left wing of Roberts' main thrust. (Other thrusts were by Mahon and Hunter over the Bechuanaland border, by Buller up from Natal and a semi-independent command under Hamilton, which might have been French's had he not been out of favour.) French lost another 184 of his still unacclimatised horses making—on Roberts' orders—a forced march to the Vet River. Botha was now making a stand along the River Zand, in front of the Orange Free State's temporary capital at Kroonstad. French was ordered to encircle Botha from the left, accompanied by Hutton's Mounted Infantry, while Broadwood struck from the right. Roberts over-ruled French's wish to make a wide encirclement and ordered a shallower one—this lost the advantage of surprise, and Botha pulled his forces back so that French ran into strong resistance on 10 May. Roberts now ordered French to pull back and make a deeper encirclement as he had originally proposed, with a view to cutting the railway behind Kroonstad. However, French's cavalry were now too tired, after an advance of forty miles, to achieve much, and Botha's army escaped. The Times History later praised French's rapidity of movement but criticised him—unfairly in Holmes' view—for failure to concentrate his forces. Transvaal Roberts halted in Kroonstad to repair the railway and refit between 12 and 22 May. New horses arrived for French, but a third of them were unfit for action, and French and Hutton were only able to muster 2,330 effectives. French and Hamilton were now sent to threaten Johannesburg from the left. Roberts entered Johannesburg (31 May) and Pretoria (5 June), although without pressing Botha to a decisive battle in either case. French correctly dismissed talk of victory as premature, and continued to spend much of his time inspecting remounts—the job of Director of Remounts at Stellenbosch had been given to an incompetent and manic depressive officer, who eventually shot himself. French played a key role at the victory over Louis Botha at Diamond Hill (11–12 June) in the north-east Transvaal. French, leading one of his own brigades in the usual encircling movement, came under heavy fire—a medical major was shot at his side—but held his position despite Roberts' permission to withdraw. In mid-July French operated against de Wet's guerrilla force around Pretoria, although he did not understand that this was an autonomous force, and advised Roberts that the best defence would be to continue to attack Botha's main