CHAPTER XXIII
THE SOUDAN WAR OF 1884-5
I. SUMMARY OF EVENTS
NOTE
A year before the British forces restored order in Egypt, trouble was beginning in the Soudan. One Mahomet Ahmed, who was the son of a boat-builder, and who had the peculiar conformation of the teeth which betokened the fore-ordained of the Prophet, announced that he was the Mahdi. In July, 1881, the holy man dwelt upon the island of Abba, on the White Nile, above Khartoum. Thence he caused it to be made known that he was the chosen instrument for the reformation of Islam, and that all those who denied him would be abolished. Reouf Pasha, who was then Governor-General of the Soudan, summoned the Mahdi to Khartoum, there to give an account of himself. The Mahdi naturally refused; and when Reouf sent soldiers to fetch him, the Mahdi slew most of them, and departed into the hills, he and all his following. The Governor of Fashoda took an expedition to Gheddeer, and was also slain, together with most of his men. Then Giegler Pasha, a German, acting as temporary Governor-General of the Soudan, succeeded in defeating the forces of the Mahdi. But Abdel Kader, who, succeeding Reouf, took over the command from Giegler, was defeated in his turn. On 7th June, 1882, the Egyptian forces were cut to pieces near Fashoda. In July, the Mahdi was besieging Obeid and Bara. By October, 1882, both places were in danger of falling, and Abdel Kader was demanding reinforcements from Egypt.
The Soudan is a country as large as India; at that time it had no railways, no canals, no roads, and, excepting the Nile during a part of the year, no navigable rivers. In November, 1882, the British Government informed the Khedive that they declined to be responsible for the condition of the Soudan. Lord Granville's intimation to this effect was the first step in the policy which progressed from blunder to blunder to the desertion and death of General Gordon.
The Egyptian Government, left in the lurch, hastily enlisted some 10,000 men, the most part being brought in by force, and dispatched them to Abdel Kader at Berber. At Abdel Kader's request, Colonel Stewart and two other British officers were sent to Khartoum to help him to deal with the raw and mutinous levies.
In December, a number of British officers were appointed to the Egyptian Army in Egypt, in accordance with the recommendations of Lord Dufferin, and Sir Evelyn Wood was appointed Sirdar. The British Army of Occupation had now been reduced to 12,000 men, under the command of General Sir Archibald Alison, who, in the following April (1883) was succeeded by Lieutenant-General F. C. S. Stephenson.
In January, 1883, Colonel W. Hicks, afterwards Hicks Pasha, was appointed by the Khedive chief of the staff of the Army of the Soudan. Before he proceeded to the theatre of war, Abdel Kader had lost and won various engagements, and had reoccupied the province of Sennar; while the Mahdi had taken El Obeid and Bara and occupied the whole of Kordofan.