HOW GORDON FELL.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 6660, 5 December 1899, Page 1

HOW GORDON FELL.

+ — To the many accounts of how Gordon fell is to be added that of Charles Neufeld, . the .r^icjj^ifijisoner,^. ;.,„....... Of course (says the "Daily Telegraph") Ueufeld himself can only speak on hearsay, but during his captivity he met with many eye-witnesses o£ what he describes. His account is born out -in every particular by that of' Gordon's body servant, Orpliali, •which, ttndeV Neufeld's "persuasion, is here at last given to the world. Up to now Gordon has been described as falling face downwards, almost without resistance, and sustaining a mortal wound in the back. So says the Mahdist account, and so say the histories, of Slatin and Ohrwalder. But in the Soudan the record of truth has not yet been obliterated, and it needed but the barest mention of Gordon's name to call forth from a host of witnesses, alive up to the battle of Omdnrman, the following Btory: — A week before the fall of Khartoum Gordon had given up hopes. Calling Ibrahim Pasha Fauzi, he ordered him to provision one of the steamers, get all the Europeans <?n board,, and set off for the north. To their credit, be it said, they refused to leave unless Gordon saved his own life with theirs. Finding him obdurate, a plot was made to seize him while asleep, carry him off, and save him in spite of himself; but he somehow heard of the plot, smiled, and said it was his duty to save their lives if be could, but it was also his duty to " stick to his post." As the troops must ba near, then sail north, he told them, and tell them .to hurry, up. Each day at dawn, when he retired to test, he bolted his door from the inside, and placed his faithful body servant — Ehaleel Agha Orphali —on guard outside it.. On tlw fatal night Gordon had, as usual, kept his vigil on the roof of the palace, sending and receiving telegraphic messages from the lines every few minutes, and as dawn crept into the skies, thinking that the long-threatened attack was not yet to be delivered, he lay down, wearied out. The little firing heard a few minuter later attracted no m>re attention than the usual firing which had been going on continuously night and day for inoiiths, but when the palace guards were heard firing it was known that something serious was happening. the time Gordon lad slipped into iris old serge, or dark tweed, suit, and taken his sword and revolver, the advanced dervishes were already surrounding the palace. Overcoming the guards, a rush was made up the stairs, and Gordon was met leaving his room. A small spear was thrown, which wounded him, but very slightly, on the left shoulder, Almost before the dervishes knew what was happening, three of them lay dead, and one wounded, at Gordon's feet —the remainder fled. Quickly reloading liis revolver, Gordon made for the head of the stairs, and again drove the reassembling dervishes off. Darting back to reload, he received a stab in his left shoulder-blade from a dervish concealed behind the corridor door, and, on reaching the steps the third time, he received a pistol-shot and spear-wound in his right breast, and then, great soldier as he was, he rose almost above himself. With his life's blood pouring from bis Toreast —not his back, remember —he fought his way step by step, kicking from his path the wounded and dead dervishes . . . and as he was passing through the doorway leading into the courtyard, another concealed dervish almost severed hi? leg with p, single blow. Then Gordon fell.