battle of Omdurman

Omdurman, battle of (2 September 1898), the decisive battle in the reconquest of the Sudan by Kitchener. His Anglo-Egyptian army (some 26, 000 men) defeated a Mahdist army almost twice its size in a morning, suffering only 48 fatalities and 382 wounded while killing 11, 000 Mahdists and wounding an estimated 16, 000. The battle inspired Hilaire Belloc to write:

Whatever happens we have got
The Maxim gun and they have not

Anglo-Egyptian firepower annihilated massed frontal charges, and hand-to-hand fighting occurred only when the 21st Lancers (including Churchill), having failed to reconnoitre, charged into a substantial force of enraged Mahdists concealed in a wadi and were roughly handled.

Bibliography

• Spiers, Edward M. (ed.), Sudan: The Reconquest Reappraised (London, 1998).
• Zulfo, ʿIsmat Hasan, Karari (London, 1980)

— Edward M. Spiers