Mahdist Military Drill

Mahdist Military Drill

Many European observers to the battle of Karari offered compliments to the Ansar and their level of drill. The correspondent Bennet Burleigh, for example, remarked: “It seemed to be a well-organised, intelligently-handled enemy we had in front” (Khartoum Campaign, 131). Likewise, Churchill asserted: “[t]heir drill was excellent, and they all stopped as by a single command,” and that “[t]he Dervishes were not the abandoned savages they had long been declared. They possessed a drilled and disciplined army, an organised Government, a mint, a powder factory, and courts of law” (River War, 2/99, 394).

But what did said drill look like? 

The Mahdist system of drill often times mirrored those of the Turco-Egyptian government which had preceded the, though with some modifications. For example, the Mahdists employed soldiers of the old army as drill instructors, both Egyptians, such as Muhammad Bey Iskandar, ex-commander of soldiers in al-Ubayyid, as well as Sudanese, such as Muhammad al-‘Ajami and Marjan Idris. This applied both to the regular troops in Omdurman and the soldiers of the provinces, as is shown by the governor of Berber, al-Zaki ‘Uthman, employing an Egyptian as drill instructor (IRE no. 23, 3; no. 27, 3; ‘Abd al-Rahim, al-Nida', 258). Such practices likely dated to the time of the Mahdi, however the documentation is scarce. One of the first instances of the Mahdi deploying rifle troops was under a Syrian officer (Nicoll, Mahdi of Sudan, 130), and a report regarding the siege of Khartoum lists Iskandar Bey as commander of soldiers to the Mahdi (Nushi, Gen. Report […], 110–111). However, the Mahdists differed from the previous system by replacing several of the drill commands from Turkish to Arabic substitutes. According to a mulazim interviewed by Egyptian Military Intelligence, this was done because the Baqqara commanders complained that “they could not understand his [Iskandar Bey’s] language” (IRE 27, 3). Though, one might also assume certain ideological inspirations as well. Below is an example of the Mahdists’ verbal substitution as provided by the Sudanese historian and journalist Mekki Shibeika [Makki Shubayka]:

 Makkī Shubayka. al-Sūdān ʿabr al-qurūn, 3rd edn. Bayrūt: Dār al-Jīl, 1991.

“They [the mulāzimīn] were trained on the arts of war as they were in the Turkish era except they altered the words to others, for example, the word ‘ṣaghdan’ to ‘bi-yamīnk,’ ‘ṣaldan’ to ‘bi-shamālik,’ ‘ḥāz dūr’ to ‘allāhumma anṣur,’ ‘rawāḥ dūr’ to ‘allāhumma astur,’ as well as ‘birinjī’ and ‘kinjī’ to ‘al-āwwal’ [and] ‘al-thanī.’ They continued to be trained along these lines and whenever new recruits [mujannadūn] entered they were subjected to this new system and vigorous drilling [al-tadrībat al-ḥadīda] . These groups of mulāzimiyya are those who resided inside the great wall [al-sūr al-kabīr] of Umm Durmān” (400).

Explanation of Turkish terms [given in Arabicized forms]: ṣaghdan = from the right; ṣaldan = from the left; ḥāz dūr = shoulder arms [1]; rawāḥ dūr = order arms [2]; birinjī and kinjī = 1st and 2nd. Explanation of Arabic terms: bi-yamīnk = with your right hand; bi-shamālik = with your left hand; allāhumma anṣur = O God, grant us victory; allāhumma astur = O God, protect us; al-āwwal and al-thanī = 1st and 2nd.

1. Read ṣād for zāyn; ḥāṣ dūr.

2. Read ḥā for wāw, read tā for ḥā; raḥāt dūr.