In March 1801, near the ruins of ancient Canopus outside Alexandria, a British expeditionary force under General Sir Ralph Abercromby threw back a determined French assault led by General Jacques-François Menou. The victory gave Britain the upper hand in Egypt, where the army Napoleon had left behind in 1799 was now isolated. Abercromby was mortally wounded in the fighting, but within months the French garrisons at Cairo and Alexandria surrendered, ending France's Egyptian adventure.
Napoleon Bonaparte had slipped out of Egypt in 1799, leaving his stranded army to hold the country as best it could. Britain resolved to evict it, and in early March 1801 Abercromby, a veteran general in his sixties, landed his troops on the beach at Aboukir Bay under fire, one of the more difficult amphibious operations of the era. The British pushed west toward Alexandria and dug in on a narrow strip of land between the sea and Lake Aboukir, where Menou, the French commander, decided to strike before they could grow stronger.
The French attacked in the darkness before dawn, and the fighting around the ruins of a Roman-era camp was confused and savage. French cavalry broke through the British line, and at one point the 28th Regiment of Foot found itself assailed from front and rear at once. Its rear rank turned about and fought back-to-back with the front, repelling both attacks. The regiment was later granted the right to wear its badge on the back of its headdress as well as the front, a distinction its successors still carry as the 'Back Badge.' The Black Watch also fought hard in the same sector. By mid-morning the French had withdrawn, having lost heavily, including General François Lanusse, who was mortally wounded.
Abercromby had been struck in the thigh by a musket ball during the fighting but kept to the field until the battle was won. Doctors could not extract the ball, and he died aboard the flagship HMS Foudroyant about a week later; he was buried at Malta. Command passed to General John Hely-Hutchinson, who pressed the campaign to its conclusion. Cairo capitulated that summer, and Menou surrendered Alexandria in the autumn, after which the remaining French troops were shipped home. The campaign restored confidence in a British army that had known few successes against Revolutionary France, and it made Abercromby a national hero.
Key people: Ralph Abercromby