Gordon of Khartoum: From the Crimea to China to Sudan

by Alexander McKee

Explore the extraordinary life of Major-General Charles George Gordon, one of Victorian Britain’s most illustrious military figures.

This captivating narrative chronicles Gordon’s action-packed exploits in the Crimea, China, and the Sudan during an era of imperial expansion, making it essential reading for enthusiasts of Julian Symons, Charles C Trench, Richard Garrett, and Mike Snook.

Born into a family steeped in military tradition, Gordon inherited a legacy of service, with his father a General and all his brothers army officers. Demonstrating exceptional skills in map-making and fortification design, he joined the Royal Engineers and embarked on his first active duty in the Crimea, notably participating in the renowned siege of Sevastopol. His military career extended to commanding the ‘Ever Victorious Army’ in China and serving in Egypt and Sudan.

In 1884, Gordon was dispatched to Khartoum to oversee the evacuation of civilians and soldiers threatened by a Muslim revolt. There, he courageously confronted his fate, meeting his famous and untimely demise.

Drawing from contemporary sources such as Gordon’s war diaries, eyewitness testimonies, and newspaper articles, McKee delivers a meticulous portrayal of this deeply religious and enigmatic soldier — a legendary figure in British history.

280 pages, Kindle Edition

Published November 24, 2024

About the author

Alexander McKee was no "yes-man", he dared to criticise many military, political, economic, media and academic icons and he always kept an open mind. He was fanatical about making his works as accurate as he possibly could. He was ever alert to plain-wrong, biased, distorted or sloppy reports and hidden agendas; wickedly delighting (the more so as a self-educated man) in criticising and exposing assertions that did not fit the evidence. Among his targets were those who tended to emphasise media-image-managment, the accumulation of personal wealth and career progression over both personal integrity and respect for other people's contributions. He gleefully highlighted all the many lapses of integrity that he found. Equally, many established experts, often highly educated people and indeed experts regarding the theoretical aspects of their disciplines, but whom he considered scandalously remiss when they complacently failed to complement such theoretical understanding with practical knowledge as a way to test their theories empirically. Consequently, some of them came in for some harsh criticism on occasion. One gets the impression from his work that some of them appeared reluctant to venture outside the academy at all; out into the "real world": let alone to mix with ordinary people. Implicitly, he urged them to converse with the fishermen, the builders, the soldiers, the doctors, the nurses, the shipwrights and the firemen to glean practical understanding from these practical people, who had to be willing and able to carry out the ultimate tests on their theories to provide demonstably working solutions in order to fulfill their typical working roles. Then he urges such experts in the theory to re-test their theories against the empirically derived knowledge gleaned from their excursions among the working classes, and to do so conjunction with their own senses, out in the "real world": rather than limiting themselves and risking their reputations on the results of thought experiments alone. He dug deep into eye-witness testimonies and spent countless hours searching libraries and museums for the documentary evidence surrounding each his-story. One may find this slightly comical that viewed against the background of established caricaturisations, when the elevated "pillars of wisdom", went "building castles in the air" around about the "ivory towers" and he found strong contradictory "real world" evidence he often lambasted them mercilessly, although it does sometimes seem to be overdone. In contrast, he made the point that some of the sloppy documentary historical works such as that of Sir Robert Davis, that temporarily led his own research astray (and much to his annoyance caused him to repeat untruths in public lectures) while causing the propagation of serious errors until he uncovered them, were nevertheless probably a consequence of the pressures of work, owing to the high quality of the rest of the publication.

Reviews

[Sandy Craig · Rating 5 out of 5]

Concise yet with enough detail for the reader to v form a coherent picture

The book confirms my suspicion that while many good soldiers are quick to apply lessons learned, their politician bosses continue to exercise their right to ignore them.