Letters From Baghdad

by Bell, Gertrude

  To H.B.

  BAGDAD, April. 25th, 1921.

  Capt. Thomas who is a musician, carried up a piano with him to Shatrah and invited his Sheikhs to come and listen to the Pathétique sonata. At the end he asked what they thought of it. "Wallahi," said one "khosh daqqah." By God a good thumping.

  To her Parents.

  BAGDAD, May 2nd, 1921.

  Yesterday, Sunday, their Excellencies took a party to Babylon with me as guide. We left at 7 a.m. and arrived by motor about 11, saw the Palace and Ishtar gate and had an excellent lunch — need I say since it was provided by Lady Cox in the German Expeditions-Haus...

  I've just had about 30 ladies to tea, quite a nice party in the garden, so that's that.

  The office hours are now 7 a.m. till 1, which means breakfasting at 6:30. I think I shall rather like it. Later in the summer I shall come back for lunch and then have a rest in my house, but as yet it's not at all hot, an exceptionally cool pleasant spring...

  Good-bye my dearest beloved Father and Mother, I'm happy and interested in my work and very happy in the confidence of my chief. When I think of this time last year...

  To H.B.

  BAGDAD, May 5th, 1921.

  Your weekly letters are the greatest joy, I don't know what I should do without them...

  We are not having a very easy time. Persia is a doubtful quantity but so far remains quiescent.

  In Angora, I think I told you, the extremists have got the upper hand, which from our point of view means that Turkish agitation continues on our northern frontier...

  My young Nationalist friends are alarmed at the activity of the Turks on the frontier and the existence of a large body of pro-Turkish feeling in this country. Their fear is that the return of the Turks would kill or indefinitely postpone their dearest hopes — namely the setting up of an independent Arab State. This is the sentiment which we want to foster, and as it is held exclusively by Sharifians, they are the people for us to back, as we decided at Cairo. Unfortunately there must have been many delays and Faisal who should have been here in the middle of May has not yet left Mecca. The League of Nations is holding up the mandate in deference to American prejudice and Mr. Churchill's statement in the House which ought to have taken place on June 2nd is again postponed. Sir Percy has urged that we should drop the mandate altogether and go for a treaty with the Arab State when it is constituted. It would be a magnificent move if we're bold enough to do it. It isn't the mandate which bothers us here — no Nationalist wants to shake loose from British help and control — but the word mandate isn't popular and a freely negotiated treaty would be infinitely better liked, besides giving us a much freer hand. We have always known that Faisal would ultimately insist on a treaty in place of a mandate — now we have the opportunity of making a 'beau geste' and giving of our own accord what we should certainly have had to give later at his request.

  Meantime the amnesty is out and my friends are busying themselves in the constitution of a moderate Sharifian party with a definite programme- the latter was submitted to me...Sir Percy has told them through me to go ahead and rely on his support...

  Captain Smith and I (you know he's the son of the Master of Balliol) went to another school function this week. It was a Prodigious affair. 'Le tout' Bagdad was there — -the Arab world. We were the only English- and it lasted the usual three hours. We sat in rows and listened to speeches, songs and poems and I really believe the audience liked it. There were parts of it which were quite remarkably long speeches (no speech lasted less than 15 minutes) about the light of education being the sole ray that illumines the world; but I must confess that there were also interesting moments. one was an ode by a half paralysed old poet, Jamil Zuhawi — there was 35 minutes of it, which is long for an ode, but nevertheless it was worth sitting through. He is not only a great poet but he is a very great 'diseur.) He began by tumbling off the estrade and having to be poked and pushed back on to it while everyone murmured "Allah!" Then he embarked on an invocation of some 20 couplets to the skies of the Iraq. He began very quietly with great throbbing lines which pulsed on to a glowing volume of sound. The whole audience took fire; they leant forward with their faces illuminated and time after time the falling couplet was revivified with a "Repeat! Repeat!"...jamil Zuhawi was followed by another and rival poet, a man called Maruf. He is said to be one of the greatest Arabists living. I didn't understand the poem which was immensely applauded but I did understand the speech with which he prefaced it and I thought it first rate, very bold and liberal and full of good sense...

  We all had to get up at 5 next morning to go to the King's birthday parade which was held in the desert quite near my house. All the Arab magnates came and there were an astonishing number of troops; but this was a deception — we happened to have in Bagdad the regiments which have just come down from Persia and are going to India or England. It ended with a flight of 30 aeroplanes which was really splendid. The Coxes gave a dinner that night...It was very well done. After dinner we sat on the terrace over the river. The trees were hung with coloured lamps and the lights of the town glittered across the river. It's a great asset having your river running through the heart of your city...

  To F.B.

  BAGDAD, May 8th, 1921.

  On Friday there was an immense tea party at the Persian Consul's in honour of the Shah's birthday — I wonder how many more birthdays the Shah will celebrate on his throne! Persian affairs seem fairly stable but there's a great pressure of opinion against the rich landlord class, most of whom are indeed in prison, the Shah only, who is the greatest landlord of them all, being spared...

  I was feeling so tired of sitting up and behaving that this morning, Sunday, I rode out early to Karradah and breakfasted with Haji Naji who is the salt of the earth. We gossiped pleasantly of all that was happening — he is eminently sensible — and walked about under the fruit trees where the apricots are just ripening. I ate the first to-day. This week, Ramadhan begins, which will put an end to tea parties, a thing I shan't regret. I go into the office at 7 a.m. come away about 3:30, and if there's a tea party to follow I haven't a minute all day in which to ride or rest or look about me.

  Our politics are rather hanging fire...A bewildered little Saiyid from Najaf way came to see me one day, and told me his hopes and fears. He was very shy...He left me feeling that it wasn't astonishing that they don't know what we're up to. First we imprison them for saying they want Abdullah and then we encourage them to ask for Faisal! One of my best informants about affairs in Bagdad, when he relates the conversation with people who inquire what he thinks the British Government wants, generally gives as his share in the conversation, this answer: "Wallahi, my brother! who knows what is in their minds."

  To H.B.

  BAGDAD, May 15th, 1921.

  Your letters have an almost too acute interest...You speak of a possible settlement, but more than a month has passed without one. It is most interesting about the Defence Force and the miners joining it. It doesn't sound as if there were much bitterness in our part of the world...I think of all our countryside at this beautiful time and wish I were there, nevertheless I'm happy in the work here and it ought to develop very soon in various directions. We haven't even yet got the amnesty out. It has been held up first by having to consult the French, then the Government of India, Nor has there yet been a pronouncement about the elections, but that is because we had to find out first what parts of the Kurdish provinces would come in to the Arab State. I hope that we shall know this week that most of them will. Answers are beginning to flow in from the Sharif in reply to the first telegram sent to him asking him to send one of his sons here. The answers are characteristically vague...

  Basrah opinion will carry a good deal of weight. They are trying to draw up a programme for the election which will be wide enough to embrace the greatest number of opinions. I've got the draft and it seems quite good. If one leaves them alone, giving them only the sympathetic encouragement they ask, they come to an agreeme
nt with one another, and that's the best...

  It strikes me that not many people of the upper classes are fasting this year. Even the Naqib, for the first time in his life, is not keeping the fast — for reasons of health. He would have died of it...I wonder how long the fast will hold Islam — like the veiling of women it might disappear, as a universal institution, pretty fast. The women who have come back from Syria or Constantinople find the Bagdad social observances very trying. They have been accustomed to much greater freedom. As soon as we get our local institutions firmly established they will be bolder. They and their husbands are afraid that any steps taken now would set all the prejudiced old tongues wagging and jeopardise their future. Nevertheless these new men bring their wives to see me, which is an unexpected departure from Bagdad customs according to which a man would never go about with his wife, I welcome everything that tends in this direction, but, again one can do so little but give sympathetic welcome to the women. They must work out their own salvation and it wouldn't help them to be actively backed by an infidel, even if the infidel were I who am permitted many things here...

  Maurice must b having a time with his Territorials and the Defence Force, bless him.

  To H.B.

  BAGDAD, May 22nd, 1921.

  I anticipated that things would happen much more quickly. But they haven't happened. They are, I may say, just beginning now, for the telegrams from Mecca ...are making an appreciable effect. People are inclined to think ...that they are more or less inspired by H.M.G. or at rate imply a leaning in a Sharifian direction on the part of H.M.G. They are the natural result of our saying that a son of the Sharif would be regarded as a suitable candidate and might be approached as to whether he would stand...

  Naji Suwaidi has drawn up and submitted to me a programme for a moderate Sharifian party — which I showed to Sir Percy who thought it all right. I'm very grateful to Naji for keeping me so closely in touch...I've found Naji very sensible and capable as well as very patient under the prolonged delay. All this promises well for the future...

  We're debating what we can do to strengthen the foundation of Ctesiphon so as to save the great façade wall. There's no immediate prospect of its falling but it has a very marked list outwards. We have dug some holes down to the foundations and I went out early on Saturday morning with Major Wilson (the architect, you remember) to look at them. He proposes to put a big wad of concrete against the foundations underground, and I'm afraid we shall have to slope it off against the wall for about 10 feet of its height above ground, which won't be pretty, but ought to make the wall as safe as we can make it.

  To H.B.

  BAGDAD, May 29th, 1921.

  It's too soon for a forecast but probably this turn of the wheel will mean that North Persia will fall once more under Russian domination- under the new Russia whose foreign policy differs not a whit from that of the old ...

  From Anatolia the news is not good. The extremists have got the upper hand at Angora, they will accept no compromise over Smyrna or Thrace; they are in for a prolonged struggle with the Greeks during the whole of which they will be bitterly anti-European. Our chief hope there is that if we get Faisal he may come to some settlement with them on our northern frontier.

  The amnesty is out tomorrow, Heaven be praised. It will set free the hands of our Nationalists and they will get to work in earnest. Mr. Churchill's statement to the House ought to clear the air further, for he must, I take it, say something about Faisal's being a candidate acceptable to H.M.G. which will be widely regarded as indicating that he is the most acceptable.

  I'm thinking of going to Sulaimaniyah at the end of the week for a few days — to Kirkuk for a couple of nights and so on by motor. Sulaimaniya has refused, on a plebiscite, to come in under the Arab Govt. and is going for the present to be a little Kurdish enclave administered directly under Sir Percy...The population is wholly Kurdish and they say they don't want to be part of an Arab State. I've never been there and as we shall hear a good deal about it in the High Commissioner's Office I should like to get the colour and sentiment of it at first hand, so I spend my evenings rubbing up my rusty Persian.

  To H.B.

  BAGDAD, June 12th, 1921.

  Things are at last beginning to move. Telegrams have come from King Hussain saying that Faisal leaves for the Iraq this week.

  What everybody wants to know is our wishes and as soon as they get any kind of lead they will all, I think, come into line. Meantime, I receive many agitated visits from my young Sharifian friends asking for reassurances and for guidance, which I give to the best of my ability and according to Sir Percy's directions. He is a master hand at the game of politics; it's an education to watch him playing it ...

  I've just had this Sunday morning a long visit from two big Sheikhs, Fahad Bey of the Anazeh and Ali Sulaiman, of the Dulaim. Both came down from Ramadi to see Sir Percy and find out his views... So they have been told to stay here for a day or two when H.M.G. will make pronouncements.

  I don't for a moment hesitate about the rightness of our policy. We can't continue direct British control though the country would be better governed by it, but its rather a comic position to be telling people over and over again that whether they like it or not they must have Arab not British Govt...

  To H.B.

  BAGDAD June 19th, 1921.

  We here are now launched on our perilous way. On Monday my old friend the Mayor came to my office and said that since Faisal was coming it was up to the notables of Bagdad to make a proper reception for him and not to leave it all to the young extremists. Faisal was a famous Arab and the son of a King and must be treated as such. I said I thought that view perfectly proper, he as the Mayor of the town, should make the arrangements.

  The younger men have frequented my office this week. We had to settle on a temporary flag — I suppose the Constituent Assembly will have the final word there — and then there was the difficult question as to where Faisal should be lodged. If only we had got the official communiqué from home earlier everything would have been much easier ... I believe Faisal is statesman enough to realise that he must capture the older more steady going people while at the same time not chilling over much the enthusiasm of his more ardent supporters.

  Well, to continue my tale ...Here was Faisal arriving at Basrah on the 23rd and we still without any communiqué from home...Meanwhile his partisans were growing naturally impatient and anxious to get busy. Sir Percy realised this and unofficially approved the project presented through me that they should summon the town to a big meeting on Friday, 6 days before Faisal's arrival. As soon as the invitations were out, in the name of Naji Suwaidi, clerics and others dropped in to my office to sound me as to whether they ought to go "Oh yes." said I "why not?" the meeting has the approval of H.E." On Thursday afternoon the Naqib... made a sound move. He informed the Council of Ministers that Faisal was coming and that they must make preparations to receive him properly and see that he was suitably lodged. Therefore they appointed a reception committee of 5 Ministers. I had been out after tea and on the way home I met the Secretary to the Council, who stopped me and told me this excellent news. I rode on much cheered and when I got home I found a letter from Sir Percy enclosing the long expected communiqué which he told me to get through to Jafar or Naji Suwaidi before the meeting which was to take place at 8 next morning. By good luck Jafar with his wife and sister were dining so I translated the communiqué to them and gave it to Jafar for the meeting. They were all delighted with it and indeed it was just what we wanted.

  Next day Naji Suwaidi and the Mutasarrif, came to my office after the meeting to report. It had been a great success, everyone had been present and 60 people had been chosen to go down to Basrah to welcome Faisal — would I kindly make arrangements with the Railway. There remained the question of his lodging here which they proposed to solve by putting him into some rooms in the Sarai (the Government offices) which were now under repair, ...if they could be got ready in time. Public Works
declared that it couldn't be done. Jafar telephoned to me in despair on Saturday morning; I telephoned to Public Works, made suggestions for covering bare walls with hangings and finally the thing was arranged.

  In the evening I went to the Naqib, whom I found receiving the report of the Reception Committee. Directly I got in he showed me a telegram which had just come to him from King Hussain couched in very suitable terms and announcing that he was sending his son Faisal to him...

  This morning, being Sunday, Mr. Tod and I rode before breakfast to Haji Naji ...Haji Naji presently drew me aside and told me he thought of going with the party to Basrah only he was rather afraid of being lost in the ruck. I said I would give him a letter of introduction to Mr. Cornwallis, who is coming with Faisal, so that he might be treated with consideration...

  To H.B.

  June 23rd, 1921.

  Faisal arrives in Bastah to-day. His adherents anticipate that his coming will be the sign for a great popular ovation. Heaven send it may be so for it will immensely simplify matters for us. Meantime there can be no question that it is regarded with anxiety by the Magnates. On Monday we had a strong deputation from Basrah bringing a petition in which they asked for separate treatment for the Basrah area. They were ready to accept a common King but they asked that Basrah might have a separate Legislative Assembly, a separate Army, police service and raise and spend its own taxes, making a suitable contribution to the central administration. They came to me on their way to Sir Percy and asked me to support their request. I said No; whatever H.M.G. decided would have my loyal support as a Government servant, but until that decision was given I must exercise my private opinion which was that what they asked was not in the interests of the country as a whole and would not prove to be permanently in their own interests... With that they went to Sir Percy who gave them a sympathetic hearing but said in general terms that he would not conceal from them that H.M.G. wanted to see a United Iraq. However a large degree of local autonomy would be consistent with that end and a compromise on these lines should be considered ...I have been elected President of the Bagdad Public Library...