ESTA PINTURA DE JOY, intitulada "General Gordon's last stand" mostra o momento final do célebre Charles Gordon, militar britânico morto no cerco de Cartum, em 1885.

Além de ser um militar de renome, Charles "Chinese" Gordon dedicava-se também à arqueologia e à escrita. Protestante convicto, ficou célebre pelas suas pesquisas na Terra Santa.

Em 1883, o governo britânico encarregou-o de liderar a evacuação de Cartum, então ameaçada pelo exército de Mohammed Ahmed, chamado o "Mahdi" (messias). Este místico do deserto, uma das personagens históricas mais misteriosas dos últimos séculos, vencera meses antes uma bem preparada força anglo-egípcia de onze mil homens. O Sudão era então um condomínio anglo-egípcio, governado conjuntamente por Londres e pelo Paxã do Cairo. O Mahdi surgiu com uma mensagem de integrismo islâmico anti-ocidental, muito semelhante às actuais doutrinas dos talibans, Bin Ladens e afins. Reuniu um exército de vários milhares de homens, composto principalmente por nómadas do deserto, e avançou contra Cartum. O governo inglês decidiu-se pelo abandono do território, uma vez que os custos da guerra seriam maiores que os proveitos da ocupação. Mas antes era necessário evacuar os cerca de 15 mil europeus que viviam na capital sudanesa, e Gordon foi o homem escolhido para a missão:

"In I882 there arose in the Soudan, a province of Upper Egypt, one Mohammed Ahmed, who called himself the Mahdi or Messiah, and invited all true believers to join in a holy war against the Christians. Thousands of wild tribesmen flocked to his banner, and in the following year he annihilated an army of eleven thousand English and Egyptians that had attempted to subdue the revolt. Rather than send more soldiers to die in the deserts of the Upper Nile, England decided to abandon the province. But first the thousands of Europeans who had taken refuge in Khartoum and other towns of the Soudan must be rescued from their perilous position. In this crisis the Government turned to the one man who could effect the withdrawal if it was still possible, and in January, 1884, appointed General Gordon to superintend the evacuation of the Soudan." (Eva March Tappan, ed., The World's Story: A History of the World in Story, Song and Art, [Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1914], Vol. III: Egypt, Africa, and Arabia, pp. 240-249.)


Gordon conseguiu evacuar as mulheres e as crianças, enviando-as para o Egipto protegidas por uma forte escolta. Conseguiu ainda vencer o Mahdi em vários recontros armados. O encontro entre os dois líderes ditaria o destino de ambos:

"A very determined attack upon one of the steamers coming up from Berber, at the Salboka Pass, was beaten off with great slaughter, Gordon's men firing no fewer than fifteen thousand rounds of Remington ammunition. Meanwhile, his efforts to negotiate with the Mahdi failed. "I will make you Sultan of Kordofan," he had said on arrival to the Mahdi. "I am the Mahdi," replied Mahomet Ahmet, by emissaries who were "exceedingly cheeky," keeping their hands upon their swords, and laying a filthy, patched dervish's coat before him. "Will you become a Mussulman?" Gordon flung the bundle across the room, canceled the Mahdi's sultanship, and the war was renewed. From that day to the day of the betrayal no day passed without bullets dropping into Khartoum." (idem, ibidem)

O Mahdi sitiou Cartum, mas Gordon defendeu a cidade com grande eficácia. Depois de um combate especialmente violento de que saiu derrotado, o Mahdi retirou-se para um caverna durante três dias, para meditar sobre o que fazer. Sairia da caverna munido de uma estranha profecia, que por cálculo humano ou acaso do destino cumprir-se-ia na íntegra:

"After his defeat before Omdurman, the Mahdi is said to have made a very remarkable prophecy. He retired into a cave for three days, and on his return he told his followers that Allah had revealed that for sixty days there would be a rest, and after that blood would flow like water. The Mahdi was right. Almost exactly sixty days after that prophecy there was fought the battle of Abu Klea." (idem, ibidem)


Não obstante os esforços de Gordon, a traição de um dos seus oficiais egípcios entregaria Cartum ao Mahdi. O general foi trespassado por uma lança, quando procurava refúgio no consulado austríaco:

"On January 26, Faraz Pasha opened the gates of the city to the enemy, and one of the most famous sieges in the world's history came to a close. It had lasted from March 12 to January 26---exactly three hundred and twenty days. When Gordon awoke to find that, through the treachery of his Egyptian lieutenant, Khartoum was in the hands of the Mahdi, he set out with a few followers for the Austrian consulate. Recognized by a party of rebels, he was shot dead on the street and his head carried through the town at the end of a pike, amid the wild rejoicings of the Mahdi's followers. Two days later the English army of relief reached Khartoum." (idem, ibidem)

O exército britânico de socorro chegou dois dias depois da queda de Cartum. O Mahdi e os seus correligionários foram destruídos.