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Updated: July 2, 2025
It is somewhat difficult to follow all the workings of Gordon's mind on this point, nor is it necessary to do so, but the fact that should not be overlooked is Gordon's conviction in the great power for good or evil of Zebehr. Thinking this matter over in the train, he telegraphed from Brindisi to Lord Granville on 30th January, begging that Zebehr might be removed from Cairo to Cyprus.
The financial position of the Egyptian Government in the Soudan was as bad as the military and political. The Khedive's Governor-General at Khartoum, Ismail Yakoob Pasha, was nominally responsible for the administration of Darfour, although Zebehr reaped all the gain. This arrangement resulted in a drain on the Khedive's exchequer of £50,000 a year.
The argument against Zebehr was that he had been an inveterate slave-hunter, and that to put him into supreme power would be to give him unlimited means of gratifying his vices. Against this it must be urged that under the Mahdi's rule the kidnapping of slaves would be just as cruelly carried on as under that of Zebehr.
The slave dealer, taken by surprise, surrendered, and was shot next day, and it would have been well for the Soudan if Suleiman's father Zebehr had paid the same penalty for his rebellion against the khedive. It was in the year 1879 that the khedive Ismail was deposed at Cairo, and Tewfik appointed in his place.
In this affair my desire, I own, would be to take Zebehr. I cannot exactly say why I feel towards him thus, and I feel sure that his going would settle the Soudan affair to the benefit of H.M.'s Government, and I would bear the responsibility of recommending it. "C. G. GORDON, Major-General."
No sooner was one trouble settled than he was off on another expedition, and this time his steps were directed towards Dara, the stronghold of the great prince of slave-dealers, Zebehr Rahama. En route he was nearly starved as well as poisoned by putrid water.
In the same message he repeated his demand for the services of Zebehr, through whom, as has been shown, he thought he might be able to cope with the Mahdi.
Apart from these arguments, Gordon did not believe that Zebehr loved slave-hunting for its own sake, but rather for the wealth and position it gave him. He believed that if Zebehr were made Sultan of the Soudan, his ambitious nature would be satisfied, and he would cease to hunt slaves, the raison d'être for such an occupation being gone.
Notwithstanding the inferior quality of his troops, Colonel Gordon was determined to march on and pay a visit to Zebehr Rahama's camp, one of the boldest acts of his life. Zebehr, himself the head of the cursed slave traffic, was at this time practically a prisoner in Cairo.
Some time after the fall of Khartoum, Miss Gordon made a further communication to Zebehr, but, owing to his having been exiled to Gibraltar, it was not until October 1887 that she received the following reply, which is certainly curious; and I believe that this letter and personal conversations with Zebehr induced one of the officers present at the interview on 26th January 1884 to change his original opinion, and to conclude that it would have been safe for General Gordon to have taken Zebehr with him:
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