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Updated: June 26, 2025
Volley firing and shell firing dislodged many of them, but others kept potting away, increasing our casualty returns, particularly in the 1st, or Wauchope's brigade. Just then the battle broke out with greater fury than ever. What happened in the dervish army may be guessed. Out of immediate danger and re-formed, the Khalifa and Yacoub determined upon a second attack.
The guns soon came to the relief, and shot and shell fell from steamers on to the devoted host; and Wauchope's brigade coming up, the rout of the dervishes was soon complete. Again the army advanced, and soon after four o'clock the Sirdar with the captured standard of the Khalifa entered Omdurman, arriving just after the Khalifa, with a small body of followers, had succeeded in slipping away.
The ground being now cleared, the gunboats opened with Maxim and cannon upon the rear of the Dervishes. The camel corps coming up, each man dismounted and added his fire to the turmoil; and, finally, three of Wauchope's battalions arrived, and the Lincolns, doubling to the right, opened a terrible flank fire.
They thought he rather fancied himself at that particular job, and supposed that he was some sort of a "pro" who had spoiled his "form" by overdoing it, and had lost the confidence of his backers. They agreed that if Wauchope's friend the curate had given them a straight talk it would have been much straighter.
At the same moment the remaining brigades were wheeled to face west, and Major-General Wauchope's was sent back at the double to help the staunch battalions of Colonel Macdonald, now beset on all sides. Fortunately Macdonald knew his men thoroughly, for he had had the training of all of them, the 9th, 10th, 11th Soudanese, and the 2nd Egyptians under Major Pink.
The four British battalions thereof marched side by side in column, the Lincolns upon the right, the Warwicks on the left, with the Seaforths and Camerons between them. To the right of Wauchope's brigade was Maxwell's, and next it Lewis's Khedivial brigades. Seen upon the desert the army had the appearance of a huge square with front a mile broad.
On the 14th August these stern-wheelers, heavily laden with Wauchope's men, steamed at a fast rate past the Atbara camp, on their way south. These craft, the first of which took part in the 1896 Dongola Expedition, turned out to be really the most useful and dependable of the whole Nile flotilla. They steamed remarkably well, towed splendidly, and were, besides, good fighting craft.
After describing the battle of Magersfontein, he refers to the Highland Brigade: "Being chiefly Highlanders, they were in Robertson's charge. He, good-hearted fellow, was risking his life in the trenches and under fire to find General Wauchope's body. Why he was not killed in his fearless efforts I cannot say."
This movement was admirably executed, and now, supported by a portion of Wauchope's brigade on the right and by Lewis's brigade enfilading the attack on the left, he completely crushed this second most determined dervish charge.
By the west door, Wauchope's friend, the cumbrous curate, who fancied himself as a featherweight, stood smiling and shaking hands with each man as he came, and thanking him for coming, thus carrying out the idea that it was an entertainment. He had his largest smile, his closest grip for Wauchope and for Ransome, for they were men after his own heart.
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