Sudan Military Railway, Count Calderari and Colonel Sir F Wingate KCMG, 1898

Photograph attributed to Francis Gregson, 2nd Sudan War (1896-1899), 1898.

Colonel (later General) Sir Francis Reginald Wingate (1861-1953), pictured on the left, was Director of Military Intelligence in Egypt at the time of the 2nd Sudan War (1896-1898). Count Calderari was an Italian military attaché. They are photographed in front of railway carriages on the Sudan Military Railway, especially constructed between Wadi Halfa and Abu Hamed for the campaign to re-conquer the Sudan.

Wingate was a veteran of the Sudan as he had been Aide-de-Camp to Sir Evelyn Wood during the Gordon Relief Expedition in 1884-1885 and subsequently Assistant Military Secretary to Sir Francis Grenfell in Egypt in the late 1880s. He was fluent in Arabic and had written a detailed account of the rise of the Mahdi and subsequent events in the region.

From an album entitled 'Khartum 1898', associated with the 2nd Sudan War (1896-1899).