Travelled on the roof of a train on this railway on my overland trip Cairo to Cape Town in 1984. Amazing landscape.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

I have worked in Sudan in the past, and the scenery is amazing

I've read a lot about Chinese Gordon (a hero of mine), Sudan, and Kitchener, and Churchill when he was young at the end of the Dervish. Fascinating men and fascinating history. Thank you for your work on this aspect of the tale, as i have learned about things I did not know. 👍

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Glad you enjoy them. Thanks for watching.

Yes to a Kitchener episode. I’ve been Orkney and overlooked the place of his death. Odd end for such a remarkable man.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Kitchener is on the cards. Watch this space!

glad I found this channel. Your videos have a similar feel to Historiograph’s British naval videos; of which I binged all

@TheHistoryChap

22 күн бұрын

Thanks for watching my video

Kitchener, Ontario was formerly named Berlin (many German immigrants settled there), until it was changed in 1916. Some there are still bitchn about it, to this day. 🙄 tyvm for another upload 🍻🇨🇦😁

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Thought the Canadians might enjoy this one! -:)

@jimcrawford5039

5 ай бұрын

Same here in Australia, a lot of German place names were changed!

@user-zp7jp1vk2i

4 ай бұрын

Well, it's smack dab in the middle of Ontario's Loyalist country. Aunt just left a big bequest to the "Orange Order" in London (Ontario). !!

Impressive I must say, build in a hurry 150 years ago, still in working condition today!

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

I understand the Chinese are offering to build a new railway, but I’m not sure that the negotiations have been completed

@fedecano7362

5 ай бұрын

@@TheHistoryChap Offering in exchange of access in perpetuity to all the minerals that Sudan as a country have for the next hundred years... Chinese government is not into charity work thats for sure

I went to Kitchener's memorial when I was in Orkney. Bit run-down and there was definitely some work underway on it. If you're not familiar with his death, it's quite an interesting story.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

As are some of the legends around it, such as the former Boer soldier, who claimed he had placed a bomb on the ship.

@andrewstevenson118

5 ай бұрын

@@TheHistoryChap Legends aka conspiracy theories. 🙂 Like, the British government did it and so on. A pretty cool life story, but maybe too "imperialist" for audiences these days.

Marvellous as always. Amazing History!! Yes. Please to a Series on Kitchener himself ..

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Will do. Thanks for posting.

In 2017 i was part of a team conducting an airborne geo physical survey in the Nubian desert about 300 km NE of Abu Hamed , we landed our helicopter at several of the old stations on this railway and were amazed at the wells and old riveted British water storage tanks still intact and blacked by the sun . We never seen any trains using the railway line it in our time there . I love watching your videos Chris , very well made and informative . How about doing a video on the battle of Mirbat in Oman my childhood home . Thanks Chris and keep up the great work .

@TheHistoryChap

2 ай бұрын

Thanks for watching my video & for taking the time to share your experiences. I will add your suggestion to my ever growing list.

This is a good video to have on a Monday morning interesting to learn about our involvement of the railway expansion into the Sudan and the entering part and it’s man behind it good video good to see we’re following Kitchener’s campaign and yes it would be good to see the full video of the man and his life thanks again for another interesting look into this part of late Victorian history

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Thank you for watching and for taking the time to comment.

They can't fix the pot hole outside my house but a rail road through a dessert not a problem them were the days I guess.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Chuckling.

Thanks again Chris, it's amazing what they could do back then. To be able to build a railway that is running to this day with just the basic. Another brilliant telling, many thanks

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Thanks for watching and I'm glad you enjoyed it.

Hector MacDonald, "the fighting Mac", is still well remembered in the highlands, especially Dingwall where there's a monument to him. An interesting life and a sad end.

@TheHistoryChap

29 күн бұрын

Thanks for watching my video

Fascinating again. Well done

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

My pleasure, thanks for watching

Enjoyed the video, thank you

@TheHistoryChap

22 күн бұрын

Glad you enjoyed it

I've read WC's "The River War twice. He does mention the Desert Railway, but it's clear he wasn't there at the time. More interesting to me is WC's description of the Cataracts of the Nile. I looked up C of the N, amazingly enough the Wikipedia article referenced T R W!

@TheHistoryChap

Ай бұрын

Thanks for your feedback.

Good video👍, on change of subject, did you see the other day the story about Peter Butterworth( Carry On Films) , brave man, can’t judge a book by its cover they say, perhaps a vlog on him in the future?

@TheHistoryChap

22 күн бұрын

Thanks for watching. Hope you have found my video on Peter Butterworth.

Another good one Chris .

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Glad you enjoyed it

Kitchener video? Yes please! Great channel :)

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Kitchener will be coming soon

Good to see you in action again, Chris! I'd be interested to know more about the railway at the Woolwich Arsenal, if there is anything more to be had.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

I will add that to my list, which seems to be getting longer and longer thanks to all the suggestions here on KZread

Wonderful video!

@TheHistoryChap

4 ай бұрын

Thank you very much!

A really interesting and detailed video of the construction of the desert railway Ive long been a fan of the various Sudanese campaigns leading up to the Battle of Omdurman and this provide information I had lacked in the building of the railway. Quite a feat and it’s still running 125 years later. A quick comment on Britains reasons for invading Sudan in order to prevent French expansion which resulted in the Fashoda Incident which it would be good to have a video about as well as the final demise of the Khalifa at Umm Diwaikarat.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Fashoda and the Umm Diwaikarat are on my list. Please subscribe so you don't miss them.

@ianstobie

5 ай бұрын

Seconding Fashoda. Classic tale of deception, high Victorian technology and outwitting the French!

Top notch story sir!

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

I’m glad that you enjoyed it. Thanks for watching

His Chris, that is an amazing feat of engineering built without a single navvie? Great story thank you!!

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

I have visited Sudan in the past on business. When it gets hot, it gets very hot

Very interesting content you are poviding us time and time again. I was wondering if there are any movies made covering this episode of British history? As a small boy I can recall a movie which could have been portraying one of these campaigns. Unfortunately I don 't know the title. Please keep up your great work.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Thank you for your kind message

Would love a video or 4 on Kitchener!

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

I will do it in the near future

This story is best told in Wilbur Smiths book Triumph of the Sun. Absolutely fascinating though harsh in some places.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

I haven’t read Wilbur Smith in years. Are used to enjoy his early stuff setting in South Africa and Rhodesia

Kitchener is an interesting character. One of your talks about him would be appreciated!

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

He is now on my list. Thanks.

What did we learn from this story? Never underestimate British pluck!

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Indeed.

Nice video

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Many thanks for watching

Kitchener can indeed be considered like Montgomery. In some respects, Kitchener was wiser than Wolseley for choosing to build a railway for his logistics instead of Wolseley relying on the river which cost him dearly. For the boatmen and construction workers of the Nile Expedition and Second Sudan War respectively, Wolseley and Kitchener hired the men from Canada. Lt. Girouand sounds like George B. McClellan who was also trained as an engineer at his military academy and would become the president of a railroad company before the American Civil War and was known for his meticulousness and careful preparations but unlike Kitchener and Montgomery was too cautious. I have said it before and I will say it yet again, Kitchener and his fellow engineer and general Gordon, show that in the 19th century, on the most part, engineers make good soldiers. I have to agree with others here saying this was an amazing feat of engineering and it still operates to this day. The British did a lot of good for North and Central Africa in the time they were there. Hector MacDonald's Wadi Halfa to Abul Hamad reminds me of Sherman's March to the Sea in the American Civil War where Union soldiers marched between 10-15 miles per day for several weeks laying waste to all before them through Georgia and the Carolinas to end to cripple the South's will to fight and end the war. Girouand's feat is similar to the Japanese's 260 mile railroad through the jungles of Asia for their logistics which just like the Desert Railway was accomplished at great cost. Kitchener may not have been a fighting man like MacDonald but he always got the job done and was a competent leader.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Nathan, you are so knowledgeable, maybe we should collaborate somehow in the future. What do you think? Drop me a line via my website

@nathanappleby5342

5 ай бұрын

@@TheHistoryChap Thank you very much! Quite the offer.

Excellent video The train 🚂 still runs.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Thanks for watching my video, I’m glad you enjoyed it

My Grandmere was a Girouard from New Brunswick, Canada (Acadians pronounce it "Geer Way" ou "Geer Ward"). Given Percy's last name he is probably a descendant of Acadian refugees that fled into Quebec during what is called Le Grand Derangement or the Acadian Expulsion. The Girouard were known to be problematic to the English, fighting in a guerilla war against them et New Englanders for several years in Maritime Canada from 1755-1767. There is even a village in the Acadian Region of New Brunswick called "Girouardville". On a side note Acadians and the Cajuns of Louisiana are cousins ethnically. Acadians were known to be stubborn clinging to Roman Catholicism and resistant to assimilation. They spoke the old French of Poitou mixed with some native/ indigenous words and phrases of the Mikmaq Tribe. I never guessed there was an Acadian soo prominent in British Empire History.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

That is fascinating. Thanks so much for taking the time to share.

Kitchener in South Africa would be interesting. He loved technology - not just railways, but the telegraph. Used in very effectively once the Boer resistance entered its guerilla phase.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

That would be an interesting angle on his role in South Africa, which has always been controversial due to the establishment of concentration camps

@ianstobie

5 ай бұрын

@@TheHistoryChap The use of telegraph lines and blockhouses (manned mainly by black troops and linked by trip wires with simple tin cans filled with stones to raise the alarm at night) were all part of the same military initiative as the camps and farm burnings. The problem for the British was that after the regular forces of the two Boer republics were defeated Boer forces fought on, using a highly mobile form of hit & run cavalry warfare, supported by food produced on far-flung Boer farmsteads. The military solution, pursued with brutal logic until victory, was to burn the farms and remove the women and children to "concentration camps", a tactic copied from the Spanish in Cuba when faced by similar rural insurgency. The role of the telegraph was to give Kitchener centralised control of his cavalry columns, sent out in massive sweeps to hunt down the Boer mobile commandos. The telegraph lines were mostly simply trailed behind the advancing columns rather than being permanently dug in - this being before the invention of radio and the failure of a few lines being acceptable in return for a massive gain in real-time control. The network of block houses was intended to detect the movement of Boer commandos towards their food and supply sources at night. This all worked pretty well, with the Boer forces eventually splitting over whether to surrender - the ones willing to treat with the British eventually bringing in the die-hard units, by force if necessary. A good source is still Byron Farwell's excellent "The Great Boer War". This also covers the response on the British side to the high death toll in the camps, mostly from disease, among Boer women and children. This was before universal suffrage, but saw effective female political campaigning at home affecting army policy. Not covered in any source I'm aware is the toll on the black population. Both sides were wary of using black troops as active armed participants. But black civilians suffered in the many sieges earlier in the war, and in the starvation brought about by the widespread destruction of farms intended to deprive Boer roving forces of food.

Another highly enjoyable episode from history, I really enjoyed every minute. However I was curious to know how the steam engines took on water for their boilers, across a desert? Or could the locomotives carry the extra water? What terrific organiser's the victorians were, with not a computer in sight!

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

I don’t know. I understand initially the carried extra water, but something in the back of my head tells me that there were water depots erected along the route.

I'd recommend Khartoum by Michael Asher. Great book very informative, hurrah for the CRE.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

The opening pages had me gripped.

Another great installment - think I can add some Internet content of my own on railways hot or (preferrably) cold: This has nothing to do with the Sudan, but I do have a comment on The ”Nelson bombards Copenhagen” episode. Then again, I think This blog merits a little "side content" as it were. I spent 50 hours on British soil this weekend, just to see some friends in the flooded areas down south, at Fleet, Hook and Southampton, and although the Southern Railway was out, I did visit the Raven pub in Hook, where I was told that the time-honoured British expression ”Cold Enough to Freeze the Balls of a Brass Monkey” harks back to 1807, and Nelson’s fleet. The supposed reason is that cast iron cannon balls don’t expand very much in cold or freezing conditions, but brass - being a much softer metal - does. Furthermore , I was told that the brass buckets allegedly used by gunners on the lower decks affectionately were known as ”Monkeys” and thus, any temperature below 20 minus degrees centigrade would send those cannon balls clattering and rolling all over the decks, which would tend to irritate all sailors sleeping in their hammocks overhead. Hence, again - "Cold enough to freeze the balls of a Barss Monkey" Rather an unlikely story, as Nelson’s action took place in the month of April, but as late as the Crimean War, the British Home Fleet was indeed operating in Finnish and Swedish waters. Been musing on the good ship Juana Nancy of Dundee, captained by one British gentleman by name of S R Chandler, who at 17 November, 1887 set out for Luleå in the Bay of Bothnia with a 16-men crew in order to deliver 2 locomotives, a 100 ton iron ore transporter and equipment to the Luleå to Narvik railway, under construction at the time by the British-based Swedish and Norwegian Railway Co Ltd. The Victorian engineers certainly overdid it that time, and fell victim to the myths of their era - namely that steam power would conquer all. Juana Nancy got stuck in the Ice outside Luleå already at November 25, and 300 Swedes made a 45 foot wide and more than 3 miles long passage through the ice - with hand tools and by dynamite ! On the return journey - 3 days later - the ship got stuck in the ice again. It took a further 600 men to free it, and by that time, it was very nearly X-mas. Chandler noted the cost of lives and human suffering among the 600, (casualty lists never verified, but likely at least some 40 ) but soon his 16 men were adrift in the ice without wireless (not invented at the time) or any way to contact the outside World - they only had provisions calculated to last a week. They finally got rescued as a result of the Ship’s dog being abandoned on the ice by Captain Chandler himself, as the men resorted to build home-made rafts or dragging the only lifeboat along, Ernest Shackelton style. There were few provisions left, in any case, and this was a Lapponian dog, bought in Luleå on departure. One Finnish citizen, named Jacobsson from Eastern Bothnia were there is a considerable, some 400 000 strong Swedish-speaking minority, even today, put on skis, and by that time - 11 January - a 300 GBP Reward (a rather large sum for 1887) had been offered by the Railway company - which the Mayor of Uleåborg was going to claim for himself, as he set up a 25-men strong rescue team, who found the missing dog - and Jacobsson, who came on skis through the mist. So it was that on 15th of January, 1887, the good ship Juana Nancy was abandoned, as temperatures suddenly dropped, and the ice collapsed behind the 16 men, who got safely out on the pack ice just in time. It stayed adrift until 5 June that year, but finally sailed back to London in August. Amazingly, all of the ship’s crew survived (albeit with severe frostbite) and so did the ship’s dog. (More details, for those so inclined can be found at www.nykarlebyvyer.nu/sidor/texter/prosa/hedstrom/op/juananan.htm - plus some original Swedish language documents on the whole affair) This has some bearing on British Military history too, since the fact that the Luleå-Narvik railway was British-built came back to haunt the World in 1940, when a joint British-French expeditionary force invaded Narvik - but - that is another story. Did one British Marine Minister, later Prime Minister actually hear about the Juana Nancy incident, as it was widely publish in newspapers over the world at the time…? Or did Lord Kitchener ?? Or did somebody else, in the Admirality, perhaps ?? Lastly, some household tips signed Jonna Jinton, otherwise a folk singer from Jemthia province, some 450 km’s down south from Luleå, another one of my favorite KZread content creators: Whether in Sudan with Lord Kitchener or up North, life remains the same as ever... kzread.info/dash/bejne/e3afsbGSkrPYcdI.html

@TheHistoryChap

22 күн бұрын

Thanks for watching my video & for your interesting feedback.

Being an veteran Sapper a profile of Kitchener would be good

@TheHistoryChap

3 ай бұрын

thank you, I will add to my ever growing list.

Amazing story Chris,fascinating,I have had a book that I love,which I've had for many.many years titled 'Warfare from Waterloo to Mons' by Micheal Glover,in the section pages 202-206 of the book it talks about Kitchener's Sudan Campaign in this period,it says in the book,the railway builders at one point 'Lost' an important 'Nut' that was an intergral part of either one of the train engines or such,or to do with the actual track laying process itself?,Kitchener supposedly sent out into the vast expanses of the Sudanese desert a Cavalry sqaudron to retrace until this important 'Part' was found?,otherwise another would have had to have been sourced from 'Old Blighty',taking too long?,the cavalry guys managed to find it & the railway eventually completed,is this true or has this 'Yarn' been over exagerrated to make the Victorian's sound like kinda 'Superhuman' if you will,just wondering?,will have to go back & read this great book once more eh,lol,cheers

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Thank you for taking the time to share that information. Much appreciated.

@malcolmbolton1473

5 ай бұрын

No worries chris,I think the part about the cavalry squadron being sent out by Kitchener to find that lost part is a great one along with the whole railway being built in the first place,cheers@@TheHistoryChap

Hum, commentaries from that time credited Kitchens slow progress down the Nile to the river boats. Which did contribute to the battle.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Thank you for taking the time to comment

As a South African, i can't help but think of Kitchener as a butcher.

@TheHistoryChap

4 ай бұрын

Thank you for taking the time to share your opinion

It always amazes me that many of the British Army's greatest tacticians / field commanders come from the R.E. and not a teeth arm like a Cavalry or Infantry regiment.🤔🇬🇧🇬🇧

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

That’s a very good observation, thanks for sharing

@bob_the_bomb4508

4 ай бұрын

Back in the days when the term ‘teeth arm’ was actually used, the Royal Engineers were considered a ‘teeth arm’. Not least because of the phrase which came into use during siege warfare: “Follow the Sapper…”

Hector McDonald aka Fighting Mac is worth a film on his own

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

I’ve done a video all about him. It’s a start!

Completion of such a large track in just 9 months was a miraculous effort. I think empire's contributions to the uplift of general lifestyle is a non-controversial thing. It should have been presented to achieve loyalty or allegiance of millions of people. But negative propaganda eclipsed the good work of empire-builders. Secondly, intelligentia of empire refused to adopt cosmopoltic thinking. After all, empire was a big big thing, lots of different ethnicities, interests, backgrounds were flourishing under one umbrella. It wasn't possible for such a large population to adopt a single line of thinking. But it should have been enough for the interests of Commonwealth if their overall direction pointed towards allegiance or unity. That's why empire-builders didn't adopt a single yardstick for every region of the empire. At some places, they just adopted policy of annexation whereas at others, they were happy with treaties with local rulers. Key of their success was to shun parochialism and adopt cosmopoltic approach.

@TheHistoryChap

3 ай бұрын

Thanks for watching my video

I think that some experienced track builders were brought from India to help with the construction.

@TheHistoryChap

4 ай бұрын

Thank you for taking the time to comment

Yes please re Kitchener video. There are ones on KZread but they are a bit dry. Yours would be better.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Very kind comment. I will add Kitchener to my list.

I assume, now, I know this is a Naming Fallacy, but, bear with me, I am serious about this, utterly sincere... I think it was a road for trains.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

or is it?

8:40 Chinese Checkers with Britain going North-South from Suez to Cape Town while the French go East to West.

@TheHistoryChap

2 ай бұрын

Thanks for the feedback

Дякую!!!!

@TheHistoryChap

4 ай бұрын

My pleasure

❤cool....ckg out now

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

About to release Battle of Atbara in next 30 mins

@billevans7936

5 ай бұрын

Excellent

The japanese did one in burma!

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Thank you for sharing.

Gondar? Never knew about a ancient Christian city over there. Who originally settled or converted it?

@TheHistoryChap

4 ай бұрын

Christianity arrived in Ethiopia very early on. It’s one of the oldest churches in the world.

Wasn't Corporal Jones from Dads Army There, "They Don't like it up em, Captain Mannering".

@lastguy8613

5 ай бұрын

If you look back through his videos he does a whole series about Cpl Jones then the rest of the dad's army casts war services, it's really interesting and well worth searching out

@lawLess-fs1qx

5 ай бұрын

yep Fuzzy-wuzzys didn't like it up em. Osman Digna was a Fuzzy commander. Only foreign commander to break the British Infantry square.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

You might like my video all about Lance Corporal Jones: kzread.info/dash/bejne/iYCTqJV-aZqZkrg.html

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

very kind of you to comment.

Any

@TheHistoryChap

4 ай бұрын

👍

Seems the British could rarely win a battle without building a railway from 1850 to WW1, Crimea, Sudan, Iraq, west front.

@Paul-dv4dr

5 ай бұрын

Eritrea

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Plenty of campaigns without railways, e.g. against the Ashanti and the Zulu. Nevertheless, why wouldn’t you use the most modern form of transportation for your campaigns?

Monty was a plodder. He like to think of himself as the master of the set piece battle; in reality I do not believe he thought well on his feet. I would put Kitchener head and shoulders above him.

@TheHistoryChap

4 ай бұрын

Thanks for taking the time to compare the two generals

Ah ha, once again we see amateurs talking battles and professionals talking logistics! Probably the most important thing transported was fresh water, as working in the desert men worked up a powerful thirst.

@TheHistoryChap

4 ай бұрын

Thank you for taking the time to comment

I wonder why the Sudanese never try sabotaging the railway

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Good question, things would’ve been different if they had

I don't believe Gordon deserves praise for his actions in Sudan. He deliberately disobeyed orders, which resulted in thousands of deaths.

@TheHistoryChap

3 ай бұрын

You are not alone in that thought. Prime Minister, William Gladstone was also of that opinion, but came under pressure to rescue him

Ahh Islam ☪️ hmmmm

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

Thank you for taking the time to comment

Brave but foolish. If mahdists had reverted to assymetrical war they'd won. Bravely charging at Maxim machineguns is pure idiocy.

@TheHistoryChap

5 ай бұрын

As many European soldiers found out in the First World War

@bob_the_bomb4508

4 ай бұрын

@@TheHistoryChapwhich is why it was important for subalterns to carry their swagger sticks…