Koos de la Rey
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Koos de la Rey (Jacobus Herculaas de la Rey) (22 October 1847 - 15 September 1914) was a Boer general during the Second Boer War and is widely regarded as being one of the greatest military leaders during that conflict.
Born near Winburg, Orange Free State, South Africa, he was the son of Adrianus Johannes and Adriana van Rooyen. He was the grandson of immigrants from Holland who settled in Lichtenburg. He married Jacoba Elizabeth Greeff and the couple settled on the farm Elandsfontein. They had ten children. De la Rey was deeply religious and a small pocket Bible was rarely out of his hand. He had formidable looks - a long neatly trimmed brown beard and a high forehead with deep-set eyes that gave him a prematurely patriarchal appearance.
He did not take a very active part in the First Boer War, but as field cornet in the western Transvaal, he took over Piet Cronje's Potchefstroom siege when Cronjé fell ill.
He is generally regarded as the most powerful and unyielding of the Boer generals during the Second Boer War and as one of the leading figures of Afrikaner nationalism. As a guerilla, his tactics proved extremely successful. De la Rey opposed the war until the last, but when he was once accused of cowardice during a Volksraad session, he replied that if the time for war came, he would be fighting long after all those clamoring for war had given up. This proved to be the case.
De la Rey was noted for chivalrous behaviour towards his enemies. For example at Tweebosch on 7 March 1902 he captured Lieutenant General Methuen along with several hundred of his troops. The troops were sent back to their lines because de La Rey had no means to support them, and Methuen was also released because he had been gravely wounded and de la Rey believed that he would die without the prompt medical attention which only the British could provide.
Koos de la Rey took part in the peace talks at Vereeniging in 1902, which lead to the Treaty of Vereeniging.
On 15 September 1914 he was shot after he ordering his chauffeur to drive through a police roadblock that was set to capture the Foster gang. At the time he was travelling Potchefstroom to encourage troops to support a planned rebellion against the South African government, which had decided to participate in the First World War as a British ally.cs:Koos de la Rey