Colonel Talbot had been continuously employed upon the difficult and arduous convoy duty since the arrival of the Desert Column at Gubat on the 21st. Two days later Talbot started to return to Jakdul to fetch supplies. Not he nor his men nor his camels had a day's rest from the 8th January, when the Desert Column left Korti, till the 27th, when the convoy was back again at Jakdul. The convoy reached Gubat on the 31st January; next day came the news of the fall of Khartoum; and the same evening the convoy marched again for Jakdul with sick and wounded. From Jakdul it returned with Sir Redvers Buller; arrived at Gubat on the 11th February; and started again on the 13th, as already related, with another party of sick and wounded. On the way back to Korti, Colonel Talbot, without engineers or commissariat, constructed a camp and built forts at Megaga Wells, where the main body, including the Naval Brigade, joined his convoy on 2nd March.
After Colonel Talbot's convoy had left Gubat on 13th February, I disposed of the poor old Safieh and the Tewfikiyeh, lest upon our departure they should be taken by the enemy. The six brass guns were spiked and thrown overboard, the ammunition was destroyed, the eccentric straps were removed from the machinery, and finally the valves were opened and the vessels sunk.
Then came the sad destruction of the stores for which we had no transport. The number of camels would only suffice to carry rations for three days, by the end of which the Column would have arrived at Abu Klea, where were more stores. When Colonel Talbot's convoy of supplies reached Gubat two days previously, the garrison had for ten days been living on short rations: nevertheless, more than half of what he brought must be destroyed. Count Gleichen (With the Camel Corps up the Nile) says that "19,000 lbs. of flour, 3000 lbs. of biscuit, 21,220 lbs. of beef, 900 lbs. of bacon, 1100 lbs. of tea, oatmeal, preserved vegetables, coffee, and all sorts of stores were pierced and thrown into the river"—an example of waste in war resulting from deficient transport.
Some of the medical comforts, small bottles of champagne and port, were distributed. One among us—I think his name was Snow—took a bottle of wine and swore he would keep it till he drank it in Khartoum. And he did. He went into Khartoum with Kitchener thirteen years afterwards, and drank his libation in the conquered city.
That incident reminds me that, when I went with the party of members of the House of Commons to Russia in 1912, a Russian farmer sent a note to the British admiral, of whom he said he had heard, together with a bottle containing mustard which he had grown, and which he sent as a token that the aforesaid British admiral would give his enemies mustard when he met them; for, said the farmer, the enemies of England would certainly be the enemies of Russia. I have that bottle of mustard.
What went to my heart when the stores were destroyed, was the dreadful waste of my drums of precious lubricating oil, carried so far with so great labour. My tears mingled with the oil as it was poured out upon the sand.
On the 14th February, at 5.30 a.m., the Desert Column quitted Gubat and started on the long return march to Korti, officers and men alike on foot, excepting the Hussars. There was hardly a pair of boots in the whole column. Some of the men cut up old rifle-buckets and tied the pieces with string to the soles of their feet. As for my sailors, they marched barefoot, every man carrying his rifle, cutlass, and 70 cartridges, and many of them towing reluctant camels. One camel to every four men was allotted to carry saddle-bags and blankets; and the camels kept dropping and dying all the way. By the time he had been three days out, Count Gleichen, in charge of the baggage, had lost 92 camels. At first the weather was cool with a northerly breeze, and all started well. On the march, in default of water, I used to spread my clothes in the sun while I rubbed myself all over with sand; a dry bath that was highly cleansing and refreshing. On the 15th February we came to Abu Klea, somewhat weary.
We were of course in constant expectation of attack. On the next day (16th) the Naval Brigade occupied a sand redoubt, on which the two Gardner guns were mounted.
Sir Redvers Buller, finding that the water supply was insufficient and that there was not enough food for the camels, sent on the Soudanese troops, baggage, stores and camp-followers under escort to Jakdul, while he halted at Abu Klea to keep the enemy in check, until the unloaded camels returned from Jakdul, and until further instructions arrived from headquarters. The remainder of the Column, entrenched at Abu Klea, thus became the rearguard, in the air, as the phrase is; isolated for the time being and deprived of transport and reserve stores; a dangerous position forced upon the general by the lack of camels.
In the evening began the customary desert performance, opened by the Dervishes firing at long range from a hill-top commanding the camp, and continued during the long, cold, sleepless night with intermittent sniping to a tom-tom accompaniment. But our men were seasoned by this time; and although one among them was hit now and again, the situation no longer set a strain upon their nerves, but was accepted as part of the routine. That night two men were killed and thirteen wounded. It is true that the faithful José Salvatro, my Maltese servant, who had done and suffered so much, lost patience on this occasion. He was heating cocoa over the fire, when a bullet struck the tin and splashed the hot cocoa all over him.