Hospital Nurses—War Office denying my existence between December and February declines to issue even Half-Pay—Offered the Governorship of the Isle of Man—Cardinal Manning—Alexandria—A shell denudes a soldier of his trousers—Smith-Dorrien—Mr. Gladstone in Downing Street—Return to Egypt.

I was very happy at Chatham, being on good terms with all the officers, including the Medical officers, the senior of whom would not agree with me, however, as to the desirability of having female nurses to attend the soldiers, a reform which has happily since been carried into effect. He was one day arguing with me that Female nurses were entirely out of place in a Military Hospital, so I told him of a scene I had witnessed in the general Hospital under his charge only forty-eight hours earlier. I was passing through a ward after the Medical officers had left for lunch, and saw a soldier evidently on the confines of the next world refusing some food which an orderly taken out of the regiment was endeavouring to force on him. The man was too weak to speak, but the look of disgust on his face was so strong that I went up to the bed, and asked the orderly, “Why do you give him that black stuff from the inside of the chicken, when you have got half the breast, which he is more likely to fancy?” The soldier said somewhat indignantly, “I was told to give him chicken, and I don’t see it matters where he begins.” Having told my story, I said, “Now, doctor, let us go to the Hospital, and see how he is.” On arriving there we found the patient had died the previous evening.

I was engaged in a lengthy correspondence from March onward, with the Financial Authorities of the War Office. For the nine months I was Acting Governor and High Commissioner in South-East Africa I was paid at the rate of £5000 per annum, and although the Colonial Attorney-General advised me I was entitled to Half-Pay on my journey home, that is at the rate of £2500 a year,—the amount drawn from Colonial funds,—I drew nothing, for the Colonial Treasurer told me that as I had never been officially appointed, and was only Acting Governor, I should have troublesome correspondence with the Colony, and the Colonial Office later, if I drew it.

When I resumed the Command at Chatham I asked for my half-pay as a Major-General, from the 22nd December 1881 to the 13th February 1882; but the War Office alleged that as I was in receipt of a Civil salary I was not entitled to any ordinary pay, or to any allowance, on the termination of my Staff appointment. Weeks of correspondence ensued; I tried pleasant words, and then sarcasm, writing I would furnish a certificate from a clergyman that I was alive from the 22nd December to the 13th February, which would entitle me to half-pay in any case, but in vain. I then appealed to Lord Kimberley, and pointed out that as he had expressed satisfaction with my services, I hoped he would point out to the Treasury that I should not be treated as if I had been dead for two months.

His Lordship replied it was impossible for him to do anything except ask the War Office to accord me the most liberal treatment, which he did; nevertheless, there was no result until Mr. Childers helped me on my appealing personally to him. This I was too shy to do, until shortly before Sir Garnet Wolseley’s victory at Tel-el-Kebir, in the following September, when an opportunity occurred.235

I had many reasons to be grateful to Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen, who invested me shortly after my arrival with the Grand Cross of St Michael and St George, and I went during the following week to stay at Sandhurst, where the Staff College students arranged a Drag hunt over my favourite line, beginning with the two flights of rails in East Hampstead Park. Captain George Gough,236 10th Hussars, mounted me on his best horse, which had won the Point to Point race in 1881, and would have probably repeated its victory in 1882, but that the horse Gough rode fell at the rails, and my friend broke a collar bone, so could not get into a saddle.

In the following week I had a kind letter237 from Sir Vernon Harcourt, offering me the post of Governor of the Isle of Man. I was driving with Her Imperial Majesty the Empress EugÉnie, when calling at my club for letters I received the offer, and with her permission read the letter. I had great difficulty in explaining to Her Majesty where the Isle of Man was situated, until I told her in my voluble, but badly pronounced French, it was the Island where the cats had no tails, when she at once understood.

The next few months at Chatham gave me opportunities of seeing many men in whom I was interested, Cardinal Manning coming twice to stay at Government House. He received a very large number of soldiers of the Royal Irish into the Temperance League, and was out on the “Lines,” from immediately after dinner till 2 a.m., watching Siege operations.

Major Duncan, who later on commanded the Artillery of the Egyptian Army, and was subsequently Member of Parliament for Finsbury, was mounting heavy guns to open fire at daylight, and the glacis, which was honeycombed from the result of previous excavations, being treacherous, one gun slipped into a deep hole. As the scheme supposed him to be close to the enemy, the work of extricating it, which took five hours, had to be carried on in absolute silence. In spite of the fact that His Eminence’s dinner, although he sat out as usual our succession of courses, consisted of some weak tea and two slices of bread and butter, he showed the most unflagging interest in the work, and did not return to Government House until I coaxed him back under the plea that I myself was tired.

On the 4th August I embarked in command of the 4th Brigade of the Expeditionary force on board the steamship Catalonia, Her Majesty coming on board to say good-bye to us. She embraced my wife, and was very gracious to me. She had honoured me with a long private interview in July, when I was commanded to Windsor, and treated me with a condescension for the memory of which I shall be ever grateful.

We landed at Alexandria on the 15th August, and went out to Ramleh. I took up my quarters in a convent school, which had prior to the bombardment been vacated by the nuns, and there remained for a day or two until another empty house became available.

Four days later I was a witness of an incident which is so remarkable that most people will have difficulty in believing the story. During the afternoon of the 19th of August, in accordance with orders received from the Divisional General, I made a demonstration with two battalions towards the enemy’s lines at Kafr Dowar. I took two companies only within effective range, and few casualties occurred. We had extended the two companies at six paces between men, and were advancing, when the Egyptians getting the range dropped several shell just short, and over the line. One shell fell about 60 yards to my left, and apparently struck down a soldier of the 1st Berkshire Regiment. I saw the flash immediately in front of his feet, and the man fell headlong. One or two men near him wavered, but on my speaking to them they resumed their places and moved steadily on.

When retiring an hour or so later, we repassed opposite the spot. I was then riding on the bank of the Mahmoudieh Canal, and said to Captain Hemphill, the Adjutant, “Send a stretcher and four men to bring in your man’s body.” He replied, “The man is in the Ranks, he was not much hurt.” “But I saw him struck by a shell; he was killed.” “No; he is in the Ranks.” “I should like to see him.” “Well, you must look at him only in front, sir!” When I overtook the company to which the man belonged I asked for him, and a titter went round, as the man halting, faced me. He had all his clothes on in front, but the shell had burst immediately at his feet, and the flash of the explosion had burnt off the back of his socks, the whole of the back of his trousers, and the skirt of his serge up to the waistbelt; so that from heels to belt he was absolutely naked. He was bleeding from burns on the more protuberant parts up to the waist, but was not permanently injured.

A day or two afterwards, when we were advancing to carry out a similar operation designed to give the Arabists an idea that Sir Garnet meant to make his attack there, the Egyptians fired many shell at us, 5½ inches in diameter, and 15 inches in length. One of these which failed to explode is now in my house, but another fell immediately in front of a section of Fours which was following me, and exploded. Putting up my hand to save my eyes from stones, I turned my face, and looked into the eyes of a young officer of the Berkshire, who delighted me by his naÏve avowal. I asked, “A little nervous?” “Very much so indeed, sir;” but he did not show it in his bearing.

When Sir Garnet Wolseley took three Brigades away to Ismailia to attack Arabi at Tel-el-Kebir, I was left to defend a front 5½ miles long, and on a Staff officer pointing out to our Chief that he was taking away every mounted soldier, he observed, “It does not matter, Evelyn Wood is sure to raise some more.” This I did, but under some difficulties, for my Divisional General would not without authority from Headquarters sanction the purchase of any saddlery. In the Derbyshire Regiment then under my command in the City of Alexandria was Lieutenant Smith-Dorrien.238 By my orders he put fifty saddles together in a shop, and ransacked the Khedive’s stables, which had indeed already been drawn on by various Staff officers. Within half an hour of the Divisional General embarking, Smith-Dorrien had collected 15 men, increased in a few days to 30. Many of them had never ridden, but before sundown a section defiled past me at Ramleh, 12 ponies, 2 mules, and a donkey; a somewhat motley detachment, and many of them held on to the saddle, but they proceeded 5 miles farther to the front, and managed to shoot an Egyptian officer that evening, and in five days killed or wounded 12 of the enemy, as they admitted. Three days later Smith-Dorrien had pushed back the Egyptian outposts, and we were not again troubled by the Bedouins looting the houses in Ramleh, as they had done the week before the other Brigade of the Division to which I belonged, embarked.239

It was necessary for me to cut down a large grove of Date trees, but I sent for the owner, and paid him the sum awarded by an Arbitrator, himself an Egyptian. It transpired that the owner was delighted, for as every female tree (and it is only the female which bears fruit) paid a yearly tax, the owner got his money based on the number of years before the trees would again bear fruit, and till then had no tax to pay.

Sir Garnet Wolseley, in sending instructions on the 5th of September, to attract the attention of the Egyptians in my front, wrote very kindly, “Your being detained at Alexandria is a sad blow to me, and I know it will be to you.” He asked me to send some one into Arabi’s lines, and find out the position of his troops. This I did by the help of our Resident, Sir Edward Malet, and furnished Sir Garnet Wolseley with information which he told me later was absolutely accurate.

I telegraphed to him on the 8th of September with reference to the orders I was “not to risk a man,” that I proposed to attack three regiments at Mandara, a few miles out from Ramleh, encamped on the spot where Abercromby was killed in 1801. There were 3000 at Kafr Dowar, and I urged that I should be allowed to attack the Mandara Force, to draw the enemy from Kafr Dowar, explaining that I could carry the Mandara position at daylight, and get back to Ramleh by twelve o’clock. He telegraphed to me on the 10th and 11th, “Act on the defensive only, risk nothing.”

The Cabinet was anxious at this time, regarding the six battalions as insufficient to defend the frontage of 55 miles, and promised a reinforcement in a fortnight. I replied to Mr. Childers, I did not expect the Egyptians would attack, but if they did so I was confident of defeating them. I could, indeed, have defended it against a force of Egyptians of eight or ten times our numbers; and after a week’s labour we opened on the 13th, the day of Sir Garnet’s victory at Tel-el-Kebir, the seawall, and thus in a week, had the war continued, a lake would have covered the south, or open front of the city, rendering it secure against Assault.

I was at Chatham again early in November, and on the 8th dined with Mr. Gladstone, in Downing Street, and had an enjoyable evening, in spite of an adverse opinion on his Irish Land Bill, which, however, I gave only on his repeated demand.

The arrangements about going in to dinner were peculiar. In a large party there were only six ladies, and Mr. Gladstone did not take either of them in to the dining-room. Lord Hartington took Mrs. Gladstone, and our host followed his guests from the room in which we assembled. As I was one of the juniors I went to the foot of the table and Mr. Gladstone followed me, apparently intending to sit next to me, but a Naval officer slipped in between us, and to our host’s evident annoyance insisted in talking about what he did in the Egyptian Expedition, from which several of us, including Sir John Adye, who was on my left, had just returned. Mr. Gladstone indicated he wanted to hear nothing more of Egypt, and then turning the conversation asked me to describe the appearance of John Dunn. From this subject we got accidently on the derivations of words, and when he had mentioned one or two French words in ordinary use in Scotland, I asked him if he had ever noticed the use in Cumberland of the German word “Gerade,” pronounced “grade.” He was greatly interested, and asked how I came across it. I told him that in 1862 being near Penrith with a Woolwich cadet who was fishing, he asked a lad who had shown him a trout pool in a stream with great success, to show him another. It was eight o’clock, and the child replied, “No, I must go grade home.” I made him repeat the word two or three times, until he became angry, thinking I was laughing at him, and then he changed the word, saying, “I must just go straight home.” I have never had a more delightful table companion than Mr. Gladstone, and he himself was so eager in telling me about the derivations of various words that he overlooked his dinner.

I was shooting with Redvers Buller at Castle Rising on the 29th November, when I had a flattering letter from Lord Granville,240 saying that Mr. Gladstone wished me to go out and recreate the Egyptian Army. This was the more complimentary on his part, as I had disagreed with him strongly about his Irish policy.

I went to London, and after a discussion by telegraph with Lord Dufferin, who wished to give me only half the salary I was willing to accept, went out on my own terms. When I reached Cairo, Lord Dufferin told me that although he had used the name of the Egyptian Government, it was he who had tried to get me at a small salary, and three months later he was good enough to say I was cheap at any price.

Chinese Gordon wrote on the 8th of December, when sending me a present of a gold-laced coat which the late Khedive gave to him, “I am so truly glad you are going out. For go you will. Remember you are creating there a British contingent.” In a P.S. he urged I should be very careful in my choice of a Native writer, about which I will later narrate something which happened in 1884.241

Just before Christmas I was back again in Cairo, and taking steps to raise the Egyptian Army, which had been disbanded after Tel-el-Kebir.