Drift column had pushed some distance towards the west, and the forces
from Albertina had showed the heads of their columns on the Natal side
of the passes.

The British force was divided between Dundee and Ladysmith. The
Biggarsberg range, the cross-line of the A, is about fifty miles long.
It is traversed from north to south by three passes. In the centre runs
the railway through a defile. Twelve miles to the west of the railway
runs the direct Newcastle-Ladysmith road; eight miles to the east runs
the road Newcastle-Dannhauser-Dundee-Helpmakaar. A third road runs from
De Jager's Drift through Dundee to Glencoe and thence follows the
railway to Ladysmith. Dundee is about five miles from Glencoe on a spur
of the Biggarsberg range. Between the two places by the Craigie Burn was
the camp of Sir Penn Symons, who had under him the eighth brigade (four
battalions), three batteries, the 18th Hussars, and a portion of the
Natal Mounted Volunteers, in all about four thousand men. Thirty-five
miles away at Ladysmith, the junction of the Natal and Free State
railways, as well as of the Natal and Free State road systems, Sir
George White had a larger force, the seventh brigade, three field
batteries, a mountain battery, the Natal battery, two or three cavalry
regiments, the newly-raised Imperial Light Horse, and some Natal
Mounted Volunteers. It is not clear whether there were more infantry
battalions and it seems probable that one battalion and perhaps a
battery were at Pietermaritzburg. The Ladysmith force was at least six
thousand five hundred strong, and its total may have been as high as
eight thousand.

The Boer plan was dictated by the configuration of the frontier and of
the obstacles and communications in Northern Natal. The various columns
to the north of the Biggarsberg had only to move forward in order to