HC Deb 10 April 1885 vol 296 cc1305-7
MR. BAXTER

asked the First Lord of the Treasury, If his attention has been called to the following passages in a book just published, on authority, intituled Charles George Gordon. A Sketch, by the Rev. Mr. Barnes:— Page 73. "He (Gordon) saw certain of Her Majesty's Ministers, and it was decided that he should proceed to the Soudan as the representative of the British Government, but in no way responsible to the Khedive. His Mission was to superintend the evacuation of the Soudan; Page 75. "At Cairo Gordon's functions were greatly extended. He accepted from the Khedive the office of Governor General of the Soudan, and, in the firman conferring on him this appointment, he was instructed not only to effect the evacuation of the Soudan, but to take the necessary steps for establishing an organised Government in the different provinces of the Soudan, for the maintenance of order, and the cessation of all disasters and incitement to revolt; if these extracts correctly represent what took place both in London and in Cairo, and if the instructions of the Khedive were at variance with those of Her Majesty's Government; if it is true that, in his diaries, General Gordon states that there were serious differences between himself and Colonel Stewart, the latter having repeatedly and strongly urged that, by remaining in Khartoum, they could do no good whatever, but might cause much bloodshed; and, if any confirmation has been received of the intelligence that it was an emissary of Zebehr who betrayed Khartoum and murdered General Gordon?

MR. GLADSTONE

The Question of my right hon. Friend imposes on me rather a difficult duty—namely, to answer various Questions which I am afraid I cannot undertake to do in a way satisfactory to my right hon. Friend. But I may tell him that I have not seen this work of Mr. Barnes until to-day, and I have not had an opportunity of making myself thoroughly acquainted with its contents. I have reason to believe, however, that Mr. Barnes is a gentleman of character, and was on terms of friendship with the late General Gordon. My right hon. Friend says that Mr. Barnes said that General Gordon was in no way responsible to the Khedive; but in that I think he is certainly mistaken. General Gordon left this country on a mission of a comparatively humble nature intrusted to him by Her Majesty's Government—namely, to inquire into the best means of evacuating the Soudan—and that mission was intrusted to him by the Government in answer to the request of the Egyptian Government for an officer for that purpose. Subsequently the object of that mission was enlarged with the privity, and undoubtedly under the responsibility, of Her Majesty's Government; but the principal enlargement that took place was the conferring on General Gordon the office of Governor General of the Soudan. That, of course, was done by the Egyptian Government, and General Gordon could not be exempt from responsibility to the Egyptian Government in respect of what he did in that capacity. In Lord Granville's original instructions to him he was told that he was to consider himself authorized and instructed to perform such other duties—those duties beyond the function of inquiry—as the Egyptian Government might desire to intrust to him. My right hon. Friend refers to a Firman issued by the Khedive of Egypt empowering General Gordon to act in the capacity of Governor General of the Soudan; and he quotes an extract which states that in this Firman General Gordon Was instructed not only to effect the evacuation of the Soudan, but to take the necessary steps for establishing an organized Government in the different provinces of the Soudan. I cannot say that that is a totally incorrect quotation; but it certainly conveys an entirely different effect to my mind from that which we considered to be due to the Firman, and which I still consider to be due to it, after having referred to it again. The Firman is to be found in a despatch at pages 27 and 28 of No. 12 of the Egyptian Papers of last year, and I would recommend my right hon. Friend to refer to the original documents. What I understood the Firman to say is this—that after the evacuation of the country General Gordon was to take steps much like those described by Mr. Barnes. The evacuation of the country meant the withdrawal of all material means. Therefore, undoubtedly, I understood, and still understand, that the instructions meant that by amicable correspondence General Gor- don was to give effect to the plan he had described—namely, to invite the local Sultans to resume the exercise of those powers which they and their families before them had exercised in the Soudan previous to the Egyptian invasion. I do not, therefore, consider that the extracts quoted in the Question do represent with perfect accuracy what took place. I would not say that the instructions of the Khedive were at variance with those of Her Majesty's Government; but, so far as I know, they certainly went beyond those which General Gordon had received from Her Majesty's Government. But Her Majesty's Government recognized them, and accordingly became responsible for them. My right hon. Friend asks me whether there were serious differences between General Gordon and Colonel Stewart, the latter having repeatedly and strongly urged that by remaining in Khartoum they could do no good whatever, but might cause much bloodshed; and whether these statements are to be found in General Gordon's diaries? I should doubt that there were serious differences; but I would rather not answer Questions about the diaries of General Gordon for two reasons. In the first place, I have seen nothing, except the last of these six volumes; and, in the second place, the question with regard to the publication of these diaries is one on which Her Majesty's Government feel a peculiar delicacy. It is very much in the hands of Sir Henry Gordon, and no ultimate decision has as yet been arrived at. I would not, therefore, wish at the present time to refer to those diaries. The last paragraph of the Question of my right hon. Friend asks— If any confirmation has been received of the intelligence that it was an emissary of Zebehr who betrayed Khartoum and murdered General Gordon? We have no intelligence to that effect.

MR. O'KELLY

asked whether it was not true that in some instances where the people had restored their local Sultans, as at Berber, General Gordon sent down his steamers and bombarded their town?

MR. GLADSTONE

said, Her Majesty's Government had not, to his knowledge, received any such intelligence. Perhaps the hon. Gentleman could give Notice of the Question.