Jim Wallace

Knowing No Fear: the Canadian Scouts in South Africa 1900 - 1902 Jim Wallace

The story of the Canadian Scouts, a small, well-armed, aggressive unit of scouts formed in South Africa in 1900 by a group of Canadians who had finished their tours with other units. It was not an official Canadian unit but a mounted irregular force raised in South Africa by the British. As time went on it had many members from Australia, Britain, New Zealand, and the United States. The original members imbued the unit with a bit of a "wild west" attitude and the Scouts fostered this swashbuckling image. Unlike some "colonial" units, they made no attempt to emulate Imperial units and eschewed British Army spit and polish and parade ground discipline. Rumours of unorthodox behaviour ran rife throughout the short eighteen-month life of the unit, leaving a number of myths, some founded in fact and others the product of an active imagination. Nobody questioned the Scouts' ability to fight and any general would have been thankful to have the unit under his command in wartime.