The battle you skimmed over was the one in which Lord St Vincent was killed, the battle of Abu Klea, 17 January 1885. He was adjutant of the Heavy Camel Corps and was mortally wounded by Dervish rifle fire. As the battle raged he was strapped onto a camel with another wounded man, one on either side. But the Mahdists broke into the square and killed the camel, it collapsed on its side with the injured St Vincent underneath, the soldier on the other side was speared to death. Lord St Vincent remained behind with the other wounded under guard while the rest of the army marched on Khartoum. He died five days later on 22 January aged 34. 

What was the cause of Mahdi's death?

A undefined illness, most likely smallpox or typhoid.

A young Lt Winston Churchill of the 4th Hussars attached to the 21st Lancers took part in the battle. The 21st Lancers was a fairly new regiment with no battle honours and was given the derisory motto "Thou Shalt Not Kill" by other more senior regiments. In order to gain credibility in the field someone gave the order to charge what they thought was a body of about 400 Dervishes. However as they got closer they saw around 2500 of them in a hidden depression. The Lancers fought their way out and won three Victoria Crosses. 

The scene is recreated in the 1972 film Young Winston.

A young Lt Winston Churchill of the 4th Hussars attached to the 21st Lancers took part in the battle. The 21st Lancers was a fairly new regiment with no battle honours and was given the derisory motto "Thou Shalt Not Kill" by other more senior regiments. In order to gain credibility in the field someone gave the order to charge what they thought was a body of about 400 Dervishes. However as they got closer they saw around 2500 of them in a hidden depression. The Lancers fought their way out and won three Victoria Crosses. 

The scene is recreated in the 1972 film Young Winston.

Winston threw himself into battle & put himself in dangerous situations for most of his life, his courage could not be questioned. His reasoning many thought was to enhance his political career & he had help from his politically connected mother as well.

The battle you skimmed over was the one in which Lord St Vincent was killed, the battle of Abu Klea, 17 January 1885. He was adjutant of the Heavy Camel Corps and was mortally wounded by Dervish rifle fire. As the battle raged he was strapped onto a camel with another wounded man, one on either side. But the Mahdists broke into the square and killed the camel, it collapsed on its side with the injured St Vincent underneath, the soldier on the other side was speared to death. Lord St Vincent remained behind with the other wounded under guard while the rest of the army marched on Khartoum. He died five days later on 22 January aged 34. 

Getting too much into minutia of these battles would extend them too far. Not only was Lord Vincent killed in this battle but Colonel Fred Burnaby too, a man who everybody in Victorian Britain would have known and now almost completely lost to time. Known as the bravest man in Britain he was a hugely popular hero of his time, when Britain wasn't short of them due to the multitude of battles we were fighting and expeditions going on in all corners of the earth. He was a Brit who could speak seven languages, when the majority of them had trouble with English. He was extremely tall for his time and freakishly strong. He was commissioned into the Horse Guards aged just 17. He travelled far and wide during his periods of leave to many very dangerous places and became somewhat of a celebrity wherever he went. Back home his books were best sellers and he became the first Englishman to cross the Channel in a balloon. The country went into mourning at the news of his death and the Queen almost collapsed.

I'm sure had he lived, he was 42 at the time of his death, he would have been properly honoured. His grave is a simple mound of stones far into the Sudanese desert.

Those killed in foreign wars in Victorian times were rarely brought home, the practicalities were enormous. 

Those killed in foreign wars in Victorian times were rarely brought home, the practicalities were enormous. 

You don't have to go back that far. Look at the first war for example. Most were buried along the French coast. The shear number of deaths would have made it impossible to bring them all home.

There are two huge ones in GB - Brookwood and Cannock, both with over 5000 burials. Brookwood is mostly UK and Commonwealth, Cannock is mostly German. 

From the two routes open to him he decided his army would go by river, all 5000 of them, a seemingly impossible task but Wolseley had previous experience of moving an army by river, in Canada. There he had used professional hunters and river men called voyageurs and he considered the same could be done here on the Nile.

The rivers in Canada weren't full of Crocs and Hippos like the Nile was. Only a fool not in his right mind would try travelling in a birch bark canoe on the Nile. Even the locals boats were too narrow and shallow to carry much weight far these 5000 men and equipment.

The Wolseley expedition was a military force authorized by Canadian Prime Minister John A. Macdonald to confront Louis Riel and the Métis in 1870, during the Red River Rebellion, at the Red River Colony in what is now the province of Manitoba. The expedition was also intended to counter American expansionist sentiments in northern border states. Leaving Toronto in May, the expedition arrived, after a three-month journey in arduous conditions, at Fort Garry on August 24.^[1] This extinguished Riel's provisional government and eradicated the threat of the American expansion into western Canada.

They would have travelled from Toronto up and into the Great Lakes and finished the water journey in Lake Superior. From there they would have walked around the north end of Superior to Manitoba. They could have taken a shorter route if they cut through the States but none of them had passports needed to clear through customs with them at the time.

The Metis were half Native half French usually. They did have the odd Scott throw in the mix who also probably had a native lady. The main reason for the fight was over the fur trade.

The North West Company was a fur trading business headquartered in Montreal from 1779 to 1821. It competed with increasing success against the Hudson's Bay Company in the regions that later became Western Canada and Northwestern Ontario. With great wealth at stake, tensions between the companies increased to the point where several minor armed skirmishes broke out, and the two companies were forced by the British government to merge.

In many ways he was a phony Tommy. He rammed the Catholic religion into them convincing many of them that God had sent him alone to save them. Many not knowing any better swallowed it hook line and sinker. They started treating him like he was a God.

The Selkirk group of Scots that went west to the Red River Valley area were harassed by the North West Company so much with having their crops burned and their live stock killed they finally move back to my area.

Louis Riel was hanged. 

One of my Usher's Mother at my wedding could track her heritage back to Riel. He and his mother were Mohawk who originally came from Northern Ontario.

If you say his last name as if it had a double L on the end would that sound more French to you?

Here is the second church the Selkirk group built which is only one concession road lower that the first one. Both were Presbyterian Churches