A TERRIBLE EXPEDITION.

Cromwell Argus, Volume XXXVII, Issue 1985, 23 April 1906, Page 7

A TERRIBLE EXPEDITION.

—* — ATTACKED BY MAD WOLVES AND JACKALS. _ -* ! BRITISH MISSION'S SUFFERINGS IN A WATERLESS DESERT. A remarkable s*ory of hardship and suffering is told by the mission under Colonel A. 11. M'Mahon, which has returned to England alter spending two and a half years demarking the boundary between the Persian and Afghan territory in Seistan, about which there was a quarrel. No fewer than 50 members of the mission lost their lives, .some from heat and thirst, others from being i'ro/en to death., and some from drowning and hydrophobia, while nearly 5,000 camels and 120 horses succumbed. The mission, says Reuter, consisted of 11 British officers, a large staff of survey and irrigation experts, an escort of '2OO native infantry, 60 cavalry, with a large supply of transport, including the 58th Camel Corps —in all a total of 1,500 men, 200 horses, and 2,200 camels. As the base was at Quetta, 500 miles across almost waterless desert, whence all stores except grain and fodder and a few local commodities had to be imported, the difficulty of feeding the mision can be well appreciated. Five weeks were taken in the march of 500 miles over uninhabited, waterJess country between Quetta and Seistan, and three men and a number I or animals were frozen to death. The camp was formed at. Kuhak, a bare, desolutc spot, wind-swept, with al--1 ternations of extreme heat and cold, ! and here the mission stayed two and . a half summers. The work of demarcation was very difficult. South of the Helinund ' River for 90 miles, the line ran : through an absolutely waterless desert, in which the pillar-building parties had to spend six weeks, being : dependent entirely upon water i brought from considerable distances. : WATERLESS GLACIER. ! The last 20 miles of the frontier a- ; gain ran up the waterless glacial ; slopes of the Siah Koh Mountain. i The demercation was finally cumj pletcd at the end of last year. i One of the most tragic cxperiances 1 was the deatli of an Indian surveyor while on duty in the waterless desert iof Dasht-i-Margo, which had never before been visited or surveyed. He ventured too far from water, and ow- , ing to the intense heat, was unable ! either to move forward or to retrace : his steps. lie and seven of his followers paid the penalty with their ; lives. | HERO SAVES A VALUABLE MAP. The incident was marked by the heroism of one of his men, who, seeing the surveyor die. determined to .rescue Ihe map for which so many lives had been given. He cut it off from the hoard of the plane, table, and knowing that he could not long j retain consi iousuess, wound it under his waist-cloth around his body. j Then he blindly started northward j in the hope of reaching water. The j four men who started with him col--1 lapsed, and he himself remembers no more than coming to consciousness at night-time lying in a pool of water by the Krash River. Here he was found by a wandering Afghan, who carried him on his back to an Afghan village, where his life was saved after receiving careful atj tentiou. The bodies of his unfortuu- | ate companions were afterwards disj covered in a completely mummified j condition. hast winter all the jackals with I which Seistan abounds for some unknown cause went mad and attacked I men and animals. The disease also [spread to the wolves, who played I great havoc. | TERROR OF HYDROPHOBIA. | Four members of the mission were 'bitten, one of them .lied of hydroI phobia. A mad wolf which attacked j the camp of the Camel Corps bit 78 j camels and one horse, and 48 of Hie | camels and the horse died of hydroi phobia. On another occasion a | horde of mad wolves tried unsucce'ssj fully to rush the camp. | The seistanis themselves were so overcome with terror of these mad ! animals that they actually killed off ! all but a few of their dogs, on whom j they depended for safety and security at night. TERRIFIC HEAT AND BLIZZARDS O'reat suffering was caused by the winds. During the summer what is ! known as the 120-day wind attained a velocity of anything up to 70 miles an hour, and it was impossible j to venture out except, perhaps, for lan hour in the evening, when it ; slightly moderated. The heat rose jto 122 in the shade in May and June. The air was full of dust and salt and was exceedingly painful. In the winter terrific blizzards, with intense cold, were common experiences. The last visitation of this sort was on March 29, when the temperature dropped to 4 above zero, and the wind registered 120 miles an hour. In this storm GOO camels were killed, but their bodies disappeared in an incredibly short time, as the Seistanis. who are always anxious to get flesh, rushed in and speedily demolished them. ANCIENT CITIES. From end to end Seistan was found to be one mass of ancient ruins, and as many of these places will probably never again be visited again by, Europeans, the data collected will prove of greatest interest. The bulk of the deserted cities had probably not been occupied for the past 500 years. RUSSIAN AGENTS FLOGGED. When the mission crossed the River Helinund, in spite of Russian protests anti-British riots were organised, and were arranged to take place on King Edward's birthday. But the scheme failed, and was followed by the flogging in public of the ringleaders of the movement, who included the majority of the Russian agents in Seistan. The effect of this on the Persian mind is not difficult to understand.