ABSTRACT
L o r d S a l i s b u r y looked upon the occupation of Berber as an event of major importance. As early as 14th August, 1885, he had said in a letter to the British Consul-General at Cairo that he supposed that “ if Egypt becomes master of Berber, it also becomes master of Khartum, and the railway to the coast can hardly fail to follow in due time ” . He no doubt held to this same view in August, 1897. But the interval between the occupation of Abu Hamed and the final advance on Khartum was a period of much anxiety. Sir Herbert Kitchener’s force depended practically entirely on the desert railway for its supplies. Lord Cromer was haunted by the idea that some European adventurer, of the type once familiar in India, might turn up at Khartum and advise the Ansars to make frequent raids across the Nile below Abu Hamed, with a view to cutting the communications of the Anglo-Egyptian forces with Wady Haifa.1 Both Lord Salisbury and Lord Cromer, therefore, as well as the Sirdar, saw the necessity for strengthening the Khedivial possession of Berber.
