Emin Pasha, a German doctor and naturalist…

Emin Pasha, a German doctor and naturalist who had been appointed Governor of Equatoria, is able to send and receive letters via Buganda and Zanzibar and had been informed in February 1886 that the Egyptian government would abandon the extreme southern province Equatoria.

When the Mahdists captured Khartoum in 1885, Egyptian administration of the Sudan had collapsed, and Equatoria, located on the upper reaches of the Nile near Lake Albert, had been nearly cut off from the outside world.

In July, encouraged by the missionary Alexander Mackay, he had invited the British government to annex Equatoria itself.

Although the government is not interested in such a doubtful venture, the British public have come to see Emin as a second General Gordon in mortal danger from the Mahdists.

By November, Scottish businessman and philanthropist William Mackinnon, who had been involved in various colonial ventures, had approached Henry Morton Stanley about leading a relief expedition.

Stanley had declared himself ready "at a moment's notice" to go.

Mackinnon then approached J. F. Hutton, a business acquaintance also involved in colonial activities, and together they had organized the "Emin Pasha Relief Committee", mostly consisting of Mackinnon's friends, whose first meeting was on December 19, 1886.

The Committee had raised a total of about £32,000.

Stanley is officially still in the employment of Léopold II of Belgium, by whom he had been employed in carving out Léopold's 'Congo Free State'.

As a compromise for letting Stanley go, it had been arranged in a meeting in Brussels between Stanley and the king, that the expedition would take a longer route up the Congo River, contrary to plans for a shorter route inland from the eastern African coast.

In return, Léopold would provide his Free State steamers for the transportation of the expedition up the river, from Stanley Pool (now Pool Malebo) as far as the mouth of the Aruwimi River.

By January 1, 1887, Stanley was back in London preparing the expedition, to widespread public acclaim.

The plan of the expedition was to go to Cairo, then to Zanzibar to hire porters, then south of Africa, around the Cape, to the mouth of the Congo, up the Congo by Leopold's steamers, branching off at the Aruwimi River.

Stanley intends to establish a camp on the Aruwimi, then go east overland through unknown territory to reach Lake Albert and Equatoria.

He then expected that Emin will send the families of his Egyptian employees back along the just-pioneered route, along with a large store of ivory accumulated in Equatoria, while Stanley, Emin, and Emin's soldiers would proceed eastward to Zanzibar.

Coincidentally, public doubts over the plan center around whether it can be achieved; the possibility that Emin might not want to leave seems not to have been considered.

The expedition is the largest and best-equipped to go to Africa; a twenty-eight-foot steel boat named the Advance is designed to be divided into twelve sections for carrying over land, and Hiram Maxim has presented the expedition with one of his recently invented Maxim guns, which is the first to be brought to Africa.

Merely 'exhibiting' the gun is thought to be a scare that would spare the expedition problems with troublesome natives.

The Relief Committee had received four hundred applications by hopeful participants.

From these, Stanley had chosen the officers who were to accompany him to Africa:.

Stanley had departed London on January 21 and arrived in Cairo on the 27th.

Egyptian objections to the Congo route had been overridden by a telegram from Lord Salisbury, and the expedition is permitted to march under the Egyptian flag.

Stanley had also met with Mason Bey, Schweinfurth, and Junker, who had more up-to-date information about Equatoria.

Stanley had left Cairo on February 3, joined up with expedition members during stops in Suez and Aden, and arrives in Zanzibar on February 22.

The next three days had been spent packing for the expedition, loading the Madura, and negotiating; Stanley had acted as a representative of Mackinnon in convincing the Sultan of Zanzibar to grant a concession for what will later become the Imperial British East Africa Company (I.B.E.A.C.), and had made two agreements with Tippu Tib.

The first included appointing him as Governor of Stanley Falls, an arrangement much criticized in Europe as a deal with a slave-trader, and the second agreement regarding the provisions of carriers for the expedition.

In addition to transporting stores, the carriers are now also expected to bring out some seventy-five tons of ivory stored in Equatoria.

Stanley had posted letters to Emin predicting his arrival on Lake Albert around August.