command of Colonel William Otter. At their first battle, the Battle of Paardeberg the Canadians performed well, and on 27 February 1900 a battalion from the Maritimes end up holding their own ground after a confusing night battle, which just happened to be the moment that the Transvaal General Piet Cronjé chose to surrender, leading to the British and Canadian press to credit the victory to the Canadians, which gave a tremendous boost to Canadian self-confidence. In the warm glow of victory, Laurier agreed to send another 1,320 volunteers to South Africa while the millionaire Lord Strathcona raised a regiment at his own expense in western Canada, recruiting cowboys to form Strathcona's Horse regiment for South Africa. Newspaper coverage of the Boer War presented the conflict as a series of Canadian victories while less flattering news such as defective equipment and uniforms were not mentioned. British Army officers often complained that many of the Canadian officers were inexperienced, incompetent or politically well connected with the worse offender being Colonel Hughes who regarded himself as above taking orders from anybody. Lord Dundonald, the British Army officer who commanded the militia after the Boer War suggested the idea of a "skeleton army" of well trained militia officers who would form the nucleus if the militia were mobilized for war again. Dundonald's ideas were generally adopted, but Dundonald's attempts to involve himself in Canadian politics led to his dismissal on 10 June 1904 as the government announced it was intolerable that a serving officer should be speaking on political issues. In 1904, a new Militia Act was passed to reform the militia by making Canadian officers the equal of British officers and removing the governor-general from exercising command. Laurier had neither forgotten nor forgiven Lord Minto, the Governor-General, for his role in pressuring him to send a force to South Africa in 1899. In 1904, Colonel Otter became the first Canadian chief of staff for the militia through a British officer, Colonel Percy Lake, was appointed inspector general of the militia. To remedy one of the great defects that had been revealed by the Boer War, Eugène Fiset, a Boer War veteran turned deputy minister of the militia, insisted on improving the medical corps of the militia, saying he had seen too many men die in South Africa because of poor hygiene. On 1 July 1905, the last British garrisons were pulled out