Slatin, Rudolf Carl, Freiherr von [key], 1857–1932, Austrian adventurer in British and Egyptian service. Called to Egypt by C. G. Gordon, Slatin became governor of Dara (1879) and governor-general of Darfur (1881). In the Mahdist War he was forced to surrender (1883) to the Arab leader, the Mahdi Muhammad Ahmad; he was a prisoner until 1895, when he escaped to Cairo. After serving under Kitchener in the reconquest of Sudan, he became inspector general of Sudan (1900–1914). During World War I he headed the prisoners-of-war section of the Austrian Red Cross. He wrote Fire and Sword in the Sudan (tr. 1897) and was ennobled by the Austrian emperor in 1906.
See biographies by R. Hill (1965) and G. Brook-Shepherd (1973).
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