The Boer uprising caught the six small British forts scattered around the Transvaal by surprise. They housed some 2,000 troops between them, including irregulars with as few as fifty soldiers at Lydenburg in the east which Anstruther had just left. Being isolated, and with so few men, all the forts could do was prepare for a siege, and wait to be relieved. By 6 January 1881, Boers had begun to besiege Lydenburg. The other five forts, with a minimum of fifty miles between any two, were at Wakkerstroom and Standerton in the south, Marabastad in the north and Potchefstroom and Rustenburg in the west. Boers begun to besiege Marabastad fort on 29 December 1880.