3-074-544 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Cholera Camp of the 79th Regiment (Cameron Highlanders) on the Mokattam Heights, Cairo, 1883. 'We have been favoured by a military correspondent with a Sketch of the encampment of the (79th Regiment) Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders, under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel H. H. St. Leger, upon the salubrious Mokattam Heights, outside the south-east angle of the city. It was on July 24 that the first cases of cholera occurred among the British troops in the Citadel, when [two men] died, after eight hours' illness. The regiment was then ordered to make preparations for pitching camp on the Heights. Two more of the men, Privates T. Cameron and J. Dodds, died on the same day...on the morning of the 25th the camp was pitched, and the regiment marched up in the evening...[Six] men died afterwards...[but] only one of these deaths occurred at Mokattam, and the freshness of the air and the cleanliness of the sand appear to have effectually checked the spread of the disease amongst the Regiment, as they have recently had no cholera patients. The elevated situation of this cholera camp, commands a fine view of some parts of the city, with its mosques and minarets...while to the left hand are seen the Pyramids of Ghizeh'. From "Illustrated London News", 1883.