7 He kept the information: Lawrence to Charlotte Shaw, April 14, 1927, cited by Mack, A Prince of Our Disorder, p. 26.
8 This wasn’t the: E. F. Hall in A. W. Lawrence, T. E. Lawrence by His Friends (1954 edition), pp. 44–45.
9 “He was unlike”: H. R. Hall, as quoted in Wilson, Lawrence of Arabia, p. 25.
10 These were not mere spankings: Mack, A Prince of Our Disorder, p. 33.
11 “I bathed today”: Lawrence, The Home Letters, pp. 65–66.
12 “Well,” Lawrence said: Hogarth to Robert Graves, as quoted in Graves, Lawrence and the Arabs, p. 18.
13 “The distances”: Doughty to Lawrence, February 3, 1909, in A. W. Lawrence, Letters to T. E. Lawrence, p. 37.
14 “It is rather amusing”: Lawrence, The Home Letters, p. 106.
15 “This is a glorious country”: Ibid., p. 103.
16 “I will have such difficulty”: Ibid., p. 105.
17 Tellingly, considering the schoolyard taunts: McKale, Curt Prüfer, pp. 5; 152; 193–94 n. 5; 233 n. 28.
18 But in contrast: For the history of prewar Germany and the Wilhelmine era, I have primarily consulted Fischer, Germany’s Aims in the First World War; Macdonogh, The Last Kaiser; and Cecil, Wilhelm II, vols. 1 and 2.
19 Two years later: Prüfer, Personalbogen, October 24, 1944; NARA T120, Roll 2539, Frame E309975.
20 “The galleries and benches”: As translated by Olaf Prüfer in “Notes on My Father,” unpublished memoir used by permission of Trina Prüfer.
21 That winter, he: Details on Prüfer’s relationship with Frances Prüfer (née Pinkham) are at: NARA RG165, Entry 67, Box 379, File PF25794, Attachment 8.
22 “Really, this country”: Lawrence, The Home Letters, p. 218.
23 “the gospel of bareness”: Lawrence to Richards, July 15, 1918, in Garnett, The Letters of T. E. Lawrence, p. 239.
24 “an interesting character”: Lawrence, The Home Letters, pp. 173–74.
25 This passion also: For the history of the Ottoman Empire and the rise of the Committee of Union and Progress, I have primarily consulted Aksakal, The Ottoman Road to War in 1914; Kent, The Great Powers and the End of the Ottoman Empire; and Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, vols. 1 and 2.
26 In other European: Lowther to Hardinge, May 29, 1910, as cited by Yapp, The Making of the Modern Near East, pp. 183–84.
27 The adventurer finally set up: Cecil, The German Diplomatic Service, p. 102.
28 “Every autumn”: McMeekin, The Berlin-Baghdad Express, p. 25.
29 Forwarded some of Oppenheim’s: Ibid., p. 22.
30 In early 1909: McKale, War by Revolution, p. 22.
31 “I seem to have been”: Lawrence, The Home Letters, p. 217.
32 “He was such a horrible person”: Ibid., p. 225.
33 Just what that ideal: For the history of Standard Oil and its breakup, see Chernow, Titan, and Yergin, The Prize.
34 “My mind was”: Yale, It Takes So Long, chapter 1, p. 1.
35 “You must not think”: Lawrence, The Home Letters, p. 447.
Chapter 3: Another and Another Nice Thing
1 “Always my soul”: Lawrence, Seven Pillars, p. 277.
2 “Then we took”: Lawrence, The Home Letters, p. 275.
3 “I have got”: Lawrence to V. Richards, in Garnett, The Letters of T. E. Lawrence, pp. 160–61.
4 And while William Yale: Yale, It Takes So Long, undated early drafts, BU Box 8.
5 “There.” J. C. Hill: Yale, The Reminiscences of William Yale, p. 6, Columbia University, Oral History Research Office, 1973.
6 “from now on”: As cited by Florence, Lawrence and Aaronsohn, p. 91.
7 Rather than make: For details on Aaronsohn’s childhood and early life, I have relied extensively on Florence, Lawrence and Aaronsohn, and Engle, The Nili Spies.
8 While the notion of a return: For the early history of Zionism, I have primarily drawn from Laqueur, A History of Zionism; O’Brien, The Siege; and Sachar, A History of Israel.
9 “Before long”: Florence, Lawrence and Aaronsohn, pp. 90–91.
10 Both the most likely: Aaronsohn to Mack, “Aaron’s Confession,” October 9, 1916, p. 8, ZY.
11 “he was like fire”: Lawrence, Seven Pillars, p. 239.
12 “I expected to”: Newcombe in A. W. Lawrence, T. E. Lawrence by His Friends (1937 edition), p. 105.
13 “We are obviously”: Lawrence, The Home Letters, p. 280.
14 It was this ruse: The most detailed account of the military and political motives behind the Zin expedition is in Moscrop’s Measuring Jerusalem, chapter 8.
15 “The Palestine Fund”: Lawrence, The Home Letters, p. 282.
16 Most alarming to: Note Confidentielle, Government of Egypt to the President of the Council of Ministers, November 11, 1911; PRO-FO 371/1114, File 44628.
17 “unsuitable”: British government correspondence and reports related to the Prüfer khedival library dispute can be found in PRO-FO 371/1114, File 44628.
18 “I am absolutely”: As cited by Cecil, The German Diplomatic Service, p. 102.
19 “I photographed”: Lawrence to Leeds, February 28, 1914, in Garnett, The Letters of T. E. Lawrence, p. 165.
20 “I learnt that”: Lawrence, The Home Letters, p. 287.
63 Upon parting ways: William Yale’s account of the Kornub oil expedition is largely drawn from Yale, It Takes So Long, chapter 2.
22 Caught up in: British government correspondence related to the Socony-Palestine concession issue is held in PRO-FO 371/2124. See also Edelman to Secretary of State, April 10, 1914; NARA M353, Roll 67, document 867.6363/4.
23 The bulk of: Lawrence to Flecker, “Monday [June 1914],” in Garnett, The Letters of T. E. Lawrence, p. 171. While Lawrence did not specify on which Monday in June he was writing, it can be deduced that it was June 29 by a June 1 letter he wrote to his family from Carchemish. Discussing his upcoming journey home, Lawrence wrote that “you may look for me about the 25th. or so.”
Chapter 4: To the Last Million
1 “Sir: I have the honor”: Hollis to Lansing, November 9, 1914; NARA M353, Roll 6, Decimal 867.00/713.
2 “It will not end”: Magnus, Kitchener, pp. 283–84.
3 Over the next four years: Stevenson, 1914–1918, p. 54.
4 in just a two-year span: Keegan, The First World War, p. 7; J. Vallin, “La Mortalité par génération en France depuis 1899 [Mortality by Generation in France Since 1899],” Travaux et Documents, Cahier no. 63 (Paris: Presses Universitaires de France).
5 “cannot be considered severe”: Haig, diary entry of July 2, 1916, as cited in Gilbert, The Somme, p. 93.
6 Under orders from Kitchener: Lawrence to Liddell Hart, in Graves and Hart, T. E. Lawrence: Letters to His Biographers, Pt. 2, p. 90.
7 In early September: Ibid.
8 “short, cleansing thunderstorm”: As quoted in Fischer, War of Illusions, p. 542.
9 “I am writing”: Lawrence to Rieder, September 18, 1914, in Garnett, The Letters of T. E. Lawrence, p. 185.
10 If Lawrence hadn’t: William Yale’s account of life in Jerusalem in late 1914 is largely drawn from Yale, It Takes So Long, chapter 2.
11 Invoking a state: NARA RG84, Entry 448, Volume 14.
12 “preserve Ottoman neutrality”: Beaumont to Gray, August 3, 1913, File 35857, No. 605; and Tewfik Pasha to Grey, August 4, 1914, File 35844, No. 598, in Gooch & Temperly, British Documents on the Origins of the War, Vol. XI.
13 Already by mid-September: An excellent and fairly nonbiased account of the war tensions in Syria is to be found in the consulate diary maintained by the American consul in Damascus, John Dye; NARA RG84, Entry 350, Volume 101. An understandably more biased account is Alex Aaronsohn’s With the Turks in Palestine.
14 indeed, at the time of the accord’s signing: The secrecy of the Turkish-German alliance was zealously maintained by both sides. On July 29, 1914, while the secret pact with Enver was still being negotiated, General Liman von Sande
rs, the commander of the German military mission to Turkey, petitioned for permission to return to Germany in the event of war. Shown Sander’s telegram, Kaiser Wilhelm noted in the margin, “Must stay there and also foment war and revolt against England. Doesn’t he yet know of the intended alliance, under which he is to be Commander in Chief?!”
15 In mid-August, the kaiser: Oppenheim to Bethmann-Hollweg, August 18, 1914; NARA T137, Roll 143, Frames 16–21, Der Weltkrieg no. 11, Band 1.
16 Even if he remained dubious: Prüfer, Diary, September 8, 1914; HO.
17 At these meetings: Oppenheim to Bethmann-Hollweg, August 18, 1914; NARA T137, Roll 143, Frames 16–21, Der Weltkrieg no. 11, Band 1.
18 “the handsomest man”: New York Times, April 20, 1915.
19 “A man of stone”: Prüfer, Diary, September 7, 1914; HO.
20 The Turkish war minister: Interrogation of Robert Mors, October 10, 1914, pp. 4–5; PRO-FO 371/1972, File 66271.
21 “Even without [Turkey joining the] war”: Mallet to Grey, September 15, 1914; PRO-FO 371/1970, f. 8.
22 “laughed at [the] idea”: Mallet to Grey, October 6, 1914; PRO-FO 371/1970, f. 93.
23 “Because once I found”: Interrogation of Robert Mors, October 10, 1914, p. 5; PRO-FO 371/1972, File 66271.
24 For his central role: McKale, Curt Prüfer, p. 31.
25 As Lawrence quipped: Lawrence to “Friend,” in Garnett, The Letters of T. E. Lawrence, p. 188.
26 “I want to talk”: Lawrence to Liddell Hart, August 1, 1933, in Graves and Hart, T. E. Lawrence: Letters to His Biographers, Pt. 2, p. 141.
27 “Turkey seems”: Lawrence to Fontana, October 19, 1914, in Garnett, The Letters of T. E. Lawrence, p. 187.
28 “Now it’s Cairo”: Lawrence to Fontana, December 4, 1914, in ibid., p. 189.
29 “Aaron Aaronsohn watched”: Florence, Lawrence and Aaronsohn, p. 119.
30 “to the delight of the street boys”: Aaronsohn, Present Economic and Political Conditions in Palestine, p. 6, early 1917; PRO-FO 882/14, f. 328.
31 “were destroyed by”: Aaronsohn (anonymous), “Syria: Economic and Political Conditions,” Arab Bulletin no. 33 (December 4, 1916): 505.
32 Within days of Turkey joining: Kayali, Arabs and Young Turks, pp. 187–88.
33 Of course, this fatwa: Djemal Pasha, Memories of a Turkish Statesman, p. 204.
34 “generously forbidding”: Aaronsohn (anonymous), “The Jewish Colonies,” Arab Bulletin, no. 64 (September 27, 1917): 391.
35 It wasn’t until the same commander: Alex Aaronsohn, “Saifna Ahmar, Ya Sultan!” The Atlantic Monthly, July 1916, Vol. 118.
36 For many of the Jewish émigrés: A number of historians have asserted that Djemal Pasha ordered the 1914–15 expulsion of Jews from Palestine as part of a general campaign to destroy the Jewish community, and none have made this assertion more forcefully than David Fromkin. On pp. 210–11 of A Peace to End All Peace, Fromkin contends that Djemal “took violent action against the Jewish settlers. Influenced by a bitterly anti-Zionist Ottoman official named Beha-ed-din, Djemal moved to destroy the Zionist settlements and ordered the expulsion of all foreign Jews—which is to say, most of Jewish Palestine.” In fact, Djemal’s December 1914 expulsion edict applied only to the citizens of belligerent nations, the same policy adopted by other warring nations at the outbreak of World War I, and was then soon amended to exempt British and French Jews. Furthermore, those “belligerent” Jews in Palestine slated for expulsion, chiefly Russian Jews, were given the choice of staying if they assumed Ottoman citizenship, an option unique to the Ottoman Empire. As a result of this comparatively lenient treatment and the many loopholes it provided, only a fraction of the estimated 85,000 Jews residing in prewar Palestine left or were forced from the territory, and certainly not the “most of Jewish Palestine” of Fromkin’s estimation.
37 “I am always watched”: Aaronsohn to Rosenwald, January 21, 1915; NARA RG84, Entry 58, Volume 378, Decimal 800.
38 “Woolley looks after”: Brown, The Letters of T. E. Lawrence, p. 69.
39 “Jerusalem is a dirty town”: Lawrence, “Syria: The Raw Material,” written early 1915, Arab Bulletin no. 44 (March 12, 1917).
40 “to everyone on board ship”: Yale, It Takes So Long, chapter 3, p. 1.
41 He also confirmed: Military Censor, Statement of W. M. Yale, November 17, 1914; PRO- WO 157/688.
42 “When he secured”: Yale, T. E. Lawrence: Scholar, Soldier, Statesman, Diplomat (undated but 1935); BU Box 6, Folder 1.
43 With their Hebron road: Lawrence (unsigned and undated), handwritten notes on interview of William Yale; PRO-WO 158/689.
44 “Whenever he shook your hand”: Morgenthau, Ambassador Morgenthau’s Story, p. 120.
45 “gay, debonair, interested”: Bliss, “Djemal Pasha: A Portrait,” in The Nineteenth Century and After, vol. 86 (New York: Leonard Scott, July–December 1919), p. 1151.
46 “He had the ambition”: Ibid., p. 1153.
47 “Never shall I forget”: Djemal Pasha, Memories of a Turkish Statesman, pp. 141–42.
48 “And here is the only road”: Ibid., p. 143.
49 “undoubtedly the carefully”: Prüfer to Oppenheim, December 31, 1914; PAAA, Roll 21128, Der Weltkrieg no. 11g, Band 6.
Chapter 5: A Despicable Mess
1 “So far as Syria”: Lawrence, The Home Letters, p. 303.
2 From his knowledge: Intelligence Department “Note,” January 3, 1915; PRO-FO 371/2480, f. 137.
3 Understandably, the British : Details on the Doris-Alexandretta affair were related in a series of reports from U.S. consul J. B. Jackson, Aleppo, to U.S. Secretary of State Lansing, between December 22, 1914, and January 14, 1915; NARA RG84, Entry 81, Box 12, Decimal 820.
4 “We have been informed”: Untitled Intelligence Department report advocating landing at Alexandretta, January 5, 1915; SADD Clayton Papers, File 694/3/7, p. 3.
5 “Our particular job”: Lawrence to Hogarth, January 15, 1915, in Garnett, The Letters of T. E. Lawrence, p. 191.
6 “Everyone was absolutely”: Djemal Pasha, Memories of a Turkish Statesman, p. 154.
7 “I used to talk”: Ibid., pp. 154–55.
8 “I confess”: Prüfer, Diary, January 26, 1915; HO.
9 “The enemy cruisers”: Ibid., January 30, 1915.
10 As it was, the approximately: Erickson, Ordered to Die, p. 71.
11 “Despite all our agitation”: Prüfer to von Wangenheim and Oppenheim, February 9, 1915; NARA T137, Roll 23, Frame 862.
12 “The holy war”: Prüfer to Oppenheim, February 9, 1915; NARA T137, Roll 23, Frame 868.
13 Instead, the war strategists: For a detailed description of the Alexandretta-Dardanelles debate in the British government, see Gottlieb, Studies in Secret Diplomacy, pp. 77–87.
14 Even the most pessimistic: M.O.2 report, “Expedition to Alexandretta,” January 11, 1915, p. 2; PRO-WO 106/1570.
15 “Taking the Turkish Army”: P. P. Graves, “Report on Turkish Military Preparations and Political Intrigues Having an Attack on Egypt as Their Object,” November 10, 1914; PRO-FO 371/1970, f. 187.
16 “So far as Syria”: Lawrence to parents, February 20, 1915, in Lawrence, The Home Letters, p. 303.
17 As the Allied fleet: Gottlieb, Studies in Secret Diplomacy, p. 109.
18 “Can you get someone”: Lawrence to Hogarth, March 18, 1915, in Garnett, The Letters of T. E. Lawrence, pp. 193–94.
19 Sure enough, at about 2 p.m.: Hickey, Gallipoli, p. 72.
20 In various geological: Manuel, Realities of American-Palestine Relations, p. 267. Also, “Mines and Quarries of Palestine in 1921 by the Geological Adviser,”; NARA M353, Roll 87, document 867N.63/1.
21 Just prior to Yale’s return: Cole, director of Socony, to Under-Secretary of State Polk, September 18, 1919; UNH Box 2.
22 The answer: A half-million more: Cole, director of Socony, to Under-Secretary of State Polk, May 5, 1919; NARA RG59, Central Decimal File, 1920–1929, document 467.11st25/
31.
23 It had no intention: Yale, It Takes So Long, chapter 4, p. 3, and pp. 24–25.
24 To this end: Ibid., chapter 3, p. 12, and chapter 4, p. 3.
25 “Silence!”: Lewis, “An Ottoman Officer in Palestine, 1914–1918,” in Kushner, Palestine in the Late Ottoman Period, p. 404.
26 “I now can grant”: Bliss, “Djemal Pasha: A Portrait,” in The Nineteenth Century and After, vol. 86 (New York: Leonard Scott, July–December 1919), p. 1156.
27 “Upon peeking out”: Ballobar, Jerusalem in World War I, p. 55.
28 They told of entire orchards: While perhaps an exaggeration, Alex Aaronsohm claimed to have personally witnessed “Arab babies, left by their mothers in the shade of some tree, whose faces had been devoured by the oncoming swarms of locusts before their screams had been heard.” Alex Aaronsohn, With the Turks in Palestine, p. 51.
29 “Your Excellency”: As quoted by Florence, Lawrence and Aaronsohn, p. 129; Engle, The Nili Spies, p. 45.
30 If any petty officials: Engle, The Nili Spies, p. 60.
31 The result had been: For details on the history of Hussein–Young Turk relations, see Antonius, The Arab Awakening, pp. 125–58; Baker, King Husain and the Kingdom of Hejaz, pp. 12–45; Kayali, Arabs and Young Turks, pp. 144–73.
32 “English through and through”: Prüfer to Oppenheim, November 3, 1914; NARA T137, Roll 23, Frame 213.
33 Instead, the wily old emir: Prüfer to Metternich, January 22, 1916; NARA T130, Roll 457, Turkei 65, Band 38.
34 “We had no literary”: Storrs, Memoirs, p. 202.
35 “I found myself”: Ibid., p. 135.
36 “Tell Storrs to send”: Kitchener to Consul-General, Cairo, September 24, 1914; PRO-FO 141/460.
37 “immediate followers”: Antonius, The Arab Awakening, p. 132.
38 “Great Britain will guarantee”: Draft of letter from Kitchener to Sherif Abdalla, November 1914; PRO-FO 141/460.
39 “The Med-Ex came”: Lawrence to Hogarth, April 20, 1915, in Garnett, The Letters of T. E. Lawrence, p. 196.
40 Most shocking of all: Ibid., p. 197.
41 Incredibly, it seems: As noted by Guinn in British Strategy and Politics, p. 70, “This drastic change in policy of what now became the Dardanelles campaign—from primarily naval to exclusively military—had been decided on the spot in a matter of moments without the strain of taking thought.”
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