Guardsman Grenadier Guards, 1898

“A Victorian Jihad”, Redcoats on the Nile 1884-1898

The late 19th C was the high tide of Empire and British forces were engaged in battle in both Egypt and the Sudan. The British had assumed control of Egypt in 1882 after their invasion of the country and the defeat of Egyptian forces at Tel El Kebir.At this time, the Sudan was an Egyptian colony and so British involvement in the affairs of the Sudan was inevitable. In 1881, Mohammed Ahmed, an Islamic prophet, had declared himself the “Mahdi” or “Guided One” and launched a “jihad” or holy war in the desert with the intent of removing all foreigners from the Sudan, both Egyptian and European. He had gathered a large following of tribal warriors known as Dervishes who helped carry out his plan.The Egyptian-manned garrisons in the Sudan were among his main targets.

The largest of the garrisons was at Khartoum. In 1884 the British government decided to evacuate that important city and its fortress by sending major-General Charles George Gordon to organize an orderly withdrawal. Gordon, however, delayed the evacuation too long and found himself under siege by 50,000 warriors of the Mahdi’s army. The British government was reluctant at first to respond to Gordon’s plight but under public pressure sent a military force known as The Nile or Gordon Relief Expedition to rescue him and the soldiers and civilians trapped in Khartoum. Among the forces in the expedition were twenty camel regiments.

Included in the new Redcoat releases in this catalog is a Guardsman of the Grenadier Guards Camel Regiment (1884-1885). The men in these regiments consisted of volunteers who received training in riding camels after their arrival in Egypt. It should be noted that they were not used as cavalry but as mounted infantry. Thus when they were ready for battle they dismounted from their camels and fought in the typical “British Square” formation. Unfortunately, the Relief Expedition arrived too late to prevent the killing of Gordon and the massacre of Egyptians and Europeans at Khartoum.

After this British defeat, the Sudan remained under Mahdist control until 1899. However, a new wave of imperial fervor arose in Britain in the late 1890s and the government set in motion a military strategy to re-capture the Sudan. Among the most important battles that led to British victory was the one at Omdurman in 1898. The other Sudan Redcoats release in this series is an 1898 Guardsman of the Grenadier Guards. He is wearing the new khaki drill service uniform that replaced the scarlet tunic of the traditional "redcoat”.