QUEER CRAFT

Evening Post, Volume XCI, Issue 96, 24 April 1916, Page 8

QUEER CRAFT

MINOR NAVAL WARFARE

TRANSPORT ON THE TIGRIS,

EXCITING GALLIPOLI INCIDENT.

(FROM OUR OWN CORRESPONDENT.) LONDON, 14th March, j On the Mesopotamian front the advantages of the transport arrangements are with the British. We rely on war heliums, local river craft, long, narrow, canoe-shaped boats which are used by the Arabs. When the ■ latter boatmen decamped our Sepoys were taught to punt and paddle. In the Hooded state of the country during the advance up the Tigris in May and June (says Mr. Edmund Candler, the representative of the British Press) everything depended on the belliim. It. was the same at Shaiba, when they carried General Mellis's brigade "to the scene of action, and again in July, when General Goringe's column advanced up the Euphrates from Qurnah, across Harmar Lake, to Suk-eak-Sheyukli and Nnsiriyeh. But the bellum plays no part in the immediate operations ; t it is essentially a downriver boat. ' Supplementing the paddle-steamers of the Tigris is the most heterogeneous collection of scrap iron and remnants of river traffic which could possibly be gathered together. The military authorities have taxed the resources of India's inland navigation, from Bhamo to Sind. "How this craft ever found its way over the ocean the Providence which watches over the improvident alone knows," writes Mr. Candler. "Beyond question the boat of the most catholic ancestry at present on the Tigris is the ' aerial/ half houseboat, half aeroplane. The hull is from the Brahmaputra, and it is fitted with an air propeller and a 50 horse-power semi-Diesel type engine, and it makes more noise than a minor battle. It once plied as a shikar boat in Assam, lut its owner and navigator had a ha.ppy inspiration, and this miracle of private improvisation is now the officially recognised hospital ferry. It plies hourly between the field ambulance on the river bank and the hospital camp. It has run the gauntlet of shot and shell and mine, and the adventures of its navigator between Ctesiphon and Sheikh Sa'ad alone would provide material for a bulky volume. Another boat indigenous to the Tigris' is the cauldron- • like gxifar of Bagdad, probably the oldest .vessel in the world. A gufar moored alongside the 'aerial' offers a striking picture in the evolution of craft. They are reed barked, with wooden uprights plastered over with pitch from the bitumen wells of Hik. Herodotus described them 'sound as bucklers,' spinning down stream with merchandise from Nineveh to Babylon. Each gufar carried a donkey, and was navigated by two men. Arrived in Babylon .and the merchandise disposed of, the gufar was dismembered and the parts carried back overland by the passenger ass." A GALLIPOLI INCIDENT. "One of the most exciting ttiings 1 have ever seen —absolutely before our eyes a,nd very graphic." A British officer gives this description to a rowing ■ boat's .escape from Turkish fire shortly before the evacuation. He was in Trolley Ravine, and he says: "One evening, about 4, we noticed a little rowing boat plying, for the torpedo. We were rather surprised at the time that she should choose a. moment.to row out when the destroyer was within sight and range of the Turkish batteries. Just as the rowing boat was approaching the destroyer —about 100 yards perhaps—we saw a splash behind the destroyer's stern, and realised that the Turks were getting her range pretty accurately. The destroyer hesitated not a moment; she made off for all she was worth, first doing what she could for the rowing boat and herself by emitting a vast quantity of black and impenetrable smoke. Then 'out of the fringe of the cloud nearest the shore the row-ing boat emerged. The Turks were on her. like a knife—the first splash was short, so was the second and the, third—a little behind her, too. Through our glasses we could, see them plainly. It was one of those very heavy sea-going rowing boats, and the two men rowing were sweating like hell, and the man at> the rudder sat a bit forward sweating as much. The only thing I noticed about them was that they never looked at the splashes but only rowed. "Then came another splash, or rather collection of splashes, like throwing a handful of gravel into the water—for, of course, they were firing- shrapnel— and'these fell around the wretched little boat. We all felt they were done— but, by gad ! they, went on as gamely as ever. And again it came all over them, and again they did. not seem to care. The Turks had fairly got the range of them now, and burst their shrapnel in the right place every time. Another came all over them again, and this time ono of the rowers shifted in his seat, pulled again, and then changed places with the man at the rudder. . By this time they were getting under cover of a headland, and though they were still a long way from shore the Turk would have to shoot at them without being able to see his mark. The Turkish batteries, evidently intent on bagging this sparrow, fired with redoubled vigour. We were all speculating on the chances— watching if the rowing boat had changed her course, and tliinking of the hest place to see the landing, when a fresh element came in. We had all forgotten the old destroyer in her self-formed cover. Suddenly the old boat reappeared from the far corner of the cloud nearest the Turk, let off five rounds very quickly, and disappeared in a fresli cloud. The effect was like magic, and the Turkish batteri.es shut up on the instant. Whether she scored a hit, or whether the Turks were afraid of. giving their position, I don't know, but, anyhow, the rowing boat covered their last few yards and got their wounded man ashore unmolested. He turned out to have a nice clean wound in the shoulder. Wo took our glasses down and looked at each other and found wTe were sweating in drops. Then we went off with one accord to find the mariners and give them a drink."