[2] Units involved included:[3] The Desert Column arrived on the salient overlooking the wadi of Abu Klea not long before sunset, and Stewart decided not to attack that night.

The British built a defensive position (or zariba), but were sniped at from the high ground around them by Mahdist rifle units – mainly soldiers from southern Sudan – all night.

This was caused when Captain Lord Charles Beresford RN, commanding the Naval Brigade, ordered the Gardner gun to be run out on the left flank of the infantry square to provide covering fire.

Colonel Frederick Gustavus Burnaby then gave an impromptu order for the Heavy Camel Regiment to wheel out of the square in support of the Gardner gun.

Out of the forty men in the Naval contingent, Lieutenants Alfred Piggott and Rudolph de Lisle were killed along with Chief Boatswain's Mate Bill (Billy) Rhodes and five other seamen and seven more were wounded.

The troops in the rear ranks faced about and opened fire into the press of men and camels behind them, and were able to drive the dervishes out of the square and compel them to retreat from the field.

On 20 January a flotilla of four steamers with a motley force of Sudanese and Egyptian troops sent downriver by Gordon reached the British camp.

The battle was celebrated by the doggerel poet William McGonagall: Ye sons of Mars, come join with me, And sing in praise of Sir Herbert Stewart’s little army, That made ten thousand Arabs flee At the charge of the bayonet at Abou Klea and so on for 19 stanzas.

and play the game!” "The wreck of a square" is a severe exaggeration, and Newbolt conflated Abu Klea with other events such as the Battle of Tamai; most of the dead were Mahdists.

The Royal Artillery unit which took part in the battle still exists today, re-numbered as 176 Battery, and has the honour title "Abu Klea", awarded in 1955 in recognition of the Victoria Cross won by Gunner Smith.

The battle, together with that of Tamai, was also referenced in Rudyard Kiplings poem "Fuzzy-Wuzzy", voiced as a common soldiers begrudged tribute to the fighting prowess of the Beja people.