Abdallahi ibn Muhammad
By 1898, the combined British and Egyptian army was advancing down the Nile river into Sudan. The Sudanese Mahdist leader, the Khalifa Abdallahi ibn Muhammad ordered the Emir Mahmud Ahmad and his 10,000 strong army of western Sudan northward towards the junction of the Nile and River Atbara rivers to engage the British and Egyptian army led by Herbert Kitchener.