A Prisoner of the Khaleefa: Twelve Years Captivity at Omdurman

by Charles Neufeld

* This well was named “Beer-el-Ummarra” (the well of the Emirs). When ordering its construction the Khaleefa instructed Idris es Saier to put all the important prisoners on the work, as the exercise would do them good. My gang consisted of Ibrahim Wad Adlan, Ajjab Abou Jinn, Mohammad Wad Bessir, Mohammad Abou Sinn, Abdalla Abou Sinn, Ali Wad-el-Hadd, Ahmed Abd-el-Maajid, Mahmoud Wad Said, Hassan Um Barak, and the Shereef Khaleel—the aristocracy, I might say, of the Soudan. We did little or no work ourselves, we paid the imprisoned slaves for doing it; but whenever Idris es Saier made his appearance he would find us all busy. When telling us of the Khaleefa’s orders, Idris hinted that it might be advisable for us to subscribe amongst ourselves for paid labour, and he would take charge of the money. At Wad Adlan’s advice, we said we rather liked the idea of having some work to do to keep us occupied, Adlan knowing that Idris would keep the money and make us work just the same, or else pay over again for another batch of slaves.

Each month a list of the prisoners in the Saier, and an account of their progress in “education” would be submitted to Abdullahi, with recommendations for the release of certain prisoners, and each month, coincident with the preparation of this list, some prisoner would be missing from his usual place that night and next morning—and for ever afterwards; and this is how Soudan romances were managed. Sheep and goats would stray unaccountably. As these accidents always happened about sunset, the concubine would set off with the chained prisoner to bring in the strayed animals at the precise moment when her lord and master was engaged upon his official duties and locking up the prisoners in the Umm Hagar. On his calling at his house, the temporary absence would excite little or no suspicion, but as the hours sped on |123| suspicions were aroused, and if on the following morning or the same night the sheep and goats found their way back unaided, the gaoler’s only way out of the difficulty was to present a favourable report of the conduct of the escaped prisoner, in the hope that his release would be ordered by the Khaleefa. To acknowledge that he had escaped while employed in tending his sheep and goats would be to place the gaoler’s head or liberty in danger, and the eloping couple well knew this. No sooner was the release ordered, than the happy couple would present themselves before the Kadi, to be married right off—the Soudanese damsel in the possession of a husband, with no other wives or concubines to worry her in the house, and her husband free of his chains. True, he might divorce his wife the same day if he so chose, but then his and her object had been gained—they were both clear of the gaoler, whom they knew dare not trump up any case against them in the hope of one or the other being again committed to prison, for, once released by the Khaleefa’s orders, a prisoner might only be recommitted on them. Moreover, if one of the two should relate what had actually occurred, the gaoler himself, having deceived the Khaleefa with his report of good conduct and “education,” would certainly be sent to prison or to the gallows.

I was too important a prisoner to make my escape at all possible by such happy means as those above described. My only hope lay in trusty natives and swift camels which would outstrip my pursuers. I often envied my fellow-prisoners who exchanged the |124| bonds of slavery for those of matrimony, for numbers of them came to see me after their “release,” but I shudder to think what might have happened had I been released by the Khaleefa’s orders, for, following the old adage that a drowning man clutches at a straw, I must have promised marriage to dozens of Soudan beauties (?) in the event of their doing anything towards wheedling their masters or the Khaleefa into releasing me, and it is quite certain that, on my release, I should have met at the prison-gates a clamouring crowd all claiming the honour.

But I should explain how it was that I came into direct contact with the hareems of the gaolers. Having studied physiology and medicine at Königsberg and Leipzig, I was often called upon by the natives in Upper Egypt, before the place was so well known to the travelling public as it is now, and in the absence of doctors, to attend them in cases of sickness or accident. My practice, being gratuitous, was a large one, and I soon became the “Hakeem Pasha” (principal medical officer). My reputation, if it did not precede me, at least accompanied me to Omdurman when I was captured, so that I was in constant requisition at the gaolers’ hareems, paying “professional” visits ranging from cases in which the Khaleefa was soon to be presented with another subject, to the most trivial and sometimes imaginary complaints. So long as the women kept ailing, my life was rendered endurable, for I was able to sit down and chat with them for hours, waiting to see the result of concoctions made from, to me, unknown |125| herbs and roots, of the properties of which I was ignorant; but the results were always satisfactory. The only medicine or chemical I came across of any value in the stores of the Beit-el-Mal was permanganate of potash, and I soon discovered that a Soudan constitution necessitated the application of this in crystals and not in liquid form. The effects, as may be imagined, were rapid, and, though my medical readers might be inclined to doubt the statement, the results were eminently satisfactory both to the patients and myself.

Occasionally I would be sent for to attend some one in the women’s prison, which was situated a short distance from the Saier of Idris. The women’s prison consisted of the common cell and a light zareeba, through which the curious might gaze on the women as they lay stretched on the ground during the day in the sun, undergoing their first period of imprisonment. The majority of the women prisoners were slaves locked up on some pretence or other to prevent their escaping. It might be that their master was arranging for some trading trip which would occupy him for weeks and, maybe, months. The simplest way of preventing his property from running away during his absence was to trump up some charge against her, and have her locked up, knowing that her release might not be obtained until he returned and requested it. As in the mean time she would have to be fed at his expense, and gave her services free to the household of one of the gaolers, he was equally sure that the gaoler would not be too anxious to secure her release. |126|

Married women were sent to prison on all sorts of charges, ranging from suspected conjugal infidelity to the delivery of a curtain lecture. The women prisoners wore light chains connecting their anklets, but their lot was little better than that of the men. A charge of infidelity “not proven,” as the Scotch have it, was followed by imprisonment and the application of three hundred stripes with the courbag, and when the woman had recovered from these, she would be sent into the house of one of the gaolers to be the maid-of-all-work for every one there; she would have to grind corn, attend to the children, carry water, and be driven as a slave night and day for weeks. A Mrs. Caudle or a termagant received from fifty to eighty lashes, and she too on recovery would be sent into one of the gaolers’ hareems to work as hard as her possibly innocent and more severely punished companion in misery. A few weeks of such treatment sent the women back home completely cured of the faults for which they were sent to prison to be corrected, besides which the relation of their experiences acted as an effective deterrent on budding Mrs. Caudles and others.

The unloading of boats was the hardest work we were set to, and we were kept up to the mark by the ever-present lash; we might only be tired and ill when we could afford the luxury of paying for the complaint, for this labour was the most lucrative task our gaolers could set us to; we had either to work, or pay many times the equivalent of our labour. It was in connection with the unloading of boats, and this, |127| too, when I was slowly recovering from my attack of typhus fever after the death of Ahmed Nur ed Din, that I received my first flogging. A young gaoler had pestered me for money, and as I had none to give him, he ordered me to slave at the unloading of the boats. The only way of exhibiting a real refusal was to sit down upon the ground, which I did, upon which the gaoler commenced to drag me towards the gateway of the Saier. On this I got upon my feet and knocked the gaoler off his. He ran to Idris es Saier, told his own tale, and Idris, approaching me, ordered me to get up—for I had again sat down—and assist in the unloading of the boats. I refused, and accused the gaoler of trying to extort monies from me. Upon this Idris struck me with his “safarog” (an instrument almost the exact counterpart of the Australian boomerang, and used by the Soudan tribes for precisely similar purposes); the blow he gave smashed the safarog and stunned me, and while only partly conscious I was turned over and condemned to receive there and then five hundred lashes.

Only sixty or seventy, I was told, were inflicted; the remainder were not given, as Idris, seeing that I was unconscious, believed that I was dead, and in consequence received a terrible fright. I was carried to my place in the cell, while Idris set about clearing himself with the other prisoners, and explaining that it was all the work of the young gaoler. Idris knew what it meant to him had I been flogged to death, and, believing that I would not recover, he, when I did recover, evidently made up his mind to pay out the gaoler who was |128| responsible for his fright in the first place, and for his servility to the other prisoners at the moment when he thought there were good grounds for it.

A FLOGGING BY ORDER OF THE KHALEEFA.