Part 3 (1/2)
During the three or four days which we spent at Samarra, a large quant.i.ty of German gun-ammunition arrived by raft from up-stream, and was carried by Arabs up the bank to the trollies. These rafts carry big loads; they are formed by a skeleton frame of wood on which is placed brushwood, the frame being supported by inflated skins which are tied to it. On reaching the end of a journey, the skins are deflated and sent back up the river to be used again. As there are rapids between Samarra and Bagdad, it was not possible to float the rafts right down to Bagdad, and consequently everything had to be trans.h.i.+pped to the railway. One night some large motors arrived, and went on at once by road towards Bagdad. Reports immediately circulated that Enver Pasha had arrived; but this cannot have been true.
We had now learnt who our commandant on the journey was to be. He was a yuzbas.h.i.+ or captain, by name Elmey Bey, a little man with an enormous moustache, which made him look very fierce. He knew a very little French, and could therefore be approached without an interpreter. We did not really appreciate him until later. One morning he escorted a few of us over to the town; there was nothing to be seen except the mosque, and we were not allowed to look at this even from the gateway, much less to enter the courtyard.
ELMEY BEY (From a Water-colour Drawing by Lt. Browne)
After making a few purchases, we went into an Arab cafe and partook of coffee and tea flavoured with citron. Elmey Bey would not let us pay for anything, and we thought it most hospitable of him. He said he would accept our hospitality another day. However, he eventually left the cafe without paying anything, and apparently the proprietor was really our unwilling host.
The town seemed very deserted, many of the inhabitants being over on the other side, selling anything they could to the first batch of troops, who had reached Samarra that morning by rail, and were now camped in the open a little way above us. We were not allowed to go to see them, but one or two managed to get messages through, and an Indian clerk belonging to my regiment came to see us. He looked thin, and had evidently had a hard time. He said that on the way to Bagdad the guards had flogged men who fell out, to see if they were really ill, and that conditions as regards rations were pretty bad generally. None of our men, however, had succ.u.mbed so far, and, as many of the regiment had been anything but fit to start with, we hoped they would be able to stand it. We gave him a few little things in the way of eatables before he went back.
The next day, we were told we were going to march; and the question of transport became all-important. At first the Turks said there would be two animals-donkeys, mules, or ponies-to each officer; this seemed much too good to be true, and when the time came there was barely one animal to every officer. These had all been forcibly commandeered from the villagers round, and a good many were taken back again on the sly by their owners before we could get hold of them. Others were taken by the gendarmes who formed our guard, while several were too small to be of use, or were hopelessly lame. By the time we had got our kit packed, we had left for riding one reasonably large donkey and a diminutive beast between the six officers and seven Indian servants in our mess.
We started at sunset in a dust-storm. Fortunately it did not last long, and we got along without mishap till about eleven o'clock, when a heavy rainstorm came on. All through the night, and especially after every halt, we had been urged on by our Arab escort shouting ”Yallah, yallah!” This really means ”O G.o.d!” but is used by the Arabs for ”Get on and hurry up.” How we came to loathe that cry! About two in the morning, we reached some water; luckily, in the dark, we could not see what we were drinking. We must have done fifteen to twenty miles; and, as most of us had not marched any distance for months, we were only too glad to fall asleep for a few hours. At dawn we were again on the move, having had some trouble in finding our own animals again; the wise had marked theirs with copying pencil, and this method was generally resorted to afterwards.
We went on with halts of a few minutes every hour, and got down to the river again at midday. It was now pretty hot, and we were told we should arrive at Tekrit, a small Arab town, in one hour. Throughout Turkey and Mesopotamia distances are measured by hours; a good working plan is to add on 50 per cent. to the average of what one is told, as no two men will ever say the same; if journeying by night it is safer to double it.
That last hour to Tekrit was one of the worst we had; actually it was nearer two hours. There was a blazing sun, and we were very tired. The road left the river and went up a hill, then down and up again. On each rise we expected to see the town, but it was dreadfully slow in appearing. From some distance off we were met by Arab boys and women selling eggs, raisins, sour curds, and chapatties. Finally, we were taken through the place down to the river edge, a sort of dirty, stony beach, where we were told to camp; we had covered 30 to 35 miles in the last nineteen hours, and most of us had marched almost the whole distance.
There was a small Arab cafe which we were allowed to use, but otherwise there was no shade. Arabs sauntered about our bivouac, and were anything but friendly; the place was filthy, and we were far from feeling cheerful.
Some of the houses of the town stand up on a rocky crag above the river. Tekrit is a very old place, and at one time there was a bridge over the river here. It was laid waste by the Mongols and the people butchered. Before we left, we were all wis.h.i.+ng that some such fate might be in store for the present inhabitants.
Some of us bathed, but the water was very shallow and dirty. Arabs could be seen swimming across the river supported on inflated skins, in exactly the same way as Xenophon has described their forefathers doing 2,000 years ago.
That afternoon we tried to arrange to hire extra animals, as we felt that we could never get along if the succeeding marches were so severe. A good many animals were forthcoming, mostly mules and large donkeys. The usual terms were to be one pound in gold, paid in advance, and a second on arrival at Mosul. The following evening, just before starting, the owners demanded the whole two pounds in advance; there was nothing for it but to comply, the reason undoubtedly being that the commandant of the town and Elmey Bey both desired to have their share before starting, as otherwise they would not see any of it. A long delay ensued before we got off, and it was getting dark before we were clear of the town.
The march that night was uneventful, and we halted for a few hours before dawn near the river, continuing our way as soon as it got light. We pa.s.sed a few Arab encampments, formed of dark tents, where the nomads come at certain seasons to cultivate the surrounding land, together with their flocks of sheep and goats. Not a single house, or even mud-hut, was to be seen. Our next halt, which we reached in the middle of the morning, was a serai standing by itself on a low ridge. It was built on the usual square pattern, and contained a well, which however, was not of very much use, as the water was unfit for drinking; drinking water had all to be carried from the river, over a mile away.
Elmey Bey, or ”Phil May,” as we christened him, had by this time shown how anxious he was to help us, by doing nothing at all to a.s.sist us either in buying provisions or keeping prices down. Our escort consisted of a few Arab gendarmes, and, on arrival at any village or encampment, they would make the people put up their prices, and insist on taking the difference as commission themselves; whenever they could manage it they prevented all country people from approaching us until their own demands had been satisfied.
Phil May rode the whole way, and would hurry on and be comfortably asleep in his camp bed by the time we reached the end of the march. If worried sufficiently by the senior officers, he would occasionally go to the extent of abusing one or more of the gendarmes, and administer the usual punishment adopted by all officers in the Turkish army-slapping the face of the culprit. It says a good deal for the discipline of the Turkish soldier that a sergeant will stand up like a lamb and have his face smacked by the veriest nincomp.o.o.p of an officer.
Leaving the serai again the following morning, we did a short march of some six or seven miles only, down to the river. This was to be a very strenuous day, for that evening we were to start on the long waterless march about which we had heard so much. It was said to be 40 miles, that we should halt during the next day, and not reach water till the morning after, thus doing two all-night marches. Most people had bought goatskins, tied up to hold water, from the local Arabs. Most of them leaked more or less rapidly, the new skins being much the worst, and all gave the water a very strong flavour.
We got away about 5 p.m., and nothing special happened till about 11 o'clock, when suddenly the escort became wildly excited, and dashed up and down; we were halted and told there were hostile Arabs about; the gendarmes fired off a few shots into the air, but nothing more occurred. All we could find to account for the disturbance was that one officer had lost his donkey, which had got loose and gone careering off to the side of the road. As it was a dark night, this may very likely have alarmed one or two of the gendarmes, who did not strike us as being men of valour.
Two hours later we halted, and, after a sketchy supper, soon got to sleep. In the morning, instead of remaining where we were for the day, as we had expected, we had to move on once more to the tune of ”Yallah, yallah.” After three hours or so we reached some low sand-hills, and amongst these found an unexpected stream, where we proceeded to camp. This stream, like so many more in this part of the world, was not pure water, but contained salts of various descriptions, said by the Turks to make the water bad for drinking. We drank steadily from this and other similar streams; and, luckily, for the most part, felt no ill effects.
That evening, we were again upon the road, our destination being s.h.i.+lgat, a small Turkish post on the Tigris, which we were meeting once more. We arrived eventually about midnight, after a very wearisome march, and after a long wait were herded into the courtyard of the Turkish fort. When the kit had been sorted out, we were very soon asleep, the usual precautions being taken to see that boots were hidden under one's valise, or tied up in some way to prevent theft. As the Turkish troops were always badly off for footgear, boots were the articles most often stolen, and several pairs had disappeared in this way before we reached our journey's end. All were thoroughly tired out, and it had been decided that we would insist on a rest the following day. Great was our wrath, therefore, to find ourselves awakened again at dawn, and told we must move at once to another place. Phil May came in for more abuse, and lost his temper promptly. We settled down, eventually, in another enclosure not far away, where we had more room. Later on, we succeeded in our efforts to get a whole day's rest.
In ancient times s.h.i.+lgat was a.s.sur, the first capital of the a.s.syrian Empire. Archaeologists had evidently been at work here; all the foundations of the old city had been laid bare; it had covered a considerable area, and had been built largely of marble. Situated on a high promontory overlooking the Tigris and the flat plains beyond, the old town must have been an imposing sight from all the surrounding country. Now, only the foundations remain, and no carving or inscriptions are to be seen.
Next day, we were off once more across flat, uninteresting country, keeping close to the river. At the start, there was considerable delay owing to donkeys getting bogged in a creek which we had to cross. After a midday halt for a couple of hours, we continued our weary way, and finally bivouacked for the night on the bank of the river.
The following day's march proved one of the most unpleasant of the whole journey. After an early start, we soon reached a Turkish post, where a long delay occurred while our orderlies drew rations. At this place there were small bitumen works, these being the first signs of any modern industry which we had seen since leaving Bagdad. A little farther on, the track rose to higher ground, and we left the river away on our right. It began to get hot towards midday, and a warm wind got up, bringing clouds of dust to meet us. At length, in the afternoon, we reached a Turkish post, where after much altercation we were refused an entrance, and had to retrace our steps to a somewhat sulphurous stream a little way back, where we camped for the night.
The country all round at this time of year is covered with long thin gra.s.s, and in many places there are quant.i.ties of wild flowers, scarlet poppies being very conspicuous.
In order to defeat the gendarmes, we had by now formed a kind of trade union for buying eggs from villagers. On approaching each place, it was decided how much should be paid for eggs, these being more in demand than any other kind of food. In the Bagdad district the Persian kron is the usual unit: a kron is equivalent to fourpence or two Turkish piastres; farther north the piastre, or qrush, is used. The cheapest rate we obtained for eggs was eight for a piastre, or four a penny, whereas when the gendarmes had their own way we had to pay a penny for each.