The Mahdi of Allah: The Story of the Dervish Mohammed Ahmed
London: Putnam, 1931. First edition. Hardcover. This beautiful, jacketed British first edition of this scarce work features a lengthy introduction by Winston Churchill, prominently advertised on the front panel of the dust jacket. Condition is near fine in a near fine dust jacket, quite scarce thus. The tan cloth binding is clean, bright, and square with sharp corners, bright gilt, and virtually no wear. The contents are crisp, bright, and tight. We find no previous ownership marks. The only flaw noted is spotting substantially confined to the text block edges. The dust jacket is unclipped, clean, and complete with excellent shelf presentation – quite atypical given that the jacket for this edition is both thin and brittle. Minor wrinkling, short closed tears, and light wear is confined to extremities. The jacket spine shows only barely discernible toning, with the red print remaining clear and unfaded. The dust jacket is protected beneath a clear, removable, archival cover.
Mohammed Ahmed was a messianic Islamic leader in central and northern Sudan in the final decades of the 19th century. Claiming that Allah had selected him as the true Mahdi, he found fertile political ground in the inhabitants’ resentment engendered by the corruption of and oppression by Egyptian rulers who had long dominated the region. Economic and political problems in Egypt further strengthened the Mahdi's hand, enabling the Mahdi's forces and followers to occupy most of the Sudan. In 1883 the Mahdists overwhelmed the Egyptian army of British commander William Hicks, and Great Britain ordered the withdrawal of all Egyptian troops and officials from the Sudan. In 1885, General Gordon famously lost his life in a doomed defence of the capitol, Khartoum, where he had been sent to lead evacuation of Egyptian forces. Though the Mahdi died in 1885, his theocracy continued until 1898, when the British general Kitchener reoccupied the Sudan.
A very young Winston Churchill would participate in the decisive battle of Omdurman in September 1898, where the Mahdist forces were decisively defeated. Then a young war correspondent and British cavalry officer, Churchill would write his second published book - The River War - about this British campaign in the Sudan. In The River War, Churchill was unusually sympathetic to the Mahdist forces and critical of imperial cynicism and cruelty - so much so that the 1902 second edition of his book excised much of his politically questionable criticism about Kitchener.
In 1931, Churchill wrote a four-page introduction for this book about the Mahdi from - in the words of Churchill - "the Mahdi's point of view". Churchill's broadminded understanding endured three decades after he fought the Mahdi's forces: "It is interesting to know that [the Mahdi's] operations with fire and sword through the Sudan were based on a religious enthusiasm as sincere and philanthropic as that which inspired Saint Dominic or General Booth." This work is translated from the original German and Churchill's introduction appears only in the British and U.S. editions. Interestingly, this British first edition features a tipped-on slip after the copyright page printed in bright red ink disavowing acknowledgement of "the claim of the Dervish Mohammed Ahmed to the sublime title of 'The Mahdi of Allah'" in order "To avoid the possibility of causing offence to Mohammedan readers".
Churchill and the author also clearly shared anti-fascist sympathies. Richard A. Bermann (1883-1939) became a co-founder of the German Academy in Exile, established in 1936 as a platform for German intellectuals in America to speak out against Hitler. Up to his death (in 1939 in New York) he remained intensively engaged in the work of the American Guild for Cultural Freedom.
Reference: Cohen B47.1, Woods B17. Item #008160
Price: $600.00