History in the hills

Four days, 20 passes, 10 battlefields: a road trip through KwaZulu-Natal's storied Battlefields region

- Cyril Klopper

Start your journey in Mkhondo (formerly Piet Retief) and head out of town on Kruger Street, which eventually becomes the R543 regional road.

The tar is worn, and it's inevitable that you'll hit a pothole or two along the way.

Exactly 8 km outside Mkhondo's centre, turn left at the sign pointing to Lüneburg and the Intombe battlefield along the P45. The tar here is in even worse condition than the R543, but the upside is that traffic is sparse. That gives you plenty of time to weave around the potholes - and the freedom to slow down and soak up this beautiful Mpumalanga landscape.

You drive past pine plantations and farms producing vegetables, beef and animal feed, with locals along the way filling potholes with soil. About 36 km after turning onto the P45 you'll see a second sign, pointing you towards your first point of interest: the Intombe battlefield (by now you've crossed into KwaZulu-Natal).

The name appears in several forms – Ntombe in Afrikaans and eNtombe in Zulu - but what matters is that the graves and memorial to the British soldiers who fell here lie about 1.5 km off the road, on the banks of the eNtombe River. For those who like precision, the GPS coordinates are S27.27324 E30.68010.

The Battle of Intombe took place on 12 March 1879, when 104 British soldiers tried to defend a convoy of ox-wagons against roughly 600 Zulu warriors. The Zulus won decisively, losing 30 men to the British toll of 80. The defeat is largely blamed on Lt. Henry Hollingworth Harward, who fled as soon as the Zulus arrived, leaving his troops without a leader. He was later arrested and charged with cowardice.

Adding to the humiliation of the British Empire, the Zulus captured hundreds of Martini-Henry rifles, thousands of rounds of ammunition and 102 kg of gunpowder - spoils that would later be turned against the redcoats in further skirmishes.