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A MESSAGE FROM
MESOPOTAMIA
A MESSAGE FROM
MESOPOTAMIA
BY
THE HON. SIR ARTHUR LAWLEY
G.C.S.I., G.C.I.E.
HODDER AND STOUGHTON
LONDON NEW YORK TORONTO
MCMXVII
Printkd in Cr^EAT Britatm by
Richard Clav & Sons, Limitkd,
brunswick st., stamford st., s.e.,
and bungay, suffolk.
FOREWORD
My experience of America is that of the
making of speeches there is no end. They
are generally bad ones.
Recently I was called on quite suddenly
and unexpectedly to address an educated
audience on " Antarctic Exploration," a
subject of which I am profoundly ignorant.
The result was not happy, and I was fully
conscious of the sorry incoherence of my
remarks.
" Your speech, Sir ! " said a candid listener,
" was like a jig-saw puzzle 1 "
I acquit him of any intention to flatter
me. The simile was apt !
And now I ask myself, " Is this little
written effort only another ' jig-saw ' puz-
zle ? " Well ! it is just a stitching to-
gether of leaves torn from a diary of fitful
jottings. It is a bundle of odds and ends,
of scraps and sketches ! — an outline here ;
Foreword
a touch of colour there ! The most trivial
of happenings is recorded. The pettiest
trifles are told. And as I believe persons
not wholly deficient in intelligence have
been known to find occupation and interest
in a jig-saw puzzle, so perhaps my readers
may find some slight measure of interest in
piecing together my odds and ends, my
scraps and scrawls, and creating for them-
selves the form and the atmosphere and
the colour of this strange land of mystery —
the " Land of the Two Rivers."
In the publication of this little book,
however, I have, I confess, an even more
ambitious purpose in view.
There are thousands of men and women
in England who have serious misgivings as
to the conditions under which those near
and dear to them are serving in Mesopo-
tamia.
*' Is it well with them? " they ask. To
them I answer, " Yes ! It is well 1 "
All that human foresight and care and
organization can do, all that expenditure
Ti
Foreword
of money can accomplish, is being done to
ensure that all shall be well with our lads in
that far-off land of Irak.
No human being, no Body Corporate is
infallible.
No human organization but has its
weakness.
No human work is wholly free from flaw.
Occasions there must be over and over
again where the welfare, perhaps the life
of the individual, has to be sacrificed to the
military exigency of the moment.
Quite unforeseen and unpreventable con-
tingencies may arrive to upset the calcula-
tions and defeat the purposes of the finest
organization in the world. But what human
agency can do to ensure the welfare of the
troops and the proper care of the sick and
wounded is being done to-day.
A campaign in the Tigris Valley is fraught
with difficulty and danger owing to the
physical conditions which prevail in that
country. But the steps which have now
at last been taken to minimize the risks
vii
Foreword
and ensure the well-being of our men seem
to me to be wise and adequate.
And so I put forth these lines as a message
of reassurance.
I have written of the transport of our
wounded from the moment they are stricken,
and of the treatment which they receive at
the several medical units up and down the
river. I have spoken of the efficiency of
the hospital organization.
Finally, I have tried to give to my readers
a fair idea of the great part which was
played in the earlier days by the Order of
St. John, and later by the Order hand-in-
hand with our Red Cross organization in
making that efficiency yet more efficient.
I feel that I have written of Red Cross
work with unnecessary and unaccustomed
modesty ! Not that the work is mine. It is
not ! It is the work of others. And that it
should have been carried to so successful an
issue is due to the ability and the devotion
of Colonel Jay Gould, Major S. M. Moens,
and the good men and true who have kept
viii
Foreword
the Red Cross flag flying in times of great
difficulty and trial.
As to the quantity of the work achieved,
a statistical record of what has been done
up to January 31 of this year is bound up
in this volume.
As to its quality, let me quote the words
of the Army Commander written to me on
the eve of my departure —
General Headquarters,
Mesopotamia,
March 18, 1917.
" My dear Lawley,
" As you are shortly going to leave
Mesopotamia on completion of your tour
here, I should like to take this opportunity
of sending you one line to say how much we
all appreciate the excellent and thorough
work which the Red Cross is doing in
connection with this campaign.
" First and foremost I must mention the
invaluable assistance which we have re-
ceived from the fleet of motor launches
which have been so kindly placed at our
ix
Foreword
disposal. I can testify personally to the
fact that these launches were the means
of minimizing much pain and suffering
during the latter part of last summer at a
time when our medical arrangements were
not so fully developed as they are now.
But it is not only with regard to this water
transport that I have to speak. The Red
Cross has earned for itself a good name,
not merely in this great War, but in con-
nection with the campaigns which have
gone before; and I venture to think that
the work done by it out here will bear
favourable comparison with even its most
brilliant efforts in other fields. Through its
agency we have been supplied constantly
and liberally with stores of the most neces-
sary kind, and these stores, when asked for,
have always been forthcoming at the shortest
notice, and have been promptly delivered.
" I am, therefore, glad to have this
opportunity of writing to tell you how
much we are indebted to the system which
obtains out here, and which was till recently
X
Foreword
under the control of Colonel Jay Gould
with Major Moens acting as his subordinate.
Everything possible has been done to meet
our requirements, and we are accordingly
one and all grateful to the Red Cross for
their splendid efforts.
" Yours sincerely,
" F. S. Maude."
To this expression of high appreciation
on the part of the Army Commander I have
nothing to add.
It will, I think, be apparent that in the
face of great difficulties, the very best
traditions of the ancient Order of St. John
and the British Red Cross Society have been
nobly upheld.
Arthur Lawley.
XI
CONTENTS
CHAP.
PAQK
FOREWORD .
«
V
I,
THE PERSIAN GULF
1
II.
BASRAH
. 13
III.
ZOBEIR
. 23
IV.
MOHAMMERAH
29
V.
RECONSTRUCTION
31
VI.
THE TIGRIS .
37
VII.
SHEIKH SAAD
43
VIII.
SANNA-I-YAT
49
IX.
SHUMRAN
55
X.
AMARAH
59
XI.
UP STREAM .
67
XII.
BAGHDAD
75
xin.
DOWN STREAM
87
XTV.
NAZARIYEH .
95
XV.
"all aboard"
99
XVI.
BOMBAY
105
XVII.
all's well .
APPENDIX
•
113
115
Xll
CHAPTER I
THE PERSIAN GULF
Of all the work accomplished by volun-
tary effort for the sick and wounded in this
great War, none has been more effective or
more valuable than that which has been
done by the Hospital Ship Madras.
Immediately on the outbreak of war she
was acquired by the citizens of the Madras
Presidency, transformed, equipped, and
manned with such celerity that so early
as November 1914 she was able to set out
perfected, so far as human agency may
attain perfection, in design, construction
and — most important of all ! — control and
direction for the convoy of five hundred sick
or wounded men.
Having rendered services of incalculable
value to the troops in East Africa, she was,
towards the Autumn of 1915, diverted for
service in the Persian Gulf.
B 1
A Message from Mesopotamia
She was the first Hospital Ship to cross
the bar and make her way to Basrah, and
for many months she was the only Hospital
Ship in Tigris waters.
For over two years and a half she has moved
on a constant and unfailing course of mercy,
and it is by thousands that the number may
now be computed of those who have been
helped back to health and hope by as de-
voted and unselfish a body of men and
women as ever set out to heal the sick.
During the last week in January 1917
I found myself on board the Madras steam-
ing up the Persian Gulf. As a non-com-
batant and Red Cross Commissioner, I could
without impropriety travel in a Hospital
Ship, and it was perhaps not altogether
inappropriate that I should be a passenger
in a vessel bearing the name of the Presidency
with which my family and I have been
intimately associated in days gone by.
My purpose was to see so far as I could
what provision existed for the proper care
of the sick and wounded in the Tigris
2
The Persian Gulf
Valley. Reports of " regrettable incidents "
in the Mesopotamian Campaign of 1915 and
1916 had created in the minds of the British
Public a sense of profound uneasiness as to
the ability or otherwise of the Medical
Service to provide proper treatment and
transport for those who might fall by the
way, sick or wounded.
In the Autumn of 1915, river launches and
an abundant supply of medical stores and
clothing had been despatched from Pall Mall
to Basrah, and early in 1916, at the urgent
request of the present Viceroy, a staff of
Red Cross workers with an ample stock of
comforts of every kind were established
at Basrah and Amarah. Colonel Jay Gould
was in command at Basrah, and Major
Moens was in command at Amarah.
The former, after rendering very valuable
help to the Joint War Committee, returned
to military work in India, as it had been
decided that it was essential to appoint a
whole-time Commissioner whose movements
and activities would not be hampered in
3
A Message from Mesopotamia
any way by official duties. On his retire-
ment the Joint War Committee invited me
to proceed at once to Basrah to report fully
on the existing condition of things and to
investigate the possibiUty of extending the
sphere and enlarging the scope of Red
Cross activities in the Tigris Valley. Major
J. H. Stanley accompanied me as Deputy
Commissioner.
Let me say at once that from the Com-
mander-in-Chief in India, from the Army
Commander at the front, and from every
officer with whom I met, I received kind-
ness and help unstinted. I was encouraged
to go everywhere and see everything, and
wherever I went the fact that I was the
" Red Cross representative " was an " Open
Sesame " to the door of every Medical Unit,
afloat or ashore, and to the heart of every
Doctor and Matron in the Service.
I can conceive of no more eloquent tribute
to the achievements of our Red Cross workers
during the past years than the lively ex-
pressions of gratitude wherewith I was met
4
The Persian Gulf
on all sides as I passed on my way from
Basrah to Baghdad.
" What should we have done without the
Red Cross ! " was an exclamation so univer-
sal and so oft reiterated as almost to become
— like the grasshopper — a burden !
On February 1, then, behold me in the
good ship Madras, steaming up the Persian
Gulf, all things calm and cool, and very
comfortable.
I have ample leisure to visit every part
of the ship from stem to stern, the wards,
the operating theatre, the X-ray room, the
stores, the laundry, the lavatories, the
kitchens, the lift arrangements, and to study
its design and the manner in which it has been
adapted for the purposes of a Hospital Ship.
Later I have an opportunity of seeing
it with a full tally of sick and wounded —
British and Indian, and Turk — and I can
find lacking absolutely no single thing that
can minister to the comfort and well-being
of those on board.
Several of the Staff were through the early
5
A Message from Mesopotamia
phases of the Campaign, and I have leisure to
hear from them something of the old order —
or rather disorder — that then prevailed.
Here is an extract from the diary of one
of them —
November 23, 1915 (the morning after
the attack on Ctesiphon).
" With daylight more aid was able to be
given to the womided, but the medical
personnel was hopelessly inadequate for
the work to be done. There were but
three incomplete ambulances, where
according to scale there should have
been ten. The lines of communication
stretched some eight miles across country
to the river, over not roads but ploughed
fields, interspersed by deep nullahs and
thorny scrub. The available transport
was a few mules and some A.T. Carts,
many more of which would have been
available, if the Staff had determined
on some definite plan of action. . . .
The Persian Gulf
ii
Tuesday's precious hours thus passed
away with practically no attempt to
clear the wounded back to the river,
and encumbered with them the situa-
tion became increasingly dangerous."
Thursday, November 25.
We passed many — I might say a con-
tinuous stream of A.T. Carts coming
back full of wounded — poor fellows who
had been lying out in the open now
for two days and three nights. I noticed
also several dhooly bearers skulking
in the nullahs, but on approaching them
found that they, poor devils, were in
the last stage of exhaustion, some of
them white with dust, their lips covered
with caked sores, and hardly able to
drag themselves along. There was no
class of men in the force who had such
a terrible doing as these wretched and
humble followers — certainly none who
did their work more bravely or with
greater tenacity. . . .
7
A Message from Mesopotamia
** We reached Lajj at 3 in the morn-
ing (next day), and exhausted bodily
and mentally we flung ourselves on
the saturated ground, and heedless alike
of the water we lay in or that which
still beat down on us, were soon wrapped
in sleep.
" Our casualties were somewhere in the
region of 4500, but there was a total
lack of any ' bandobust.' Suddenly I
received the very welcome order to go
down river in charge of the wounded
on board of the Medjidiah.
" We reached Azizyeh on November 29.
About 8 p.m. we ran aground. Sud-
denly all was hellish tumult. We were
close to the shore, and along the sum-
mit of the whole bank — here some 12
to 15 feet high — was a continuous
sheet of flame, the flash of many rifles.
We had about 40 men on board who
could handle rifles, and these with a
machine gun and two Nordenfeldts soon
8
The Persian Gulf
added to the din as we replied to the
ambushers' attack.
*' For two such hours we endured that in-
fernal din. Many of our poor wounded
were put out of their misery and many
were wounded a second time. We
finally beat off the attack. We had
quite a number of the wounded on
deck killed. They were so closely
packed that you could hardly step
between them. We reached Kut in the
dark.
*' Altogether we had a total of 847 casual-
ties on board the ship and the two
lighters, and there was only Colonel X.,
myself and one assistant surgeon to
look after them on the voyage down
to Amarah. At Amarah we were told
to push through to Basrah. The journey,
which lasted for nine days and nights,
was nothing short of a nightmare.
" Colonel X. was so knocked out that the
work all fell upon the assistant surgeon
and myself. We got considerable as-
9
A Message from Mesopotamia
sistance from Mr. S. A., a subaltern in
the postal department who rendered
yeoman service. A Turkish doctor also
gave some help, notably in the ad-
ministering of anaesthetics.
" Organized sweeper service there was none."
A terrible tale ! I have omitted some
details which are better left unrecited.
Now let me revert to my own diary.
February 3, 1917, we are steaming along
the southern shore of Persia. It is barren
and inhospitable of aspect. The cliffs ap-
pear to rise sheer from the water's edge to
a considerable height and are seemingly
void of all vegetation.
The weather is perfect ! We are within
forty-eight hours of Basrah, and it is hard
to give credence to the tales which travellers
tell of cold and rain and bitter wind which
await us there. Soon enough, however, we
realize them to the full.
The following night we lie at anchor off
Fao till the rising tide enables us to cross
10
The Persian Gulf
the bar. We leave the open sea behind us
and breast the magnificent waterway of the
Tigris. The river is adorned on either bank
by a fringe of feathery date palms. Beyond
this ribbon of green the desert stretches
away to the far horizon — treeless, featureless,
an endless ocean of sand.
The air is cool and crisp and buoyantly
invigorating. As we move inland there are
many points of interest to the " tender-
foot." Abadan, where the pipe-line ends
which fills the huge reservoirs of the Anglo-
Persian Oil Company. Mohammerah, where
the Sheikh's Palace looks down upon the
junction of the Tigris and Karun rivers.
Beit Nameh, the Turkish house and harem
of the head of the Nameh clan, a rambling,
flat-roofed house almost hidden in its groves
of oranges and oleanders, its long pergolas
on which the rambling vines are just break-
ing to leaf, its fig trees, its rose garden, and
belts of slender palm. Now it is an Officers'
Hospital. Much has been done by structural
alterations and additions; by the intro-
11
A Message from Mesopotamia
duction of hot and cold water systems, by
the installation of electric light and fans, to
make the house suitable for its present
purposes. To its furniture and equipment
the Red Cross has been a ready contributor.
There are other directions in which the
Red Cross will work for the greater comfort
of all the inmates. Here, for example, is a
place where a motor launch would be a great
boon to Staff and patients. The Hospital
is an oasis remote and isolated. On one side
the gardens are bounded by the river, and
on the other three sides by the desert. Some
kind of transport is badly wanted to break
the monotony of life, especially in the
cruelly hot days of summer. As soon as
our Motor Launch Fleet is reinforced, one
should certainly be sent to Beit Nameh.
We have passed the spot where, on the
declaration of war, the Turks sank three
ships to block the passage of the river, but
with complete unsuccess. The masts and
the funnels appear above the surface of the
stream, and tell their tale of futile endeavour.
12
CHAPTER II
BASRAH
At Basrah the river is ahve with craft
of every description. Never was there so
motley and heterogeneous a marine ! Snow-
white Hospital Ships alternate with black-
hulled transports and cargo ships. Fussy
steam tugs snort up and down, with lumber-
ing barges in tow; stern- wheelers from the
Hooghly; penny steamboats from the city
of London; electric launches from the
reaches of the Thames ; paddle-boats from
the Irrawaddy; vessels of strange aspect
from the Nile, including her of ancient date
who bore the gallant Gordon to Khartoum.
Native craft of every description — the sea-
going " dhow " with its graduated fraternity,
the '' mahelah," the " mashouf," the " ba-
lum " (the gondola of Tigris waters), and
finally the round saucer-like " gufa " which
evokes memories of coracles on the Severn
and the Dee.
13
A Message from Mesopotamia
We thread our way through this fleet of
incongruous elements, and take up our
position alongside the jetty of No. 3 British
General Hospital. On the jetty I am greeted
by Major Moens and Captain Gordon Holmes,
two of our stalwarts who have kept the
Red Cross flag flying, and I learn from them
that I am to be the guest of General Sir
George MacMunn, the I.G.C., whose habitat
is the German Consulate, a roomy-gloomy
ramshackle house as hideous as only a
Hunnish house can be.
During the whole of my stay in Basrah
I have the good fortune to be the guest of
the I.G.C., at whose hands I am the constant
recipient of kindness without measure, and
whose sympathy with our Red Cross work is
made manifest in many a practical fashion.
Major Stanley (my " stable companion ")
enjoys hospitable entertainment in the house
of General Brownlow, to whom we are always
turning for help in Red Cross matters and
to whom we never turn in vain.
Tuesday^ February 6, at 7.30 a.m., I set
14
Basrah
out on horseback with the I.G.C. and his
staff. A deUcious morning and a perfect
hack — a canter through some stretches of
palm gardens between high walls of sun-
dried clay brings us to the Remount Camp,
and thence across the desert to the Camel
lines and back through Basrah City. The
streets are narrow and tortuous, and the
Bazaar proper is roofed in with a vaulted
ceiling. The shops on either side are almost
in the roadway. Groups of Arabs loll about
the market-places, very picturesque viewed
either collectively or individually. Camels,
donkeys, mules and gharries push and jostle
and crowd one another in the narrow alley-
ways. A turgid stream of polyglot humanity,
uttering its thousand cries in every tongue,
rolls down the street. Here and there appears
the khaki-clad figure of Thomas Atkins,
always cheerful and always ready to hold
friendly conversation in his own peculiar lingo
with any passer-by, no matter to what nation-
ality he may belong ! A strange scene !
I try to learn something of the geography
15
A Message from Mesopotamia
of Basrah. As in Venice, the river is the
roadway ! The Tigris is the main street, and
from it various creeks run back at right angles
to the river. They are the pathways of the
people and form lines of lateral communica-
tion. The creeks are also the laundries, the
bathing-places, and the main drains of the
city ! When the tide is low the smell is
pungent and nauseating. The town is laid
out on no intelligible plan. Sometimes one
must have a boat, sometimes a gharry,
sometimes a motor-car to reach his
destination.
The country is peculiar in that half an
inch of rain induces a condition of complete
paralysis of all vehicular traffic. Each road
— so called — indeed all earth's surface be-
comes a morass of sticky clay, in which
camels, horses and motor-cars alike slither
and slide helplessly, aimlessly and uncon-
trollably in a state of ludicrous impotency.
A boat or " Shanks' Mare " becomes the only
means to get hither or thither, and the man
who sets out to walk finds that at each step
16
Basrah
his feet acquire more and more the size and
consistency of a feather bed !
It is hardly necessary to point out the
value of our motor launches where river
transport plays so important a part. To the
Medical Service their provision has been
a perfect Godsend. Even to-day our
launches (I include, of course, those supplied
by the Order of St. John and the Indian
Branch of the Joint War Committee) are
the only ones available for use by the
Medical Service.
For Red Cross purposes two sites have
been allotted in Basrah. One known as
Beit Muir is on the main river front where
the Khandak creek joins the Tigris, and the
other on the Khandak creek itself. The
latter is at present the main centre of our
activities. Here the members of our Staff
are lodged in tents; our stores are packed
in somewhat flimsy huts, and on a corner of
the site our launch repair-shop has just
been opened. I found the adaptation of
some existing store huts as quarters for our
c 17
A Message from Mesopotamia
Staff about to be made on Beit Muir, indeed
the work had already begun, but the plan
seemed to me so faulty that I begged the
military authorities to provide, if possible,
some substantial houses for the whole of our
Staff before the coming of the hot season.
Ample provision has now been made for
the accommodation of our Staff.
I spent a long time in going into the
question of stores and supplies, looking into
the demands made on us in the past, con-
sidering the great increase in troops, camp
followers and Labour Corps in the country,
and estimating the probable requisitions
which we might be called upon to meet as the
season advanced, with the result that two
enormous indents were despatched to Bom-
bay and London respectively, for the supply
of motor-cars, launches, clothing and com-
forts of every kind. It is hardly necessary
to say that my request has been complied
with, with the utmost promptitude.
In the course of my sojourn at Basrah
I included a daily visit to one or more of
18
Basrah
the Medical Units, which between them make
provision for fourteen thousand sick, and the
various other enterprises which come under
the control of the D.M.S., e. g. the Isolation
Camp, the Nurses' Homes, the Ambulance
Car Convoy, the new Hospital Train running
to and from Nazariyeh, also the Cemeteries
and Turkish Prisoners' Camps.
Some of the Hospitals are lodged in
permanent buildings, some are in huts and
some are in tents. No. 3 B.G.H. is in the
Sheikh of Mohammerah's town palace. It
has some fine rooms off the main hall,
which make excellent wards. Adjoining the
palace are large hut extensions. They are
solidly built to resist the heat. The roofs
are thick and sunproof, the wards are high
and airy, with electric lights and fans. So
far as structure and conveniences go this
Hospital is as good as any one could hope
to find in Mesopotamia. A very competent
Staff of Doctors and Nurses maintain a high
standard of efficiency. Here there is a very
nice officers' ward, to the furnishing of which
19
A Message from Mesopotamia
the Red Cross has done not a httle. I
laughed at the enthusiasm of one patient
who was moved almost to tears at the sight
of one of our armchairs.
" Ah ! You don't know what it is to sink
into an armchair when for months you have
had nothing to sit on but a wooden box ! "
No. 33 B.G.H. is in the liquorice factory,
not nearly so happily situated as No. 3.
It is shut in and airless. There is a mule
depot just across the creek which brings an
" infinite torment of flies," and on the
occasion of my visit I found the wards some-
what topsy-turvied by the discovery of
plague-infected rats, and consequently of
course of plague-infected fleas. The O.C.
and the Staff have, however, been well
trained to cope with difficulties, and as
in the past, so in the future, their cheery
optimism, skill and courage will carry them
through every difficulty.
Most of the Hospitals are in tents, many
of them out on the desert. The sites of
some of them bare, bleak and depressing !
20
Basrah
Glare and idust the prevailing characteristics.
Nothing to mitigate the fierce anger of the
Sun God ! Nothing to break the deadly-
monotony of life when the earth is like a
furnace and the sky is like brass, and from
8 a.m. through the long, sweltering day the
thermometer stands at 120° in the shade.
Nothing ! nothing ! that we can achieve
for the refreshment — mind and body — of
those whose lives are cast in a Mesopotamian
Hospital through the torrid months is
enough or half enough for us to do.
21
CHAPTER III
ZOBEIR
It is a Saturday afternoon, and with an
old and very dear friend, who is doing work
of incalculable value in the political depart-
ment, I set out on a half-holiday jaunt to
Zobeir. The sky is dull and grey, and a
strong south wind is sweeping fitful clouds
of dust across the desert.
Nine miles from the present town of
Basrah is the site of the old Basrah city —
date somewhere about 650. The ruins of
old Basrah extend for some three miles
along the road to the modern Basrah and
cover several square miles. The main
feature is the Northern Minaret, faced with
yellow bricks which have weathered many
hundred years and are still of excellent
quality. This ruined minaret is a great
feature in the landscape. It leans like that
of Pisa. Zobeir is a typical walled Arab
23
A Message from Mesopotamia
town, to which the desert tribes must come
for the necessaries as well as the luxuries
of life. The desert is fringed with a scat-
tered line of such towns, and whoever holds
the towns holds the desert and the Bedouin
tribes in the hollow of his hand.
We drove through a series of narrow
winding streets between high walls of sun-
dried brick to the market-place, where we
pulled up, and at once the motor became the
centre of a friendly, chattering crowd. My
companion became suddenly prompted to
be the possessor of a brass-bound box such
as Arabs do largely affect, of which several
were exposed for sale in the market square
and some adjoining narrow streets. Our
bargaining was conducted in a chorus of
crescendo screams, in which not only the
merchant, but also his neighbours and any
casual passer-by took an interested and
noisy part. At last the box was bought and
bound to the back of the car. Then we
discovered that we had not enough money
to pay for it. So we determined to repair
24
Zobeir
to the Sheikh of Zobeir — who is a friend !
The friend was away, but we found the
friend's brother in " Mejhss " — which is akin
to a durbar — seated at the opening of a
deep alcove which seemed to combine the
commercial properties of an ironmonger's
shop with the ceremonial accessories of a
Hall of State.
We joined the posse of Arabs and negroes
surrounding the Sheikh's brother, " all
seated on the ground," and plunged (at
least my companion did) into the conversa-
tion. Our host contrived to maintain a
remarkable degree of dignity and at the
same time to convey great cordiality in his
welcome and readiness, not only to pay
our bills, but to entertain us to tea at his
house.
After some time we all climbed into the
motor and went off to his home, which is of
quite recent construction — indeed, only just
finished. Outside, blank dreary mud-walls,
featureless and windowless, but inside most
attractive. The rooms are built round a
25
A Message from Mesopotamia
series of open courts or gardens of which
one would have no suspicion from outside.
The room in which we had tea was of very
good proportions; the walls of great thick-
ness ; all round the room a low lounge ; on
the floor carpets of gaudy hues; gimcrack
tables and chairs and a few hideous lamps.
One of the six sons appeared on the scene,
a boy aged fifteen, very proud of the smatter-
ing of English which he had acquired in
the last five or six months — a very sharp
lad with good manners.
We departed about five o'clock, laden with
three couple of the lesser bustard (our old
friend the Knoorhan of S. Africa), but,
alas I in a condition hardly suitable for the
table, time and expanding bullets having
done their worst.
Home over the Shaiba battle-field I We
stopped at a big rambling serai of sunburnt
bricks which was our headquarters at the
time of the fight. The sun was setting, and
our chauffeur was not eager for a drive over
the desert in the dark, so our visit to the
26
Zobei7'
roof of the serai had to be short. A vast
expanse on every side, and at our feet Hne
upon Hne of trenches marking the British
position at the time of the battle. I longed
to see the sun set in crimson splendour in
the West, but our driver was inexorable,
and I might not dally.
We bumped back across the desert and
through Basrah city by the light of the moon.
The narrow winding streets were dark and
deserted, and their gloom was accentuated
by the fitful flicker of an occasional oil
lamp twinkling in its tiny niche. The
shadowy alley- ways were full of mystery and
sinister suggestion. In silence we glided
swiftly homewards. At such a moment
speech would have been sacrilege.
And so ended a delightful day.
27
CHAPTER IV
MOHAMMERAH
Wednesday, February 14. After a pour-
ing wet night Basrah is just one morass of
shmy clay.
Moens and Stanley arrive about 10 a.m.,
hamper-laden with luncheon to be eaten
on board the boat that is to take us to
Mohammerah. Providentially General Grey
appears on the scene and offers us his launch,
which boasts a speed of seventeen knots,
and away we go !
Anchored in the stream opposite the
Sheikh's palace, we open tins of tongue, boil
eggs, and minister to " Little Mary," then
we proceed to Mohammerah city, where
we dismount and paddle through one long
puddle of slushy clay.
The Bazaar consists of a congeries of
narrow twisting alley-ways laid out so as
to form a series of rough parallelograms,
29
A Message from Mesopotamia
roofed throughout, dark and dirty, of a
dirt that beggars description !
We find no inducement to Hnger. A
quarter of an hour's run up the Karun
River and we find ourselves at the British
Convalescent Depot. A row of anglers of
despondent mien with rod and line occupy
the pier and path leading therefrom, and
behind them is a garden ! A real English
garden ! A stiff and inartistic row of flower-
beds— mignonette, sunflowers, stocks and
hollyhocks just in their earliest growth —
and in the background vegetables of various
kinds. Very English ! very nice ! Here
the rain has induced a paralysis no less
thorough than in Basrah, and we slither
from tent to tent. Hospital tents, recreation
ditto, clothing ditto, coffee-shop ditto. We
run down the gamut of regimental institu-
tions in both British and Indian Camps and
parade the men.
Back in the cool of the evening, one hour
and thirty minutes to cover twenty-six miles
of river ! Against the stream too ! Good going !
30
CHAPTER V
RECONSTRUCTION
Before leaving Basrah I accompanied
the I.G.C. on the occasion of his inspecting
the Inland Water Transport Construction
Works at Magill under the direction of
Brigadier- General Grey.
It is wonderful to see what has been done
since September 1916, when the work was
taken in hand. We find over two thousand
workmen employed, of nationalities innumer-
able ! — English, Scottish, Irish, Pathans,
Kurds, Egyptians, West Africans, Indians,
Arabs, Chinese, etceteri multi.
Six months ago the wharfage facilities
would only allow of the discharge of eight
hundred tons a day. Nowadays — tonnage
of five times this quantity can easily be
handled, and this amount will soon be con-
siderably exceeded. In this, as in every
other branch of administration, there is
31
A Message from Mesopotamia
abundantly evident a new sense of efficiency.
The whole community seems to be imbued
with the same spirit. Truly " the old order
changeth, yielding place to new," and we
may draw a veil over the ineptitude and
the incompetency which marked the " old
order " of the two past years. To-day all
is changed ! Communications by road, rail-
way and river have been laid out and
developed on a well-thought-out plan. The
loading and unloading of vessels of every
kind proceed easily and without delay.
Stores of every kind are in abundance and
controlled methodically. Medical equipment
has been introduced on a lavish scale.
The water supply is adequate at the base
and every standing camp. Sanitation has
been taken in hand, and the inhabitants of
Basrah seem to be nothing loath to submit
to the regulations of our inspectors and fall
in with the arrangements made for improving
the sanitary conditions of the town.
An anti-fly crusade is being carried on
which may modify the plague of flies in
32
Reconstruction
and about our Camps, but the task is her-
culean, and any substantial diminution of
the fly plague must take a very long
time.
The expenditure of money must be great !
I have not the knowledge to warrant me in
hazarding a guess even of our monthly
expenditure in this country. But the con-
struction of public works, such as houses,
stores, electric light plant, cold storage, wharf-
age, docks, railways, and roads are on so large
a scale and of such a solid nature that it is not
surprising if the inhabitants of the country
interpret our activities as denoting a deter-
mination on our part to remain permanently
in Mesopotamia ; and it is, I think, impossible
not to ascribe the growing readiness of the
Arab tribes to throw in their lot with us,
to the impression which must inevitably be
caused by our having undertaken works of
such magnitude and solidity.
It is certain that, if in an ill-starred moment
when the war draws to an end we make up
our minds to vacate the land, our with-
D 33
A Message from Mesopotamia
drawal will be regarded as the betrayal of
men whom we have wheedled into allegiance,
and will have the worst possible effect on our
Mohammedan subjects throughout the Em-
pire. Indeed it may not improbably lead to
the crumbling of the whole of our Eastern
Imperial edifice.
For the moment, of course, the sufferings
of our men in the Tigris Valley loom large
in the national eye. The saying, " It wants
no fiery sword to keep me out of the Garden
of Eden," reflects fairly accurately the
opinion which the average soldier entertains
of the country. But it would in my opinion
be a deplorable blunder, if we let slip
through our hands a territory which, under
proper administration and freed from the
shackles of Turkish misrule, might produce
corn and wine and oil in the same measure
as once made it the most opulent and puissant
of countries under the sun.
The development of the resources of this
country should some day help the British
Empire greatly to meet the financial obliga-
34
Reconstruction
tions imposed by the war. Indeed, I do not
know whether from a poHtical or from a
purely economical point of view the abandon-
ment of this vast territory would be the
greater blunder.
35
CHAPTER VI
THE TIGRIS
Thursday, February 15. I am granted
a passage to Amarah in P. 56, which is to
proceed ammunition laden and with all
promptitude to Sheikh Saad. After an early
dinner we jump into the I.G.C.'s launch,
are aboard and away by 9 p.m. Our good
ship belongs to the " P. 50 " class, and
is a paddle-boat of recent importation,
built on lines that meet with approval
from all the experts. Square, squat and
ugly, of clumsy form and leaden hue, it
suggests an overgrown entree dish with its
cover on, but with a low funnel popping
up where the handle ought to be. It is
not complete till it has had lashed to it
on either side a flat-decked barge which
not only adds greatly to the " P " boat's
carrying capacity, but also acts as a buffer
in the numerous collisions with the river
37
A Message from Mesopotamia
bank which are the constant experience of
all river craft in the innumerable turns and
twists of the Tigris in the narrows or upper
reaches of the river. Each " P. 50 " boat
with its two barges will accommodate com-
fortably quite six hundred wounded men.
Deck space is the great desideratum, and the
absence of all contrivances that may im-
pede the easy movement of stretcher cases.
These, be it remembered, are ferry boats
intended to remove the greatest possible
number of wounded men in the shortest
possible time from the field ambulances
or clearing stations to the base hospitals,
or possibly from one base hospital to an-
other. Their functions are distinct from
those of hospital ships.
The removal of a badly wounded man from
stretcher to cot and from cot to stretcher
often involves intense agony, and the uni-
versal cry of those concerned in the evacua-
tion of the wounded is for "clear deck space
and no frills ! "
I have had effect given to this principle
38
The Tigris
in the construction of the Nabha, our
newest Red Cross Hospital Ship — which
has just reached Basrah from Bombay.
The elaborate network of stanchions and
cots has all been swept away, with a conse-
quent increase in carrying capacity and
greater freedom of movement in carrying
the wounded on or off the ship.
We wake next morning to pouring rain.
Cold and cheerless is the morn ! The sky
is drab and grey; the river is drab and
brown ; the banks on either land, far as the
eye can reach, are a drab and dreary mono-
tone of mud ! Towards noon the sun comes
out as we draw near to Ezra's Tomb. The
brilliantly glazed dome of turquoise blue is
ringed round with foliage of vivid green,
and twinkles " like the jewel in an Ethiop's
ear."
We may not halt to inspect this venerable
pile. " Soon up the muddy river way we
vanish and are gone." For mile after mile
we wend our vacillating way across a fiat
and limitless sea of mud. A dark dull day !
39
A Message from Mesopotamia
but at eventide a gorgeous sunset, tending
to storm, brings no slight measure of com-
pensation.
Saturday, February 17, finds us still on
board. We were to have been deposited
at Amarah during the night. The skipper
had held out hopes that we should be there
by 11 p.m., but it was 3.30 a.m. before we
arrived. We steamed slowly up the river
front, with our searchlight playing brilliantly
over the dingy Arab houses, transforming
them into ivory palaces of fantastic beauty.
Our " siren " hooted lustily, making night
hideous, but failing altogether to stir from
his slumber the man whose business it was
to come off with a launch and take us on
shore. After dropping anchor and waiting
for some forty minutes, I determined that I
would not delay even for an hour the delivery
of the ammunition which was urgently
wanted at the front, so I resolved to go
straight on to Sheikh Saad, leaving Amarah
to be " done " on our return journey.
I turned in soon after 4 a.m. and lay abed
40
The Tigris
almost till noon. From early dawn the
rain poured down. There was nothing to
tempt a man to move. A warm bed and a
novel seemed preferable to a cold, damp,
dripping deck. So passed an uneventful
day.
41
CHAPTER VII
SHEIKH SAAD
We wake to a Sabbath morn of glorious
sunshine. We have reached Sheikh Saad —
" Eastwards soared the stainless ramp of huge Push-
tiku's wall;
Ranged in white ranks against the blue,
Untrod, eternal, wonderful."
We look upon a magnificent range of snow-
clad hills. A bitterly cold wind sweeping
southwards over the icy mountains drives
me into my thickest overcoat. After break-
fast on board I make my way to the
A.D.M.S.'s quarters, where I am to lodge.
My host is an old friend whom last I saw
at work in the Indian Hospital which
occupied the old Jesuit College at Boulogne.
Those days seem far away now. Our present
home is an old Arab house strangely squalid
of aspect, standing cheek by jowl with other
similar mud-heaps, and between them is a
43
A Message from Mesopotamia
winding path which is now a puddle of
unsavoury ill -looking fluid. No wonder that
Sir Victor Horsley urged that the whole pile
of buildings which form the town of Sheikh
Saad should be levelled to the ground and
no longer used for human habitation.
My first task is to visit our Engineer's
quarters, and, indeed, I am not favourably
impressed. But " H. is a house ! " No
other is available, and " a la guerre, comme
a la guerre ! " There is much to see in
Sheikh Saad. To begin with, there are two
very fine General Hospitals (British and
Indian respectively). They are tented, of
course, but good as good can be, always with
the proviso that they would be still better,
if only existing conditions would allow of
Nursing Sisters being included in the Hos-
pital staff. Nurses are badly wanted here !
There is No. 31 to which for a time J. H.
Stanley has to repair with a sharp attack
of pleurisy. His sojourn in the hospital en-
titles him to speak with authority as to the
treatment which patients may expect who
44
Sheikh Saad
find themselves within its wards. Unfor-
tunately my vocabulary is limited, and I
should have to borrow from him the necessary
expressions of eulogy, if I wished to record
accurately his very favourable impressions
of No. 31 B.G.H.
Then there is No. 61, where I find my
friend, a fellow Yorkshireman — Colonel L. —
at work in the theatre on a strapping young
Goorklia whose thigh has been smashed
to pieces. Wonderful work this Yorkshire
surgeon is doing ! Marvellous is his un-
failing exhibition of skill ! Beautiful is his
absolute self-devotion and entire readiness
by day or night to succour the wounded
soldier and ease him of his pain. Gallant
fellow-countryman, I lay at your feet the
humble tribute of my very sincere homage !
There are two Casualty Clearing Stations
— one of which, No. 20, I visit in a moment
of disarray when evacuation of the wounded
is in full swing. It is an inconvenient mo-
ment for visitors, but at such a time one is
enabled to appreciate truly the excellence
45
A Message from Mesopotamia
of administration which ensures so smooth
and skilful an evacuation as that which
I was here able to watch through all its
phases. No. 15 CCS. is also in the pro-
gramme, and here I am confronted with a
formidable list of comforts which I am ex-
pected to produce instantaneously, as if I
were some fairy godmother — such is the
confidence in the fertility of our resources
which has grown up in the minds of men.
The sanitary system is interesting. The
whole area is cut up into clearly defined
sectors, and in each sector there is a complete
installation of incinerators, latrines and ablu-
tion rooms, all of which are under admirable
control. The water supply is no less cer-
tainly assured, while bath-houses and clothes
disinfectors are set up on the river bank,
and from dawn to dusk enjoy unceasing
patronage.
A Convalescent Home for one thousand men
is in the forming, and a goodly consignment
of games and " divarsions " and literature
of every kind is on its way from the Red
46
Sheikh Saad
Cross Depot to lighten the leaden dulness
of life in a camp which would otherwise be
barren of recreation.
Sheikh Saad was the head of the hght
railway which ran to Es Sinn and Atab till
the army swept northwards on its victorious
career. One afternoon I await the incoming
of a train from Es Sinn, with British and
Indian wounded and Turkish prisoners —
some very bad cases among them. The
train is not regarded as a bad experience.
The arrangement for the stretchers is simple,
the running is smooth, and excellent arrange-
ments are made for the men to be fed on the
way down and on arrival at the buffets
which have been established in large mar-
quees— one for British and one for Indians
—at railhead. To these buffets the Red
Cross contributed with a liberal hand.
The gardens where General Scott is busily
growing vegetables for the troops are an
interesting feature, and finally there is the
Turkish prisoners' camp. I find them busy
cooking their dinners. Oh ! so filthily dirty !
47
A Message from Mesopotamia
for their visit to the riverside bathing-house
is yet to come, and they still have on them
the clothes and the creeping things which
for weeks they have had on them in the
trenches. I hold brief converse in French
with a very handsome and courteous officer,
who assures me that he and his men are well
contented with their present lot.
48
CHAPTER VIII
SANNA-I-YAT
Ash Wednesday. The river is in high
flood. At 10 a.m. Moens and I set out in the
launch Silver Thimble VI for Arab Village.
Colonel Goodbody and Chalkley accompany
us, but we have to leave Stanley behind on
the sick list.
After brief delays to pick up duck and
teal shot by Moens from the boat, we reach
the landing-stage of El Hannah position and
walk over some of the numerous confused
lines of trenches which still mark the scene of
many a fight.
The boat bridge at Arab Village has been
swept away, so we can proceed straight up to
Sandy Ridge, where we are the guests of
the A.D.M.S. and his staff. His camp is
situated on the right bank of the river exactly
opposite the Sanna-i-yat position. The life
of one of our hosts has for some time past
E 49
A Message from Mesopotamia
been decidedly " of the Camp " rather than
" of the Court." For over fourteen months
he has not set eyes on a woman of any kind
whatever.
Thursday, February 22, is an eventful day.
We wake early, knowing that at ten o'clock
the bombardment of the Turkish position
will begin and our troops let loose to storm
the Turkish trenches. At the given hour
the curtain is rung up. From the river
bank bordering our camp we have a front
view of the drama which is being enacted
on the opposite bank. But a little way
above us and on the far side of the Tigris a
Red Cross flag is flying marking the " River-
side Advanced Dressing Station," and within
a few minutes of the first scream of a shell
their work will begin and go on until to-
morrow's dawn. For one hour we sit and
listen to the ceaseless roar of the guns. If
for a moment the big fellows cease to bellow
we hear the chatter of the machine-guns, but
the roar is well-nigh continuous. We watch
dense clouds of dust and smoke, now black,
50
Sanna-i-Yat
now brown, now smoky white, growing ever
more dense, rising ever higher towards the
firmament, till it would seem as though all
Mesopotamia were being translated to the
nether heaven. At eleven o'clock we motor
down to the bridge and across to the left
bank where the two Field Ambulances
stand.
We go all round them and are initiated
into the mysteries of the preparations made
for the reception of the wounded. We also
see the Hospital Ship Kamala, where all is
swept and garnished and clean. At twelve
o'clock the first consignment come in. They
arrive from the Riverside Dressing Station
in one of our Red Cross launches — some Sea-
forths and some 92nd Punjabis — all of them
light cases, and at once sit down to a mug of
tea and a slab of bread and butter. Others
are coming in from our Right Front Dressing
Station, and they belong to the 51st and 53rd
Sikhs. These men, too, we see comfortably
bestowed, and then we return to watch the
bombardment proceeding on its sonorous
51
A Message from Mesopotamia
way. At 2 p.m. we go by river launch (pro-
vided by the Dennis Bayley Fund) to the
Riverside Advanced Station. A long stream
of wounded keep coming in, some able to
walk, some borne on stretcher. On and on
all through the long hot afternoon and the
long dark night. We return after an hour or
more by river in a launch (another of Dennis
Bayley's) filled with wounded men — six
stretcher cases, nineteen sitters — to the two
field ambulances which we had visited in the
morning. We find that one launch load of
wounded has already gone. Then we put
thirty-five Seaforth Highlanders into the
Leopold and Dorothea launch and away at
3.45, all in great spirits, for they know that
they have done their job ! and done it well !
The Kamala with just over eighty cases
follows immediately afterwards. We see an-
other launch load come in from the Riverside
Station, and then we go off in an ambulance
to the Right-hand Dressing Station where
nothing much is doing, and then in a Ford
car up to the trenches and on foot to the
52
Sanna-i-Yat
Front Collecting Station. Just as we get
there a man is shot dead in the station, so
we affectionately embrace the wall and pack
the wounded as closely under its shelter as
we can.
It is not until the shades of evening begin
to fall that the worst cases begin to come in.
Ghastly indeed are the wounds caused by
the bomb and other missiles of modern war-
fare, and in the dressing stations and field
ambulances one realizes fully the " horrors
of war." Horrible, yes ! War is horrible
in the infliction of pain and suffering !
but glorious in the courage and endurance
with which suffering is borne !
The Seaforths have been in the thick of
it to-day. There has been a weakening on
their flank. They have been " let down,"
" badly let down," they say, and the counter-
attacks of the Turks have been savage and
resolute. But the " Kilties " have risen
gloriously to the occasion, and by their valour
the day is ours.
Some of them will see the glens and hills
53
A Message from Mesopotamia
of Bonnie Scotland no more ! But their
friends will remember them and speak of
them. " He was a Seaforth "—they will say !
Just that ! "He was a Seaforth." That
is enough ! A man may ask no grander
epitaph.
The evacuation goes on all night and it
is 6.30 a.m. before the last launch has left
the dressing station. The launches have
together carried over seven hundred. The
men have worked splendidly, and by 8 a.m.
one thousand and twenty-one wounded have
been brought into the two field ambulances,
and five hundred and fifty of these have
already gone down to Sheikh Saad.
54
CHAPTER IX
SHUMRAN
Friday, February 23, brings great news.
General Marshall's column is over the Tigris,
we have completely surprised the Turks.
By the heroism of the Hampshire lads and
the gallantry of the Goorkhas we have estab-
lished a footing in the Shumran Bend and
up to the Dahra Barracks.
By four in the afternoon we have bridged
the Tigris, which is here three hundred yards
wide at its narrowest point, and the Turks
are in full retreat.
Moens and I push across to the Army
Headquarters, and take up our abode in
the Army Commander's camp. We spend
the next three days in watching the evacua-
tion of the wounded from the Shumran Bend.
In a motor-car we bump across the desert to
Es Sinn and Imam and on by Atab to the
Bridge of Boats, visiting many a Field
55
A Message from Mesopotamia
Ambulance and Casualty Clearing Station
on the way.
As we approach the river we are in the
middle of a huge concourse of troops and
guns, transport vehicles of every kind,
camels, horses and mules, medical units and
ambulances, all converging to the Bridge
of Boats — over which a ceaseless stream is
passing and hurrying forward to the front.
Gradually in their turn the dressing
stations are pushed across and forward in
close attendance on the firing-line, and the
wounded are brought in and passed back
from Dressing Station to Field Ambulance,
thence to Casualty Clearing Station and
Base Hospital down stream.
We observe the proceedings at every stage.
We see the stretcher-bearers coming in with
their loads, moving to their work quietly
and ostentatiously, quite indifferent to the
shell and rifle fire, however hot it may be.
Heroes indeed, though their names be not
blazoned on the roll-call of Fame. We
visit the collecting stations where the first
56
Shumran
dressings are applied, whence the men are
sent back to the ambulances as soon as
may be.
The ambulances just in rear of the
boat bridge are desperately busy; work
goes on unceasingly day and night ! In the
first days of the action there is a long and
trying stretch of some thirty miles to rail-
head at Imam to be crossed in a motor
ambulance over a rough and rutty road, but
as soon as navigation has become possible
from Sandy Ridge to Kut the " P." boats
begin to arrive, and the evacuation by river
is carried out with a marvellous smoothness
and success. The difficulties of evacuation
here have been far greater than at Sanna-i-
yat, for the battle-line has been far flung and
all men and horses and material of every
kind whatsoever have had to be conveyed
across one single narrow bridge. It was a
wonderful performance. Audacious in con-
ception ; thought out and worked out to its
tiniest detail ; brilliant in achievement and
magnificent in result !
57
A Message from Mesopotamia
And now the cry is " Forward." The
defeat of the Turkish Army is assured. The
aeroplanes report a rabble rout in full
flight for Baghdad. Our Cavalry Division
has been held in readiness for this supreme
moment and now it is launched to the
attack. Not for a hundred years has a
British Cavalry Commander had such a
chance of effective action as now !
58
CHAPTER X
AMARAH
The Army Commander is to break camp
on the morrow and to take up his temporary
quarters on P. 53. No room for me, alas !
so I resolve to drop down to Amarah, where
I have much Red Cross work to do.
February 27. We wake to a muddy world,
but the air bites shrewdly from the North,
and by noon we shall be dry once more. All
is stir and bustle. The tents are coming
down. A stream of motor-cars is whirling
away Generals and Staff officers of high and
low degree. I, even I, only am left ! It is
horribly cold, and though clad in a British
warm and the cosiest of " woollies," I sit
and shiver. In the p.m. I seize a " return-
empty " motor-car and very reluctantly turn,
my face southward, deriving what comfort I
can from my host's promise to let me know
when he has found for himself a new abiding
59
A Message from Mesopotamia
city in which there will be a corner for me.
Faithfully was his promise kept ! I tele-
graph to push up every available Red Cross
launch from Basrah, Sheikh Saad, and Sandy
Ridge. Our advanced Fleet is brought
up to twelve — inadequate numerically, but
making up in energy and achievement
for any short-coming there may be in
number.
I slip down to Sheikh Saad with Moens,
and we embark on P. 51. We have the decks
packed pretty tightly with British stretcher
cases, mostly slight. The nights are in-
tensely cold, but each man is provided with
a " posteen " (Afghan sheepskin coat) and
as many blankets as he may want. The
canvas awnings are let down at night, and
on inquiring in the morning I find none of
the men complaining of the cold. All of
them are in great heart, with the happy
sense that their toil and their sufferings have
not been in vain.
We reach Amarah about 3 p.m. of the
following day. Our Red Cross Headquarters
60
Amarah
are in one of a long row of well-built brick
houses facing the river front. At the back
is a large general store full of Red Cross com-
forts of every kind. The walls and roof are
of reed matting, which is practically the only
material procurable for the construction of
so large a depository as we require. It is
horribly inflammable, but we can only hope
that the incendiary history of Beit Muir will
not repeat itself here.
Amarah is very beautiful. It is a charac-
teristic Arab town, but surprisingly free from
architectural monstrosities. It is built at
the junction of the Tigris and the Chuhaleh
canal, which in volume is here little less than
the Tigris itself. The long reach on which
our house is situated might well have formed
a subject for Canaletto's brush. In the fore-
ground is a jumble of Arab craft crowded on
the waterway. The quays are packed with
figures, and behind them rises a long line
of Arab houses, over which towers here and
there a lofty minaret shaded by the feathery
fronds of the inevitable palm tree. At
61
A Message from Mesopotamia
sunset all things are suffused in a brilliant
amethyst glow ! Unusual and singularly
beautiful. At Amarah I am uncommonly
fortunate in having as guide, philosopher
and friend Dr. W., a celebrated London
physician, and now a " Colonel Consultant,"
doing great work for the Army and the
country; with him I visit every (I think)
medical unit in the place. British and Indian
General Hospitals, Convalescent Homes (for
British officers and men respectively), the
Isolation Hospital, as well as the Cemetery,
the " Sanitary Contrivance Exposition "
and the Remount Camps. It is curious
to observe how great a difference — even to
a layman's eye — there is in these various
institutions. Some of them are more
advantageously situated than others in the
matter of site, some in the actual buildings
in which they are housed, some, again, have a
numerically stronger staff of Nursing Sisters.
Here let me say again how remarkable and
apparent is the influence of a capable nursing
staff in the wards of a hospital. I rejoice
62
Amarah
to know that several of the excellent hospitals
which I saw at Amarah, and which have since
then been sent to Baghdad, have taken their
Nursing Sisters with them. They have also
in every case taken with them a very goodly
supply of Red Cross comforts. In this case
wisdom will certainly be justified of her
children !
I am glad to say that the site of the
Amarah Convalescent Home for Officers
is to be changed. It is to abandon the
mosquito-infected and swampy garden to
which it has hitherto been relegated, and
is to take up its abode in a block of roomy
buildings which had been marked down as
G.H.Q.
I should have liked to see also the men's
Convalescent Home transferred to a happier
entourage, but no suitable site appears to
be forthcoming. A new Recreation Hut is
promised, however, and I know that our
local representative has his eye on both
these institutions, and is ready to meet in
no niggardly spirit any appeal that may be
63
A Message from Mesopotamia
made to him to render more attractive the
environment of the inmates of the Amarah
Convalescent Homes.
In every hospital there is a Red Cross
store-room, which is cherished by every CO.
and every matron as a very important in-
gredient of efficiency in their ministration
to the sick and wounded, and efficiency is
— I may say — maintained at a very high
level indeed throughout the various units,
to whose working I was in every case allowed
to gain a full insight.
Some taint, some reproach is incidental
to all human work ! With this proviso I
can state my honest conviction that by no
human agency in the world could more be
done for the welfare of our troops and the
care of our sick and wounded than is being
done to-day by the responsible officers con-
cerned. I am equally convinced that they,
on their part, would not hesitate to acknow-
ledge their vast indebtedness to the Joint
Committee in England, and to the many
voluntary agencies in India for the prodigi-
64
Amarah
ous quantities of comforts of every kind
which have been poured out with a lavish
hand to supplement Government issues,
generous as the scale may be on which such
issues are made.
F 65
CHAPTER XI
UP STREAM
Monday, March 5. A telegram from the
Army Commander bids me join him up
river with all speed. Leaving Moens to
" mind the shop," Stanley and I board P. 54
as she steams past Amarah on a non-stop
mission to the front. Away we go past
Sheikh Saad, where we pack our barges to
their fullest capacity with a strong contingent
of the " Gippy " ^ Labour Corps bound for
Aziziyeh, past Sandy Ridge, now deserted
save for a small camp of men engaged in fill-
ing up trenches, burying the dead and gener-
ally tidying up; past Kut, now an empty
shell. The houses have long ago been de-
nuded of all woodwork, doors, windows and
shutters to strengthen the Sanna-i-yat dug-
outs. No sign of life, save of cats I Hundreds
^ Egyptian.
67
A Message from Mesopotamia
of these poor, mangy, miserable things
miowHng and prowUng romid the empty
streets and hovels in search of any garbage
that may stave off starvation. We steam
past Dahra Barracks and the now historic
Bend of Shumran, till on Friday morning we
find ourselves almost (seemingly) in the very
shadow of the great arch of Ctesiphon. As
we pass, a company of Indian soldiers in
khaki is marching under its walls, looking
like very pigmies and forcing us to appre-
ciate the immensity of its size.
At 9.30 a.m. our course is stayed in mid-
stream for six hours by a bridge of boats,
over which a ceaseless stream of troops and
guns, A.T. carts and ambulances is passing
from the left to the right bank. Vast
clouds of dust in the far distance mark the
movements of large bodies of troops. A
constant boom of guns is heard Baghdad-
wards. Evidently a fight is on. About
4 p.m. the Bridge is opened to let us through,
and round the next bend we find P. 53, and
receive a cordial greeting from Sir Stanley
68
Up Stream
Maude. We pitch our tents within a stone's
throw of the ship and await events.
News comes in from the Diala River.
The story of the crossing is so simple but so
grand an epic that I venture to tell it as it
was told to me.
At the saUent formed by the junction of
the River Tigris, flowing in from the North-
West with the River Diala from the North-
East, and along the northern bank of either
stream, is a scattered row of mud hovels
forming the Diala village. Some hundred
yards up the Diala there used to be a Bridge
of Boats, now destroyed, but the site of the
old Bridge was the point selected for the
crossing of our left-hand landing-party.
At 10 p.m. on the night of March 7 the dis-
position of the troops was as follows : The
South Lanes (some two hundred strong) held
a ridge which was parallel to the Diala River
and commanded the stream. Immediately
in rear of the ridge came from left to right
— the North Lanes, with their left flank on
the bank of the Tigris, the King's Own Liver-
69
A Message from Mesopotamia
pool Regiment in the centre, and the East
Lanes on the right. Volunteers to row the
pontoons over were called for from the whole
force. The men responded with alacrity.
Not one of them but knew that it was a
forlorn hope for which he offered himself.
He was " for it " all the same ! At mid-
night the first attempt was made to cross the
Diala by the K.O. Liverpool Regiment. The
pontoons pushed off and into a very hell-fire
of shell fire. The Turks knew the range to a
yard. The rowers were shot down, the men
in the pontoons were shot or drowned ; every
boat was swept away ! None landed. None
came back ! Again and again volunteers were
called for. Again and again they came for-
ward without a moment's hesitancy. Each
man knew that it was to certain death, but
he was " for it " all the same ! At 1.30 a.m.
another attempt was made with the same
splendid gallantry as before. But success
was not yet to be ours, and at 2.30 a.m. the
whole line fell back to where their transport
column was bivouacked.
70
Up Stream
March 8 was a day of quiet, but as soon
as darkness fell the North Lanes moved up
to the position which they had occupied at
ten o'clock the previous night. They ad-
vanced in four columns of companies, each
one having its pontoon. On the left C Com-
pany, under Captain Reid, got their pontoon
across six times, and Reid found himself
over on the Turkish bank with some sixty
men. On his right B and D Companies had
in two or three crossings got over about fifty
men. Up to this moment the enemy's fire
had not been heavy, but now it began in
earnest. Reid soon found himself with only
fifteen men left. His position was quite un-
tenable, so he decided to move his little party
up the river bank to join B Company. The
latter had occupied a ruined house, which
lent itself to defence better than the position
which Reid and his men had originally taken
up, and here they proceeded to " dig in."
They were sixty in number. They had a
Lewis gun, which was quickly out of gear,
and in the way of ammunition two bombs
71
A Message from Mesopotamia
and one hundred and twenty rounds a
man.
During the night the Turks made seven
distinct attacks on Reid and his httle band.
At daybreak the attacks ceased, for with the
coming of hght our guns could put a barrage
of fire across the front of the httle British
post and check any effort on the part of the
Turks to rush the position. The attacks
ceased, but here were the Lancashire lads
absolutely cut off and subjected to a per-
petual tornado of shell and rifle fire. As
the day went on their store of cartridges
dwindled and dwindled almost to vanishing-
point, but still they " stuck it out " ! While
daylight lasted it was impossible to convey
to them ammunition or reinforcements. The
Adjutant of the Regiment was shot dead as
he tried to get across to his men. Reid's
servant swam back with a message, and by
some miracle got through unscathed, but the
Turks' fire zone was practically impassable,
and attempts to get ammunition by rockets
from the ships or by grenades from the river
72
UjJ Stream
bank were quite unsuccessful. AVhen night
fell the men had scarcely a round of ammuni-
tion left. Their case seemed pretty desperate,
and as the night wore on there came to them
no sign of relief, but still they " stuck it
out " ! Events on the right bank had gone
badly for the enemy all through that day,
and he had come to the conclusion that we
were not to be denied, and that the moment
had come for him to quit.
At 4 a.m. on the morning of the 10th the
men of the East Lanes got over the river
practically unmolested. In less than no time
a bridge was thrown over the Diala. The
remainder of the Brigade moved across.
Our men all joined up, and Baghdad was
practically ours.
Saturday, March 10, was a day of tear-
ing wind, growing in intensity throughout
the day. At night a hurricane and dust-
storm is raging, and life for the moment is
unpleasant. Our launches have been hard at
work all day. Yesterday's fight resulted in
eight hundred casualties, and their evacuation
73
A Message from Mesopotamia
has been no easy task. They have had — poor
fellows — a cruel drive of many miles in ambu-
lances or carts over a rough and bumpy
stretch of country to the river bank, some
eight miles north of our camp. From here
our launches have borne them down stream
to the field ambulances just below our
tents. At times the river has been lashed
into the semblance of an angry sea, but our
little boats have sped through the scum and
the spray to and fro, to and fro, till by sun-
down they have brought the full tally of
eight hundred to the haven where they fain
would be.
A nice bit of work !
74
CHAPTER XII
BAGHDAD
With the crossing of the Diala our road
is clear to the City of Baghdad, and at
9 a.m. on Sunday, March 11, we move off
in solemn array. Monitors, gmiboats and
launches form our escort. Immediately
ahead of us is the Firefly — the old British
gunboat recently recaptured from the Turks
and practically uninjured. We pass a
goodly number of troops marching on the
left bank parallel to our course. At about
3.30 p.m. we steam round a bend of the river,
and Baghdad is in sight. At this point the
Tigris is a vast waterway, and on either hand
is a long line of Arab houses backed by
groves of high date palms. The city as seen
from the river is singularly picturesque,
especially at sunrise or sunset. There is no
path nor roadway, as at Amarah, between
the houses and the stream. In normal
75
A Message from Mesopotamia
times the river swarms with boats of every
kind, to which each house has access by a
crazy wooden stairway leading down to the
water's edge. For the moment, of course,
there is an almost total disappearance of
river craft. A few "mahelahs" and "gufas "
only are left. There are no buildings of
any magnitude or interest. The houses are
all flat-roofed, and built for the most part on
square and simple lines. Some of the modern
European houses are florid and pretentious
in design, and in structure as gimcrack as
you please. On either bank crowds have
gathered to watch our entry. They are
singularly undemonstrative for the most
part, though here and there we are greeted
by a vigorous outburst of handclapping and
waving of flags.
We flatter ourselves that we are a very
imposing Fleet. Monitors and gunboats pre-
cede us, and they go on up stream, while we
come to anchor and are moored alongside
the British Residency. Above it floats once
more the Union Jack, flanked by a Red Cross
76
Baghdad
flag, for the Residency is in use as a hospital.
There are many Turkish wounded — very
badly wounded — in the wards ! Oh ! so foul
and filthy ! All of them clamouring for food.
The British Consulate in rear is also in use
as a hospital, but a fleeting glimpse and a
fleeting smell are quite enough.
Ninety-five of our wounded come in just
as we arrive. They are soon made quite
comfortable in the upper storey of the
Residency, and get away down stream on
the following day.
There is an hour's daylight, so we sally
forth to inspect the town. Vendors of
oranges and flyblown dates dog our footsteps.
Peripatetic poulterers, grasping in one hand
a bunch of skinny, squawky fowls, and in
the other a box of venerable-looking eggs,
press their doubtful wares upon us. Later
on our cook establishes his right to wear
the cordon bleu of his profession by serving
up a vol-au-vent de volaille of surpassing tasti-
ness, backed by a tinned plum-pudding
which has made its way to Baghdad in the
77
A Message from Mesopotamia
innermost recesses of my sleeping-bag !
Thus do we fare sumptuously as befits con-
quering heroes, but we turn in betimes, for
the Army Commander is an early bird and
begins his day's work regularly at 5 a.m.
Some half-dozen of us sleep on the bridge
of P. 53. It is an airy dormitory and some-
what noisy, but we need no rocking, and
sleep contentedly till dawn. We are up and
get a walk before breakfast, which is at
7 a.m. In the Residency grounds are some
new arrivals, travel-stained and clamouring
for a tub !
" Had a tough time ? " I ask.
" Toughish ! " is the cheery reply. " Our
emergency rations were finished the night
before last ! Yesterday we'd nothing to eat
all day, and not much to drink, and five-and-
twenty miles to march ! But we got to
Baghdad all right ! You bet ! "
Are we down-hearted ?
Breakfast over, I sally forth house-hunting
with one who has authority to pass anywhere
and everywhere. Houses are wanted for
78
Baghdad
the Army Commander, of course, as well as
for " A " and " Q " and many other. But
none of these is " my pigeon ! " I am out
for the Red Cross, and by the kindness of
Dame Fortune and the amiability of the Staff
officer whose peculiar province is the allot-
ment of mansions, I secure the old Tigris
Hotel — an ideal home for our representative,
with ample room for the whole of our Staff
and our Stores. It is very conveniently
situated on the river front. The house is
roomy and well built, with a great big vaulted
hall, cool and dark, well below ground level,
in which during the summer days the
fierceness of the heat will — let us hope — be
tempered and less intolerable than in the
upper regions.
It has a large flat roof on which every one
will sleep at night, and between the house and
the river is a charming little garden with a
broad pergola of vines and some fig trees of
heavy foliage casting a luscious shade ! In
our wanderings we are initiated into the
mysteries of many Arab households. Our
79
A Message from Mesopotamia
landlord receives us with utmost courtesy,
and treats us to Turkish coffee (very savoury)
and Turkish cigarettes (very much the re-
verse !). He is an old gentleman with very
fair complexion, bluish-grey eyes and snow-
white hair, whose portrait might well be that
of any dour occupant of the manse of Glen
Kells !
House-hunting ended, there are many
sights to see. It is interesting, in the first
place, to see what destruction has been
wrought in the city. There was evidently
no intention on the part of the enemy to
leave anything intact that could be of the
slightest possible use to us. The Railway
rolling stock has disappeared. The electric
light installation has been destroyed. The
landing-stages have been wrecked, and the
cranes reduced by fire to a tangle of twisted
scrap-iron. The bridge of boats has vanished.
An excellent newly-built mill just above the
citadel has been burnt to the ground, as also
a fine Government school, whose destruction
would seem to be mere vandalism. An
80
Baghdad
English company's office and the manager's
house— fine and costly buildings of recent
construction— have been blown up. A few
European houses, belonging for the most
part to Germans, have been looted and
wrecked by Arab marauders. But the whole
of the city is practically intact. The Govern-
ment Offices, the Citadel and the Barracks
are all standing, though with the departure
of the troops the scallywags of the city have
broken into them all and ransacked every
room. Nothing is left that could be of value
to any one. In the Citadel the Small Arms
Factory is undestroyed, but the central
square is strewn with wreckage. Burnt
motor-cars stand in rows. Shells and fuses
are scattered in dire confusion. Everywhere
are signs of hurried ffight.
The Bazaar is a long, winding alley. It
is roofed throughout, and, consequently,
very dark and airless. Shops are on either
side, but every shop is empty. Every
door and shutter is torn down and carried
away. Nothing is exposed for sale. The
G 81
A Message from Mesopotamia
Arabs have swept the whole place bare of
any and every thing that could be removed.
The Bazaar is crowded ! All the Arab and
Jew world is out to see what is doing. The
streets are filthy ! The crowd ill-smelling
and un pleasing of aspect. Baghdad boils
are much in evidence, and one is made pain-
fully aware of the prevalence of disease.
It is good to escape into the open air and
leave behind the fetid smells and repulsive
sights which we have had with us in our
first introduction to the city life of Baghdad.
In what was recently the Russian Consulate
there is an excellent Hotel. I am assured
that both the provender and the prices are
quite tiptop !
I take an early opportunity to visit the
Turkish Military Hospital, which is situated
just above the Citadel and is almost outside
the town. There is a large enclosure, round
the outside of which are dotted at intervals
high, roomy wards, well built and well de-
signed for the purposes of a hospital. With-
in the ring of buildings is a large, well-kept
82
Baghdad
garden. The departure of the Turks meant
also the departure of all the sick and wounded
that were deemed to be fit to travel, to the
number, it is said, of some fifteen thousand !
There were three or four hundred, however,
whose wounds were such that they could not
be moved. These unfortunates were left to
the care of a Greek doctor and four French
Sisters of Mercy. These did all that they
possibly could do to minister to their suffer-
ing, but every ward-boy and medical servant
had cleared off with all that they could lay
their hands on. We arrived to find many
of the men unwashed, unfed, untended. Not
one of them could move. In some of the
wards corpses were lying uncovered. In all
of them the smells and the sights were in-
describable. An Algerian, who had fought
for the French in Belgium, told me in very
corrupt French of his removal to Berlin and
thence to Kermanshah, where he was forced
to fight in the ranks of the Turkish Army.
I could not stay for the rest of his story.
The stench was too overpowering. I also
83
A Message from Mesopotamia
saw a Russian prisoner of war, but as he
knew naught but Russian our greetings were
Hmited to nods and grins.
Just at the time of my arrival there came
also an I. M.S. officer, who for the moment was
practically single-handed, with an Augean
stable to cleanse. In a very short time his
work was done, the wounded were all
evacuated, and the Hospital itself made sweet
and clean. I was glad to escape from that
Hospital. It was a sad experience.
On another afternoon I ran up river some
four miles in my motor launch to Khadimaine,
which boasts rather a fine mosque. The
dome and four very tall, slender minarets
are heavily gilded, and below the gilding are
very elaborate patterns in tiles of brilliant
blue. The Mosque is only to be viewed
piecemeal by peeps through the great doors.
Entrance by the infidel is absolutely for-
bidden, and evidently his approach is
resented. The houses of the town are built
in hugger-mugger fashion right up to the
walls of the Mosque itself, and the streets
84
Baghdad
are even narrower and filthier, if that be
possible, than those of Baghdad. We have
suddenly — quite suddenly — jumped into hot
weather. The day has been almost oppres-
sive, but the evening is deliciously cool. The
sunset and the afterglow a dream of beauty !
And now the moment has come for me to
turn my face southwards again. I have in-
stalled Major Stanley as my Deputy in one of
the finest houses in the city. The wires have
been at work, and already four hundred
cases of Red Cross comforts are on their way
up stream. A storeman, a clerk and three
servants are also on their road. I have had
several discussions with the military " powers
that be " as to the programme for the sum-
mer months, and I am able to lay down a
Red Cross policy to dovetail in with the
arrangements which the D.M.S. has in view.
I say farewell to my exceedingly kind host,
and find myself once again in my old quarters
on board^'P. 56.
85
CHAPTER XIII
DOWN STREAM
A PARTY of six officers and over two hun-
dred men are expected. One corner of the
deck is screened off with canvas " Kanats "
for the officers, and we may peep inside
before they come on board. Half a dozen
cots are made up with snow-white sheets
and pillow-cases, and over the foot of each
bed is a soft plaid rug. By each bedside is
a small table on which are set out books,
magazines, chocolates, pipes, tobacco, cigar-
ettes and matches, all provided by the Red
Cross. Dressing-gowns, bed-jackets, clean
shirts, pyjamas, vests, socks and handker-
chiefs are there in abundance, as well as
hot-water bottles and other comforts, such
as Brand's Essence, Liebig's Oxo (specially
given by the makers), Benger's Food, biscuits
and tinned fruits. All of these are from
the same " Pandora's box " !
The men come on board towards evening.
87
A Message from Mesopotamia
For many days now they have been march-
ing and fighting, fighting again and marching
again, with mighty Httle rest. They are un-
shaved, travel-stained and dirty. Very foot-
sore, very tired — almost too tired to tackle
the jorum of hot cocoa which is ready for
them as they come on board.
The little Doctor is bustling round seeing
to every man's needs. Two Army Sisters
are there, ministering to all and sundry;
and there is an ample staff of trained
orderlies, both British and Indian. In the
morning clean shirts or pyjamas are served
out from the Red Cross Stores, as well as
razors, soap, tooth-brushes and powder,
hair-brushes, slippers and writing material
(in great demand). A night's rest, a wash,
a shave and a hearty breakfast, and lo !
the man of yesterday, a thing of dirt, dust
and dejection, is to-day alive and alert — a
soldier ! clean, confident and cheerful.
We leave at 6 a.m. and are at Sheikh
Saad in thirty hours. Here we drop some
light cases and take on some very bad
88
Down Stream
stretcher cases bound for Basrah. At
Amarah I rejoin Moens, and spend another
week completing my round of inspection of
all the medical units, and mapping out our
plan of campaign for the summer months.
We settle the demarcation of each sphere of
operations, the scope of Red Cross activities
in each one, the distribution of the per-
sonnel, the quantities of stores and comforts
to be ordered, the method of their supply
and control, and the system of transportation
and distribution.
In all this we have to look more and more
to the Indian Branch of the Joint War Com-
mittee and less and less to Pall Mall, having
regard to the ever-growing menace to sea-
going ships.
Luckily this change of the source of our
supply will not weaken us, nor diminish in
the slightest degree the efficiency of our
organization. Sir Pardey Lukis, our Indian
Chairman, is just a tower of strength ! I
have made endless demands on him for
supplies of every kind. He has met them
89
A Message from Mesopotamia
unfailingly. I have burdened him with
work. He has shouldered the burden un-
complainingly. I have made inconsiderate
encroachments on his time. He has wel-
comed me as a guest when he might have
warned me off as a trespasser. I thank him
heartily for his invaluable help.
On Saturday, March 24, I step aboard
our Red Cross Launch, the Wessex, and slip
down to Kurnah. It is a very hot day;
there is a fierce glare off the water. The
river is bank high, and we meet numerous
mahelahs being towed up stream. All of
them are heavily laden, and it is a wonder
to me to see how few men will keep a big,
heavily loaded mahelah going against a five-
knot current and make steady progress all
through the day.
By 5 p.m. we are comfortably bestowed
in the Hospital at Kurnah. It is set in the
midst of a thick belt of palms, and the
camp is intersected by winding nullahs, of
which some are dry and some are filled with
a stagnant, green, soupy fluid that is sug-
90
Down Stream
gestive of fever and other jungly horrors.
A number of reed huts of picturesque
design are dotted here and there, crowded
in close and cosy companionship with a
number of E.P. tents. The effect is fan-
tastic and unreal. Surely this is Fairyland,
the Forest Home of some evil genii beautiful
and bad ! Surely the broad arrow yonder
and the letters O.C. carved roughly on a
tree-trunk point to the Ogre's Cave ! Bull
frogs which would hold their own with the
Christmas monsters of Drury Lane croak
savagely from every pool, and huge dragon-
flies recall the splendid antics of our aviators
on the Western Front.
A kingfisher in gaudiest garb of sapphire
blue darts through the trees. There is a
whirr of tiny trumpetings and a cloud of
mosquitoes is upon us — big, burly fellows
that dance like dervishes about our necks and
faces, and dispel any illusions as to Kurnah
being aught save of the earth earthy. The
sun is sinking, and we move away to the
Euphrates, which joins the Tigris hard by
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A Message from Mesopotamia
our camp. Between its banks of palm
groves far as the eye can reach the great
river rolls towards us out of the crimson
west, a flood of molten gold.
Sunday, March 25. — A glorious hot
morning. I am out early, and wander
leisurely along the Euphrates, and am lost
in wonder at the quantity, the variety, and
the beauty of the bird life ! We stop to
watch an Arab hauling himself up the
rough trunk of a palm tree to propagate
the flower with male pollen, which he
carries in a little bag at the end of a stick
some ten to fifteen inches long. The canvas
of which the bag is made is of open mesh,
so that a gentle shake releases a little
shower of dust-like pollen, and the deed of
propagation is done.
This is a strange country. There are no
stones in it. There are no forest trees in it.
There are no bees in it. So the dates are
barren unless resort is had to artificial
propagation, and the process which I have
just described is universal.
92
Down Stream
We have a look at a very substantial
hospital that is under construction, and
realize that its inmates will be very com-
fortably housed when all is done, and then
we slip away down stream. There are lots
of wild duck in every reach of the river, but
they are very wild indeed, and, though we
lighten our cartridge -bag considerably, yet
we have no plump mallards wherewith to
replenish the larder.
Just as we reach Basrah our steering gear
goes " fut." We are brought to an igno-
minious halt, and have to finish our journey
in a humble " balum." The Khandak creek
is packed with river craft of all kinds, and
the jamb and jostle of the boats, and the
jabber and gesticulations of the boatmen,
remind me of Henley on regatta day. We
are greeted by the news that P. 56, the
boat which I have grown to regard with
paternal affection, almost with a sense of
ownership, has been burnt. The catastrophe
was purely accidental, and fortunately
occurred when no wounded were on board.
93
A Message from Mesopotamia
The engines are intact, but four or five men
have been drowned, and it will be at least
a month before she will be fit for service
again.
On arrival at our Red Cross Depot I find
that the repair-shop is now completed, and
so fully equipped that we ourselves will be
able to carry out any repair work that it
may be necessary to take in hand.
94
CHAPTER XIV
NAZARIYEH
The following night sees us travelling in
a very ancient " Southern Mahratta " rail-
way carriage bumping and grinding over
the desert by the newly-made line to Naza-
riyeh. It takes us fifteen hours to accom-
plish the 150 miles (we can do better than
that on the L. & N.W.R. !). I breakfast at
11.30 with the G.O.C., who is an old friend.
The Arabs, it appears, have their own names
for distinguished persons with whom they
become familiar. Our host's sobriquet is
*' Father of Lions." It is not unfair to
assume that they have heard him roar. He
will shortly be roaring at the Gates of
Baghdad, for simultaneously with our arrival
is that of a telegram ordering him thither
with the bulk of his force.
There are two hospitals to be seen here,
one in the brick-built Turkish Barracks and
one in tents.
95
A Message from Mesopotamia
After their inspection I go shopping
in the Bazaar, whither I am accompanied
by the " Mayor," if you please ! a very
dignified old Arab who has been exalted to
this right worshipful position. With him
are two of his Town Councillors, to whom
my insistence on buying old copper pots is
quite unintelligible and — I fear — a cause of
offence !
At two o'clock we start in motor-cars,
with an escort of motor-bikers in case of
audacious and malevolent snipers, for Ur of
the Chaldees. We buzz along over quite a
practicable road which is of British con-
struction. This is one of the many activities
of my friend the G.O.C. Road-making,
bank-building to restrain the floods, sanita-
tion, housing, hutting, lighting, watering,
burying, and general cleaning up of the
community. A good year's record ! And
here we are at Ur. I last came across Ur
in the Book of Genesis, and I realize that
I am in touch with that which was six
thousand years ago ! Now it is a vast
96
Nazariyeh
sand-covered mound. A few ruined walls,
built of bricks which emerged from the
kiln many centuries ago, stand out above
the dust of ages. Sea-shells, broken sherds,
odds and ends of pottery, traces of stone-
built tombs I All these things prompt the
desire to dig and delve, and open the halls
and corridors once trodden by the feet of
Father Abraham himself.
We motor back as the sun goes down, but
there is just time to jump into a launch and
see the river front touched by the last rays
of the setting sun. It is a beautiful picture,
which fades all too soon ! Night falls, and
I am once again in my railway carriage,
creeping back slowly towards Basrah. A
few more hours and my sojourn in the Land
of the Two Rivers is ended. By good for-
tune, the Madras is about to return to India
with a moderate number of patients, and
there is room for me. I avail myself with
alacrity of the opportunity to repeat my
wholly delightful experience of a few weeks
ago.
H 97
CHAPTER XV
"all aboard"
I SAY " Good-bye " to Basrah with infinite
regret, but before I go I have secured for
our staff ample accommodation in houses
well built and conveniently situated.
At Amarah, too, the house is now ours
which adjoins our original and somewhat
cramped premises. Our men, therefore, may
now contemplate the approach of the hot
weather with the assurance that they will live
and move and have their being under con-
ditions far less trying to health and strength
than those under which they spent last
summer.
In this graceful concession on the part of
the military authorities I detect a fresh
recognition of our Red Cross organization
as an integral part of the great branch of
the Army which is concerned with the care
of the sick and wounded, and a fresh proof
of the happy relations which exist between
the two.
99
A Message from Mesopotamia
Friday, March 30.— We are on board at
ten o'clock and away before noon. We have
a handful of British officers and men, a
goodly number of Indian officers and men,
and over one hundred Turkish prisoners.
The wounds of many of the latter are very
serious and very septic. The devotion of
our doctors to their healing brings the
reward of painful septic throats and no
little consequent misery. I am constantly
in and out of the wards, sometimes in the
day, sometimes
" When the night is still and deep,
And the drowsy heave of Ocean
Mutters in its charmed sleep,"
and I am strengthened in my conviction
that nothing is left undone on board the
Madras which skill and care and devotion
can achieve for the welfare of the sick and
wounded — no matter what their rank or
what the colour of their skin may be.
Wednesday, April 4. — We reach Karachi
in the morning. Our progress is leisurely,
100
' All Aboard
for mine-sweeping operations have to be
concluded before ships are allowed to come
into the harbour. It is noon before we are
tied up alongside the Quay, though we
might have got in very much sooner, if
steaming was the only thing to be con-
sidered. A hot day and dry ! Karachi's
annual rainfall is three inches.
The A.D.M.S. very kindly takes me in tow
and carries me off in his motor to No. 1
Indian Hospital (recently at Bournemouth).
A splendid building, the Karachi Port Trust
Offices, well adapted for the purpose and
beautifully equipped. There are three floors,
with a lift in the centre.
The hospital is in a semicircular build-
ing, from the middle of which a rectangular
block runs back for some distance.
The hospital is divided into two sides,
medical and surgical. Administrative offices,
X-ray, operating rooms, etc., are in the
Central Block. The annexe to this hospital
is very sumptuously bestowed in the offices
of McKinnon, Mackenzie & Co. This is a
101
A Message from Mesopotamia
magnificent building, with great wide stair-
cases and corridors, and lofty marble halls
which make beautiful wards, replete with
every comfort and convenience. To both
these hospitals, especially when the original
installation was in process, gifts of every
kind have been contributed by the St. John
Ambulance and the Sind Women's War
Work Depot in generous measure.
We then motor to the Sind Women's War
Work Depot, which is now affiliated qua
Red Cross work with the Indian Branch of
the Joint War Committee. These very
capable ladies have done and are doing
great things in the way of war gifts to the
troops in Mesopotamia, as well as to the
sick and wounded.
Thence to the old Artillery Barracks, now
No. 37 B.G.H. The Barracks form only
the nucleus of the hospital; the majority
of the patients, the operating theatre and
X-ray rooms (contiguous), the infectious
cases and tubercular cases being housed in
very well appointed, up-to-date huts. The
102
' All Aboard
design, the arrangement of the theatre and
X-ray rooms, and the mechanical plant and
contrivances, are the most ingenious, com-
plete and convenient that I have ever
seen.
Then back by motor six miles to the
Docks, and away. Karachi is evidently like
Madras — a city of magnificent distances !
103
CHAPTER XVI
BOMBAY
We reach Bombay at noon on Good
Friday, nine weeks almost to a day from
the time that I left.
At Bombay and Karachi marvellous
changes have been wrought in the matter of
hospital accommodation, and all that apper-
tains to the care and the cure of our sick
and wounded soldiers and camp followers.
At Bombay there is a hospital at Calaba for
British officers and men, which has been
subjected to many recent alterations and
brought up to date in all administrative
matters, and hard by is a Home for sick
Nursing Sisters. The new museum has been
adapted as a hospital for Indian officers and
men. Its vast marble halls and corridors
lend themselves admirably for use as hospital
wards, and temporary buildings have been
erected in rear of the museum, where the
105
A Message from Mesopotamia
administrative block, the theatre and various
wards — infectious and otherwise — are housed.
This is known as the Lady Hardinge Hos-
pital, and is beautifully equipped and replete
with every comfort. The same may be
said of the " Freeman Thomas Hospital "
near by. The buildings in which this hos-
pital for British soldiers is lodged were
intended as science schools attached to the
Bombay University. They are only just
attaining completion ; indeed, when it was
taken over for its present purpose the con-
struction of the building was not so far
advanced but that extensive alterations and
adaptations were feasible to make it as it
is to-day, as good as any hospital may be
in the matter of design, structure and
equipment. Recently the Gaekwad of
Baroda's Palace has been equipped and
opened for British officers. It is the last
word in sybaritic sumptuousness. If there
is aught in environment many a wounded
warrior will here be wooed back to con-
valescence by the very beauty of his
106
Bombay
luxurious surroundings. Away at Dadar a
chain of excellent wards is in course of
erection, wherein the sick of the Indian
Labour Corps will be lodged and cared for
as they were never lodged and cared for
before. There are several other hospitals
of excellent repute, but I only speak of
those which I personally visited. I visited
three Convalescent Homes at Coonoor, and
the number is to be extended to five, with
a total capacity of five thousand beds.
Wonderful indeed is the provision made,
not only in the Karachi and Bombay hos-
pitals, which I am able from personal
inspection to describe, but throughout India,
for the welfare of the sick. Much is of
recent consummation. But there it is to-day
— ample in quantity, admirable in quality,
whether in the matter of administration, or
of professional skill and devotion, or of
equipment and those extra things which
come under the category of " comforts."
It is impossible for me to exaggerate the
degree to which Lady Wilhngdon, and the
107
A Message from Mesopotamia
very capable Committees associated with
her in the Bombay Presidency War Works
of various kinds, have contributed to this
consummation. Bombay may indeed be
proud of her hospitals, and not only of them,
but of all that she has done for our soldiers,
either in the fighting line through the War
Gifts Committee, or in hospital through the
Red Cross organization.
No record of Red Cross work in Meso-
potamia and India would be complete with-
out reference to what has been done in our
Bombay depot under Major Hepper. The
collection and distribution of stores in
abundance to Indian Hospitals, to Hospital
Ships and Ambulance Trains has been con-
ducted on a very large scale. During my
sojourn in the Tigris Valley, Major Hepper
must have been well-nigh " snowed up " by
the requisitions of inordinate length with
which I bombarded him. The accuracy
with which my every indent was met was
only equalled by the promptitude with
which the goods were despatched. His work,
108
Bombay
however, did not begin and end with
" comforts."
A Sub-Committee has been formed to deal
with " Womided and Missing " inquiries,
another for providing amusements and enter-
tainments and recreation. Both these Com-
mittees work hand-in-hand with the Y.M.C.A.
Other Committees concern themselves with
** outings " for convalescents, either in the
Harbour in launches lent with profuse gener-
osity by shipping companies, or in the
environs of Bombay in motor-cars either
hired or lent by private owners. These
"joy rides," which often include picnics
and tea-parties, are immensely popular.
The preliminary organization necessary to
ensure their success is considerable, and their
popularity bears testimony to its excellence.
Major Hepper's call to other important
service entails the relinquishment of his
Red Cross work, but luckily we have found
a very capable successor in Mr. Arthur
Davies, who will give the whole of his time
to Red Cross work.
109
A Message from Mesopotamia
Not in Bombay alone, but indeed through-
out the length and breadth of India, the
work which has been done, not only by the
Order of St. John and the British Red
Cross Society united under Sir Pardey
Lukis's able direction, but also by the many
and various voluntary agencies, has been
simply magnificent.
Since the formation of the Indian Branch
of the Joint War Committee much has been
accomplished in the co-ordination of Red
Cross activities in India and the prevention
of overlapping. As elsewhere, the Joint
Committee works in close co-operation with
the mihtary authorities and in consultation
with them. A Red Cross representative
has been appointed at the Headquarters of
each Division, Divisional Area, or indepen-
dent Brigade, and a uniform system of
indenting for Red Cross stores has been
adopted throughout India. Most of the
organizations doing Red Cross work are
aflfihated to or work in conjunction with
the Joint War Committee, and negotiations
110
Bombay
are now proceeding to link up with the
remainder.
I have not the sHghtest hesitation in
saying that, whatever may have happened
in 1915 and 1916, whatever the blunders
may have been, whatever the deficiencies
may have been in Mesopotamia, yet there
is to-day no army in the world whose
soldiers are better fed, better clothed, and
better cared for, be they hale and hearty
or be they sick and sorry, than those fight-
ing under Sir Stanley Maude, who has
proved himself to be no less able an Adminis-
trator than he is a brave and briUiant General.
He has borne spontaneous testimony to the
value of the Red Cross work which Major
Moens and his little band of brothers have
achieved.
Ill
CHAPTER XVII
all's well
For the moment all is well with our
gallant force in the Tigris Valley. But
the hot weather is upon them, with its
attendant horrors ; and once more our Meso-
potamia Army is confronted with all the
evils incidental to a summer campaign in
the Tigris Valley — the evils of heat like that
of a furnace ; of flies, of mosquitoes, and
other abominations of insect life unknown
in this northern clime of ours; the evils
of fever, of dysentery, of scurvy, and all
the other ills to which Oriental flesh is
heir; of dust and thirst and ennui. But
our Army to-day will look those evils in
the face undaunted and undismayed. The
clouds of doubt and distrust which twelve
months ago darkened the horizon and
quenched the spirit of our soldiers have
been swept away. The men are in great
I 113
A Message from Mesopotamia
heart. They know that they are going to
win through. They know that their leaders
will look carefully to their well-being, that
England is aUve to the magnitude of the
task to which she has put her hand, and is
resolved that not again shall the sinews of
war be withheld. And this they know also
—that beyond the Generals and the Staff,
beyond the Government and the War Office
there is the great British PubUc, big-hearted
and generous, who have made the work
of caring for the sick and wounded their
own special concern. The task has been
entrusted to Red Cross hands, and with
that arrangement Thomas Atkins is well
content.
114
APPENDIX
RED CROSS WORK IN MESOPOTAMIA
During the year 1915 large consignments
of Hospital necessaries, clothing, and com-
forts were despatched to Mesopotamia by the
Indian Council of the St. John Ambulance
Association. For the transport of sick and
wounded, motor boats, ambulance flats and
launches were specially constructed in Cal-
cutta and sent over to Basrah.
Monthly supplies for the equipment and
furnishing of the Hospitals at Amara, and
of Mobile Laboratories on the Tigris, were
provided by the same organization, and
Lieut. -Colonel Jay Gould was appointed to
be the representative of the Order and of the
British Red Cross Society in Mesopotamia.
Basrah
General.— It was in April 1916 that the
Advance Guard of the British Red Cross
Unit, under the command of Mr. E. A.
115
ApjJendix
Ridsdale, British Red Cross Commissioner,
arrived in Mesopotamia.
Prior to this date Lieut. -Colonel Jay
Gould, I.M.S., had been acting as Com-
missioner for the Indian Branch of the
St. John Ambulance Association and dis-
tributing comforts to the Hospital units,
while three motor launches, sent out by
the British Red Cross Society in 1915— the
Wessex, Alouette and Olinda— had been doing
valuable work on the Shatt-el-arab.
At Basrah the Base Depot was in charge
of Lieut.-Colonel Jay Gould, I.M.S., Com-
missioner for the Indian St. John Ambulance
Association.
An Advance Depot was started under
Major Moens at Amarah— about 150 miles
up the Tigris from Basrah.
The total strength of the Red Cross unit in
Mesopotamia is eight officers and sixty-four
men, together with a considerable number of
native followers and coolies. Our casualties
have been heavy, some 57 per cent, of our
men having been invalided home.
116
Appendix
Stores. — In spite of the difficulties ex-
perienced in the early stages on account
of lack of accommodation and other facilities,
it is worthy of note that on April 27, 1916
several large indents from Hospitals were
complied with, so that no time was lost in
getting to work. Orders were at once given
to a local contractor for the erection of huts
for quarters and stores on a portion of the
ground occupied by the Barracks about
half a mile down a tidal creek known as
Khandak Creek.
These huts, however, were not completed
until early in June, and the large stores
hut not until the beginning of August. The
stores had to be stacked in the open in their
original cases, thus throwing an enormous
amount of extra work on the Staff, as every
case had to be opened and re-secured for
every requisition dealt with.
The area dealt with by the Base Depot
extends down river to Mohammerah — a Per-
sian town on the Karun River — twenty-six
miles below Basrah, where there are two
117
Appendix
large Convalescent Depots of 1000 beds
each; and thence 160 miles up the Karun
River to Ahwaz, near to the Anglo-Persian Oil
Fields. Up river at a distance of about forty
miles is Kurnah, notorious for its mosqui-
toes and the reputed site of the Garden of
Eden. Here there is a combined Stationary-
Hospital of 250 beds situated at the junction
of the Euphrates and the Tigris; while
some 200 miles up the main stream of the
Euphrates is Nazariyeh, where are the Field
Ambulances, a Stationary Hospital and a
Casualty Clearing Station.
Not only has the Base Depot to comply
with the requisitions made upon it by the
Hospital imits in this large area — units
with accommodation for over 14,000 patients
— but it also has to keep the Advanced
Depot at Amarah supplied with stores suf-
ficient to cope with a still larger medical
area.
These stores are sent up to Amarah in
large shallow draught sailing boats or
" mahelahs," which take from ten to eighteen
118
Appendix
days for the 150 miles journey, according to
whether the winds are favourable or the
reverse. It is a slow and cumbersome method
of transport, but it has two distinct ad-
vantages: (1) it throws no additional strain
upon the now highly organized River Steamer
Transport System; (2) these " mahelahs,"
with their Arab crews and their extremely
shallow draught, can negotiate without much
difficulty the numerous sandbanks and shal-
lows of the Tigris in its low water season.
A fire took place in the Stores Department
on June 23, 1916, and over £11,000 worth
of stores were destroyed — a loss which would
undoubtedly have been far greater had not
the men stationed at the time in the
barracks coped with the situation promptly
and efficiently. Another fire took place on
the night of 1/2 October, 1916, at the
building occupied by the Base Medical Stores
Depot, where the Red Cross Officers had
their quarters and offices. Although con-
siderable office material was burnt, the loss
was mainly one of personal kit and property,
119
Appendix
and all important books and papers were
saved.
The following figures taken at random from
the list of Red Cross gifts issued from the
Base Depot may prove of interest : —
Quantities
issued.
Goods.
Quantities
issued.
Goodi.
1,766
Blankets
261
Primus Stoves
203 cases
Books
34,356
Pyjamas
1,089 large
Calves' Foot
3,699
Razors
bots.
Jelly
6,178
Sheets
8,270
Cardigans
33,034
Shirts
2,150 lbs.
Chocolate
12,048
Slippers
3,225,160
Cigarettes
34,591
Tablets Soap
8,788 lbs.
Extract of
32,985 pairs
Socks
Meat
22,106 lbs.
Sweets
49,234
Fans
5,130 lbs.
Tobacco Indian
9,263
Goggles
1,214 lbs.
Tobacco British
24,569 bots.
Horlick'sMilk
11,021
Toothbrushes
70,648 tins
Milk
75 cases
Tooth Sticks
12,761
Mosquito Nets
10,596
Towels
8,116 yards
Mosquito Net-
20,172
Vests
ting
3,193 yards
Waterproof
3,478
Pillows
Sheeting
10,006
Pipes
The Wounded and Missing Inquiry Bureau
has been conducted by Lieut. E. V. Salcombe,
who had carried out the same work for some
time in Malta, and he has been assisted by
Viscount Tamworth.
The Amarah Depot was started in the
120
AjDpendix
beginning of May 1916. Amarah is a town
of 20,000 inhabitants, composed of Arabs,
Jews, Christians, Chaldgeans, Kurds and
Sabbaeans, of whom Arabs are in the vast
majority. It is situated at the junction
of the Tigris and the Chahala Canal, about
150 miles above Basrah, and has Hospital
accommodation for 7,800 beds.
The Red Cross secured for its Depot a
large house on the left bank of the Tigris
with a river frontage — admirably situated
for the loading, unloading and distribution
of its goods.
Very soon additional storage room had to
be found, for the Depot soon had to cope
with very large demands upon its resources,
not only from Amarah itself, but also from
all the Hospital units along the long lines of
communication from Amarah to the front,
a distance of about 200 miles by river.
First, there were three permanent De-
fence Posts with Post Hospitals of Mudelil,
Filai Filah and Ali Gherbi, and in addition
six other smaller marching posts with Medical
121
Appendix
Detention Tents and personnel. These were
all between Amarah and Sheikh Saad.
At Sheikh Saad — 140 miles above Amarah
and the river head of the " P " boats,
there were two Stationary Hospitals, four
Casualty Clearing Stations and one large
Convalescent Camp— 4000 beds in all — as
well as smaller units such as Sanitary
Sections, etc.
Between Sheikh Saad and the Sanna-i-yat
position on the left bank and the Es Sinn
position on the right bank, there were
nineteen Field Ambulances — British, Indian
and Combined — each one of which had 400
beds.
The medical area thus covered by the
work of the Amarah Depot had accommoda-
tion in all for 20,920 patients.
Lastly, and on the whole the unit most in
need of Red Cross comforts, is the River
Sick Convoy Unit, which— exclusive of the
H. S. Sikkim presented, staffed and provided
for by the Madras Presidency — has 20 " P
boats under its control.
122
55
Apijendix
The Medical Officers in charge of these
boats can obtain their Red Cross comforts
of clothing or of food from the Red Cross
" Dump " at river head or from the Amarah
and Basrah Depots. They seldom fail to
make a call at one or more of these sources
of supply, for the increased comfort and
well-being of their patients during the long
river journey.
During the hot weather, from June to
September, the Staff was much reduced by
sickness, and at one time it looked as if it
would vanish altogether. Brittain was the
first to go. He died of cholera after a few
hours only of illness. He was an inde-
fatigable worker, whose loss was irreparable.
Lieut. Reed stayed long enough with the
Red Cross to make his transference to the
Intelligence Staff very keenly felt. He had
an intimate knowledge of the country, its
customs and its languages, and Intelligence
gained where Red Cross lost. Both of our
Sergeants of the Regular Army were invalided
to India at about this time, and the four
123
Appendix
"P.B." men spent more time in Hospital than
out. The timely arrival of Mr. Vigo in early
September was most welcome, but after
six weeks' valuable work at Amarah he,
too, was invalided to India after a long
sojourn in Hospital. Towards the end of
October 1916 the Red Cross lost another
valuable worker in Engineer Travers, who
was accidentally drowned.
But all requisitions made upon the Red
Cross were complied with, and as soon as
the hot weather became a memory only
the Staff was considerably strengthened, and
is now stronger than ever it was.
The following is our method of distribution
of our Stores : —
A revised list of available Red Cross
comforts comprising over 200 items, from a
toothpick to a Hospital ship, is sent every
month to all the Medical Officers of each
Division and on the lines of communication.
The result is that every Officer commanding
a medical unit in Mesopotamia is kept con-
tinuously in touch with the Red Cross as
124
Appendix
a universal provider of comforts for the
sick and wounded under his charge.
As soon as a requisition is received at
the Depot— if it is a local one— the goods
are loosely packed and taken away by the
Hospital Staff. If it is an up-river requisi-
tion it is carefully packed and forwarded on
the first available "P" boat bound for the
North.
On several occasions the Red Cross, by
keeping a fair reserve stock, both at Basrah
and Amarah, of goods most in demand, has
been able to bridge over a deficiency in
Government Medical comforts — a deficiency
in most cases temporary and local only,
owing perhaps to the stranding of a " P "
boat in the shallows of the Tigris, with the
consequent blocking of the only available
passage for other boats.
Of all work done by the Order of St.
John and Red Cross in Mesopotamia that
of the river launches has been unique,
inasmuch as they alone have occupied this
field of activity, and it is no exaggeration
125
Appendix
to say that without this organization the
Medical Service would have been seriously
handicapped.
The supply of motor launches for carrying
sick and wounded, hospital personnel and
Red Cross stores represents the first phase
of Red Cross work in Mesopotamia. In the
Autumn of 1915 two launches, the Alouette
and Olinda, were sent out ; and in September
of the same year, in response to a cable from
General Nixon, a larger boat, the Wessex,
capable of carrying as many as sixty sitting
patients, was purchased. Owing to delays
in shipment she did not arrive at Basrah
until the end of December, and was put into
commission immediately after arrival. At
that time there were no other motor launches
available in the country for the purpose,
and for weeks on end the Wessex was running
almost continuously day and night. Up to
the end of January 1917 she had carried
more than 15,000 sick and wounded, and is
still in service carrying Red Cross stores, of
which she has already transported more than
126
Appendix
200 tons : sometimes over long distances,
such as from Basrah to Amarah (150 miles)
and Amarah to Arab Village (145 miles).
After the Wessex had been despatched,
and further launches had been asked for
by the Army Commander, I.E.F., " D "
special launches were constructed designed
for the specific purpose of carrying sick
and wounded, whether sitting or stretcher
cases. In all there are at present in Mesopo-
tamia thirty-four launches provided by the
British Red Cross Society, and it may fairly
be said that all transport of sick and wounded
that can be effected by motor launches is
done by these thirty-four boats supplemented
by the additional launches provided by the
Indian Branch of the Order of St. John.
The boats have been in service at various
points along the line of river communications
from the base at Basrah up to the front —
a distance of about 300 miles at the end of
the period covered by the report. The
work varies according to the locality. At
Basrah, Amarah and Sheikh Saad the
127
Appendix
launches are employed for the discharging
of the sick and wounded from the River
Sick Convoy Steamers to hospitals, the dis-
tributing of them from hospital to hospital
according to circumstances, the visiting of
marching posts and Post Hospital up and
down river, and for the evacuation of patients,
involving sometimes journeys of over 100
miles. At the front the launches have been
utilised for carrying the sick and wounded
from the advanced dressing stations just
behind the trenches to the nearest field
ambulances.
In addition to this work, certain small
launches have been detailed for the con-
veyance of medical officers, who sometimes
have to cover long distances in the course
of their duties in districts where the only
means of conveyance is by water. Besides
this. Red Cross stores are transported from
the depots to their destination by motor
launches, and in this connection mention
should be made of the Silver Thifnble Vlly
located at Basrah, which, up to the end of
128
Appendix
January 1917, had carried over 120 tons of
stores.
The total number of sick and wounded
carried by British Red Cross launches since
the first boat arrived, up to January 31,
1917, was approximately 80,000, and the
general utility of the boats can be gauged
from the fact that. the transport of sick and
wounded, both main and subsidiary, is almost
entirely by water. It should be added that in
no part of the river is navigation easy, owing
to the strong current, the narrow channels
and the shifting sandbanks, whilst in some
parts it is exceptionally difficult. Moreover,
the launches make very long trips up
to 250 miles under their own power, being
almost the only vessels of their size to do so,
and in view of these circumstances the pro-
portion of casualties must be considered low.
All repairs to the boats have been effected
by our own repairing engineers.
All the launches are manned by Red Cross
drivers and engineers and are attached for
duty to the medical authorities.
K 129
Appendix
Two or three different types of launch
are in service, according to the work for which
they are intended ; but the majority are
forty-feet launches with a speed of eight to
ten knots and one engine of from twenty to
forty H.P. fitted right forward in a cabin
just large enough to provide sleeping berths
for the two drivers, who as a rule sleep in
their boats. The rest of the launch is open.
Ordinarily the accommodation is for thirty-
six sitting cases, or eight stretcher and
sixteen sitting cases ; though as many as
fifty-six sitting cases have actually been
carried in one trip. Substantial double
awnings and side curtains protect the patients
from the terrific heat of the sun's rays in
the summer months.
On many occasions the Red Cross launches
have been instrumental in preventing what
would otherwise have resulted in serious
breakdowns in transport. In July and
August of 1916, the Florence Nightingale,
SL Scottish Red Cross boat, was evacuating
the sick from a certain area in Amarah,
130
Appendix
starting at six a.m. and often not finishing
work until long after midnight.
A British Red Cross River Hospital Ship for
service on the Tigris has just been completed
in Bombay and is already in commission
on the Tigris. She will carry on board
an exceptionally large ice -making machine
plant, which alone will entitle her to her
place in the sun, where ice is worth its
weight in gold.
The Indian Order of St. John has also
readily responded to the great demand for
launches on the Tigris, for the evacuation of
sick and wounded, and has actually nine
launches and one hospital ship in com-
mission doing yeoman service for the Red
Cross in Mesopotamia.
To the British Red Cross Society and
Order of St. John will alwavs accrue the
honour of having contributed in measure
incalculable to the rescue and relief of the
sick and wounded during the Mesopotamian
Campaign.
131
IN MESOPOTAMIA
BY
MARTIN SWAYNE
Illustrated hi Colour. Price 5^. net.
" An officer in the Royal Army Medical Corps,
who uses the pseudonym 'Martin Swayne,' has
just published a book which deserves to be widely
read as a sequel to the Report. The book is
entitled ' In Mesopotamia.' " — Lancet.
"There is not a page in this narrative that
should be missed." — Daily Telegraph.
London: HODDER AND STOUGIITON.
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