"…You know the context well: the Mahdi, leading a "holy war", had taken over Sudan and its defender, Gordon, has died. The English have fallen asleep and, for now, they are waiting (they will do so until 1898, a very long nap, so long that it gave Churchill the opportunity to participate in the campaign). The Mahdi died in 1885 and his successor, the Khalifa Adbullahi Mohamed al-Taishi, aware that his movement needed to expand to survive, decided to occupy Eritrea to control the port of Masawa, from where he could spread along the African and Arabian coast and receive weapons.
On December 21, 1893, the battle of Agordat, a small fort in northwestern Eritrea, took place. Ahmed Ali, Emir of Ghedaref, with 11,000 men, approaches the fort, where 75 metropolitans and 2,106 native soldiers await…"
OT
More here
link
