Thence the
first half-battalion were brought to Kunur in steamers. The second wing -
since the need was urgent and the steamers few - were jolted across the
desert from Railhead on camels, an experience for which neither their
training nor their clothes had prepared them. By the 16th the whole force
was concentrated at Kunur, and on the following day they were reviewed by
the Sirdar. The first three days at Kunur were days of eager expectation.
Rumour was king. The Dervish army had crossed the Atbara at Hudi, and was
within ten miles of the camp. Mahmud was already making a flank march
through the desert to Berber. A battle was imminent. A collision must take
place in a few hours. Officers with field-glasses scanned the sandy horizon
for the first signs of the enemy. But the skyline remained unbroken, except
by the wheeling dust devils, and gradually the excitement abated, and the
British brigade began to regret all the useful articles they had
scrupulously left behind them at Dabeika, when they marched in a hurry
and the lightest possible order to Kunur.
On the 19th of March the gunboats reported that the Dervishes were leaving
the Nile, and Mahmud's flanking movement became apparent. The next day the
whole force at Kunur marched across the desert angle between the rivers to
Hudi. The appearance of the army would have been formidable. The cavalry,
the Camel Corps, and the Horse Artillery covered the front and right flank;
the infantry, with the British on the right, moved in line of brigade
masses; the transport followed. All was, however, shrouded in a fearful
dust-storm. The distance, ten miles, was accomplished in five hours,
and the army reached Hudi in time to construct a strong zeriba before
the night. Here they were joined from Atbara fort by Lewis's brigade of
Egyptians - with the exception of the 15th Battalion, which was left as
garrison - and the troops at the Sirdar's disposal were thus raised to
14,000 men of all arms. This force was organised as follows:
Commander-in-Chief: THE SIRDAR
British Brigade: MAJOR-GENERAL GATACRE
1st Battalion Royal Warwickshire Regiment (6 companies)
" " Lincolnshire Regiment
" " Seaforth Highlanders
" " Cameron Highlanders
Egyptian Infantry Division: MAJOR-GENERAL HUNTER
1st Brigade 2nd Brigade 3rd Brigade
LIEUT.-COL. MAXWELL LIEUT.-COL. MACDONALD LIEUT.-COL. LEWIS
8th Egyptians 2nd Egyptians 3rd Egyptians
XIIth Soudanese IXth Soudanese 4th "
XIIIth " Xth " 7th "
XIVth " XIth "
Cavalry: LIEUT.-COL. BROADWOOD
8 squadrons
2 Maxim guns
Camel Corps: MAJOR TUDWAY
6 companies
Artillery: LIEUT.-COL. LONG
Detachment, No. 16 Company, E Division R.A.,
with 6 five-inch B.L. howitzers
Egyptian Horse Battery (6 guns)
Nos. 1, 2, and 3 Field Batteries Egyptian Army (18 guns)
British Maxim Battery (4 guns)
Rocket Detachment (2 sections)
Mahmud had early intelligence of the movement of the Anglo-Egyptian army.
His original intention had been to march to Hudi. But he now learned that
at Hudi he would have to fight the Sirdar's main force. Not feeling strong
enough to attack them, he determined to march to Nakheila. The mobility of
the Arabs was now as conspicuous as their dilatory nature had formerly
been. The whole Dervish army - horse, foot, and artillery, men, women,
children, and animals - actually traversed in a single day the forty miles
of waterless desert which lie between Aliab and Nakheila, at which latter
place they arrived on the night of the 20th. The Sirdar's next object was
to keep the enemy so far up the Atbara that they could not possibly strike
at Berber or Railhead. Accordingly, at dawn on the 21st, the whole force
was ordered to march to Ras-el-Hudi, five miles nearer the Dervishes'
supposed halting-place. The detour which the Arabs would have to make to
march round the troops was nearly doubled by this movement. The utter
impossibility of their flank march with a stronger enemy on the radius
of the circle was now apparent.
The movement of the Anglo-Egyptian force was screened by seven squadrons
of cavalry and the Horse Artillery, and Colonel Broadwood was further
instructed to reconnoitre along the river and endeavour to locate the
enemy. The country on either bank of the Atbara is covered with dense
scrub, impassable for civilised troops. From these belts, which average a
quarter of a mile in depth, the dom palms rise in great numbers. All the
bush is leafy, and looks very pretty and green by contrast with the sombre
vegetation of the Nile. Between the trees fly gay parrots and many other
bright birds. The river itself above Ras-el-Hudi is, during March and
April, only a dry bed of white sand about 400 yards broad, but dotted with
deep and beautifully clear pools, in which peculiarly brilliant fish and
crocodiles, deprived of their stream, are crowded together. The atmosphere
is more damp than by the Nile, and produces, in the terrible heat of the
summer, profuse and exhausting perspiration. The natives dislike the water
of the Atbara, and declare that it does not quench the thirst like that of
the great river. It has, indeed, a slightly bitter taste, which is a
strong contrast with the sweet waters of the Nile. Nevertheless the British
soldiers, with characteristic contrariness, declared their preference
for it. Outside the bush the ground undulated gently, but the surface was
either stony and uneven or else cracked and fissured by the annual
overflow. Both these conditions made it hard for cavalry, and still more
for artillery, to move freely; and the difficulties were complicated by
frequent holes and small khors full of long grass.
Amid such scenes the squadrons moved cautiously forward. Having made
the ground good for fifteen miles from Hudi, Colonel Broadwood halted
his force at Abadar, an old fort, and sent one squadron under Captain
Le Gallais seven miles further.
