Shoots came early - a Fashoda TL

Introduction and POD
So this is my first attempt at writing a proper Timeline. Given it's my first attempt and that it will be a very general thing, expect this TL to be a very bad one. Also I'm not native speaker so you'll see typos and all that.

Introduction

Since the Berlin Conference, European powers had competed for the African cake, each one wanting the biggest chunk they could get. Amongst these powers there were two that held the biggest claims, the French Republic and the United Kingdom. Both empires had already taken large pieces of the continent from their respective centers of power (Dakar in the French case and Cape Town in the British). Both countries happened to have minor colonies in the other side of the continent, Djibouti and Egypt. And both wanted to connect their colonies into a contiguous empire.


If you look at a map of Africa and draw two lines connecting these points you see they intersect in South Sudan, close to the town of Fashoda. France had sent an expedition up the Congo River to take control of the area. Commanded by a certain Jean-Baptiste Marchand, it took off from the Congo on May 1897. It took them 14 months of slow march through the jungles and marshes of the Congo to finally reach the Nile. "The same river Napoleón went through" - thought Marchand. His expedition reached the Nile on June 10th. However, something wasn't going according to the plan. An expedition commanded by Christian de Bonchamps was supposed to be here, coming from Yibuti. But it wasn't. Marchand decided to wait, ignoring Ethiopian tribes refused to let Bonchamps' expedition to cross their country.

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French poster about Marchand's expedition.

Britain controlled Egypt, and thus Sudan as it was an Egyptian territory. However the Sudanis refused and launched an insurrection against their British overlords, the Mahdist War in 1881. It took the British quite some time to build up their forces for an attack, but by 1898 they were crushing the uprising. Their leader, Abdallah ibn Muhammad was decisively defeated in the Battle of Omdurman on September 2nd 1898. He was forced to flee south with his 52,000-strong army obliterated. "South, yes, but where?" - thougt Horatio Herbert Kitchener, chief of the British expedition. He decided to go up the Nile. After all it was the only major source of wated available, and soldiers need water.

On September 18th, Kitchener's forces encountered Marchand's expedition in Fashoda. Kitchener politely asked Marchand to leave, but he refused. Both forces were on a standby as no one wanted to retreat and no one wanted to push the other out. The French had a force of 120 franc-tireurs and 12 officers. The British had ten times the amount of soldiers. Marchand knew that and he remained calm, knowing that if this came to blows his force would be obliterated. Nothing he knew an accident would force his hand.

Back to Europe, the incident was met with anger and accusations from both sides. Both nations' imperial pride was hurt and no proud Frenchmen or Englishmen would permit this to happen. Media began publichsing satirical drawings and jingoist ones were warning that a war was soon to come. Within the governments, despite the anger and offences towards the other, cooler heads prevailed. Why would anyone seriously think a small incident in Africa could cause a war between the two great colonial empires? The situation in France was different, no one wanted another humilliation by a foreign power. Not after the Franco-Prussian war. As Henri Rochefort stated "Germany keeps slapping us in the face. Let’s not offer our cheek to England". France was not prepared at all for a major war. The Dreyfus affair had divided the French army in two blocks, one more "liberal" and the other more "reactionary". But the army didn't really matter in a war with Britain. It was the navy that mattered, and be sure that despite the Royal Navy is not unbeatable, it is several times the size of the French Fleet and slightly more modern. France simply had no chance in the naval camp. And without a navy to transport troops, the army becomes useless in a colonial war.

The standoff continued through September into October. Tensions kept rising and during October the Royal Navy began preparations for a possible conflict with France and called for reservists to resume service. French generals began planning and plans were laid for a recruitment campaign. In Africa the situation was both calmed and tense. It's been around a month since the British gunboats appeared and they have not left, nor have the French. But both commanders refuse to do anything and remain polite to each other.

Amongst soldiers, the situation is different. Some French soldiers are getting anxious about the issue and want to continue all the way to Djibouti. But their pride doesn't allow them to.

October 11th 1898

It was 2:42 PM. Marchand was on his tent writing a letter to be delivered to his wife. Despite being October, it's still over 30ºC outside. Enough heat to trigger a powder explosion if it remains. It hasn't happened yet because Marchand has been strict to his soldiers about it, specially native soldiers and assistants. Suddenly a quick blast was heard. Mardhand raised his head. "It has to be an accident" - he said. He went back to the letter and picked his quill to resume the letter. Then a second explosion was heard. And a third, and a fourth...


His assistant ran into his tent and before he could say anything Marchand asked:

-"Charles! What's going on?"

-"Sir, one of our guns has missfired. British troops have replied with their own. Now we are in a battle, sir!"

-"For the love of god, really?" - a bigger explosion was heard - "Was... was that artillery firing?"

The assistant glanced to the Nile and saw an explosion on the French bank. - "Definetely".

-"Ugh, I tried to be polite and work a way out of this without fighting, and now some of my soldiers ignored my orders about gunpowder and turned this into a battle. If it stops or we survive, I swear he..."

-"Major, we have no time for this, we have to get out of here, we'll be bombed if not!"

-"Pick a rifle, we are going to fight."

-"Wait what?"

-"Our soldiers need us. And we're proud Frenchmen. We have been forced to the battle and that's what we're going to do" - He picked the rifle from the floor - "Charge!"

Charles smiled to this. "We'll see again, sir, wether it's after the battle or in the heavens."


A certain native assistand that didn't speak French well misunderstood Marchand's orders. He kept the gunpowder and bullets in his rifle during the whole day and eventually, due to the intense heat and the dry air, the gunpowder reached a critical point and exploded all out of sudden. The bullet hit no one, but Egyptian soldiers in the east bank of the Nile understood this as an attack and they responded. It didn't take much time before both forces were openly engaging each other. Kitchener didn't want a battle either. But if he was forced into it, he would avoid casualties. "Send the gunboats to where the French are and shoot at them".

The gunboats simply smashed the French as they had nothing to respond to that amount of firepower. Marchand himself was hit by a bullet in his left lung around 3:58 PM. He died some minutes after due to a lack of oxygen and intense bleeding. Out of his total force od 132 men, 78 died and 39 were wounded. The remaining 15 surrendered shortly after. Amongst them was Charles Mangin, Marchand's right hand. The British and their Egyptian allies lost a total of 27 men, 13 of them being dead.


The battle sent shockwaves through both France and Britain. French forces were specially angered. "We have been defeated and hurt, but it's our duty to continue what the British started!" (French Media said that the British shot first). The French Parliament debated wether or not to scalate the incident and start a war that was essentially impossible to win. The rightwing politicans shouted "War! War! War!"...

France declared war on the United Kingdom on October 23rd 1898.

Btw I posted a modern-day map of this in the Map Thread. If you saw it, you've eaten the greatest spoiler ever.
 
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this is so strange. earlier today i was reading about the fashonda incident and was wondering what would happen if Russia backed France and they went to war with Britain. good luck with the TL, i look forward to reading it.
 
American Theater - 1898
October 24th 1898

First Sea Lord Sir Frederick Richards was looking at reports coming from Paris. "So they finally did it, we are at war with the French". He stoop up and went to the commanding hall, beginning to issue orders by telephone, a rather new invention that allowed for fast and direct communication. Sir John Commerell was waiting with the Home Fleet in Portsmouth. The Royal Navy was waiting orders to set sail to the channel and secure the Channel from any French Ship. If the French Navy was decisively beaten, French colonies would see no more reinforcements and their defenders would be an easy prey for any British landing force. However the war came almost as a surprise and despite the Royal Navy had begun calling ships home from around a week ago the amount of ships wasn't enough to gain absolute superiority over the French. Then his telephone rang. It was the First Sea Lord. He recieved orders to set sail inmediately and block the western entry of the Channel so the French Atlantic Fleet, based at Brest, couldn't enter it. His force was composed of 19 ships, 4 of them battleships. At the beginning of the war, the United Kingdom had 23 and the French had 6 of these powerful, heavy ships.

France also began preparations for a war. French admiralty was well aware of the British numerical superiority almost everywhere. The French would have to play defensively and score as many tactical victories as possible to reduce the gap between both forces. France had two fleets in Europe, the Atlantic and the Mediterranean fleets, and at the moment the Atlantic Fleet had 3 battleships and the Mediterranean Fleet had one, while the rest where on service elsewhere. Auguste Alfred Lefèvre, French admiral, was on the Ironclad Formidable, which had been transfered to Brest that same year. He was given command of the French Atlantic Fleet, and he was decided to strike before the British could gather all their ships. His force, excepting the 3 battleships contained other 12 ships. Almost on pair with the British Home Fleet at Southampton. "We need to strike now, no matter where" - he thought. He ordered his fleet to prepare and set sail to the west, then turn northwest and enter the Channel.

Meanwhile, news of the conflict spread to other parts of the world. The French Mediterranean Fleet was stationed at Touloun, and here the Royal Navy was superior with their 3 battleships and 9 ironclads. Algeria would be cut-off almost immediately. Henri Reunier, admiral of the Mediterranean decided not to attack and remain in port. No reinforcements would come as the British controlled both entrances to the Mediterranean. His force was trapped here, but as long as he had enough coal he could repel the British if they attacked. He asked for land reinforcements in the form of artillery, which was granted and they were placed across the coastal cliffs in Provence and Western Corsica, defending Touloun, Marseille and Ajaccio. With this the French Mediterranean should be safe from any attcks. North Africa was a different issue. It lacked it's own industry to build weapons and would soon be cut off by a British screen of ships from Malta to Gibraltar.


The American Theater

Both France and Britain had colonies in the Americas. France owned Cayenne and the islands of Saint Barthélemy, half of Saint Martin, Guadeloupe, Martinique and Saint Pierre et Miquelon; while Britain controlled Canada, Bermuda, Jamaica, the Bahamas, Guyana and (most) of the Leeward and Windward islands. Governor of Jamaica, Augustus William Lawson Hemming received orders to assmble an invasion force and attack nearby French colonies. His guard corps of 1,400 British soldiers recruited 2,000 negros through the island and military training began. It would take a week to at least teach them how to shoot, identify the enemy and gather supplies. Lemming was determined to keep his force of British soldiers on the rear and let the negros do the dirty job.


Meanwhile, local army forces from Saint John (Newfoundland) landed on the Saint Pierre and Miquelon islands, which were virtually undefended as they only had a pair of fishing vessels which didn't even try to resist. By November 4th, the fleet was ready in Kingston and set sail towards the French Caribbean. Saint Martin and Saint Barthélemy both surrendered within a day and on November 6th 1898 British forces landed directly on Basse-Terre, the capital of Guadeloupe island. Local French forces, led by Delphino Moracchini. Moracchini was an efficient colonial administratord and soon began to fortify the island, placing artillery in the sides of Mount la Soufrière and fortifying the small capital of Basse-Terre with everything he could before British forces landed. The island, however, was lightly inhabited and the town didn't even have a town hall at the moment, and Moracchini itself wasn't very popular amongst the island's peasants.

When British forces landed they were met with gunfire from the houses on the harbour, which had to be destroyed by coastal bombing before a beach head was secured. Hemming then proceeded to land most of his forces in the town and defeat whatever force could remain, securing Basse-Terre by November 7th. However the bulk of the the French forces retreated to the nearby Fort Delgrès where they entrenched and prepared to resist British attacks. An intial assault composed entirely of Jamaican forces was repelled. Succesive assaults over the nights of the 8th, 9th and 10th November were met with a similar result, but the French had used most of their ammunition supplies by then, being forced to capitulate on November 13th with the capture of the last French forces a day later.

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With Guadeloupe secured, Hemming left a garrison of 200 soldiers and went ahead to the island of Martinique. A swift landing in Saint Pierre, the capital of the island was enough to defeat the French force who surrendered rather quickly when compared to Martinique. By late November, the only piece of the French Colonial Empire in the Americas remaining was French Guyana. The Guyana was a larger and more distant place, so Hemming had to ask for supplies which came in from the Bahamas and on December 3rd 1,500 British and Jamaican soldiers landed in the small fishing town of Tonate, at 25 kilometers from the capital of Cayenne. British forces marched through the coast and reached Cayenne the next day, when they issued an ultimatum to the French garrison. Governor Henri Charles Victor Amédée Roberdeau refused and the town was laid siege on December 5th. French forces resisted stubbornly, but couldn't cope with superior British numbers and firepower, ultimately capitulating on December 9th. With their surrender the last bastion of French presence in the Americas disappeared.
 
SPOILER ALERT:
Heh, you had to find out. I plan to change several things from the video and overall expand all of what's shown there. A YT video is never enough for a complete Althit.

By the way I want this TL to be as accurate as possible within my reach, so excuse me if sometimes I take too long to post the next part.
 
I'm a bit confused as to why this theoretical Wikibox would list "negro soldiers"?

It doesn't seem to bode well for the future if Wikipedia when discussing two separate British forces differentiates by race.

Otherwise though, I'm relatively intrigued.
 
It doesn't seem to bode well for the future if Wikipedia when discussing two separate British forces differentiates by race.
I did this way to distinguish both forces. The British force were professional, well-trained soldiers where Jamaicans were just draftees with little to no experience.
 
I did this way to distinguish both forces. The British force were professional, well-trained soldiers where Jamaicans were just draftees with little to no experience.

Well, normally you'd just use "militia" to describe that in OTL articles rather than use race. Has a bad connotation and all to use race when training is just as good for differentiation.
 
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