Egyptian soldiers mutinied, held officers prisoner, and were slaughtered when they tried to desert

Evidence

The first incident is recounted by Henry Salt, the British Consul-General in the 1820s, and concerns an officer, a certain Kurd Ali, who, after being taken prisoner by his soldiers because of a delay in the distribution of their pay, talked them into ending their mutiny and giving themselves up since “it could be of no service but only involve them in rebellion and certain ruin.” After he had freed himself he “seized two of the ringleaders, cut off their heads and put some thirty of the rest in prison.” The officer under his command subsequently released them from prison telling them that those who chose “to serve the Pasha and rest in obedience” might stay and return to their duties; as for those who did not want to stay they would be free to leave the camp. “On this a part of the thirty prepared to leave the camp, when an order was given to fire upon them and they were for the most part slaughtered.” … This case is significant, however, for it shows that the regime of internment that was based on the actual or implicit threat of the use of force was not effective: it proved inadequate to deter the soldiers from passing out of the gates of the camp. What was aimed for was a system that would have the very idea of internment and of the impossibility of desertion imprinted on the minds of the soldiers so as to prevent them from escaping in the first place and to spare the authorities having recourse to this kind of brutal force. — Khaled Fahmy, All the Pasha_s Men_ Mehmed Ali, his…, 665