had been engaged, which now returned to Baghdad. We were camped at
Mirjana, a few miles north of Kizil Robat, on the Diyala River. A pontoon
bridge was thrown across and the cars were taken over to the right bank,
where we bivouacked with a machine-gun company and a battalion of native
infantry. The bed of the river was very wide, and although throughout the
greater part of the year the water flowed only through the narrow main
channel, in the time of the spring floods the whole distance was a riotous
yellow torrent. We had no sooner got the cars across than the river began
to rise. During the first night part of the bridge was carried away, and
the rest was withdrawn. The rise continued; trees and brush were swept
racing past. We made several fruitless attempts to get across in the
clumsy pontoons, but finally gave it up, resigning ourselves to being
marooned. We put ourselves on short rations and waited for the river to
fall. If the Turks had used any intelligence they could have gathered us
in with the greatest ease, in spite of our excellent line of trenches. On
the fourth day of our isolation the river subsided as rapidly as it had
risen.
We had good patrolling conditions, and each day we made long circuits.
Sometimes we would run into a body of enemy cavalry and have a skirmish
with them. Again we would come upon an infantry outpost and manoeuvre
about in an effort to damage it. The enemy set traps for us, digging big
holes in the road and covering them over with matting on which they
scattered dirt to make the surface appear normal. The nearest town
occupied by the Turks was Kara Tepe, distant from Mirjana eight or ten
miles as the crow flies. In the debatable land were a number of native
villages, and such inhabitants as remained in them led an unpleasantly
eventful existence. In the morning they would be visited by a Turkish
patrol, which would be displaced by us in our rounds. Perhaps in the
evening a band of wild mountainy Kurds would blow in and run off some of
their few remaining sheep. Then the Turks would return and accuse them of
having given us information, and carry off some hostages or possibly beat
a couple of them for having received us, although goodness knows they had
little enough choice in the matter. There was one old sheik with whom I
used often to sit and gossip while an attendant was roasting the berries
for our coffee over the near-by fire. He was ever asking why we couldn't
make an advance and put his village safely behind our lines, so that the
children could grow fat and the herds graze unharmed. In this country
Kurdish and Turkish were spoken as frequently as Arabic, and many of the
names of places were Turkish--such as Kara Tepe, which means Black
Mountain, and Kizil Robat, the Tomb of the Maidens. My spelling of these
names differs from that found on many maps. It would be a great
convenience if some common method could be agreed upon. At present the
map-makers conform only in a unanimous desire to each use a different
transliteration.
Kizil Robat is an attractive town. I spent some pleasant mornings
wandering about it with the mayor, Jameel Bey, a fine-looking Kurdish
chieftain of the Jaf tribe. He owned a lovely garden with date-palms,
oranges, pomegranates, and figs. Tattered Kurds were working on the
irrigation ditches, and a heap of rags lying below the wall in the sun
changed itself into a small boy, just as I was about to step on it.
Jameel's son was as white, with as rosy cheeks, as any American baby.
Harry Bowen, brother-in-law of General Cobbe, was the political officer
in charge of Kizil Robat. He spoke excellent Arabic and was much respected
by the natives. His house was an oasis in which I could always look
forward to a pleasant talk, an excellent native dinner, and some
interesting book to carry off. Although the town was small, there were
three good Turkish baths. One of them belonged to Jameel Bey, but, judging
from the children tending babies while squatting in the entrance portico,
was generally given over to the distaff side and its friends. The one
which we patronized, while not so grand a building, had an old Persian who
understood the art of massage thoroughly, and there was nothing more
restful after a number of days' hard work with the cars.
In the end of February there passed through Kizil Robat the last
contingent of our former Russian Allies. They were Cossacks--a
fine-looking lot as they rode along perched on their small chunky saddles
atop of their unkempt but hardy ponies. When Russia went out of the war
they asked permission to keep on fighting with us. They were a good deal
of a problem, for they had no idea whatever of discipline, and it was most
difficult to keep them in hand and stop them from pillaging the natives
indiscriminately. They had been completely cut off from Russia for a long
time but were now on their way back. A very intelligent woman doctor and a
number of nurses who had been with them were sick with smallpox in one of
our hospitals in Baghdad. When they recovered they were sent to India, for
it was not feasible to repatriate them by way of Persia. When the Russians
first established connection with us, some armored cars were sent to bring
in the Cossack general, whose name we were told was Leslie. We were
unprepared to find that he spoke no English! It turned out that his
ancestors had gone over from Scotland to the court of Peter the Great.
V
THE ADVANCE ON THE EUPHRATES
Early in March we got orders to return to Baghdad, where all the armored
cars were to be concentrated preparatory to an attack on the Euphrates
front. There was much speculation as to our mission. Some said that we
were to break through and establish connection with General Allenby's
forces in Palestine. While I know nothing about it authoritatively, it is
certain that if the state of affairs in France had not called for the
withdrawal from the East of all the troops that could be spared, the
attack that was launched in October would have taken place in March. We
could then have advanced up the Euphrates, and it would have been entirely
practical to cross over the desert in the cars by way of Tadmor.
When we got word to come in, the roads were in fearful shape and the rain
was falling in torrents, but we were so afraid that we might miss the
attack that we salvaged everything not essential and started to fight our
way through the mud. It was a slow and wearisome process, but we managed
to get as far as Bakuba by evening. The river was rising in one of its
periodical floods and we found that the pontoon bridge had been cut half
an hour before our arrival. No one could predict how long the flood would
last, but the river rarely went down sufficiently to allow the bridge to
be replaced within a week. At that time the railroad went only as far as
Bakuba, and crossed the river on a wooden trestle, so I decided to try to
load the motors on a flat car and get across the Diyala in that way.
After having made arrangements to do this I wandered off into the bazaar
to get something to eat. In native fashion I first bought a big flap of
bread from an old woman, and then went to a pickle booth to get some
beets, which I wrapped in my bread. Next I proceeded to a meat-shop and
ordered some lamb kababs roasted. The meat is cut in pellets, spitted on
rods six or eight inches long, and lain over the glowing charcoal embers.
In the shop there are long tables with benches beside them. The customer
spreads his former purchases, and when his kababs are ready he eats his
dinner. He next proceeds to a coffee-house, where he has a couple of
glasses of tea and three or four diminutive cups of coffee to top off, and
the meal is finished. The Arab eats sparingly as a rule, but when he gives
or attends a banquet he stuffs himself to his utmost capacity.
Next morning we loaded our cars successfully and started off by rail for
Baghdad, some thirty miles away. The railroad wound across the desert,
with here and there a water-tank with a company from a native regiment
guarding it. As we stopped at one particularly desolate spot, a young
officer came running up and asked if we would have tea with him. He took
us to his tent, where everything was ready, for he apparently always met
the two trains that passed through daily. Poor fellow, he was only a
little over twenty, and desperately lonely and homesick. Many of the young
officers who were wounded in France were sent to India with the idea that
they could be training men and getting on to the methods of the Indian
army while yet recuperating and unfit to go back to the front. They were
shipped out with a new draft when they had fully recovered. This boy had
only been a month in the country, and ten days before had been sent off in
charge of his Sikh company to do this wearisome guard duty.
We spent a few days in Baghdad refitting. The cars were to go out
camouflaged to resemble supply-trucks, for every precaution was taken to
prevent the Turks from realizing that we were massing men for an attack.
The night before we were to start, word came in that the political officer
at Nejef had been murdered, and the town was in revolt. We were ordered to
send a section there immediately, so Lieutenant Ballingal's was chosen,
while the rest of us left next morning with the balance of the battery for
Hit. The first part of the route lay across the desert to Falujah, a
prosperous agricultural town on the Euphrates. Rail-head lies just beyond
at a place known as Tel El Dhubban--the "Hill of the Flies." From there on
supplies were brought forward by motor transport, or in Arab barges,
called shakturs. We crossed the river on a bridge of boats and continued
up along the bank to Ramadie. Here I stayed over, detailed to escort the
army commander on a tour of inspection.
The smaller towns along the Euphrates are far more attractive than those
on the Tigris. The country seems more developed, and most inviting
gardens surround the villages. Hit, which lies twenty miles up-stream of
Ramadie, is an exception. It is of ancient origin and built upon a hill,
with a lovely view of the river. It has not a vestige of green on it, but
stands out bleak and harsh in contrast to the palm-groves fringing the
bank. The bitumen wells near by have been worked for five thousand years
and are responsible for the town being a centre of boat manufacture. With
the bitumen, the gufas and mahelas are "pitched without and within," in
the identical manner in which we are told that the ark was built. The jars
in which the women of the town draw water from the river, instead of being
of copper or earthenware as elsewhere, are here made of pitched
wicker-work. The smell of the boiling bitumen and the sulphur springs is
trying to a stranger, although the natives regard it as salubrious, and
maintain that through it the town is saved from cholera epidemics. We had
captured Hit a few weeks previously, and the aeroplanes flying low over
the town had reported the disagreeable smell, attributing it to dirt and
filth. "Eyewitness," the official newspaper correspondent, mentioned this
in despatches, and when I was passing through, a proclamation of apology
was being prepared to soothe the outraged and slandered townsfolk.
[Illustration: A water-wheel on the Euphrates]
After taking the army commander back to rail-head, we retraced our steps
with all speed to Hit, and thence the eight miles up-stream to Salahiyeh.
The road beyond Hit was in fearful shape, and the engineers were working
night and day to keep it open and in some way passable. In the proposed
attack we were to jump off from Salahiyeh, and it was here that the
armored cars were assembled. Our camp was close to a Turkish hospital.
There were two great crescents and stars laid out for a signal to warn our
aeroplanes not to drop bombs. One of the crescents was made of turf and
the other of limestone. The batteries took turns in making the
reconnaissances, in the course of which they would come in for a good deal
of shelling. The road was unpleasant, because the camels and transport
animals that had been killed during the Turkish retreat from Hit were by
now very high. For some unknown reason there were no jackals or vultures
to form a sanitary section. After reconnoitring the enemy positions and
noting the progress they were making in constructing their defenses, we
would make a long circuit back to camp.
One unoccupied morning I went over to an island on the river. Its cool,
restful look had attracted me on the day I arrived, and it quite fulfilled
its promise. Indeed, it was the only place I came across in Mesopotamia
that might have been a surviving fragment of the Garden of Eden. It was
nearly a mile long, and scattered about on it were seven or eight
thick-walled and well-fortified houses. The entire island was one great
palm-grove, with pomegranates, apricots, figs, orange-trees, and
grape-vines growing beneath the palms. The grass at the foot of the trees
was dotted with blue and pink flowers. Here and there were fields of
spring wheat. The water-ditches which irrigated the island were filled by
giant water-wheels, thirty to fifty feet in diameter. These "naurs" have
been well described in the Bible, and I doubt if they have since been
modified in a single item. There are sometimes as many as sixteen in a
row. As they scoop the water up in the gourd-shaped earthenware jars bound
to their rims, they shriek and groan on their giant wooden axles.
On the night of March 25 we got word that the long-expected attack would
take place next morning. We had the cars ready to move out by three. Since
midnight shadowy files had been passing on their way forward to get into
position. One of our batteries went with the infantry to advance against
the main fortified position at Khan Baghdadi. The rest of us went with the
cavalry around the flank to cut the Turks off if they tried to retreat
up-stream. We were well on our way at daybreak. The country was so broken
up with ravines and dry river-beds that we knew we had a long, hard march
ahead of us. Our maps were poor. A German officer that we captured had in
some manner got hold of our latest map, and noting that we had omitted
entirely a very large ravine, became convinced that any enveloping
movement we attempted would prove a failure. As it happened, we came close
to making the blunder he had anticipated, for we started to advance down
to the river along the bank of a nullah which would have taken us to Khan
Baghdadi instead of eight or ten miles above it, as we wished. I think it
was our aeroplanes that set us straight. I was in charge of the tenders
with supplies and spares, and spent most of the time in the leading
Napier lorry. Occasionally I slipped into an armored car to go off
somewhere on a separate mission. The Turks had doubtless anticipated a
flanking movement and kept shelling us to a certain extent, but we could
hear that they were occupying themselves chiefly with the straight
attacking force. By afternoon we had turned in toward the river and our
cavalry was soon engaged. The country was too broken for the cars to get
in any really effective work. By nightfall we hoped we were approximately
where we should be, and after making our dispositions as well as the
circumstances would permit, we lay down beside the cars and were soon
sound asleep. At midnight we were awakened by the bullets chipping the
rocks and stones among which we were sleeping. A night attack was
evidently under way, and it is always an eerie sensation. We correctly
surmised that the Turks were in retreat from Khan Baghdadi and had run
into our outposts. In a few minutes we were replying in volume, and the
rat-tat-tats of the machine-guns on either side were continuous. The enemy
must have greatly overestimated our numbers, for in a short time small
groups started surrendering, and before things had quieted we had twelve
hundred prisoners. The cavalry formed a rough prison-camp and we turned in
again to wait for daylight.
At dawn we started to reconnoitre our position to find out just how
matters stood. We came upon a body of two thousand of the enemy which had
been held up by us in the night and had retreated a short distance to wait
till it became light before surrendering. Among them were a number of
German officers. They were all of them well equipped with machine-guns and
rifles. Their intrenching tools and medical supplies were of Austrian
manufacture, as were also the rolling kitchens. These last were of an
exceedingly practical design. While we were taking stock of our capture we
got word that Khan Baghdadi had been occupied and a good number of
prisoners taken. We were instructed to press on and take Haditha, thirty
miles above Khan Baghdadi. It was hoped that we might recapture Colonel
Tennant, who was in command of the Royal Flying Corps forces in
Mesopotamia. He had been shot down at Khan Baghdadi the day before the
attack. We learned from prisoners that he had been sent up-stream
immediately, on his way to Aleppo, but it was thought that he might have
been held over at Haditha or at Ana.
We found that a lot of the enemy had got by between us and the river and
had then swung back into the road. We met with little opposition, save
from occasional bands of stragglers who concealed themselves behind rocks
and sniped at us. Numbers surrendered without resistance as we caught up
with them. We disarmed them and ordered them to walk back until they fell
in with our cavalry, or the infantry, which was being brought forward in
trucks. As we bowled along in pursuit the scene reminded me of
descriptions in the novels of Sienkiewicz or Erckmann-Chatrian. The road
was littered with equipment of every sort, disabled pack-animals, and dead
or dying Turks. It was hard to see the wounded withering in the increasing
heat--the dead were better off. We reached the heights overlooking Haditha
to find that the garrison was in full retreat. Most of it had left the
night before. Those remaining opened fire upon us, but in a half-hearted
way, that was not calculated to inflict much loss. Many of the inhabitants
of the town lived in burrows in the hillsides. Some of these caves had
been filled with ammunition. The enemy had fired all their dumps, and
rocks were flying about. We endeavored to save as much of the material as
was possible. We were particularly anxious to get all papers dealing with
the Arabs, to enable us to check up which were our friends and which of
the ones behind our lines were dealing treacherously with us. We
recaptured a lot of medical equipment and some ammunition that had been
taken from our forces during the Gallipoli campaign.
Haditha is thirty-five miles from Khan Baghdadi, and Ana is an equal
distance beyond. It was decided that we should push on to a big bridge
shown on the map as eight miles this side of Ana. We were to endeavor to
secure this before the Turks could destroy it, and cross over to bivouac
on the far side. The road was in fair shape. Many of the small bridges
were of recent construction. We soon found that our map was exceedingly
inaccurate. Our aeroplanes were doing a lot of damage to the fleeing
Turks, and as we began to catch up with larger groups we had some sharp
engagements. The desert Arabs hovered like vultures in the distance
waiting for nightfall to cover them in their looting.
That night we camped near the bridge. At dusk the Red Cross ambulances and
some cavalry caught up. The latter had had a long, hard two days, with
little to eat for the men and less for the horses, but both were standing
up wonderfully. They were the Seventh Hussars and just as they reached us
we recaptured one of their sergeants who had been made prisoner on the
previous night. He had covered forty miles on foot, but the Turks had
treated him decently and he had come through in good shape. We always felt
that the Turk was a clean fighter. Our officers he treated well as long as
he had anything to give or share with them. With the enlisted men he was
not so considerate, but I am inclined to think that it was because he was
not accustomed to bother his head much about his own rank and file, so it
never occurred to him to consider ours. The Turkish private would thrive
on what was starvation issue to our men. The attitude of many of the
Turkish officers was amusing, if exasperating. They seemed to take it for
granted that they would be treated with every consideration due an honored
guest. They would complain bitterly about not being supplied with coffee,
although at the time we might be totally without it ourselves and far
from any source of supply. The German prisoners were apt to cringe at
first, but as soon as they found they were not to be oppressed became
arrogant and overbearing. At different times we retook men that had been
captives for varying lengths of time. I remember a Tommy, from the
Manchesters, if I am not mistaken, who had been taken before Kut fell, but
had soon after made his escape and lived among the Kurdish tribesmen for
seven or eight months before he found his way back to us. Quite a number
of Indians who had been set to work on the construction of the
Berlin-to-Baghdad Railway between Nisibin and Mosul made good their escape
and struggled through to our lines.
It was a great relief when the Red Cross lorries came in and we could turn
over the wounded to them. All night long they journeyed back and forth
transporting such as could stand the trip to the main evacuation camp at
Haditha.
By daybreak we were once more under way. Under cover of darkness the Arabs
had pillaged the abandoned supplies, in some cases killing the wounded
Turks. The transport animals of the enemy and their cavalry horses were
in very bad shape. They had evidently been hard put to it to bring through
sufficient fodder during the wet winter months when the roads were so deep
in mud as to be all but impassable. Instead of being distant from Ana the
eight miles that we had measured on the map, we found that we were
seventeen, but we made it without any serious hindrance. The town was most
attractive, embowered in gardens which skirt the river's edge for a
distance of four or five miles. In addition to the usual palms and
fruit-trees there were great gnarled olives, the first I had seen in
Mesopotamia, as were also the almond-trees. It must be of great antiquity,
for the prophet Isaiah speaks of it as a place where kings had reigned,
but from which, even in his time, the grandeur had departed.
The greater part of the enemy had already abandoned the town, but we
captured the Turkish governor and a good number of the garrison, and many
that had escaped from Haditha. The disaster at Khan Baghdadi had only been
reported the afternoon before, as we had of course cut all the telegraph
wires, and the governor had not thought it possible we would continue the
pursuit so far. He had spent most of his life in Hungary and had been
given this post only a few months previous to our advance. From the
prisoners we had taken at Haditha we had extracted conflicting estimates
as to the time when Colonel Tennant, the commander of our air forces, had
been sent on, and from those we took at Ana we received equally varying
accounts. The cars had been ordered to push on in search of the colonel as
long as sufficient gasolene remained to bring them back. Captain Todd with
the Eighth Battery was in the lead when some thirty miles north of Ana
they caught sight of a group of camels surrounded by horsemen. A couple of
belts from the machine-guns scattered the escort, and Colonel Tennant and
his companion, Major Hobart, were soon safe in the turret of one of the
cars.