optimistic, but more men are coming. We must, if we can, save the Arabs
with Townshend. The last telegrams in were pitiful. Townshend quotes
military precedents and other campaigns, and it’s all mixed up with
famine and the stinks of Kut. Wilfred Peek’s his A.D.C. I am to try
and get him a safe conduct to take Townshend’s stuff up to him, also
one for us. If Townshend does not make it clear that it’s a return
ticket, we shall all be kept. I saw General Lake this morning. Captain
Bermester, the Chief of the Staff, Neville, Dick Bevan and Miller all
went off this morning. The Admiral is coming back. I have received
instructions about negotiations.
_Friday, April 28, 1916._ _H.M.S. “Mantis.”_ For the last two days I
have been standing by to go to Kut, constantly dressing up for it and
then undressing for the heat. A wave of great heat has come and the air
is black with flies. Practically no firing, though they tried to shell
us yesterday and an aeroplane dropped bombs near here. We have got very
little to bargain with, as far as the Turks are concerned, practically
only the exchange of prisoners. The operations of this force are not to
be reckoned with as a bargaining asset. We are not to retire to save
Townshend. Yesterday Townshend saw Khalil at ten a.m., whom he liked.
Khalil said that Townshend would have as great a reception in Turkey
as Osman Pasha in Russia, but he demanded unconditional surrender, or
that Townshend should march out of Kut. This last is equivalent to an
unconditional surrender, and Townshend’s men are too weak. We are all
sorry for them.
Yesterday morning General Lake sent for me, and talked about the Turks.
I said it was quite clear to me that the Turks would procrastinate,
if it was only from force of habit, and the end of that must mean
unconditional surrender. General Lake was calm. He has been made
responsible for things for which other people are answerable. Townshend
has telegraphed to say that he has only food for two more days and
that Khalil has referred to Enver for better terms.... I still think
Townshend would get better terms for himself than we shall get for him.
He has made a desperately gallant fight of it, and his position has
not been taken. Lack of food makes him surrender, not force of arms.
We, the relieving force, have been checked by the Turks, but I suppose
all these men, Lake, Townshend and Nixon, will be made scapegoats. In
the last telegrams Townshend warns us that the Turks may attack. He
says he cannot move out, and that even if he were able to get his weak
men out the Turks would not have enough tents for them or transport to
Bagdad, and that there will be a terrible tragedy and that a lot of
sick and wounded will die.... We are not in a position to insist on
anything. One is more sorry for Townshend and his men than words can
say.
_Sunday, April 30, 1916._ _H.M.S. “Mantis.”_ _The Events of Saturday_:
Yesterday morning Colonel Beach came to the _Mantis_ at seven and
took me off. We rode across the bridge to General Younghusband’s H.Q.
Nothing that I have ever seen or dreamed of came up to the flies. They
hatched out until they were almost the air. They were in myriads. The
horses were half mad. The flies were mostly tiny. They rolled up in
little balls when one passed one’s hand across one’s sweating face.
They were on your eyelids and lashes and in your lips and nostrils. We
could not speak for them, and could hardly see.
We went into General Younghusband’s tent. The flies, for some reason,
stayed outside. He put a loose net across the door of the tent. They
were like a visible fever, shimmering in the burning light all round.
Inside his tent you did not breathe them; outside you could not help
taking them in through the nose and the mouth. We left General
Younghusband and went on to the front trenches, where we met Colonel
Aylsmee. There Lawrence joined us. We three then went out of the
trenches with a white flag, and walked a couple of hundred yards or so
ahead, where we waited, with all the battlefield smells round us. It
was all a plain, with the river to the north and the place crawling
with huge black beetles and singing flies, that have been feeding on
the dead. After a time a couple of Turks came out. I said: “We have got
a letter to Khalil.” This they wanted to take from us, but we refused
to give it up, and they sent an orderly back to ask if we might come in
to the Turkish lines. Meanwhile we talked amiably. One of the Turkish
officers, a Cretan, had left school five years ago and had been in five
wars. He reckoned that he had been in 200 attacks, not counting scraps
with brigands and comitadjis. The Turks showed us their medals, and we
were rather chagrined at not being able to match them, but they and we
agreed that we should find the remedy for that in a future opportunity.
Several hours passed. It was very hot. I was hungry, having had no
breakfast. Again they asked us to give up our letter. I said that
our orders were to deliver it in person and, as soldiers, they knew
what orders were, but that Colonel Beach would give the letter up if
their C.O. would guarantee that we should see Khalil Pasha. This took
a long time. The Turks sent for a tent. A few rifle shots went off
from our lines, but Beach went back and stopped it. The Turks sent
for oranges and water, and we ate and drank. We had to refill these
bottles from the Tigris, and up and down the banks were a lot of dead
bodies from shot-wounds and cholera. After some time they agreed to
Beach’s proposal. We were blindfolded and we went in a string of hot
hands to the trenches of the Turks. When it was plain going the Turk,
who talked French, called: “Franchement, en avant,” and when it was
bad going, over trenches, “Yavash Dikatet.” We marched a long way
through these trenches, banging against men and corners, and sweating
something cruel. Beyond the trenches we went for half an hour, while
my handkerchief became a wet string across my eyes. Then we met Bekir
Sami Bey. He was a very fine man and very jolly, something between an
athlete and old King Cole. He lavished hospitality upon us, coffee
and yoghurt, and begged us to say if there was anything more he could
get us, while we sat and streamed with perspiration. He told us how
he had loved England and still did. He was fierceness and friendship
incarnate. He said it was all Grey’s fault, and glorified the Crimea.
Why couldn’t we have stuck to that policy? Then, as we were going off,
I said that he would not insist on our eyes being bandaged, showing him
my taut, wet rag of a pocket-handkerchief. He shouted with laughter
and said: “No, no; you have chosen soldiering, a very hard profession.
You have got to wear that for miles, and you will have to ride across
ditches.” Then he shook hands and patted us on the shoulder.
My eyes were bound, and I got on a horse that started bucking because
of the torture of the flies. The Turk was angry and amused. I heard
him laughing and swearing: “This is perfectly monstrous. Ha, ha! He’ll
be off. Ha, ha! This is a reproach to us.” I was then given another
horse that was not much of an improvement, and off we three went
with a Turkish officer, Ali Shefket, and a guard. Lawrence had hurt
his knee and could not ride. He got off and walked, a Turkish officer
being left with him. Colonel Beach and I went on. Then our eyes were
unbound, though as a matter of fact this was against the orders I had
heard given. The Turk Ali Shefket and I talked. He knew no French. He
said to me: “Formerly the Arabs would not take our bank-notes; now they
take them. Once upon a time they would not take medjids; two days ago
they took them. To what do you put that down?” I knew he meant the fall
of Kut, but it was not said maliciously. I said that I put it down to
the beautiful character of the marsh Arabs, “yerli bourda beule” (here
the native are thus). He laughed and agreed. We passed formidable herds
of horses and mules, our road a sand-track. The escort rode ahead of
us. The heat was very great, but we galloped. The Turks we met thought
that we were prisoners. They saluted sometimes at strict attention,
sometimes with a grin, and later our Indians were told in return to
salute the Turkish officers, who looked at them as black as thunder.
At last we came to Khalil’s camp, a single round tent, a few men on
motor cycles coming and going, horses picketed here and there and the
camp in process of shifting. Later on, Khalil said that the flies bored
him and that he meant to camp beside the river. Colonel Beach told me
to start talking. I said to Khalil, whose face I remembered: “Where
was it that I met your Excellency last?” And he said: “At a dance at
the British Embassy.” Khalil, throughout the interview, was polite. He
was quite a young man for his position, I suppose about thirty-five,
and a fine man to look at--lion-taming eyes, a square chin and a mouth
like a trap. Kiazim Bey, who was also courteous, but silent, was his
C.G.S. We began on minor points. The Turks had taken the English ladies
in Bagdad. Their husbands were sent across to Alexandretta, where I
met them last year; some of them, worse luck, are now prisoners again.
We had Turkish ladies at Amara and also twenty-five Turkish civilian
officials. This exchange was arranged. They were to meet each other at
Beyrout.
I went on to speak of the _Julnar_. He said that there had been two
killed on the _Julnar_. He was afraid it was the two Captains. He was
sorry. It made Beech and me very sad. I did hope they would have got
through. Firman was a gallant man--he had had forty-eight hours’ leave
in four years--and old Cowley was a splendid old fellow. Well, if you
are going to be killed, trying to relieve Townshend is not a bad way to
end.
After that, I began talking of the treatment of the Arab population
in Kut. I asked Khalil to put himself in the position of Townshend. I
said that I knew that he could not help feeling for Townshend, whose
lifelong study of soldiering was brought to nought through siege and
famine, by no fault of his own. I said that the Arabs with Townshend
had done what weak people always do: they had trimmed their sails,
and because they had feared him, they had given him their service. If
they suffered, Townshend would feel that he was responsible. Khalil
said: “There is no need to worry about Townshend. He’s all right.”
He added that the Arabs are Turkish subjects, not British, and that
therefore their fate was irrelevant, but that their fate would depend
upon what they did in the future, not upon what they had done in the
past. We asked him for some assurance that there would be no hanging or
persecution. He would not give this assurance, for the reasons already
stated, but said that it was not his intention to do anything to the
Arabs. Then Lawrence turned up.
We discussed the question of our sick and wounded. He said that he
would send 500 of them down the river, but that he required Turkish
soldiers for them in exchange. I said that he gained by having sound
men instead of wounded. He wanted us to send boats to fetch these men.
He said that he was sending them drugs, doctors and food, and doing
what could be done. Beach asked for the exchange of all our prisoners
in Kut against the Ottomans that we had taken. He at first said that he
would exchange English against Turk and Arab against Indian, because
he had a poor opinion of the fighting qualities of the last two. I
said that some of the Arabs had fought very well, and he would gain by
getting them back. He then pulled out a list of prisoners of ours, and
went through the list of Arab surrenders, swearing. He said: “Perhaps
one of our men in ten is weak or cowardly, but it’s only one in a
hundred of the Arabs who is brave. Look, these brutes have surrendered
to you because they were a lot of cowards. What are you to do with men
like that? You can send them back to me if you like, but I have already
condemned them to death. I should like to have them to hang.” That
ended that. We must see that Arabs are not sent back by mistake.
He then said that he would like us to send ships up to transport
Townshend and his men to Bagdad; otherwise they would have to march,
which would be hard on them. He promised to let us have these ships
back again. Colonel Beach said to me, not for translation, that this
was impossible. We have already insufficient transport. He told me to
say that he would refer this to General Lake. We then talked about
terms and the exchange of the sick and wounded. On this, Khalil said he
would refer to Enver or Constantinople as to whether sound men at Kut
would be exchanged against the Turkish prisoners in Cairo and India.
He did not think it likely. He was going to give us the wounded in any
case, at once. He would trust us to give their equivalent.
_Guns_: Townshend had destroyed the guns. Khalil was angry and
showed it. He said he had a great admiration for Townshend, but he
was obviously disappointed at not getting the guns, on which he had
counted. He said: “I could have prevented it by bombarding, but I did
not want to.” Later, one of his officers said to me: “The Pasha’s a
most honourable man; all love him. He was first very pleased and said
that Townshend should go free. After that something happened, I don’t
know what, and now Townshend will be an honoured prisoner at Stamboul.”
Beach told me to say that we would willingly pay for the maintenance
of the civilians and the Arabs of Kut. Khalil brushed this aside and
returned to his proposal that we should send up boats to transport
Townshend’s sick and wounded to Bagdad. Beach whispered to me that we
had not enough ships for ourselves at the present moment and no reserve
supplies....
Then we talked of the general situation and its difficulties. I asked
him if all this business would be possible without an armistice. Khalil
said very strongly indeed that he was entirely against an armistice
and that he wanted his assurance given to General Lake that even if
there was a general offensive the ships carrying the sick and wounded
could still come and go. Beach told me to say that we had no idea of
an armistice. Khalil, at this point, grew very sleepy. He apologized
and said he had had a lot of work to do. He also said that he had seen
Townshend that morning and that he was all right, but he had slight
fever.
Our final understanding with Khalil was that we were to notify him when
we were sending up boats, so that he might clear the river. He laughed
and said that he had forgotten all about the mines, which we had not.
We ended with mutual compliments, and we said good-bye to him and
Kiazim Bey. As we were leaving he called to me and said that he hoped
we should be comfortable that night and that we were to ask for all we
wanted. After more compliments, we shook hands and rode away, all the
Turks saluting. I talked to Ali Shefket, who now seemed a fast friend
and said: “How angry the Germans would be if they could see the Turks
and the English.”
We rode on, and before sunset, came to the Turkish camp. There the
three of us sat down and, as far as we could for the flies, wrote
reports.
The Turks gave us their tent, though I should have preferred to sleep
out. They gave us their beds and an excellent dinner. We all sat and
smoked after dinner for a few minutes under the stars, with camp
fires burning round us. Muezzin called from different places and the
sound of flutes and singing came through the dusk. Then Colonel Beach
decided that I had better stay and go to Kut, where I was to meet him
and Lawrence, who would come up with the boats to take our prisoners
away. I didn’t believe that Khalil would accept this sort of liaison
business. Beach wanted to go straight back, but would not let Lawrence
or me. We pointed out that, if he got shot in the dark by our people,
it would upset everything.
I dictated a French letter to Lawrence, asking for permission for me to
stay and go across to Kut. I cannot think how he wrote the letter. The
whole place was one smother of small flies, attracted by the candle.
They put it out three times. B. and I kept them off Lawrence while he
wrote. We got an answer at about two in the morning. Khalil said that
it was not necessary. All this happened on April 29th.
_To-day. April 30th._ We left at 4.30 this morning, and this time rode
all the way with unbandaged eyes. We ended up on the river bank amongst
dead bodies. We walked across to our front line and Colonel Beach
telephoned to H.Q. While he was doing this a Turkish white flag went up
and we went out again. After several palavers, Ali Shefket came out and
said that the river was clear of mines. Beach and Lawrence went back to
H.Q.
Our boat could go up if it arrived by 2 o’clock in the afternoon. I,
with the Cretan, the man of a hundred fights, Ali Shefket and others,
went across. A fierce bearded Colonel came out, arrogant and insolent,
talking German. He boasted that he knew Greek, but when I talked to him
in Greek, he could not answer. He then harangued me in bad German,
talking rot. I said, in Turkish: “Neither you nor I can talk good
German, therefore let us talk Turkish.” “Yes,” said the other Turks;
“it’s a much better language.”
The ship tarried. At 5 o’clock in the evening she was in sight, but she
could not have arrived for another hour. It was decided that we could
do nothing that night and that she would have to be put off until next
day. A monstrous beetle, the size of half a crown, crawled up my back.
The Turks were as horrified as I.
_Monday, May 1, 1916. H.M.S. “Mantis.”_ I came back last night. I saw
General Lake this morning to report. I think Khalil is going to play
the game, but he has got something up his sleeve. A letter has come
in from him. The ships, he said, could go. He wanted boats to send
the prisoners to Bagdad. He was answered by General Money that His
Excellency would understand that we ourselves needed all our boats.
Beach went up this morning with two boats, but they stopped him at No
Man’s Land.
_Tuesday, May 2, 1916. H.M.S. “Mantis.”_ Last night I went on the
_P----_ to go to Kut, with a rather tiresome Padre. It rained and blew
in the night, and was very uncomfortable on deck. I got up at four, and
we started soon after. They opened the bridge of boats for us. A launch
followed for me, for I was to get off before entering neutral territory.
At the neutral territory I found white flags and an Indian Major,
who was tired and nervous. All the way up the river there had been a
curious feeling of expectancy and uncanniness; the Indians looked at
us, shading their eyes from the rising sun, and our own troops stared.
There was an uncomfortable, eerie feeling in the air. The Major said
the Turks refused to allow the boats to go on. I telephoned to Colonel
Beach, who was leaving H.Q. He told me to do the best I could.... I
took a white flag and went out into No Man’s Land and found the man
I had talked to before, the Cretan’s brother. I asked what all this
meant. This was neither war nor peace. He said that it was our fellows,
who had been shooting on the right bank, and there was quite enough
shooting while we talked to make one feel uncomfortable. I said that
Khalil had given his word that the boats could go up, even if there was
an offensive. This was telephoned to Khalil. Our fellows began loosing
off with a machine-gun. The beastly Colonel and the Cretan then came
out to say that they had telephoned, and later the Cretan came again,
alone, to say that our boats could not go through until the others had
returned from Kut. He said it might not be necessary to send them up
to Kut. We sat and talked in the great heat. I have given Ali Shefket
Bobby Palmer’s photograph and have asked him to make enquiries. He
sent it back to me by the Cretan, who read me out what Ali Shefket had
written me. It was to say that Bobby Palmer was killed. He spoke very
kindly and very sadly. I am so sorry for his family.
I went back very tired and found a lot of men making up burying parties
which, reluctantly, I sent back again. A lot of the bodies on the river
bank look as if they died of cholera. By the way, we have had a hundred
and fifty cases in the last three days. Then I shaved on the deck of
the launch, while the Turks looked on in the distance. Then I went and
telephoned from the front line to Beach. He told me to bring all the
four boats back, which I did. The only news is that the Turks have dug
in below us near Sheikh Saad.
_Wednesday, May 3, 1916. H.M.S. “Mantis.”_ You foul land of
Mesopotamia! This morning bodies raced by us on the stream and I spent
most of the day walking in the ruin of battle. I was sent for by
General Gorringe and General Brown. They wanted to know why our boats
had not come down from Kut. They said that the Turks had been shooting
on the right and sent out white-flag parties, 200 men strong, to bury
the dead. I said I thought it would be all right about the ships but
I would go and see Khalil. The fact that they did not want us to send
more ships showed that it was all right, but I thought they would
probably like to nag us into doing something indiscreet, and asked the
General if he would give orders that there should be no firing except
under instructions, as long as they had our hostages. He sent me off to
see the Turks.
I rode fast through suffocating heat, with an Indian orderly. At the
bridge I found our two ships, the _Sikhim_ and the _Shaba_, which had
come through from Kut. They were banking above the bridge, which was
being mended. This altered the whole situation, since the General had
sent me out to complain that they had not been let through, and I
galloped back. After a talk at H.Q., it was decided that I was only to
thank Khalil.
I jumped the trenches and finally arrived at the main trench, where
my horse stared down at a horrified circle, lunching. The circle said
that no horses were allowed there and that none had ever been there,
and that my horse, or rather Costello’s, would be shot immediately
by the Turks. So I went to General Peebles, who was lunching farther
along in the same trenches, and he had her sent back. I then got a
white flag and walked out.... I met a couple of Turks. They wanted us
to send up two ships to-morrow, and were quite agreeable. I asked them,
as a favour, not to send out again the Colonel who talked German, as I
couldn’t stand him, and they said they wouldn’t.
It was blazing hot; a Turkish officer and I sat out between the lines.
* * * * *
There is one incident not recorded in the diary that is, perhaps,
worth mentioning, as it had a curious result that will find its place
in the sequel to this journal, if it is ever published. On one of the
occasions when I was talking to the Turks between the lines, a general
fire started from the British and the Turkish trenches. The Turks, for
the honour of their country, and I, for the honour of mine, pretended
to ignore this fire, and we continued to discuss our business, but
in the end the fire refused to be ignored, and, with loud curses, we
fell upon the ground and there attempted to continue the discussion. I
suggested to the Turks that the whole proceeding was lacking in dignity
and that it would be better for each to retire to their own trenches
and resume negotiations when circumstances were more favourable.
Next time I returned I was informed that one of the Turks had been hit
whilst returning. I naturally said how sorry I was, and that I hoped
they would not think it was a case of _mala fides_, as it might have
happened to one of us, and wrote a note explaining my regret.
_Diary._ It was curious and bitter sitting in that peaceful field
talking amicably with the Turks between the lines, with maize round us.
The river murmured and the larks were singing, while the stiff clay
held the knee-deep prints, like plaster of Paris, of the Black Watch
and the others, who had charged across that foul field, when it had
been a trap and a bog.
_Thursday, May 4, 1916. H.M.S. “Mantis.”_ Very tired to-day. I rode
back last night from the Turks, very fast. The flies made it impossible
to go slow, horses couldn’t breathe. At the bridge, I found that the
traffic was going the other way and had to hold up an unfortunate
brigade to get across, hating to do it.