The Force On The Island Was Under The Sole
Command Of The Emir Saadalla, Of Gedaref Repute; But, Besides His Own
Followers, Most Of The Men Of The Four Other Emirs Were Concentrated There.
The prospect was uninviting.
Colonel Lewis discovered that he had absurdly
under-rated the strength and discipline of the Dervish force. It had been
continually reported that the defeats at Gedaref had demoralised them,
and that their numbers did not exceed 2,000 men. Moreover, he had marched
to the attack in the belief that they were equally divided on both sides of
the river. Retreat was, however, impossible. Strong as was the position
of the enemy, formidable as was their strength, the direct assault was
actually safer than a retirement through the nineteen miles of gloomy
forest which lay between the adventurous column and Rosaires. The British
officer immediately determined to engage. At nine o'clock the two Maxims,
which represented the artillery of the little force, came into action in
good positions, while the Xth Soudanese and most of the irregulars lined
the east bank. Musketry and Maxim fire was now opened at long range.
The Dervishes replied, and as the smoke of their rifles gradually revealed
their position and their numbers, it soon became evident that no long-range
fire could dislodge them; and Colonel Lewis resolved, in spite of the great
disparity of force and disadvantage of ground, to attack them with
the bayonet. Some time was spent in finding fords across the interposing
arm of the river, and it was not until past ten o'clock that Bakr's men
crossed on to the island, and, supported by a company of the Xth Soudanese,
advanced towards the enemy's right and took up a position at about
800 yards from their line, to cover the rest of the passage.
Colonel Lewis now determined to turn the enemy's left from the north,
attack them in flank, and roll them into the deep part of the river.
With the Xth Soudanese, under Colonel Nason and Major Fergusson, he marched
northwards along the river's edge, sheltering as far as possible under the
curve of the bank from the fire, which now began to cause casualties.
Having reached the position from which it was determined to deliver
the attack, the battalion deployed into line, and, changing front half left,
advanced obliquely by alternate companies across the bare shingle towards
the sandhills. As they advanced, a galling fire was opened upon the left
flank by two hundred Dervishes admirably placed on a knoll. Major Fergusson
was detached with one company to dislodge them. The remaining four
companies continued the attack.
The Dervish musketry now became intense. The whole front
of the island position was lined with smoke, and behind it, from the high
cliff of the west bank, a long half-circle of riflemen directed a
second tier of converging bullets upon the 400 charging men. The shingle
jumped and stirred in all directions as it was struck. A hideous whistling
filled the air. The Soudanese began to drop on all sides, 'just like the
Dervishes at Omdurman,' and the ground was soon dotted with the bodies
of the killed and wounded. 'We did not,' said an officer, 'dare to
look back.' But undaunted by fire and cross-fire, the heroic
black soldiers - demons who would not be denied - pressed forward without
the slightest check or hesitation, and, increasing their pace to a
swift run in their eagerness to close with the enemy, reached the first
sandhills and found cover beneath them. A quarter of the battalion
had already fallen, and lay strewn on the shingle.
The rapidity of their advance had exhausted the Soudanese, and Lewis
ordered Nason to halt under cover of the sandhills for a few minutes,
so that the soldiers might get their breath before the final effort.
Thereupon the Dervishes, seeing that the troops were no longer advancing,
and believing that the attack was repulsed, resolved to clinch the matter.
Ahmed Fedil from the west bank sounded the charge on drum and bugle,
and with loud shouts of triumph and enthusiasm the whole force on the
island rose from among the upper sandhills, and, waving their banners,
advanced impetuously in counter-attack. But the Xth Soudanese,
panting yet unconquerable, responded to the call of their two white
officers, and, crowning the little dunes behind which they had sheltered,
met the exultant enemy with a withering fire and a responding shout.
The range was short and the fire effective. The astonished Arabs
wavered and broke; and then the soldiers, nobly led, swept forward
in a long scattered line and drove the enemy from one sandy ridge
to another - drove them across the rolling and uneven ground, every fold
of which contained Dervishes - drove them steadily back over the sandhills,
until all who were not killed or wounded were penned at the extreme
southern end of the island, with the deep unfordable arm of the river
behind them and the fierce black soldiers, roused to fury by their losses,
in front.
The Sheikh Bakr, with his men and the rest of the irregulars,
joined the victorious Soudanese, and from the cover of the sandhills,
now in the hands of the troops, a terrible fire was opened upon the
Dervishes crowded together on the bare and narrow promontory and on
the foreshore. Some tried to swim across the rushing river to their friends
on the west bank. Many were drowned - among them Saadalla, who sank horse
and man beneath the flood. Others took refuge from the fire by standing
up to their necks in the stream. The greater part, however, escaped to a
smaller island a little further up the river. But the cover was bad,
the deep water prevented further flight, and, after being exposed
for an hour and a half to the musketry of two companies,
the survivors - 300 strong - surrendered.
By 11.30 the whole island was in the possession of the troops.
It was, however, still swept and commanded by the fire from the west bank.
The company which had been detached to subdue the Dervish riflemen
were themselves pinned behind their scanty cover.
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