AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 11 October 1924, Page 15

AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY.

GENERAL SIR O’MOORE CREAGH It is rare indeed to find that a. great soldier, especially one who, like the subject of this notice, had in addition to his military commands, a long semi-political position, is able to make a life-story readable and get away from the narrow bounds of departmental life. This however, General Creagh, with the aid of . his unqtienchable Irish wit and humour, his very human outlook on life, and his genuine interest in men of all nations and creeds with whom he was thrown in contact in the course of his long and active life in the East, was able to do. ’ The result is a most fascinating story. In the course of a long review the literary editor of the Australasian gives the gist of the work. Inter alia lie says: - The range of his experience in 48 years of soldiering was 'unusual, and we-catch glimpses of Sandhurst in the early ’sixties, experience in Indian irrigular forces, service with the fightinp .Rajputs, marches through Afghanistan, the administration of Somaliland, command of the Boxer Relief force, work at the India office, and, finally, an account of an • unusually successful term as commander-in-chief in India. But that .is not all, for it is when Creagh forgets his serious work and deals with the bypaths of service and smaller international incidents Hhat he is most entertaining, and to the last the com-mander-in-chief could join in a subaltern’s “rag,” or in the discomfiture of a coxcomb.

It is serious to observe how the pride of his old Irish family and the tradition of service naturally led young Creagh—a bounding, ' £a.\' J r headed, squire’s boy of County Clare —to military life. For generation the Creaghs had been “wild geese,” or soldiers of fortune, selling their swords from Flanders to, Belgrade, and even serving the French in India. Himself a hoy of eight when his brothers- were “clipping off the heads of the Roosians in fine style,” entered Sandhurst in the early ‘sixties Could a lineal descendant of Rory O’Moore help fighting? So it came about that young Creagh had a unique experience of the British Army. Entering it as an ensign in 1866, and leaving it as a general in 1914,. he had over 48 years of continuous service, ranging from the time when Peninsular ideas dominated every, thing to the very month when the English battalions were holding on at Le Gateau and Mons, and when his own Pathans and Baluchis were embarking for service. When he entered the ‘army the soldiers were badly paid and badly treated, almost entirely illiterate, regarded as the dregs of society, serving for a shilling a day (most of which was confiscated on the way), and looking forward only to a pension of eightpence a day after 20 years of service. Punishments were inflicted for the most trifling details, even drunkenness incurring flogging with the cat-o’-nine-tails. Over all was the fear of being literally kicked out of the army hv tiny drummer hoys, and it was no infrequent sight to see a. dismissal with ignominy. The culprit, frequently on an insignificant charge, was brought by an escort to a full-dress parade of his unit; the facings and buttons of his uniform were cut off; a noose was then placed round his neck with a piece of rope attached, by which he was led by a small drummer-boy to the barrack gate, with the fife-and-drum band playin'; the “Rogue’s March” behind him.

Yet these were- the men of Kabul and Rorlce’s Drift and Ulundi. The officers at this time were trained only by two terms and ridiculously easy examinations at Sandhurst, and, for the most part, purchased their commissions. An ensigney realised £450, and other ranks corresponded, the most expensive being a lieutenant-colonelcy in the cavalry, for which the applicant had to produce no less than £13,000 in ready cash. The sensitive young’ Irish ensign observed these things only too plainly when on his way in 1869 to join the 95th 'Foot in India—noticing, too, that the shipping officials placed the milch cows and the ducks just on the other side of his cabin, and this for a journey through the newly-opened Suez Canal! One year of regimental service in Central India convinced him that not enough compensation was given for the filth and the cholera and the ennui, and he accordingly transferred to the Indian Staff Corps. This was a bold step for one . who boasted no family connections, as India was at that time under the “county families,” whose power was reputed to be so great that a lieutenant-governor could procure an easy path for his family for five generations after him. In Creagh’s case, however, the plunge was wise, for it soon brought him (through the agency of some friend whom he never knew) the adjutancy of an irregulur force at Deoli—a corps of Rajput warriors, men who lived only for martial traditions. It was truly a strange- post for an Irish hoy of 19 to command Indian irregulars in the heart of a forest 200 miles from the nearest railway. The experience was invaluable, for it brought him an understanding of the psychology and mode of life of the native princes, and thus gave him knowledge at an impressionable age which stood him in good stead 40 years later, when, as commander-in-chief, he had to settle thorny questions of precedence for the same chiefs. A tyoical potentate with whom Creagh associated at this time was the young Prince of Alwar, who arrived at the Mayo College with a grumpy, ill-mannered. Eng-lish-educated Kashmiri tutor, whom ho detested; with or four lords-in-waiting; and with some 500 followers; together with a great array of Engbsh--1 built carriages. a four-in-hand drag, a large stable of riding and driving Arabs and walers, several bullock conveyances of native pattern, about a

dozen riding camels and elephants, a pack of English fox-hounds, a number of hunting leopards, and falcons of every description. It is not related how the college authorities disposed oi this motley array, hut the episode serves to bring to one’s mind the feudal splendour of these native princes, and makes one appreciate the tact which must have been necessary to maintain harmony with many such persons. After 12 years of this work, which was half police and half diplomatic in its scope, Creagh, now gazetted a captain. served in the Afghan war from 1878 to 1880, gaining the Victoria Cross for defending ,an isolated frontier post against encircling Molnnand forces. The defence consisted chiefly of innumerable bayonet sorties, for ammunition was always deplorably lacking on the frontier; yet Creagh describes it in these laconical terms: The fighting at Kam Dakka was pretty hot; and so indeed was the weather, which did not improve matters. I had to deliver severaEattacks with the bayonet with part of my command, leaving the other part to hold the post. The difficulty was that wherever I led an attack (and I had to leacl them all) my men all wanted to be with me.

In the account of these wars by Creagh the most striking fact was the utter futility of the political officers, who upt Only mismanaged their own affairs, hut virtually directed the armies in the field. The Afghan wars were, from first to last, a tale of obsolete guns, hotchpotch brigades, inadequate medical and transport arrangements, and a. policy “signalised by imbecility and by false economy.” Truly, as Creagli’s trenchant facts prove, the Indian army was at this time, and for years afterwards, paralysed by the dual control and by political interference, Creagh himself suffering so much that, after twenty years of service with the Rajputs, and with the V.C. and several mentions in despatches, he was still a major. Service with the Baluchis and Pathans on the frontier inclined him less and less to favour political manipulators and agitators, for hq realised by this time “that the various Indian races understand the management of their own affairs uncommonly well, and difficulty only arises when they are called upon to graft British methods, which they do not understand, on their own customs.” He always believed in rule bv British tradition, and held that the “Indian Party,’’ which advocated self-government an European models, was “a. body'Composed almost entirely of faddists who knew nothing whatever about India.”