As it had been given too few camels, the column had to return to Korti to bring up the remainder of the Camel Corps. This was a serious logistical miscalculation, which led to a loss of vital time.
From Khartoum an increasingly desperate Gordon managed to get a message to Wolseley, saying that the garrison was starving, but that in any rescue attempt, Wolseley should not leave Berber (to his rear) in enemy hands.
Chapter 4
OPERATIONS IN THE SUDAN: THE NILE EXPEDITION, 1885
The Mahdi now controlled a vast area from Daru in the west to the Red Sea, and to Gondoroko in the south. Tribes continued to flock to his banner. Aware of the British advance along the Nile, the Mahdi was preparing to meet it between Abu Hamed and Merowe. To the east the hinterland remained largely in Osman Digna’s hands.
From his headquarters at Korti, Wolseley advised the British government to send a fleet to Suakin as a demonstration of force, and to deceive local tribes into believing that a landing was imminent. The presence of warships at Suakin could also curb Osman Digna’s influence and reduce the threat to Suakin itself.
In London the government’s main strategic focus remained on destroying the Mahdi. A plan was devised under which a force from Suakin, supplied by rail, would link up with Wolseley’s force at Berber (a town of around 8500 people, which had been a rendezvous for slave merchants from Sennar and Khartoum before they proceeded to Cairo) before the two forces struck at Khartoum. Wolseley’s two columns made slow progress.
Around Khartoum some 50,000 Mahdist followers laid siege to the city, and the chances of a successful breakout declined as time went on. Gordon could not be relieved without a sizeable British force. With starvation and cholera rampant in the city, and the morale of the Egyptian troops shattered, Gordon’s position became untenable. Khartoum fell after a siege of 313 days on 25 January 1885 and the doomed Gordon and his garrison were massacred.
COMMUNICATIONS
FIELD TELEGRAPHY
A vibrating sounder. Source: http://chestofbooks.com/reference/American-Cyclopaedia-11/Telegraph.html.
Members of the Royal Engineers’ Telegraph Battalion (formed in 1884) did important work under very difficult conditions while supporting units under the command of both Wolseley and Graham.
They had to fend off enemy attacks and deal with constant sabotage, lack of transport, termite infestation in poles, broken wires and cracked insulators. In one Nile boat wreck alone an irreplaceable 64 kilometres of line stores were lost. In the absence of poles, and for urgent communications, experiments were carried out using a ‘vibrating sounder’ over a bare wire laid on the ground. This proved effective because of the high resistance to earth in the exceptionally dry conditions.
Sounders were the most common means of transmitting telegraph signals along bare lines laid across the ground. This campaign was the first time the vibrating sounder was deployed and was used as a transmitter.
THE NILE
A telegraph line had been built between Cairo and Khartoum in 1870. The army deployed 133 officers and men and 12 civilians under Colonel C. E. Webber, RE, with 700 kilometres of line, to support the 1885 Nile expedition. The wire used for field telegraphs was stranded galvanised iron wire, less than 5 mm thick. Hardened copper wire was used for long legs along the Nile. The civilian telegraph line ran along the left bank of the Nile, and in 1884 it consisted of these stages:
• Cairo to Asyut - four wires over 354 kilometres;
• Asyut to Aswan - two wires over 815 kilometres;
• Aswan to Wadi Halfa – one line over 338 kilometres;
• Wadi Halfa to Al Dabbah – one line over 635 kilometres;
• Al Dabbah to Merowe – a recently repaired single line over 137 kilometres; and
• Merowe to Khartoum – destroyed.
As Wolseley’s column was deployed along the right bank of the Nile, wire had to be run across the river at several locations (such as Aswan and Wadi Halfa). Between 1 October 1884 and 30 April 1885, 80,671 messages were sent on this route, despite the lines being down at different times for a total of 40 days. In 1885 the furthest south the army telegraph reached was Hamdab.
SUAKIN
Major Turner was appointed Director of Telegraphs at Suakin, where he commanded two sections of the Telegraph Battalion to support the 1885 Suakin expedition. During Graham’s advance on Tamai and later, along the railway route to Handoub, cable was laid from a wagon and then covered with a few centimetres of sand. Once the area had been secured this was followed by an overhead line built alongside the railway line, using bamboo or light tubular iron poles.
Before he learned of Gordon’s death, Wolseley and his staff (which included then Major Herbert Kitchener, who would eventually subdue the region in 1898) had devised two simultaneous tactical operations to capture Khartoum. However, their strategy had real constraints. Khartoum had to be captured by the onset of summer, after which Wolseley believed that losses from disease and heat would be unsustainable. Summer also meant that the low level of the Nile would make navigation impossible. Victory therefore depended on:
• the speed of the advance;
• the success of British arms in defeating attacks en route;
• the maintenance of adequate military and logistic transport; and
• access to sufficient drinking water.
In the first of these two operations, the objective was to be reached by a very long route south, largely along the Nile. This had the advantage that the attacking force could use the river for transport and water. A risk was navigability and the need to secure both banks of the river against enemy riflemen. Therefore a River Column and a Desert Column were deployed, with Wolseley as senior commander and coordinating the overall advance.
Whaler with awning. A contemporary sketch. Source: Louis Jackson, Our Caughnawagas in Egypt, W. Drysdale, Montreal, 1885.
The second operation used a considerably shorter route west from the port of Suakin, supported by a well supplied base defended by the navy. This route was bisected by the town of Berber (still in enemy hands), and also had to cross largely waterless terrain dominated by Osman Digna’s forces. Graham commanded this expedition, which included the New South Wales Contingent.
THE NILE EXPEDITION
Temporary Headquarters: Korti, on the Nile River
Commander: General Lord Wolseley
Chief of Staff: Major General Sir Redvers Buller, VC
Line of Communications (2253 kilometres): Major General Sir Evelyn Wood, VC
THE DESERT COLUMN
Commander: Major General Sir Herbert Stewart, KCB (died of wounds at Kakdul, 16 February)
Strength: 1107 officers and men, 221 local labourers, 2206 camels, 45 horses:
19th Hussars (less one squadron);
Heavy Camel Regiment;
Light Camel Regiment;
Guards’ Camel Regiment;
Mounted Infantry;
Royal Artillery (one battery);
26th Field Company, RE (detachment);
Commissariat and Transport Staff:
11th Transport Company (detachment); and
Field hospital and bearer corps.
THE RIVER COLUMN
Commander: Major General William Earle, CB, CSI (killed at Kirbekan, 10 February)
Strength: 2545 officers and men, about 600 voyageurs, boat crew and haulers, 400 camels:
19th Hussars (one squadron);
South Staffordshire Regiment, one battalion;
Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry, one battalion;
Black Watch (Royal Highlanders), one battalion;
Gordon Highlanders, one battalion;
26th Field Company, RE (detachment);
Egyptian Artillery (one battery);
Egyptian Camel Corps;
Commissariat and Transport Staff:
9th and 11th Transport Companies;
Canadian voyageurs; and
Egyptian and West African boat crew and haulers.
Battle of Abu Klea.
Wolseley’s plan was to secure both routes to Khartoum (south along the Nile and west from the coast) before he began his campaign against the Mahdi. In January he had sent a column (1800 troops and 1118 camels), under Sir Herbert Stewart and his second-in-command Colonel Sir Charles Wilson, RE, to attack and occupy Metemmeh, a small town on the west bank of the Nile opposite Shendi, about 130 kilometres north of Khartoum. Along the way Stewart was to establish a depot at the wells around Abu Klea.
Two days into the march, and a few kilometres short of Abu Klea, they came upon a large Mahdist formation. Stewart’s column bivouacked a little to the north of the wells at Abu Klea on 16 January. On the following morning his troops stood to as the camp was subjected to enemy rifle fire.
The Battle of Abu Klea, 17 January
By 0830 Mahdist tribesmen occupied the high ground in force but, having got the range of the British camp, then withdrew. Stewart decided to advance to attack, and orders were given to form a square.
Cavalry and mounted troops were deployed in front and on both flanks as a protective screen, and to keep the enemy at a distance while the square formed. The column’s baggage and sick and wounded were left in a zareba under guard. Shortly after the square moved off along the bottom of a valley towards the wells, the guns were taken down from the camels and brought into action, while the enemy kept up heavy rifle fire. At one point the left rear corner of the British square became detached and thousands of tribesmen charged towards this gap.
Designed in the USA in 1874, the Gardner gun was an early type of machine-gun. Those used by the Royal Navy in the Sudan were multi-barrelled and fed from a vertical magazine or hopper, and operated by a crank. When the crank was turned, a feed arm positioned a cartridge in the breech, the bolt closed and the weapon fired. Turning the crank further opened the breechblock and extracted the spent casing.
Inside the square, a Gardner gun and dozens of rifles began to jam, and the fight became a fierce hand-to-hand combat. A mass of camels that was being pushed into the centre gave the defenders enough time to regroup and counterattack. The result of this pitched battle was that an enemy force of 10,000 was repelled for the loss of about 150 British dead and wounded, while enemy losses were at least 1100, based on the body count. A less disciplined force would have been annihilated. As it was, one Victoria Cross was awarded for this action.
Stewart then advanced a further 30 kilometres to Metemmeh. Wolseley wanted to use Metemmeh as a logistics base for operations against Khartoum and elsewhere in the Sudan. Securing this village would enable steamers to proceed to Khartoum as soon as a tactical opportunity appeared. Any force reaching the besieged city was to hold it while Wolseley brought up his main force and engaged the enemy in the open. If the Mahdi’s forces withdrew, then Berber would become the next military objective.
Gardner Gun. Source: http://www.gardnerguns.com/Chinn/chinn01_gardner_on_stand.htm
The road to Metemmeh. A contemporary sketch by R. Caton Woodvile, Illustrated London News, 1885.
Stewart ordered a halt on 19 January within sight of Metemmeh. However, a large body of tribesmen appeared and engaged the British. In the ensuing battle Stewart was mortally wounded, and died on 16 February. Having sustained more wounded, the column reached the village of Gubat, a few kilometres south of Metemmeh, leaving Metemmeh still in enemy hands.
Map of Metemmeh with legend. Source: John Grant, Cassell’s History of the War in the Soudan, Map Box, map no.5, Cassell, London, 1885
After Stewart was wounded, Wilson, his second-in-command and intelligence officer, assumed command, and made for the Nile with a small force. En route his troops encountered more of the enemy, but drove them off before he and his men started for Khartoum on four steamers on 24 January. Wilson’s orders were to confirm that Gordon was still holding out.
Wilson and his men sighted Khartoum on 27 January 1885. However, the city had fallen on the 25th and Gordon was killed the following day. Due to a series of mishaps and shipwrecks, Wilson did not reach his own lines at Gubat until 4 February. Two days later he left for Korti, where he briefed Wolseley, who in turn telegraphed London.
The news electrified the empire, including the Australian colonies when newspapers there published the news on 11 February. Gordon’s death both demoralised and angered British troops. The Mahdist capture of Khartoum meant that the previous military strategy was no longer relevant.
On receipt of Wilson’s report, Wolseley advised the British government that it would be another six weeks before he could reach Khartoum with sufficient force to attack the Mahdi (now armed with 15,000 rifles, unlimited ammunition, and Khartoum’s artillery). Wolseley had to wait on a decision by the British government, but he was understandably worried that he faced an enemy with considerably enhanced firepower gained from the arsenal captured in Khartoum.
On 6 February, the same day as Wilson’s departure from Gubat, the River Column, which had been concentrating at Hamdab, started its advance to Abu Hamed with the aim of seizing Berber.
It was approaching the hot season, and Wolseley’s reinforcements would not arrive in time for him to mount an attack in sufficient force on Khartoum. Osman Digna was still at large in the eastern part of the Sudan, operating virtually unhindered across to the coast. Another problem was the collapse of Wolseley’s transport system, as there were no camels available to replace those being overworked carrying troops, supplies and water from one desert outpost to the next.
The Desert Column remained at Gubat for almost a month. From there it carried out sporadic raiding and fired on enemy positions from a steamer on the river, but in the absence of any intelligence reports from the hostile countryside it could do little else. Wolseley dispatched Buller to make an appreciation. He did not like what he saw: many sick and wounded men, a shortage of boots, and insufficient camel transport. He ordered the column to retire, as it was clear the enemy had the upper hand across the region.
This forced the postponement of any British attempt to capture Berber until autumn. Troops were pulled back from Gubat and Abu Klea in the second half of February, the last units in the desert reaching Korti on 16 March.
Wolseley then advised his government of a new plan. He would try to seize Berber by a combined movement of the Desert and River Columns, but for the present he had to withdraw and regroup. The treacherous cataracts along the Nile (whose waters were then falling) had taken a heavy toll on his boats, some of his troops were almost barefoot, and his Desert Column was losing hundreds of camels a day.
Throughout January and February a naval force of seven British warships had been on station near Suakin, some 530 kilometres north-northeast of Berber. Despite some moves from London to send a military force there, nothing happened until news of Gordon’s death was confirmed. Wolseley then asked for the despatch to Suakin of a force of three cavalry squadrons, four infantry battalions, and a battery of the Royal Artillery then in Cairo. This force was to crush Osman Digna.
Progress of the River Column
Earle’s orders were to advance by river and secure Abu Hamed. He was to establish it as his base for a further advance to seize Berber. Half of his force deployed from Korti on 28 December by whalers. Once the rest of River Column reached Hamdab by foot, boat or camel or horse, Earle left there on 24 January.
Intelligence reports confirmed the existence of an enemy force of 3000 at Abu Hamed, but a few days later the number was estimated to be closer to 14,000. Earle decided to concentrate his force at the oasis at Berti, where there was both open ground and an anchorage for boats. When the British entered Abu Hamed they found it deserted. On 4 February Earle was informed that Khartoum had fallen. Wolseley ordered him to remain at Berti until fur
ther orders.
The next day a reconnaissance patrol reported that an enemy force of some 1500 had advanced west from the Shukuk Pass and taken up a position at Kirbekan. Wolseley’s new instructions meant that the capture of Berber remained an important part of his strategy, and Earle was ordered to seize the town.
Because the tribesmen around Kirbekan completely blocked the route, Earle decided to attack. As he closed with the enemy, his forces came under heavy rifle fire. After a six hour fight the British had cleared the hills of tribesmen, but Earle and several senior officers were killed. Intelligence reports had overestimated the enemy’s strength, and it is unlikely more than 800 were present during this action. The River Column returned to Merowe, and then to Korti, where it arrived on 7 March.
On the same day as the battle of Kirbekan (10 February), the Secretary of State for War proposed to Wolseley the construction of a railway from Suakin to Berber. The government suggested that as he might not be able to supply his force during the summer from the countryside or by the Nile route, such a railway could bring up heavy artillery and steamers to Berber preparatory to Wolseley’s assault on Khartoum.
It was also suggested that to ensure the safety of Wolseley’s force, and to prevent an attack on Berber, a ‘demonstration’ should be made from Suakin against Osman Digna. On 18 January 1885 the British sent a garrison force to Suakin to supplement a battalion of Royal Marines already there.
Sir Redvers Buller, VC. Courtesy, The Rifles Berkshire and Wilshire Museum, UK.
As Wolseley wanted to deal decisively with Osman Digna, and neutralise him as a threat to his left flank, more troops were approved. These came first from India, and later from New South Wales. Osman Digna’s death or capture would have an important psychological effect on local tribes. It also would secure the Suakin-Berber route, a vital corridor that had to be in friendly hands if Wolseley’s advance on Khartoum was to be successful.
Sudan 1885 Page 8