ABSTRACT
Emin Pasha, born Edouard Schnitzer, had been made Governor of Equatoria, the southernmost province of Sudan, by General Gordon in 1878. Gordon's defeat and death in 1885 at the hands of the Mahdist forces helped create an image of Emin as isolated and abandoned by the Egyptian government. Stanley was also acting for King Leopold of Belgium, for whom he had already helped lay the foundations of the Congo Free State. In the end it was decided to follow the Congo up to its confluence with the Aruwimi River, then up the Aruwimi to the Yambuya, through the Ituri forest to Lake Albert and then up the lake towards Emin's headquarters at Wadelai. Stanley's decision to leave his rear column at Yambuya had disastrous consequences. The rear guard was left in the charge of the temperamentally unsuited Major Barttelot, whose overt racism had already attracted unfavourable comment from some of his colleagues.
