GONDOKORO, a stopping place for steamers on the east bank of the upper Nile, in 4° 54' N., 31° 43' E. 1,077 m. by river south of Khartum and 13 miles below Rejef where, up stream from Khartum, the Nile ceases to be navigable. The station, which is very unhealthy, is at the top of a cliff 25 ft. above the river-level.
Gondokoro was first visited by Europeans in 1841-1842, when expeditions sent out by Mohammed Ali, pasha of Egypt, ascended the Nile as far as the foot of the rapids above Gondokoro. It soon became an ivory and slave-trading centre. In 1851 an Aus trian Roman Catholic mission was established here, but it was abandoned in 1859. It was at Gondokoro that J. H. Speke and J. A. Grant, descending the Nile of ter their discovery of its source, met, on Feb. 15, 1863, Samuel Baker and his wife who were jour neying up the river. In 1871 Baker, then governor-general of the equatorial provinces of Egypt, established a military post at Gondokoro, which he named Ismailia, after the then khedive. Baker made this post his headquarters, but Colonel (afterwards General) C. G. Gordon, who succeeded him in 1874, abandoned the station on account of its unhealthy site, removing to Lado, I1 miles down stream. Gondokoro fell into the hands of the Mah dists in 1885. After the destruction of the Mandist power in 1898 it was occupied by British troops and formed the northern most post on the Nile of the Uganda protectorate. In 1914 however the administration was transferred to the Sudan Gov ernment which gained control of the whole stretch of the Nile navigable from Khartum.