Fuzzy-Wuzzy

(notes by
Roger Ayers)

May 18th 2006]

The poem has four eight-line narrative verses, each followed by a four-line stanza in the form of a toast to the bravery and local success of the Sudanese warriors that the British Army faced in operations against the forces of the Mahdi in 1884-85 in its attempt to relieve General Gordon and his Egyptian garrison in Khartoum

In 1893, Francis Adams wrote in Fortnightly of "Fuzzy-Wuzzy": ‘no single ballad has had such a furore of success’. [Quoted in A Kipling Primer, F.L. Knowles, Brown & Co., Boston, 1899).

Richard Le Gallienne wrote of its initial reception‘:

…the news went round that Mr Kipling was contributing some quite fascinating ballads to the Scots Observer….and, long before the volume entitled Barrack-Room Ballads appeared, “Danny Deever”, “Fuzzy-Wuzzy” and “Mandalay” had become household words. There was a go and a catchiness about them that no English ballads had possessed since Macauley. When the volume appeared it was more widely read than any poetry published for some years. It was that rare thing in poetry, a genuinely popular success; and the success was significant of the achievement.’ [Rudyard Kipling, A Criticism, John Lane: The Bodley Head, London & New York, 1900].

The mix of violence and fairly crude humour in this poem has continued to trouble some critics to this day.
The Mahdist forces from the Beja and the Baggara tribal groups had considerable success against Egyptian troops in 1882 and 1883 until, in early 1884, the British Government was forced to send two British brigades, with cavalry and artillery, to the support of the Egyptian army. In addition, General Charles George Gordon was seconded to the Egyptian forces. Sent by the Khedive to Khartoum, he ended up with the Egyptian garrison besieged by the Mahdists, then decided that he was unable to extricate his garrison and called for reinforcements.

However, with a change of Government in London, the decision was taken to build up a British, Indian and Australian force based on Suakin in the Eastern Sudan with a view to reasserting just that control. This build up was well under way by mid-March, 1885, but was opposed by Beja tribesmen under Osman Digna, who attacked British troops in the process of building a defensive compound at Tofrek on 22 March. Both sides suffered heavy casualties but the Beja losses caused the tribesmen to lose heart. The new British Government then had other concerns so that was effectively the end of the Early Campaigns, which fizzled out in the sweltering Sudanese summer of 1885.

‘Fuzzy-Wuzzy’

The two main tribal groups in active opposition to the Egyptian and British forces were the Baggara and the Beja. Not all the Beja, dwelling in the Red sea coastal area of the east, were hostile, but the main opponents of the British forces were the Hadendowa, Amarer and Bisharin tribes and it was their distinctive, shaggy, frizzed-out hairstyles which caused the British soldiers to give them the name of ‘Fuzzy-Wuzzy’.

This nickname, almost a pet name, was probably also a deliberate attempt to make a ferocious enemy seem less awesome, less terrible, since it was quickly found out that:

‘...without a doubt, these Arabs are the most fierce, brave, daring and unmerciful race of men in the world.’

The British Square

Beja tribesmen pictured on a postcard sent from Khartoum during World War I but still showing the hairstyle that gave rise to the nickname Fuzzy-Wuzzy and the typical long Crusader-style swords.

The quare was broken twice.
The first was at the battle of Tamai, 13 March 1884, when one of two British brigades, moving in separate squares with a cavalry and mounted infantry escort, was surprised by a mass attack of Mahdist troops launched from the cover of a ravine. In the confusion, one British battalion charged forward from the square, leaving a flanking unit unsupported and the square was penetrated and broken up into smaller groups of desperately fighting men. Heavy rifle fire from the other brigade square and the mounted escort came to the rescue and the surviving Mahdists were driven off. British casualties were over 100 dead and a similar number wounded. Mahdist dead on the field were estimated at over 1000.

The second occasion was at the wells at Abu Klea on 17 January 1885 when Mahdist forces tried to cut the supply lines of Wolseley’s Desert Column struggling to reach Gordon in Khartoum.

There are two contemporary descriptions which convey something of the ferocity of the Sudanese assaults. One is a very simple verse from a piece in Punch, 11 April 1885, two weeks after Tofrek, the battle it describes, when it seemed to the surprised British troops that the desert itself rose up against them:

THE SKY WAS BLIND WITH SAND AND SMOKE,
WITH BULLETS SHRIEKED THE AIR,
LIKE WAVE ON WAVE THE DESERT BROKE
AGAINST THAT STUBBORN SQUARE.