Abyssinia (battle honour)

A diplomatic mission led by Hormuzd Rassam to gain their freedom, which entered the country in 1866 after numerous delays, met the same fate.

The force disembarked on the Red Sea south of Massawa in 1868, traversed 500 kilometres using native labour for road construction, crossed mountain ranges as high as 2,970 metres to storm the Imperial fortress at Magdala to release the prisoners.

[1] The Abyssinian expedition of 1868 was led by an engineer officer, Lieutenant General Sir Robert Napier, then Commander-in-Chief of the Bombay Presidency Army.

The Sappers were engaged for six weeks in making a road 10 feet wide, in some places it was carried over enormous granite boulders, by ramps.

The advance was resumed over increasingly barren and difficult country, where altitudes exceeded 2,900 metres, until at last General Napier arrived at Arogye, a plain at the foot of Magdala on 12 April, where the British could see the way barred, by many thousands of armed Abyssinians camped around the hillsides, with up to 30 artillery pieces.

Despite this, the Abyssinian soldiers continued their attack, losing over 500 with thousands more wounded during the ninety minutes of fighting, most of them at little over 30 yards from the British lines.

During the chaotic battle an advance guard unit of the 33rd Regiment overpowered some of the Abyssinian artillerymen and captured their artillery pieces.

On reaching the gate there was a pause in the advance as it was discovered the engineer unit had forgotten their powder kegs and scaling ladders and were ordered to return for them.

The church was guarded by soldiers from the 33rd Regiment [3] although, according to Henry M. Stanley, looted of "an infinite variety of gold, and silver and brass crosses".

[1] The following Indian units were awarded the battle honour (their present-day inheritors are listed after):[1] The 1868 Expedition to Abyssinia was depicted in a work of historical fiction, Flashman on the March by George MacDonald Fraser.