 This force was placed under the command of a retired British Indian Staff Corps officer William Hicks and twelve European officers.The force was, in the words of Winston Churchill, "perhaps the worst army that has ever marched to war"—unpaid, untrained, and undisciplined, its soldiers having more in common with their enemies than with their officers.El Obeid, the city whose siege Hicks had intended to relieve, had already fallen by the time the expedition left Khartoum, but Hicks continued anyway, although not confident of his chances of success.