Nearly half the British rifles jammed, owing to the use of leaf cartridges. The Remington rifles used by the Mahdi's soldiers had solid drawn cartridges which did not jam. During the action of Abu Klea the officers were almost entirely employed in clearing jammed rifles passed back to them by the men. The British bayonets and cutlasses bent and twisted, the result of a combination of knavery and laziness on the part of those who were trusted to supply the soldier with weapons upon which his life depends. The bayonets were blunt, because no one had thought of sharpening them. The spears of the Arabs were sharp like razors. The cutlasses of the Naval Brigade were specially sharpened.
I noticed that when a soldier was killed, a bluejacket always endeavoured to secure his bayonet; and that when a sailor was killed, a soldier always tried to take his hat, preferring it to the Army helmet.
The official report of Sir Charles Wilson states the total number of the enemy to have been from 9000 to 11,000, consisting of men from Berber, Metemmeh, Kordofan, and 1000 men of the Mahdi's army. Of the total number, it was estimated that 5000 or 6000 attacked. The British numbered something over 1200 men; but, these being in square, the weight of the attack fell upon no more than about 300 men. There were 342 men of the Royal Artillery on the front face of the square; 235 men on the left flank, reinforced when the charge came by some of the Naval Brigade and a company from the rear face; 300 men and the Naval Brigade, between 40 and 50 strong, on the rear face; and 307 men on the right flank. The centre was a solid mass of camels. This thin framework of men, forced back upon the camels, resisted the tremendous impact of thousands of frenzied fanatics who knew not fear, and whom nothing stopped but death.
I cannot better describe the result than by quoting the words of Colonel the Hon. Reginald Talbot, 1st Life Guards, who commanded the Heavy Camel Regiment at Abu Klea (Nineteenth Century, Jan. 1886):
"It was an Inkerman on a small scale—a soldiers' battle; strength, determination, steadiness, and unflinching courage alone could have stemmed the onslaught."
It was a soldiers' battle, because the attack was sudden; it came before the square was formed; and in the stress and tumult orders were useless.
THE AUTHOR, 1912