3-086-086 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Soudan Advance: Commander the Hon. C. Keppel, D.S.O., on his gun-boat the "Zaffir" reconnoitring Osman Digna's position at Shendy, 1898. The Royal Navy in Africa. 'Riflemen in Ambush. Batteries. From a Sketch by our Artist in the Soudan.' In December 1884 Royal Navy officer Admiral Sir Colin Richard Keppel (1862-1947) was appointed to the 2nd Division of the Naval Brigade under Sir Charles Beresford serving on the Nile for the relief of Khartoum. As such, he was with Beresford on the Nile paddle gunboat Safia which had to run upriver to rescue Sir Charles Wilson and the men with him from the wrecked gunboat Talahawijeh and the Bordein, the latter having grounded on Mernat island during its return run (under fire) from Khartoum. It was during this journey that Wilson had established that Khartoum had fallen to the Mahdi and that, in all probability, Gordon was already dead. Shendi, or Shandi, is a small city in northern Sudan, situated on the southeastern bank of the Nile River 150 km northeast of Khartoum. From "Illustrated London News", 1898.