They fought for him in the trenches at Paardeberg not because they loved him, but because they respected him as an able leader.

He did not have the affection of his burghers like Botha, Meyer, De Wet, or De la Rey, but he held his men together by force of his superior military attainments--a sort of overawing authority which they could not disobey.
Personally, Cronje was not an extraordinary character.

He was urbane in manner and a pleasant conversationalist.

Like the majority of the Boers he was deeply religious, and tried to introduce the precepts of his religion into his daily life.

Although he was sixty-five years old when the war began he had the energy and spirit of a much younger man, and the terrors and anxieties of the ten days' siege at Paardeberg left but little marks on the face which has been described as Christlike.