Major-General Charles George Gordon CB -- 54mm Glossy Metal Toy Soldier
$39.99
Item Number: TRA1302
Major-General Charles George Gordon CB
Major-General Charles George Gordon CB, 1833 – 1885, also known as Chinese Gordon, Gordon Pasha, and Gordon of Khartoum, was a British Army officer and administrator.
He saw action in the Crimean War as an officer in the British Army. However, he made his military reputation in China, where he was placed in command of the "Ever Victorious Army", a force of Chinese soldiers led by European officers.
In the early 1860s, Gordon and his men were instrumental in putting down the Taiping Rebellion, regularly defeating much larger forces. For these accomplishments, he was given the nickname "Chinese Gordon" and honours from both the Emperor of China and the British.
He entered the service of the Khedive of Egypt in 1873 with British government approval and later became the Governor-General of the Sudan, where he did much to suppress revolts and the local slave trade. Exhausted, he resigned and returned to Europe in 1880.
A serious revolt then broke out in the Sudan, led by a Muslim religious leader and self-proclaimed Mahdi, Muhammad Ahmad. In early 1884 Gordon was sent to Khartoum with instructions to secure the evacuation of loyal soldiers and civilians and to depart with them.
In defiance of those instructions, after evacuating about 2,500 civilians he retained a smaller group of soldiers and non-military men. In the buildup to battle, the two leaders corresponded, each attempting to convert the other to his faith, but neither would accede.
Besieged by the Mahdi's forces, Gordon organised a citywide defence lasting almost a year that gained him the admiration of the British public, but not of the government, which had wished him not to become entrenched.
Only when public pressure to act had become irresistible did the government, with reluctance, send a relief force. It arrived two days after the city had fallen and Gordon had been killed.
All hand painted Toy Soldier sets packed in Red Boxes. Cast in quality white metal, hand painted gloss enamels.
In 1980 the toy soldier range painted in gloss was introduced, sculpted by David Scheinmann, and today by Andrew Stadden and Art IG which from modest beginnings has expanded to a very extensive range covering many popular subjects and periods of military history.
