OBITUARY

Press, Volume LXXI, Issue 21400, 16 February 1935, Page 11

OBITUARY

FORMER KING LI (trXITEO PRESS ASSOCIATION— FT ?'Lr —-W TELEOEATII—COPTBIGHT. BAGDAD, February i;. The death has occurred of A!:. I :■ mer king of the Hedjaz. All, former King of the Hedjaz. o.ra in 1878, was the eldest son vi :ha foitncr King Hussein, who. in October, 1924, abdicated in his favoufk His mother was a daughter of Ah* dulla Ibn Mohammed, who was Tmif of Mecca from 1858 to 1877. During the war he directed fhfl siege of Medina, one of the holy cities of Arabia, and then look part in the campaign against the Turks in Palestine in 1916-18, as commander of the auxiliaries sent by King Hussein. He was afterwards installed a* Emir of Medina. When his father a few weeks before his abdication introduced a sort of constitutional regime into the Hedjaz, Ali became president of the Council of State. On ascending the throne, an act which was endorsed by a vote of the people, he cud not assume the title of "King of Arabia," which had earned his father the hostility of the Wahabis, but merely that of "King of the Hedjaz." He also declined to take over the Khalifate, of which there is now no holder. Hussein left him as a legacy a war with Ibn Saud, Emir of Nejd, head of the Wahabis, who captured the holy city of Mecca and beseiged Jedda. His representative in London, Dr. Naji, proposed to arrange an armistice with Ibn Saud, and to come to an agreement with him as to the cession of some villages which stood in the way of the conclusion of peace. But King Ali refused consent to this course and Dr. Naji resigned in May. 1925. Ibn Saud continued his campaign, entering Mecca on October 13. Medina and Jedda, where Ali had established himself, were invested and eventually Ali left the latter town. It yielded on December 19, 1925, to the "VVahabl ruler, and on the following day Ali abdicated the throne, announcing that he did so for the sake of peace. On January 8, 1926, Ibn Saud proclaimed himself King of the Hedjaz. and was recognised as such by Britain. Ali made his way to Bagdad where he lived at the court of his brother Feisal, King of Iraq. During the absence of the latter in London in the autumn of 1927 Ali acted as Regent. He had a dispute with the acting Premier, Yassin Pasha, over the publication by certain Bagdad papers cf articles which Yassin considered to be against the public interest As Ali did not share this view, the acting Premier resigned. DR. HERBERT GILES I (Bamaa ornciit. wizslxssJ (Received February 15, 7.5 p.m.) RUGBY. February K. Dr. Herbert Giles, professor of Chinese at Cambridge University from 1897 to 1932, whose knowledge of the language and literature of China won for him a world-wide reputation, died yesterday. He was 90 years old. MR h. B. HALL LONDON, February 15. The death has occurred of Mr Lindsay Bernard Hall. LMr Hall was director of the National Gallery, Art Museum, and Art Schools of Victoria from 1882 to tins year. He was born in England in 1859, and after studying there and on the Continent went to Australia.]