Closely examined, the speaker explained that Hicks Pasha was at the commencement on a red horse, but when all his men were falling he changed and got on a white horse, because his first horse was tired. Hicks Pasha and his six officers fought for half an hour alone; the battle lasted two hours and a half. The soldier who tells this story says that he escaped death, along with about 150 others, by declaring himself a Mussulman, and he was afterwards told by one of the Arabs: "Hicks Pasha was a terrible man; he killed a great many of us, and so did the other English officers." Other men talked with wonder of how this little English band kept them at bay. Two Englishmen who did not wear uniforms were among the killed. "One sketched, was a stout man, eagle-like nose, elderly, and gray hair. The other was a spare, tall man, with dark-brown hair, and narrow thin face"—evidently Vizetelly and O'Donovan. The correspondent's informant went on to say that, escaping to Khartoum, he became an orderly to General Gordon, that being sent down to meet the relieving force at Metemneh, he accompanied Sir Charles Wilson to near Khartoum, that afterwards he marched to Korti, and was sent thence to Cairo with four or five other soldiers who had come from Khartoum.
The destruction of Hicks Pasha's army gave the Mahdi control of all the country south of the junction of the Blue and White Niles, with the exception of a few unimportant posts whose garrisons held out. In 1884 he extended his power to the Red Sea, waged war with the British in and around Suakim, blockaded General Gordon at Khartoum, rejecting the title of "Sultan of Kordofan" which Gordon offered him, and compelled England to send an army under Lord Wolseley to Khartoum for the relief of Gordon.
