THE SUDAN CAMPAIGN 1896-1908
M.I.D. 2 April 1901: Lord Roberts’ Despatch. (South Africa) Director of Railways Department. ‘The difficult and arduous work carried out by this department reflects the greatest credit upon all concerned. Brevet Major E. P. C. Girouard, D.S.O., held the important position of Director, and to his able administration, power of organisation, and unflagging energy, the success of his department is mainly due. I am much indebted to him for his valuable services.’
M.I.D. 2 April 1902: Lord Roberts’ Despatch. (South Africa) Director of Railways.
Édouard Percy Cranwill Girouard was born on 26 January 1867, in Montreal, the son of Désiré Girouard and his second wife, Essie (d. 1879), daughter of Dr Joseph Cranwill, of Ballynamona, Ireland. The Girouard family had been prominent in Quebec administration and politics from the early 1700s, and his father was a Conservative member of the Canadian parliament from 1878 to 1895, and thereafter judge of the supreme court of Canada until his death in 1911. Girouard grew up fluent in both French and English. He was educated at the seminary at Trois Rivières, and at Montreal College before entering, aged fifteen, the Royal Military College at Kingston, Ontario, from which he graduated in 1886 with a diploma in engineering. He then worked for two years on the engineering staff of the Canadian Pacific Railway. This proved to be important training for his future. In a sense Girouard's career can be seen as a conduit whereby Canadian railway technology and experience was transferred to British Africa, where low costs and speed of construction were equally important to imperial expansion. In 1888 Girouard accepted, much against his father's wishes, a commission in the Royal Engineers, and from 1890 to 1895 served as railway traffic manager at the Royal Arsenal in Woolwich.
Girouard's African career began with his secondment to the Egyptian army in 1896, as part of the preparations for Kitchener's invasion of the Sudan to forestall the French expedition to Fashoda. As director of the Sudan railways from 1896 to 1898, his construction of the railway bypassing the Nile cataracts made possible Kitchener's victory over the Mahdists at Omdurman. Girouard's reward was appointment as president of the Egyptian railway and telegraph board in 1898.
Ralph Moore-Morris takes up the story in his article The Sudan Military Railway:
‘The story of Kitchener's 1896-98 reconquest of the Sudan is of course well documented. Herbert Horatio Kitchener the giant driving force, the newly trained Egyptian/Sudanese Infantry and the great British Tommy. The decisive weapon that was used was the Sudan Military Railway; Victorian writers had described it as the greatest weapon ever forged against Mahdism. It is a long, detailed and fascinating story and too important to be omitted from this Sudan Special, so I have attempted to give a concise and readable account of it.
The opportunity for the reconquest came during March 1896 when an Italian army was routed by the Abyssinians at Adowa in Eritrea. The British Government saw that this might encourage the Khalifa to re-start attacks on Suakin and the Egyptian frontier. If Italy was crushed in Africa, her European partners would be weakened, thus creating an imbalance with France and Russia. France did seize the opportunity which culminated in the Fashoda incident. Italy asked for Britain's help to relieve Kassala, with a diversion up the Nile. Britain saw this as an opportunity to forestall Dervish aggression and to extend her influence south.
Kitchener, who had been appointed Sirdar of the Egyptian Army in 1892, was ordered to advance up the Nile and recapture the province of Dongola. To do this, Kitchener needed the existing Wadi Haifa to Kerma railway line. After the Sudan was abandoned in 1886 the Dervishes had bent, twisted and torn up much of the line and burnt the sleepers for firewood, and the line was now in need of replacement and repair as far north as Sarras. Kitchener had found the answer to the problem in the growing reputation of a Royal Engineer - Edouard Percy Cranwell Girouard.
Girouard was born in Canada and was fluent in English and French from an early age. He was a good student, receiving a sound education at the Royal Military College. In the small class that he had led, it had won prizes in military history, strategy, tactics, reconnaissance, administration and law. During summer vacations he had worked on Canadian railroads. After four years at R.M.C, he was offered a commission in the British Infantry in 1886, which he declined due to a disagreement with his father who wanted him to follow a career in law. He compromised by accepting employment with the Canadian Pacific Railway until they could agree on his future. After two years as a junior civil engineer, and only twenty years old, he learned of a limited number of commissions in the Royal Engineers being offered in Britain. He applied, was accepted and in 1888 took passage to England. He trained at Chatham, ran the Royal Arsenal railway, continued to study, and gained himself the reputation as an imaginative railroader.
Kitchener, after meeting Girouard in London, arranged for his transfer to the Egyptian Army and railway. Girouard now known as ‘Gerry’ was high spirited, handsome and cheerful, and spoke his mind - a man after the Sirdar's own heart. On one occasion Kitchener had taken command of a slow heavily laden train, ordered the latter half detached and the driver to “Go like hell”. After a hair-raising journey and arriving in record time Kitchener exclaimed, "What a terrible terrible, dreadful journey we have had Girouard". Gerry adjusted his monocle before replying with his lazy smile, "You'll break the record and your own ruddy neck one day". Kitchener, flushing with rage quickly cooled, he could not be angry with Girouard for long, who was his favourite, privileged and indispensable Director of Railways.
In March 1896, Girouard got stuck into repairs and relaying the tracks, and by June the army which had advanced with the line defeated the Dervishes at Firket. Kitchener's first phase of the Reconquest was a success. Girouard had had his problems, there were delays at first, as the labour force of largely Egyptian and Sudanese navvies, also included convicts and prisoners. Laziness, dishonesty, stupidity and intelligence were all intermixed. The intelligent learned quickly and Girouard formed a school to educate them at Wadi Haifa. They were supervised by technicians from many nations and guarded by an Egyptian infantry battalion.
Girouard suffered sunstroke, and the Egyptian army and railway engineers suffered a cholera outbreak. They worked in heat of 109° - 116° in the shade, and a massive storm washed away twelve miles of track. This was replaced by Girouard and Kitchener with five thousand men working day and night for a week. Now that Dongola was reached by the railway, Kitchener went to London for further orders, and in November 1896 the advance to Khartoum was sanctioned.
Kitchener faced strong opposition from all the ‘experts’, to the idea of a desert military railway from Wadi Haifa towards Khartoum. The land was hostile, there was no water, nothing like it had ever been attempted through an ocean of sand - it was madness. Kitchener over-ruled all this and made a start. Girouard had begun with his lists and plans ever bearing in mind the cost, and had gone to England for essential equipment. There he met Cecil-Rhodes who was buying for the Cape Railways, and borrowed several heavy engines from him. Rhodes was happy to lend them. Kitchener had forced the decision of using the 3' 6" broader gauge, and it would seem that he had a hidden agenda. This gauge matched with Rhodes' imperial dream of a Cape to Cairo railway!
Kitchener's ‘Band of Boys’ under Girouard drove the first spike on New Years Day 1897, and construction began. The experience of the former work was now beginning to pay off, and the workmen were progressing faster. The workshops at Wadi Haifa were the industrial heart of the whole enterprise working day and night. Water was discovered at two points along the route, and wells were sunk at 77 and 126 miles from Wadi Haifa, a tremendous advantage. Gerry in his small rail-car converted to an office, was up and down the line giving advice, praising, criticizing and encouraging.
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