Army Act of the era, this engagement meant a recruit bound themselves to 12 years of total service, split into seven years as a full-time active duty infantryman and five years in the Army Reserve (subject to immediate recall). Samuel's initial seven-year active service window technically expired in July 1892. However, regulations dictated that if a soldier's colour service ended while he was deployed at a foreign station, the military had the legal right to extend his active duty for up to an additional 12 months, or until the next mass troopship transport could safely bring him home. In February 1893, the entire 2nd Battalion concluded its long-term overseas tour and was sent home. Samuel was processed out almost immediately. His Military History Sheet shows he spent just four days on home soil before being officially "Transferred to the Army Reserve" on February 14, 1893.

In 1889 the West Yorkshire regiment was moved to Meean Meer (still in the Punjab) and in 1892 was in Seetapore or Sitapur, which is now in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. In 1893, the regiment was in Burma, but that would have been after Samuel returned home.

An artist's depiction of West Yorkshire Regiment soldiers/officers, circa 1890 by R.Simkin published on the cover of an 1892 Army & Navy Gazette. This drawing was created when Samuel Pickles was serving in India, but the uniforms depicted are officers rather than enlisted men, who would have had more modest attire.

In total Samuel spent 5 years and 354 days in India. He was again serving at 'home' from 10 February 1893 until 13 February 1893, which was just enough time to sort out his discharge. Then he was listed as 'res' from 14 February 1893 until 28 January 1900. This would appear to mean that he was in the reserves, and might indicate his willingness to continue in the army, but there may not have been enough work for the soldiers they had at the time. It was common to furlough or 'lay off' soldiers after a war or campaign, but Sam's enlisted time was up.

Samuel ended up back in Leeds, where he grew up, and he returned to coal mining. On 26 December 1893, he married Margaret Connell. Margaret was 23. Sam was 25, and the marriage register shows he was working as a coal miner. Although he indicated he was Church of England on his army attestation, they were married in St. Patrick's Roman Catholic Church in Leeds, because Margaret was from an Irish Roman Catholic family. The church had been built only a couple of years before in 1891 so was practically new.

Samuel and Margaret had their first child the following year, Isabel, born in 1894. Their next child was named Luke and was born in 1896, but he died in 1897. Son John was born around 1898.

On 9 January 1900, Samuel returned to the army. He'd had active service from 1885 until 1893 and was on reserve after that. But the Boer War began in October 1899 in South Africa. Officially known as the Second Anglo-Boer War, and most recently as the South African War, this conflict lasted until May 1902.

The Boers (Dutch colonists) and the British had been in conflict for years. During the 1800s, British subjects and other Europeans settled in southern and eastern Africa. The Boers had colonized an area that they named The Transvaal Republic. When gold was discovered there, settlers from other countries moved in. The Dutch government of the colony refused to give the non-Dutch residents voting or any other rights for fear of losing power to the other Europeans, especially the British who owned significant territory in Africa. This conflict eventually turned to full-on war between the South African Dutch government and the British Empire in 1899.

While Sam’s 12-year promise to the army would have expired in 1897, when a Victorian soldier completed his full service and was discharged with a "Good" character rating, he was offered a choice. He could walk away forever, or he could voluntarily re-enlist in a special branch called Section D of the Army Reserve (often called the Supplemental Reserve). A man in Section D agreed to stay on the military’s books for an additional 4 years. In exchange, the army paid him a steady monthly retainer fee (four pence a day). For a working-class coal miner with a family in Leeds, this was easy, reliable extra money. In 1897, Europe was at peace, and Samuel likely assumed he would just collect his retainer pay and never see a barracks again.

In fact, his Statement of Services ledger shows "Discharged 9-7-97" when his first 12 years ended. But because he immediately re-engaged for Section D, that discharge was superseded. When the the Second Boer War started in 1899, Queen Victoria issued a royal proclamation mobilizing Section D of the army. Because Samuel had voluntarily signed that extension in 1897, he was legally caught in the net and officially "Recalled to the Colours" on January 29, 1900.

Samuel was called back to the Prince of Wales Own West Yorkshire Regiment, probably at the end of 1899, and took up his post in January 1900. While the actively serving contingent of the 2nd Battalion of the West Yorkshire Regiment was sent to South Africa at the end of 1899, the reservist took longer to arrive. After recall in January, Sam, and many others, spent two months at “home,” likely retraining after years away from the army. He would have been sent to South Africa in the second wave of the battalion, arriving in April or May of 1900. He retrained for 66 days before being shipped off to South Africa in April. The trip from England to southern or eastern African ports took approximately a month by ship, so he'd probably have arrived in May.

Photograph taken of West Yorkshire Regiment soldiers in South Africa in January 1900, a few months before Samuel arrived to fight in the Boer War.

In the beginning of the conflict, the British were taken by surprise by Boer attacks on their settlements and were unprepared with a weak military presence in the area. During 1899 and 1900, the Boers defeated the British in several battles and besieged three towns settled by Brits. But the arrival of reinforcements for the British army throughout 1900, including Private Samuel Pickles, ensured victory over the Boers and relieved the besieged settlements. The Boers responded with guerilla warfare tactics that lasted into 1901. The British retaliated with a 'scorched earth' policy that involved burning farms owned by both Boers and indigenous Africans. Residents, including women & children, were rounded up and put in concentration camps, where many died due to unsanitary conditions. The Boers were eventually worn down and surrendered.

Sam’s record shows he served in the Transvaal (officially the South African Republic), which was an entire independent Boer nation—and the ultimate prize for the British Empire due to its incredibly rich Witwatersrand gold fields. After surviving a disastrous start to the war (known as "Black Week") on the borders, British forces launched a massive counter-offensive. Sweeping north with an overwhelming force of over 100,000 men, the British successfully crossed the Vaal River and invaded the heart of the Transvaal.

The West Yorkshires were pushed into the Transvaal to hold territory, secure supply lines, and hunt down mobile Boer commandos. The regiment's most famous engagement during the Transvaal campaign took place near Lake Chrissie at Bothwell Camp in February 1901. To breach the British perimeter, the Boers stampeded a panicked mob of roughly 200 cavalry horses directly through the picket lines under cover of darkness and heavy mist. Despite being utterly blindsided and suffering heavy casualties, the West Yorkshires held their ground with immense steadiness, refusing to break until the Boer attack eventually failed and the commandos withdrew.

For their collective sacrifices, tenacious defensive stands, and battlefield gallantry across Natal and the Transvaal, the regiment was collectively granted the battle honour "South Africa 1900–02." Their total losses on the campaign numbered 159 officers and men who died of wounds or disease. By enlisting in Section D for 4 years in July 1897, Samuel's contract was set to expire in July 1901. But under the terms of the British Army Act, if a soldier's period of service expired while a state of war or national emergency existed, the Crown held the legal right to retain him for an additional 12 months. The military invoked this clause, holding Samuel and thousands of other "old sweat" Section D reservists in the Transvaal until the Boers finally signed the surrender treaty in May 1902.

Unfortunately, Samuel's service record does not provide a detailed account of his time in the army and only mentioned that he was never injured during his military service. Samuel had one major campaign listed on his service record: the 'Transvaal' of 1900, and he appears on the medal rolls for the Queen's South Africa medal and the King's South Africa medal. He may have received other medals or awards during the rest of his service, but he remained a private throughout his military career so either refused or was not offered promotion.

As noted, the war ended with British victory, and the Boer forces finally surrendered on 31 May 1902. The Dutch territories were annexed, and both republics were later incorporated into the new country of South Africa.

Samuel came home in June 1902 and returned to coal mining. He was 35 years old and had spent about 10 years in active service in the army. He had several more children with his wife Margaret while living in Leeds. Samuel died of chronic bronchitis/arteriosclerosis 19 February 1932 at the age of 64. Both chronic bronchitis and arteriosclerosis have been associated with coal mining.