Tuesday, May 22, 2018

From Khartoum to New York

Following up yesterday's post about British generals and Russian novelists, I note that Leo Tolstoy and Charles George Gordon served as junior officers in opposing armies at the Siege of Sevastopol during the Crimean War.  Gordon then made his reputation working for the emperor of China and khedive of Egypt, as well as the British government. He was the first famous general to die in 1885, killed on January 26 at the fall of Khartoum. Grant, of course, died the same year on July 23, in bed at Mount McGregor, and his death was about as much of a journalistic sensation as Gordon's.

The poster is from the 1966 movie Khartoum, with Charlton Heston as Gordon, which I was impressed by at the age of 12 and on a later viewing. The British Guardian newspaper was less impressed in 2009. While I agree that the film took too many liberties with the historical facts, which I did not do in The Last Circle of Ulysses Grant, the 2009 review is crudely PC, and fails to mention Gordon's vigorous anti-slavery record.

The death of Gordon is discussed in Manhattan by Nellie Grant Sartoris, Tom Sweeny, Ely Parker, Matias Romero, Frank Herron and Grant himself in Chapter 11 of my book, with others including Adam Badeau and Samuel Clemens participating as the topics of talk come back to the American Civil War.

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