Battle of Tell El Kebir

2025-08-19T08:01:34Z

2A01:CB18:64B:300:9E2:CBEB:A0EF:24A: Wording edits

{{Short description|Battle between Egyptian army and British military (1882)}}
{{more citations needed|date=September 2020}}
{{Infobox military conflict
| conflict = Battle of Tel El Kebir
| partof = [[Anglo-Egyptian War]]
| image = Tel El Kebir1882.jpg
| caption = ''The Storming of Tel el Kebir'' [[Alphonse de Neuville]], 1883
| date = 13 September 1882
| place = near [[Kassassin]], [[Suez Canal Zone|Canal Zone]], [[Egypt]]
| coordinates = {{coord|30|40|N|31|56|E|region:EG_type:event_source:kolossus-cawiki|display=inline}}
| casus =
| territory =
| map_type = Egypt
| result = British victory
| combatant1 = {{flagicon|UK}} [[United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland|United Kingdom]]
*{{flagcountry|British India}}
| combatant2 = [[Image:Egypt flag 1882.svg|22px]] [[Khedivate of Egypt]]
| commander1 = {{flagicon|UK}} [[Garnet Wolseley, 1st Viscount Wolseley|Garnet Wolseley]]
| commander2 = [[Image:Egypt flag 1882.svg|22px]] [[Ahmed ‘Urabi]]
| strength1 = 13,000 troops 60 guns<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/battles/egypt/battle.htm|title = The National Archives - Exhibitions & Learning online - British Battles}}</ref>
| strength2 = 18,000 troops (estimates)<ref>{{cite book |last1=Wright |first1=William |title=A Tidy Little War |date=2009 |publisher=Spellmount |page=229}}</ref> 60–75 guns
| casualties1 = 57 killed 380 wounded 22 missing<ref>[http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/battles/egypt/popup/telel4.htm Reproduction of official British casualty figures]</ref>
| casualties2 = 2,000 killed <ref name="Wolseley1"/><ref>{{cite book |last1=Featherstone |first1=Donald |title=Tel El-Kebir 1882 |date=1993 |publisher=Osprey Publishing |pages=85–86}}</ref><ref>Wright, ''Tidy Little War'', p. 255</ref>
58 guns captured<ref>Wright, ''Tidy Little War'', p. 229</ref>
| campaignbox = {{Campaignbox Anglo-Egyptian War}}
}}

The '''Battle of Tel El Kebir''' (often spelled Tel-El-Kebir) was fought on 13 September 1882 at [[Tell El Kebir]] in [[Khedivate of Egypt|Egypt]], 110 km north-north-east of [[Cairo]]. An entrenched Egyptian force under the command of [[Ahmed ʻUrabi]] was defeated by a [[British Empire|British]] army led by [[Garnet Wolseley, 1st Viscount Wolseley|Garnet Wolseley]], in a sudden assault preceded by a march under cover of darkness. The battle was the decisive engagement of the [[Anglo-Egyptian War]].

==Background==
===Bombardment and invasion of Alexandria===
{{Main|Bombardment of Alexandria (1882)}}
On May 20, 1882, a combined Franco–British fleet arrived at [[Alexandria]]. At the same time, Egyptian troops were reinforcing the coastal defenses of the city in anticipation of an attack. These events heightened tension in Alexandria, and eventually triggered tumultuous rioting with loss of life on both sides.<ref>Pakenham, Thomas. ''The Scramble for Africa: White Man's Conquest of the Dark Continent from 1876 to 1912'' Harper Collins, 1992. p. 114</ref> As a result of the riots, an ultimatum was sent to the Egyptian government demanding they order Urabi's officers in Alexandria to dismantle their coastal defence batteries. The Egyptian government refused. Meanwhile, tension increased between Britain and France over the crisis, as most of the losses had been non-French, the principal European beneficiaries of the revolution would be the French. Thus, the French government refused to support this ultimatum and decided against armed intervention.

When the ultimatum was ignored, Admiral Seymour gave the order for the Royal Navy to bombard the Egyptian gun emplacements at Alexandria. On July 11 at 7:00 am, the first shell was fired on Fort Adda by {{HMS|Alexandra|1875}} and by 7:10, the entire fleet was engaged. The coastal defenses returned fire soon after, with minimal effect and minimal casualties to the British fleet. No British ships were sunk. On July 13, a large naval force landed in the city. Despite heavy resistance from the garrison for several hours, the overwhelming firepower of the smaller British forces eventually forced the Egyptian troops to withdraw from the city.

==Prelude==
[[Image:HMS alexandra.jpg|thumb|Photograph of HMS ''Alexandra''|left]]
Lieutenant General [[Garnet Wolseley, 1st Viscount Wolseley|Garnet Wolseley]] was placed in charge of a large force with the aim of destroying Urabi's regime and restoring the nominal authority of the [[Khedive]] Tawfiq. The total force was 24,000 British troops, which concentrated in [[Malta]] and [[Cyprus]], and a force of 7,000 Indian troops which staged through [[Aden]].

Wolseley first tried to reach [[Cairo]] directly from Alexandria. 'Urabi deployed his troops at [[Kafr El Dawwar]] between Cairo and Alexandria and prepared very substantial defences. There, attacks by British troops were repelled for five weeks at the [[Battle of Kafr El Dawwar]].<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.discovershropshire.org.uk/html/search/verb/GetRecord/theme:20061016150347 |title=Kafr el Dawwar surrender |access-date=2012-11-05 |archive-date=2020-07-26 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200726154742/http://www.discovershropshire.org.uk/html/search/verb/GetRecord/theme:20061016150347 |url-status=dead }}</ref>

===Securing the canal===
Wolseley then decided to approach Cairo from a different route. He resolved to attack from the direction of the Suez canal. 'Urabi knew that Wolseley's only other approach to Cairo was from the canal, and he wanted to block it. [[Ferdinand de Lesseps]], upon knowing of Urabi's intentions, assured him the British would never risk damaging the canal, and would avoid involving it in operations at all costs according to Lutsky,<ref>[http://www.marxists.org/subject/arab-world/lutsky/ch17.htm Modern History of the Arab Countries]</ref> he even "gave his word of honour to Urabi not to permit the landing of British troops in the Canal Zone, and Urabi trusted de Lesseps. By so doing, Urabi committed a grave military and political mistake". 'Urabi listened to his advice and did not block the canal, leaving it open for an invasion by British forces.

When Wolseley had arrived at Alexandria on 15 August he immediately began to organise the movement of troops through the [[Suez Canal]] to [[Ismaïlia]]. This was accomplished so quickly, Ismailia was occupied on 20 August without resistance.<ref name="HCRE2">{{cite book |last=Porter |first=Maj Gen Whitworth |title=History of the Corps of Royal Engineers Vol II |year=1889|publisher=The Institution of Royal Engineers |location=Chatham}}</ref>{{rp|67}}

Ismailia was quickly reinforced with 9,000 troops, with the engineers put to work repairing the railway line from Suez. A small force was pushed along the [[Sweet Water Canal]] to the [[Kassassin]] lock arriving on 26 August.

===Egyptian attack at Kassassin===
'Urabi attempted to repel the advance and attacked the British forces near [[Kassassin]] on 28 August. The British troops were caught by surprise, as they did not expect an attack. Fighting was intense but the two British battalions, with their 4 artillery pieces, held their position.

The British Heavy Cavalry, composed of the [[Household Cavalry]] and the [[7th Dragoon Guards]] had been following the infantry and were encamped {{convert|4|mi|km}} away. When the cavalry arrived, the British went onto the offensive and causing heavy casualties on the Egyptians, forced them to retreat {{convert|5|mi|km}}.<ref name="HCRE2"/>{{rp|67}}

A further attack by Egyptian forces at Kassassin was repulsed and the Egyptians retired to their lines to build defences.<ref name=HCRE2/>{{rp|68}}

===Capture of Mahmoud Fehmy===
At around the same time as the first battle at Kassassin, the British scored a major success with the capture of the Egyptian chief military engineer, General [[Mahmoud Fehmy]].<ref>Wright, ''Tidy Little War'', p. 195.</ref> The exact circumstances of his capture are unclear - according to one account, he had changed into civilian clothes due to the heat, and had gone for a walk accompanied by only one other officer when he was ambushed by a group of British cavalrymen.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Blunt |first1=Wilfrid Scawen |title=the Secret History of the English Occupation of Egypt |date=1907 |publisher=T. Fisher Unwin |pages=415–416 |url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.82854/page/n429/mode/2up}}</ref> The loss of Fehmy was "a blow to the defence of Tel-el-Kebir for which there was no remedy", for the highly-regarded General had only recently arrived to oversee the construction of fortifications at the site.<ref>Blunt, ''Secret History'', p. 416.</ref>

==Battle==
[[File:Henri-Louis Dupray - Bataille de Tel-el-Kebir.jpg|thumb|270px|Tell El Kebir by Henri Louis Dupray]]

'Urabi had redeployed to defend [[Cairo]] against Wolseley. His main force dug in at Tel El Kebir, north of the railway and the [[Sweet Water Canal|Sweetwater Canal]], both of which linked Cairo to [[Ismailia]] on the canal. The defences were hastily prepared, but included trenches and redoubts. Urabi's forces possessed 60 pieces of artillery and breech loading rifles. Wolseley made several personal reconnaissances, and determined that the Egyptians did not man outposts in front of their main defences at night, which made it possible for an attacking force to approach the defences under cover of darkness. Rather than make an outflanking movement around Urabi's entrenchments, which would involve a long march through waterless desert, or undertake formal bombardment and assault, Wolseley planned to approach the position by night and attack frontally at dawn, hoping to achieve surprise.

Wolseley began his advance from Ismailia on the night of 12 September, with two infantry divisions and a cavalry brigade. A brigade of Indian troops covered the flank on the southern bank of the Sweetwater Canal. The approach march of the main forces was made easier because the desert west of Kassassin was almost flat and unobstructed, making it look like a gigantic parade ground. Even though there were repeated halts to maintain dressing and alignment, the British troops reached the Egyptian position at the time Wolseley intended.
[[File:VOGT(1883) p247 BATTLE OF TEL-EL-KEBIR (1882).jpg|thumbnail|270px|Tell El Kebir]]
At 5:45 a.m. Wolseley's troops were six hundred yards from the entrenchments and dawn was just breaking, when Egyptian sentries saw them and fired. The first shots were followed by multiple volleys from the entrenchments and by the artillery.<ref name=HCRE2/>{{rp|68}} British troops, led by the Highland Brigade on the left flank, and the 2nd Brigade on the right flank with the Guards Brigade (commanded by Queen Victoria's third son, [[Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught and Strathearn|Prince Arthur]], the Duke of Connaught and Strathearn) in support, charged with the bayonet.

The British advance was shielded from view by the smoke from the Egyptian artillery and rifles. Arriving in the trenches at the same time, all along the line, the resulting battle was over within an hour.<ref name=HCRE2/>{{rp|68}} Most of the Egyptian soldiers were tired from having stood on the alert all night. Because of the haste with which Urabi's forces had prepared their defences, there were no obstacles in front of them to disrupt the attackers. Several groups stood and fought, mainly the Sudanese troops in the front of the 1st Battalion, of the [[Black Watch|Blackwatch Regiment]], Highland Brigade, but those not overwhelmed in the first rush were forced to retreat. In the end, it was a crushing defeat for the Egyptians. Official British figures gave a total of 57 British troops killed. Approximately two thousand Egyptians died. The British army had more casualties due to heatstroke than enemy action.<ref name="Wolseley1">{{cite book |first=Halik |last=Kochanski |title=Sir Garnet Wolseley: Victorian Hero |date=1999 |publisher=A&C Black |isbn=978-1852851880}}</ref>{{rp|130}}

British cavalry pursued the broken enemy towards Cairo, which was undefended. Power was then restored to the khedive, the war was at an end and the majority of the British Army went to Alexandria and took ship for home, leaving from November, just an army of occupation.<ref name=HCRE2/>{{rp|69}}

Lieutenant [[William Mordaunt Marsh Edwards]] was awarded a [[Victoria Cross]] for his gallantry during the battle.


== See also ==
* [[History of Egypt under the British]]

==Notes==
{{Reflist}}

==References==
{{Refbegin}}
* {{cite book|last=Pakenham|first=Edward|title=The Scramble for Africa|publisher= Abacus|date= 1992|isbn=0-349-10449-2}}
* {{cite book|last=Featherstone|first=Donald|title=Tel el Kebir 1882|year=1993|publisher=Osprey Publishing|isbn=1-85532-333-8}}
* {{cite book|last=Spiers|first=Edward M|title=The Victorian Soldier in Africa|publisher=Manchester Univ. Press|date= 2004|isbn=0-7190-6121-0}}
* {{cite book |last1=Wright |first1=William |title=A Tidy Little War: The British Invasion of Egypt, 1882 |date=2009 |publisher=Spellmount}}{{ISBN?}}
{{Refend}}

==External links==
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20070930201008/http://onwar.com/aced/chrono/c1800s/yr80/fegypt1882b.htm OnWar.com]

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Tel El Kebir, Battle Of}}
[[Category:1882 in Egypt]]
[[Category:Battles involving Egypt|Tel El Kebir 1882]]
[[Category:Battles involving the United Kingdom|Tel El Kebir 1882]]
[[Category:Conflicts in 1882|Tel El Kebir]]
[[Category:Egypt–United Kingdom relations]]
[[Category:Urabi revolt]]
[[Category:Battle honours of the King's Royal Rifle Corps]]
[[Category:September 1882]]

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Battle of Tell El Kebir