[48] The battle of Arogee is well described in Holland and Hozier, and by Stanley and Henty. The latter wrote a separate account in greater detail for Battles of the Nineteenth Century, vol. 1, 1890, and there is an admirable essay on the battle, D. G. Chandler’s “The Expedition to Abyssinia, 1867-8", which is to be found in Victorian Military Campaigns, edited by Brian Bond. Flashman’s version is sound, but he adds nothing to the one point of controversy, the exposure of the army’s baggage to attack, which Theodore fortu nately delayed. Henty was in no doubt that if Napier had been facing a European enemy, disaster must have followed; as it was, Napier was quick to retrieve the position. What seems to have happened is that Colonel Phayre, the Quartermaster-General, had reported the defile from which the baggage was emerging to be safe and guarded, when it was not; it has also been suggested that Napier himself had miscalculated the speed of his own advance, and that the baggage got ahead of him. Holland and Hozier tact fully glide over the incident, [p. 243]
[49] The feeling in Napier’s army is reflected in Henry, who pays tribute to the bravery of the Abyssinians, emphasising that they retreated, but did not fly, and that not a spear or a gun was thrown away. He writes of “a slaughter, hardly a fight, between disci plined well-armed men and scattered parties of savages scarcely armed at all.” The firearms of the Abyssinians were certainly infe rior to the Sniders and Enfields, but Henty is not quite fair to the Sikh Pioneers who enjoyed no advantage of weaponry against the enemy spear and swordsmen, were outnumbered, and still won a decisive victory with their bayonets, as Flashman, a veteran of the Sikh War, notes with satisfaction. For the rest, his account of the battle is well corroborated on the British side, and by those who were with Theodore, [p. 243]
[50] When Blanc came face to face with Theodore, “I was quite pre pared for the worst, and, at that moment, had no doubt in my mind that our last hour had come.” Theodore reached for the musket of the nearest soldier, “looked at me for a second or two, dropped his hand, and in a low sad voice asked me how I was, and bade me good-bye.” This accords with Flashman, but Blanc is modest about outfacing the Emperor, saying that it was mere accident that he was first to approach Theodore, who had no animosity towards him; “the result would have been quite different had his anger been roused by the sight of those he hated.” [p. 254]
[51] There is an interesting group photograph of the principal prisoners taken after their release. It includes Cameron wearing his cap and holding a crutch; Dr Blanc, burly and serious; Rassam quite brisk and dapper; Prideaux lounging on the ground, arms folded and looking both languid and jaundiced; and the two missionaries, the Rev. Stern whose alleged criticism of Theodore helped to start the crisis, and the Rev. Rosenthal with Mrs Rosenthal and their baby. Blanc and Prideaux are wearing their shackles. (Army Museums Ogilby Trust.) [p. 254]
[52] This was a letter of apology for what Flashman calls Theodore’s "lunatic message” of the previous day. Both are quoted in full in
Holland and Hozier, and there can be no better evidence of Theodore’s violent swings of mood. They are truly extraordinary productions, and Napier can have been in no doubt that he was dealing with a highly unstable and dangerous man. It may be sig nificant of how Theodore saw himself that the first letter, an aston ishing rant, is headed from “Kasa, whose trust is in Christ, thus speaks", while the apology, much more moderate in tone and accompanied by the gift of cattle, comes from “the King of Kings Theodorus". Kasa was his name before he assumed the title of Emperor, the name of his humble beginnings. Flashman’s account of Theodore’s behaviour at this time, his relations with his own leading men, his diplomatic exchanges with Napier, and his inability to decide whether to fight or surrender, are confirmed in Rassam and Blanc, and by his valet Wald Gabr (see Note to p. 270). [p. 255]
[53] What Flashman was seeing was the first breaching of Magdala’s defences. The attack had proceeded as he describes, with the British advancing en masse across Islamgee and the artillery barrage covering the troops as they climbed up the narrow track leading to the Kobet Bar Gate. Some were wounded by the fire of Theodore’s defenders, but the Sappers reached the gate, only to discover that the powder charges needed to blow it in had been forgotten. The Duke of Wellington’s 33rd had come up, and a party of them ran along the wall to a point where Private Bergin and Drummer Magner forced a way through the thorn hedge and scaled the wall. Ensign Wynter was boosted on to the wall car rying the 33rd’s Regimental Colour, and waved it to signal that the wall had been carried. This was the last time the Colour of the 33rd was carried into action. (See Chandler.)
There is general agreement with Flashman’s view that if Magdala had been properly defended with artillery, the British attack—and indeed the war—might have ended very differently. Whether Theodore’s gunners would have been capable of mounting such a defence is another matter; they had made poor work of it on Fala at the battle of Arogee, and one concludes that, for all his military talents, Theodore was not a master of the art of gunnery, [p. 266]
[54] The best corroboration for Flashman’s account of Theodore’s suicide, and indeed for his description of the Emperor’s move ments and behaviour in the week they were together, is Theodore’s valet and gun-bearer, Wald Gabr. In a statement made to Speedy, the valet recounted his service with Theodore over a period of five years; he was obviously deeply devoted to his master, but made no attempt to gloss over his atrocities, and indeed confessed his share in them (see Note to p. 255). He describes Theodore’s attempted suicide, his release of the prisoners, his hopes of a peaceful settlement, his attempt to escape from Magdala, his gal loping on the plain and challenging the British cavalry, and the bombardment and storming of the amba. Finally, he tells how Theodore released him from his allegiance and then shot himself, precisely as Flashman says, before the arrival of the first British troops. Stanley, in one of his more colourful passages, gives a romanticised account of the two Irishmen of the 33rd who were the first soldiers on the scene. Wald Gabr’s statement is quoted in full by Holland and Hozier.
Stanley has a slightly purple description of the body, which he viewed soon after Theodore’s death: “His eyes, now fading, gave evidence yet of… piercing power… the lower lip seemed adapted to express scorn.” The features showed “great firmness and obstinacy mingled with ferocity", but Stanley admits he may have been influenced by Theodore’s shocking reputation. Compare the Times’ description of “bloated sensual indulgence about the face, by no means heroic or kingly", but “the forehead intellec tual and the mouth singularly determined and cruel.” It was also noted that “a strange smile lingered about the lips", [p. 270]
[55] It is not clear whether Speedy is referring to James Gordon Bennett, founder and publisher of the New York Herald, or his son and namesake who succeeded him in control of the paper in 1867, the year in which H. M. Stanley was sent to cover the Abyssinian War. Bennett junior later sent Stanley to the Ashanti War of 1873 4, and, most memorably, in search of Dr Livingstone. If either of the Bennetts was an Anglophobe, it evidently did not influence Stanley’s reporting, which is not only meticulous in its detail but eminently fair. [p. 275]