A PARTIAL LIST OF MAHDIST FLAGS ON DISPLAY
Blair Atholl: About a half dozen flags captured at Atbara and Omdurman.
Black Watch Museum, Perth, Scotland: One large blue flag, captured at Omdurman and presented to the Black Watch.
Durham University, Sudan Archive: Five flags: 2 from Atbara, 1 from Omdurman, 1 formerly belonging to Saltine and one formerly belonging to Wingate; all in boxes in the archive.
Khalifa's House, Omdurman, The Sudan: Mohammed's Flag, Zaki Uthman's Flag, flag from the Bahr al-Ghazal, c. 1897; several flags captured at Omdurman.
National Army Museum, Chelsea, U.K.: 3 flags from 1898 (one from Shaykh al-Din's army); 2 flags from the Mahdi's tomb; 2 flags from Tofrel, 1885; 1 flag from the Bayuda desert, 1885; 4 misc. flags. These are not on display but are contained in Colour Store 6.
National Museum, Khartoum, The Sudan: Uthman Diqna's flag, captured 1885.
Queens Own Highlanders Museum, Ft. George, Iverness. Flags, (furled), captured at Ginnis, Kosheh, Toski, Omdurman and Atbara; the Mahdi's flag, captured by the IXth Sudanese at Umm Diwaykarab, 1889, when the Khalifa was killed.
Royal Green Jackets Museum, Winchester, Hants.: six Omdurman flags.
Swiss Cottage, Osbourne House, Isle of Wight, U.K.: The flag of Uthman Arzaq, captured at Rika, 1896.
13th Light Infantry Regimental Museum, Taunton, Somerset: Flag captured at Abu Klea.
FLAGS ILLUSTRATED IN BOOKS ON THE SUDAN
Brooks-Shepherd, G., Between Two Flags, the Life of Baron Sir Rudolf von Slatin Pasha, 1972. Photo No. 11; crude sketch of a flag captured at McNeill's Zeriba; mislabeled "The Mahdi's Banner, and shown upside down.
Galloway, W., The Battle of Tofrek, London, 1887, Plate IV, with a detailed description on page xlv, of a flag captured in the Eastern Sudan, 1885. Clear detail.
Neufeld, K., A Prisoner of the Khaleefa, 1899; photo of the Khalifa Sharif's red flag.
It should be noted that two flags of the design of figure C are on display at Blair Castle, and other duplicate flags are also on display there. Flags of the same design may have been used to indicate subdivisions of the same unit. None of the flags pictured here were attributed to any specific commander or division. The Omdurman flags are most likely to have come from the Black Flag division, or the divisions of the Green Flag and Uthman Azraq.
A Note on Mahdist Flags
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© Copyright 2004 by Milton Soong.
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