British general. In 1860 he went to China, where he crushed the Taiping Rebellion, for which he became known as Chinese Gordon. In 1877 he was appointed Governor of the Sudan. He returned in 1884 to relieve Egyptian garrisons and was besieged at Khartoum for 10 months by the Mahdi's troops, and was killed there two days before a relief force arrived. There are memorials to Gordon in St Paul's Cathedral and elsewhere. ALS signed “C.E. Gordon,” three pages on two adjoining sheets, 4.25 x 7, July 7, 1870. “My dear Clarke, Very kind of you to send me the ticket for the 9th, but I cannot…I shall visit when you are settled in your new abode. Just recd your report on Suez Canal, it is very clear & I think…without being a maze of science difficult to understand. I wish all reports were like it. I hope your visit was satisfactory…” He adds a postscript containing an address. In fine condition, with typical letter folds and a vertical fold through one letter of the signature, inconspicuous collector’s pencil notations. Between 1870 and 1900 the irresistible demands of strategy and national honour, along with the need to control the route to India - and to revenge General Gordon’s death in Khartoum - led to British control of Egypt and the Sudan. Egypt thus acquired a strategic significance for Britain which she would not lose for more than 150 years - an interest that was accentuated by the building of the Suez Canal in 1869, and led Britain ever deeper into the mire of Egypt’s administration. R&R COA.
