Then, While They Were Yet Dispersed On The Plain,
With No Zeriba To Protect Them, The Chosen Warriors Of The
True Religion
would abandon all concealment, and hasten in their thousands to the utter
destruction of the accursed - the Khalifa
With 15,000 falling upon them from
behind Surgham; Ali-Wad-Helu and all that remained of Osman's army
assailing them from Kerreri. Attacked at once from the north and south,
and encompassed on every side, the infidels would abandon hope and order,
and Kitchener might share the fate of Hicks and Gordon. Two circumstances,
which will appear as the account proceeds, prevented the accomplishment of
this plan. The second attack was not executed simultaneously by the two
divisions of the Dervish army; and even had it been, the power of the
musketry would have triumphed, and though the Expeditionary Force might
have sustained heavier losses the main result could not have been affected.
The last hopes of barbarism had passed with the shades of night.
Colonel Broadwood, with nine squadrons of cavalry, the Camel Corps,
and the Horse Artillery, had been ordered to check the Dervish left,
and prevent it enveloping the downstream flank of the zeriba, as this was
held by the Egyptian brigade, which it was not thought desirable to expose
to the full weight of an attack. With this object, as the Dervishes
approached, he had occupied the Kerreri ridge with the Horse battery and
the Camel Corps, holding his cavalry in reserve in rear of the centre.
The Kerreri ridge, to which reference has so frequently been made,
consists of two main features, which rise to the height of about 300 feet
above the plain, are each above a mile long, and run nearly east and west,
with a dip or trough about 1,000 yards wide between them. The eastern ends
of these main ridges are perhaps 1,000 yards from the river, and in this
intervening space there are several rocky under-features and knolls.
The Kerreri Hills, the spaces between them, and the smaller features
are covered with rough boulders and angular stones of volcanic origin,
which render the movements of horses and camels difficult and painful.
The cavalry horses and camels were in the dip between the two ridges;
and the dismounted men of the Camel Corps were deployed along the crest of
the most southerly of the ridges, with their right at the desert end.
Next in order to the Camel Corps, the centre of the ridge was occupied by
the dismounted cavalry. The Horse Artillery were on the left.
The remainder of the cavalry waited in the hollow behind the guns.
The tempestuous advance of Osman soon brought him into contact with
the mounted force. His real intentions are still a matter of conjecture.
Whether he had been ordered to attack the Egyptian brigade, or to drive
back the cavalry, or to disappear behind the Kerreri Hills in conformity
with Ali-Wad-Helu, is impossible to pronounce. His action was, however,
clear. He could not safely assail the Egyptians with a powerful cavalry
force threatening his left rear. He therefore continued his move across the
front of the zeriba. Keeping out of the range of infantry fire, bringing up
his right, and marching along due north, he fell upon Broadwood.
This officer, who had expected to have to deal with small bodies on the
Dervish flank, found himself suddenly exposed to the attack of nearly
15,000 men, many of whom were riflemen. The Sirdar, seeing the situation
from the zeriba, sent him an order to withdraw within the lines of
infantry. Colonel Broadwood, however, preferred to retire through
the Kerreri Hills to the northward, drawing Osman after him.
He replied to that effect.
The first position had soon to be abandoned. The Dervishes,
advancing in a north-easterly direction, attacked the Kerreri Hills
obliquely. They immediately enveloped the right flank of the mounted troops
holding them. It will be seen from the map that as soon as the Dervish
riflemen gained a point west and in prolongation of the trough between the
two ridges, they not only turned the right flank, but also threatened the
retreat of the defenders of the southerly ridge; for they were able to
sweep the trough from end to end with their fire. As soon as it became
certain that the southerly ridge could not be held any longer, Colonel
Broadwood retired the battery to the east end of the second or northern
ridge. This was scarcely accomplished when the dip was enfiladed, and the
cavalry and Camel Corps who followed lost about fifty men and many horses
and camels killed and wounded. The Camel Corps were the most unfortunate.
They were soon encumbered with wounded, and it was now painfully evident
that in rocky ground the Dervishes could go faster on their feet than the
soldiers on their camels. Pressing on impetuously at a pace of nearly seven
miles an hour, and unchecked by a heavy artillery fire from the zeriba
and a less effective fire from the Horse battery, which was only armed with
7-pounder Krupps of an obsolete pattern, the Arabs rapidly diminished the
distance between themselves and their enemies. In these circumstances
Colonel Broadwood decided to send the Camel Corps back to the zeriba under
cover of a gunboat, which, watchfully observing the progress of the fight,
was coming down stream to assist. The distance which divided the combatants
was scarcely 400 yards and decreasing every minute. The cavalry were
drawn up across the eastern or river end of the trough. The guns of the
Horse battery fired steadily from their new position on the northern ridge.
But the Camel Corps were still struggling in the broken ground, and it was
clear that their position was one of great peril. The Dervishes already
carpeted the rocks of the southern ridge with dull yellow swarms, and,
heedless of the shells which still assailed them in reverse from the zeriba,
continued to push their attack home.
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