A Wartime "Side-Show"

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22819, 28 August 1937, Page 11 (Supplement)

A Wartime "Side-Show"

Mersa Matruh Memories And the . With Senussi Warriors

By COLONEL THE HON. E. F. LAWSON

(Copyright) THE news of the Egyptian Cabinet's decision to fortify and garrison Mersa Matruh may recall to many ex-soldiers in different part's of the Empire one of the curious "side-shows" of the Great War. For some time in the latter part of 1915 the growth of German propaganda and Turkish activity among the Senussi had been causing anxiety to the Egyptian command, and at the end of November this anxiety developed into positive alarm that an immediate invasion of the Western Frontier of Egypt was threatened. Practically all available troops from Egypt had been despatched to reinforce the Suvla Bay attack, and troops could only be collected by hasty improvisation. The recital of a personal experience will show how hasty it was. Composite Squadron 1 was in Cairo, having been granted, as one of the oldest inhabitants of Gallipoli, a week's leave in Egypt. From Shepheard's Hotel I was collected in the afternoon, and sent out

in a taxi to a base camp at the Pyramids, where I joined a composito squadron with officers from three different regiments, was given two strange horses and a miscellaneous collection of saddlery, and despatched on the night train for Alexandria. Two days later we disembarked from a single-line --railway at Daba and marched 80 miles into Mersa Matruh, By that time we knew some of our colleagues at any rate by sight. Matruh was a coastguard station with a small harbour almost entirely landlocked. A pleasant little place, but not sufficiently attractive to convey at first impression why Cleopatra should have selected Paraetonium (as it then was) as a seaside resort.

It was now occupied by armoured cars and a detachment of the 15th Sikhs, who had been collected from somewhere and arrived by trailer. Colonel Snow, the political officer, had formed the view that Saved Ahmed tho Senussi was still amenable to reason, and I was detailed to take two troops as formal escort to Colonel .Snow, and to conduct him to the Wadi Senab, some nino miles west of Matruh, to receive the submission of tho Senussi army. As we paraded at the coastguard headquarters to collect the colonel, a boat sailed into the harbour and the expedition was called off. "Old Peg-Leg" The boat contained the newly appointed Commander of the Force, Major-General Wallace, irreverently known to the soldiery as "Old PegLeg." Captain Gooch, the well-known horse-trainer, had been appointed his. A.D.C., and, on his first appearance mounted, his horse tho general on tho leg, making a noise that could he heard in tho oasis. Gooch thought that his military career would be abruptly and ignoniiniously terminated, but found that he had the good fortune to serve probably the only British general with a partially, artificial limb. Tho general's arrival was fortunate, as when, some days later, we advanced to tho Wadi Senab with a very much larger force, the Senussi's intention was far from pacific and a respectable engagement ensued. Coloncil Snow was shot at close quarters by an Arab whom ho called upon to come and speak to him. It was then decided that thcro should be some pause to collect an adequate fighting force. Gradually the force assembled, and seldom in so small a campaign can there have been such a heterogeneous collection of troops. A regiment of Sikhs, a composite Yeomanry Brigade, naval armoured cars, Bikanir camel corps, a New Zealand battalion (Rifle Brigade), a Lowland Scottish Territorial Brigade, an Australian Light Horse Squadron,, and finally, to complete the Empire party, the first South African infantry brigade, which hail been intercepted on its way to France. Gathering of Nations The New Year of 1916 was ushered in to tho music of the pipes by a gathering of nations indeed strange to find at an old Roman watering place in North Africa. Tho Australians, like ourselves, wore composite, and strange to their horses, and unauthorised exehango of horses, took place on a considerable scale. Wo Yeomen had only this advantage over them, that wo could hog our horses or any that we acquired and trim their .tails, gad g, koggeci horse oft jfcho line

of a march in an Australian squadron stood out like a good deed in a naughty world. The campaign dragged on with raids, expeditions, and reconnaissances westward under General Wallace, and eastward under Lord Lucan. The latter were known among the fox-hunting section of the force as bye-days in the woods, and were less dangerous than the personally conducted advances of the Commander-in-Chief, which from a military point of view were only slightly more productive. This implies no reflection on either commander. Lord Lucan had the misfortune to he instructed to round up non-existent forces on our lines of communication. Lessons in Mirages So it continued until Sir William Peyton was appointed to,the command and massed his forces for a resolute, planned and organised advance on Solium. He had the advantage of taking over troops who had gained training and cohesion under his predecessor. As well as definite military lessons they had learned to distrust mirages threatening on a flank, they had learned their officers by sight, their comrades by name and their horses sometimes by sight and always by number: in fact they were more like soldiers. Though they discovered to their surprise that a dismounted Arab is hardly less mobile than an English cavalryman owing to the latter's insistence on carrying "everything except the kitchen stove," they also found there was just sufficient difference in the rate of progress to reward rapid attack resolutely pushed home. The advance to Solium was planned by the establishment of advanced supply bases, by escorted camel convoys and co-operation of naval transport. It

was probably the use of tho latter that turned the scale, as where later they attempted the same system from the Nile in Upper Egypt to the Baharia oasis it was discovered after long and costly experiment that the project was unworkable after a certain distance from home, because the camels ate more than they carried. Here, at any rate, the method was successful, and after due preparation the advancing force set out from the barbed wire entanglements of Mersa Matruh for the frontier post of Solium. Roman Cisterns Full accounts of the campaign have been written elsewhere, the official detail in military histories and in other places the "human interest" stories; such as the capture of Jaafar Pasha by a chargo of the Dorset Yeomanry, and the dashing 200-mile desert raid of the Duke of Westminster's armoured cars to rescue tho survivors of the Tara. More than twenty years after, one's memories are faint and varied. Historical associations were very strong. On every march we used the vast cisterns which tho llomans had dug on their strategical road along the African coast. Their work was quite unimpaired, tine water was plentiful and good except on tho occasion when we found after drinking that it had been pre-occupied by a deceased camel. Perhaps the strongest recollection is of marching westward in February over hard, bare, stony sand, and returning eastward at the end of March over a thick carpet of desert flowers, a lovely and unforgettable sight. That was tho pleasant part of the eastward inarch; the unpleasant was escorting over tho 3CO long and weary miles to Alexandria a party of captured female camels and some 2000 Egyptian baggage camels. Of enemy interference there was none — the campaign was ended —but it can never bo the ideal task of the cavalry soldier to act as a chaperon to camels in the springtime of tho year.

Live Shell Salute A final and most satisfying memory is that of the whole force drawn up in line on the plain before Solium — Sir William Peyton out in front on a great white horse —to see tho flag hauled up, while the guns boomed out a. salute. They had no blank, and therefore were firing shell after shell into tho hillside. As tho right-hand gun fired, a party of Arabs in the far distance started walking across from right to loft. Tho first shell whistled behind them, and they speeded up sufficiently for the second shell to do tho same, which further increased their sped . . and so on right across the line. No doubt they thought it intentional, and considered the crowning act of oppression that an Arab gentleman and his family should bo sniped by battery fire from a brigade of horse artillery.

But no humorous incident could spoil tho effect, it may have been an easy success but it was success, and those of us who had spent months in Gallipoli had not been overburdened with the feeling of successful endeavour. ]fc was a real thrill and a lasting memory. Members of tho Western Frontier Force spent somo not unhappy days along that coast, they faced hardship uncomplainingly, and when they had settled down they, fought creditably. They will wish well to their present day successors as guardians of the integrity. of Egypt's western boundaries.