THE CAIRO RIOTS.

Timaru Herald, Volume CVIII, Issue 16821, 28 May 1919, Page 3

THE CAIRO RIOTS.

NEW ZEALANDER'S INTERESTING STORY. The following interesting account .(dated -March 161 hj) of the first Cairo riots has 'been received by Mr C. J. Bilton, of Temuka, ixom his son, Sergt-Major E. J. Bilton, Bth Canterbury Mounted Rifles, who is at present in the New Zealand Records Office in Cairo— • 1 told you in my last that I -swould, in all probability, be in Alexandria during the week, but the whole thing was upset by this native rising. We tried to go down to-day but found it impossible, as the train had ceased to run, for how long no one knows, but we think it likely we shall be able to Jeave to-morrow. Well, this rising is i the only topic of interest, so I had ! better get on with it. ACTION OF THE PASHAS PRECIPITATES TROUBLE. In tho first place, on Saturday morning, the .Sth inst.y five pashas (a pasha is practically equal to an English lord) came down to Lite G.H.Q. just opposite ° l | ll i °-r, lc . u,s alu ' asked for an interview, wicii Major General Watson, who is the commander of the force in Egypt. J-liee live pashas delivered an ultimatum to Alajor-Geiieral Watson to the effect that he was to get all the English troops and civilians out of Egvpt immediately, and to. hand over tho country to the Egyptian people. These pashas belong to the Nationalist J artwhich lias been antagonistic to ii n ? s , h '.fraternity, ever since they declared the an English proectoiate, and which .has.been'working lip, mostly i>y religious methods, among ie lower classes of".."the -'Egyptians, a lanatical hate of the Enrliqh Thiywp „hol, J,„ hascome lo n head-, starting, in th.i? .first,.-ia- ' stance. in thoso five pashas attempt-,!-'S to , Hl fc the hu?:h hor.se with the oonjmaiirhi. r understand that Watson heard them through, and then rang his -bell} .-.lien m marched a platoon of fixed bayonets. and tlnv pasha-i were im'jn?diat"!v n laced under arrest, and inside six hours were on tl?eir way to _ deported and imprisoned long before [their party had time to ' get their breath. It was a jelly smart ' p/ece of work, and it makes me think that Watson had very'good information long beforehand that this affair was likely to come to a. head, and. in fact, 1 from events which hay? happened since, ' it is verv jipp*»r«nt - that the intelli- i gence staff at. G.H.Q. know every de- ' tail of the affair. < FIRST RIOTS ON MONDAY. i

Well, on Sunday . the Gyppies got their heads together and arranged th® programme for the Monday morning. Monday morning everyone came down to work' jnst in the usual way. no more thinking there was going to be anything doing in the way of a riot than of jumping over the moon. In faot, ;t was only a few of us at G.H.Q. who knew that the pashas had been deported even. So consequently when about 200 of the rabble of the town rushed down Sharia-Kasr-el-Ni!, which i? the street G H.Q. and our offices are in, and started in with sticks and stones to smash everything 'orSakable in tli<» street, there was no one more surprised than the ordinary Tommies knocking, about the streets. . This mob broke every plate-glass window for miles, and it appears that similar mobs were doing the same thing in practically every quarter of the town. It was quite well organised, but, . of course, as soon as the Gyppies were let loose they became just a rabble. Within two hours of the outbreak there were thousands of troopr. put into the town, and every civilian policeman they oould lay hands On was quelling the disturbances. I can assure you there was soma fun; no firearms were used, just sticks and batons, and immediately a mob commenced to collect then, either the military or the police would rusb i n and scatter them. Onp or two soldiers were rather badly handled on that dav, but. nothine rerv serious was received'. Of course there wpr» quite a number of Gyprries who had to be, taken to th P _ hospital. Thev burnt down a big nrintimr establishment not far from her p. and it wa<« then -apparent that the thing wnsi serious.

This mobbing and breaking up of mobs went on all Monday, but settled down at night. _ On the Monday afternoon the senior n-c.o's were issued with revolvers and thirty rounds of ammunition and instructions were given that -we were not to go about singly but must stick together in little crowds, and also that, on leaving the office, we were to go straight to our billets, and were not to shift from tbers except under very special ciroumstances. This last order was not strictly observed by onr cowd; w© wanted to see any fun that might come off. LOOTING AND ATTEMPTED BRIDGE-WRECKING.

Tuesday went off fairly quietly, alUKiugn tiiere was a gouu uea«. of rioting .n iwe io\vor part of the town, and one or two shops were Durhifc down. Wednesday t-hey mat for it, properly down in blie M'oosky quarter. A great number of the bazaars and. saops in this quarter are o wned by .Europeans, the majority of whom are Jews, aiud in every instlance the shops of these people were smashed up and looted. Of course, wo h«ve been: unabile to go down there it being well and truly out of bounds but it is aitt absolute wreck. They say that, hundreds of tihousands of pounds' worth of goods have been looted. They wenit for -tlhe gold bazaar first, then everywhere and anywhere there was a possibility iof looting. The military aanti waggon-loads of troops down, but they did net use thair rifles, only pick handles, and there were numbers of broken heads among the Gyppies. The/ p ace is awkward to get through, little ."narrow by-paiths, in many oases covered completely by tW overlapping of 'the house oveifeead, so that the Gyppies just went before our fellows aiud wrecked everything before the Tommies conull p with them. There were numerous little dust-ups everywhere in town that day. It was quite a common occurrence to see ten or a dbzen s'crMiers cfeairing a square with sticlcs. The neio moTiiingj Thursday, the laob attempted to wireck , tli© Ohoubra traffic: bridge, and, of course that reaily had to be stopped with a firm hand, sa , the infantry in the nearby barracks of B.ab-el-a-Did were ordered to open fire, and did so, the casualties bei'ag reported as 17 kihed and 50 wounded. Thalt effectively put a stop to the bridge wrecking stunt, and 1 think it made the Gyppies tlhink twice about doing any damage in the letter quarter of the town. In. their own quaUfcers they still carried an with the smashing of everything smashable. Thursday was very exciting during the morning, no one knowing exactly whait was going to 'happen, bult in tlhe afternoon everything quietened dotwn again. Friday they started it again in the Moo-sky, and wllien an armoured car was sent down to quel,! ithe disturbance some Gypp'es on top of a house opened fix's, wouftdiiug four soldiers. The ear immediately turned the machine on and kilted a number more. Sina? then there have been similar disturbances', ajid I be-ieve the casualties -among tlhe Earvp'tians up to Sunday night W9re 161 killed and several hundred wounded*

SOLDIERS ACT ON THEIR OWN ACCORD. One _ little incident which happemed yesterday morning affected us a good deal, because it was our own fellows who were mixed -up in. it. Two New /•' alanders and three Australians who were down here on leave, ''hired a taxi and started out for the Barrage, which is a very interesting place for sightseeing. They were very foolish to do so; it was looking for trouble They got about four miles out, and ran into a mob of Gyppies, and the driver, an ji n '/- s^°PPe d the car in the middle ot the mob, and said it had broken down, which was a lie, for after our fellows got away be started her going agan. Well, the boys were attacked, and had to fight wien way out with sticks. One New Zealarider was seriously injured, and is now in the hospital. dangerously ill. Thoy all got away all right, but they were ''in a frightful mess when I saw them.

Consequent on this the New Zealanders and Australians held a mass meeting to decide what and when they were going to do in the way of revenge. This came .off. all right last night at 0.00, and they iormed up into column j ol ii S a , marphed through the town and through Choubrah to , Choubrah vllage, _tlie place where the mob took I i°+ir oys - A crowd went righti out tltiere and played mei*ry harry 'for a wlu.e. Tfey burnt four ,of five shows clown and' smaslied every nisrger tluitcame theni. Then 'they calmly turned round and marched bock to otto, again. - Nearly everyone of us in the cyowd had a, revolver, and ■'# sava romethitig for the felWs "tha*, not one shpt wn= firerl. anv hond-br^ikmo- • , 0 m, tlrtne with walk''nrr SX - ,C fe" 7 n^er bave been 'tbe. ord>2;* ■ ot;; the far thisweek, and \th~e vondois in the streets must bare clone a.jrood tracfev

Tiiis morninc; Gfl Q I C k bxT up a bit of a fhndy about us. faking the "matter h a uds, but I think thev ha%e taken a. tumble, tliat, if th.ey don't take some sicrong measures soon; the | roops will take the matter into' their own hands, and then tlHere will be soma blood-.ieit.tmg. The 10th Division composed of bigj raw-boned Irislhmen (de■gfj: a--the army tlie gentemen with the hau- between their teeth) is camped at Men,a, 9 miles from town, Jnd to date they have been confined to camp, bmt it is rumoxn-ed that 'tliey are getting sick of it, anU have threatened to march out lock, stock, and barrel. If tlhey do, then, evei-y Gir>po out of doors will .geffTiis head broken, for tliey are the wildest, most hairbrained soldiers I have yet struck. It is tfe saiu-tf crowd who played up about three months ago. I hope they don't loose, or things will really move i n tihisi country, and in. probabilitv it . would: put the kibosh on for us, in-the poJiti cal line anyway.

WRECKING LINES', OF COMMUNICATION. On Saturday, the natives from many of the smaller villages started rioting; they have had great trouble with: this crowd for they are going for the railway lines. They have broken up the line several times, though eacii time they have been caught and severely punished by our machine-guns on the armoured cars. However, they got away with it last night by putting an engine and three goods trucks off the line at Kaloub, and that is the reason that no trains are running north from Cairo. The service has been very restricted so far as the South line is concerned, but things seemed to have improved there lately. Tho military have hundreds of aeroplanes scouting along all the lines, and these can do, a good deal to stop the natives damaging the lines. Orders have "been given that anyone tampering with any lines, railway or telegraph (the telegraph lines from Cairo have all bsen cut) is to be shot at once. Practically every train that has got through from Alexandria has been attacked, so this means that we may get a chance to use the revolvers tomorrow if -we can manage to get a train. Ido hope the rotters come along, for I'm just dying for a change-; to knock them over. They *cOme on by hundreds and fling stones, etc., at the windows of the trains, so one will have no trouble in shooting them_ and I'm sure I won't have any compunction about it. In sympathy with the movement, the tram-drivers and conductors have gone on strike, and so up till to-day we have had ho trams. I think the military would have stopped them anyway to prevent the natives moving easily from place to place. However, the trams started again to- day, and on each, are two soldiers with ball cartridges; and fixed bayonets. On t!he first day of the affair the mobs broke about a dozen trams, so they have had to guard them, and even now 'they ar:e only using the main lines.

We are beginning to wonder when te affair is going to end; but it is quiteexciting going around with a loaded, revolver in ypur belt and never knowing what is going to happen round the next corner. We have had one nice" little dust-up. Six of us went round to.the Abdin squarie and got promptly mixed up with a crowd of 3000 students, and; ■arthlcrugh we cleared the square once, they were too many for us and eventually we had to get for our, livies. While we wexie retreating down a smaljl alley, we had the pleasant sen&at-ion of heading flower-pots, half-bricks, and, in fact, any old thing, coming down from above, thrown by people on th!e roof. It was rather exciting while it lasted, but I was not sorry to get out of it unhurt. One of the armoured cars ; was se-ntt: down, and the crowd soon scattered. DIFFICULTIES OF THE I AUTHORITIES. I would not like to have Major- General Watson's job; he must be having a very anxious tme. We "sling off" j at the military authorities, but when you think the (thing ont, they have mora to contend with than you at first realise. If they shoot these naitives "hiolus bolus," tlheni someone will make a row at the Peace Confereipoe. (This is one of hones of contention between the parties, for the Egyptians cfonsider they should he represented, and they have not heen allowed to send a delegate even.) Then, should one of the other nations maike trouble aboult Egypt, there is ai possibility of England losing l the country. It is easily seon that England would rather fight than lose amy part of the country,, because it is.essential |to the Empire tlhat we retain E-gypit. As they cannot use violence to any extent, they will have to take things quietly, and that is apparently what they are doing Whether it will turn out right remains to be seen.