And it is possible that a feeling of resentment
against the officer whose intractable nature was bringing such odium upon
the Government may have coloured his resolution with a darker tinge.
But for all his power and influence he was forced to give way.
The Government which had long ignored the call of honour abroad,
was driven to the Soudan by the cries of shame at home. Lord Hartington,
at that time Secretary of State for War, must be dissociated from the
general censure which his principal colleagues have incurred. He was the
first to recognise the obligation which lay upon the Cabinet, and through
the Cabinet upon the nation, and it was to his influence that the despatch
of the relieving expedition was mainly due. The Commander-in-Chief and the
Adjutant-General, who were fully alive to the critical position at
Khartoum, added their recommendations. But even at the last moment
Mr. Gladstone was induced to sanction the advance only by the belief that
the scale of the operations would be small, and that only a single brigade
would be necessary. The decision was taken forthwith by the Ministry and
announced to the nation. The Adjutant-General, however, asked for a very
different force from what the Government had anticipated, and the single
brigade was expanded into an expedition of ten thousand men, selected from
the whole army.
To reverse the decision was now, however, impossible, and the 'Gordon
Relief Expedition' began.
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