Tuesday Boer War Cartoon

I think that this is the last John Tenniel cartoon concerning the Boer War. It appeared in Punch in February 1900.

 

It shows Britannia – bearing a striking resemblance to Athena, the Greek Goddess of War (and Wisdom), congratulating Lord Roberts, ‘Bobs’ as he was affectionately known to the public at large. In December Lord Roberts replaced Sir Redvers Buller as Commander in Chief of the British and Empire forces in South Africa. It certainly seemed to be turning the tide of war in the favour of the Empire forces by the time that this cartoon was published. The next few months would see the sieges raised, both Boer capitals captured and the annexation of the two republics. It wouldn’t bring the end of the war about though. That was just over two long years in the future.

30x30 Direct Watercolour Challenge 2026 *1 - Whitley Bay in the Fifties

 We're off! The challenge begins with my first direct watercolour of this year's challenge. Here it is:-

I'm not going to lie, I'm really pretty happy with this. It kind of just all came off. I do love this kind of nostalgic beach scene - can you believe that kids used to wear a tank yop like that on the beach? I think it's a pretty strong start. Mind you that might mean that it's downhill from here.

#30x30DirectWatercolor

Monday Boer War Cartoon

R.C. Bowman was an American cartoonist who died tragically early at the age of 33 in 1903. He worked for the Minneapolis Tribune and made many cartoons on the subject of the Boer War.

In this one we get comment on the huge rising cost of the war. Joaeph Chamberlain loads another backbreaking package onto the back of John Bull, who is already bent double by the weight of the larger pack he is already carrying. The larger pack is labelled Original Boer War tax, and the second is labelled Additional Boer War Tax. Yet despite all this John Bull is smiling cheerfully and saying “Heavy, of course it’s heavy! But think of the glory!” Of course, the sign reminds readers that the cost of the war so far was $55 million dollars. Whichever way you look at it the Boer War was economically disastrous. The eventual cost was about £210 million – billions in today’s money.

Bow man’s work looks far more modern than the work of Tenniel, Sambourne, Furniss and Partridge. The character figures are more exaggerated and the use of shading is far less heavy. Despite his tragic early death, Bowman’s work pointed to the shape of things to come.

Waiting for June and the 30x30 challenge 2026

I’ll be winding down my Boer War cartoon copies over the next few days. Why? Because tomorrow is the first day of June. June is the month of the 30x30 Direct watercolour challenge. Direct watercolour means no preparation, no preliminary sketching, just making your watercolour painting directly onto your paper. The challenge is to average one painting per day and to complete 30 paintings in the month of June.

I first took part in the challenge in 2018 and I completed it. I repeated in 2019, didn’t start in 2020, completed it in 2021, 2022 and 2023. I started the challenge in 2024 but gave up. I’ll come back to that. Then I completed it again in 2025.

Certainly if you compared my 2025 set of paintings with my 2018 paintings I think you’d agree that I’ve improved. And again, I think that while I’ve produced some paintings I’m delighted with in each set since 2022, I think as a complete set each in the 2020s has been better than the previous. With the exception of 2024. Here’s some of my favourites from each set. Please bear in mind though that these were pretty much the best from each set - they weren't all like this:-

2018

 

2019

 

2021

 

2022

 

2023 

2025

Of course, this does mean that I can end up putting pressure on myself to outdo the previous year. So 2024 came along. And the first few paintings just didn’t work. This put me off and I started begrudging the time to spend doing it. Then I started trying to blag my way through the month by making small pictures in an A6 sketchbook. But the whole thing just made me so despondent I gave up before I was a third of the way through.

So getting off to a decent start tomorrow will be vital. Last year I was pleased with the painting I made of an old Royal Mail van which was so much better than anything I’d done the year before.

One of the obstacles I’ll need to overcome is that last year I broke my shoulder on the last weekend of May and was off work all June. Thankfully it was my left shoulder and I’m right handed so it didn’t affect my ability to paint, and being off work meant I had the time to do it. I’m in work every weekday in June now, so won’t have as much time for painting as I did last year. But then, most of the years I’ve completed the challenge I have also been in work every weekday so this doesn’t necessarily have to make it that much harder.

So, what are my chances? Pretty decent I think. I have the materials that I need- just bought some replacement brushes and paints yesterday. I have enough proper 300 gsm watercolour paper for all 30 paintings. I’ve learned just one or two more techniques since this time last year – only in the last few months have I learned how to use masking fluid, for example. I’ve thought about the sort of things that I might like to paint too – certainly for the start of the month I think I’m going to embrace a nostalgic seaside theme. So all we need now is for June to arrive so we can start. Watch this space.

Sunday Boer War Cartoon

Today’s Boer War cartoon is a copy of an original by Harry Furniss, which appeared in The King on May 19^th 1900.

Harry Furniss is an artist illustrator whose work I have copied in the past. Harry Furniss was born in Ireland but worked for the most part of his career in England. He joined the staff of Punch in 1880 and stayed with the magazine for 14 years, before parting company with them after he sold a cartoon that had appeared in Punch first to Pears soap to use in their advertising.

Harry Furniss was reportedly very upset that he was too young to illustrate Alice in Wonderland when it was published. He did illustrate Carroll’s later Sylvie and Bruno books, but found it to be a very frustrating experience. When the Alice books did fall out of copyright, Furniss did illustrate Wonderland, and I made several copies of his illustrations. Here’s my copy of his illustration of Alice falling down the rabbit hole.

I don’t know “The King” magazine and I haven’t been able to find out any information about it. I would guess that it was one of many magazines that came along trying to grab a slice of the popularity of Punch and probably didn’t last very long. When Furniss’ attempts to create his own successful humour magazine floundered he moved to America, becoming a writer and actor in very early movies, and reputedly even making an animated film for Thomas Edison.

To the cartoon, then. I’ve been quite critical of the attitude expressed in many of the cartoons I’ve copied, but to be honest I really find this one quite objectionable. The point of the cartoon is to hail Lord Roberts, whose appointment as Commander in Chief of the British Empire forces had seen the tide of the war turn in favour of the Empire. The method Furniss used to do this was to compare the war to a grand military tournament. It puts me specifically in mind of the Royal Tournament, the world’s largest military pageant and tattoo staged annually from 1880 to 1999. I saw it a couple of times with my cub scout pack in the early 70s.

Comparing the bloody business of war to a military pageant is not something I can get in board with. But far, far worse than this is the central image of Lord Roberts, on horseback, plunging his sword into what one can only hope is an effigy of the head of a Boer soldier. It’s pretty horrible.

Technically, I do think it’s a brilliantly executed cartoon. If you look at my copy of the Alice in Wonderland illustration above, I think you can tell that the rabbit and horse images were composed by the same artists. I do like the back view of the large soldier in the foreground, almost a silhouette. It’s remarkable to think that ten years earlier, Furniss, Tenniel, Linley Sambourne and Bernard Partridge were all contributing to Punch at the same time. What a talented team.

Saturday Boer War Cartoon

J.M. Staniforth here again. This one appeared in June 1899 in Wales’ Evening Express. It’s another cartoon published during the few months leading up to the outbreak of the Boer War.

What we see is John Bull, seemingly with toothache having bitten hard on something too tough to bite through. He stands before what looks to be a lushly forested area, and bears a piece of paper in his right hand, which seems to refer to President Paul Kruger’s ultimately fruitless meetings with Alfred Milner, the British High Commissioner for Southern Africa and Governor of the Cape Colony. On the floor is a roll with the words Uitlanders Petition. The caption is A Hard Nut To Crack.

What I like about this is that it doesn’t seem to lay the blame at the feet of supposed Boer stubbornness, but admits that the whole situation is extremely difficult. If anything, it seems as if the cartoon is saying that Uitlanders’ petition is the problem. The cartoon seems a pretty good forecast of what the next couple of years would bring. Yes, eventually the Boers did have to surrender, the Transvaal and Orange Free State were annexed and eventually would be part of the Union of South Africa. But it was very difficult for the British Empire, with all the huge resources at its command, to accomplish and cost a staggering amount in terms of money and lives. A hard nut indeed.

Friday Boer War Cartoon

Today’s cartoon appeared in a French magazine during the early months of the war, drawn by Jead’Aurian.

It shows Transvaal president Paul Kruger, with a sickle in his right hand and his left arm around a young lady, who has an armful of flowers. Slightly behind and to the left is Queen Victoria, with a wounded left arm and a worried expression on her face. The young lady has Republique d’Orange written on the hem of her dress. The sling around Victoria’s left arm has the word Ladysmith upon it, and the bandage on her head has the word Glencoe. The inscription below is:-

“Nous n’irons pas aux Boers, les lauriers sont coupés, la belle que voila vient de les ramasser!” – which is a pun on the first line from an old traditional French rhyme. If you substitute bois for Boers you get, - we will not go to the woods, because the laurel trees have been cut down and the beautiful girl has come to gather them up - . Which pretty much seems to have the meaning that the best peas have gone to farrow. The meaning when applied to the images are basically that the Transvaal has embraced the Orange Free state, and together the two Boer republics have wounded Britain with the siege of Ladysmith and the heavy casualties inflicted upon the British forces at the Battle of Glencoe, also called the Battle of Talana Hill, the first major engagement of the war.

What strikes me about this cartoon is how modern it looks stylistically. In terms of the modelling of the main figures it might easily have been made in the 1960s or after. If anything, this is a pointer towards the future. In Britain, though, the more realistic tradition of Tenniel would continue to be dominant for some time yet.