by E. H. Jones
22. The Senior Officer of the camp met me after I had regained my liberty. ‘Why on earth did you keep us in the dark, Jones?’ he asked; ‘If you had only told us what you were up to we would have helped you.’ ‘Would you, sir?’ I replied. ‘I put it to you frankly: had we gone to you in February and said we were planning to do the things which we actually did, you would undoubtedly have regarded it as impossible, and used your authority to stop us.’ ‘Yes,’ he admitted, after a moment’s thought, ‘you’re right. I would.’
23. POSTSCRIPT. This was done. See the coded postcard dated 20th March 1918 in Appendix V and further coded postcards which can be found in the Supplementary Material on the website accompanying this book.
24. POSTSCRIPT. For an an example page from the original diaries see Appendix IV.
25. This is really a code sentence (code-word ‘Bonhil,’ code Playfair). It was put in for our own protection should things go seriously against us at any future time. Decoded it reads: ‘Take note this is a leg pull against both Turks and camp.’ POSTSCRIPT. The page from the séance diary which contains the coded message can be found in Appendix IV. It has a slightly different code and it can only be assumed that the message was wrongly transcribed when copied to the original printed version of The Road to En-dor. E.H. Jones describes it as being in Playfair Code with the code-word ‘Bonhil’ but, if that code-word is used to code the message ‘Take note this is a leg-pull against both Turks and camp’ the result is not the set of letters in either the séance diaries or the book so there is a bit of a mystery here.
26. This report was sent by the Commandant to the Turkish War Office on 18th March 1918, and was the first of a series of official documents dictated by the Spook.
27. See p. 124.
28. The order is quoted in endnote 17.
29. Major Gilchrist was not alone in his admiration for the Commandant’s leniency. Major Peel, in recording the sentence in his account of the trial, adds the comment: ‘The Commandant seems to have behaved remarkably well over this.’ See also Col. Maule’s letter to the Netherlands Ambassador at Constantinople quoted in Chapter XXX.
30. The ‘hockey pitch’ was a piece of ground rather smaller than a tennis court and surrounded by stone walls. Lack of space limited the size of the sides to four men.
31. Several of the photos in this volume were taken with this home-made camera. They were developed at Yozgad by Hill and Miller who somehow got possession of the necessary chemicals.
32. After our ‘conviction’ for telepathy Colonel Maule asked the spookers in the camp to refrain from further experiments.
33. POSTSCRIPT. See Appendix V for the original postcards and the decoded messages.
34. Really to give us a ‘starved look’ which might be ascribed to madness should we have to adopt the madness scheme, and in order to enable us to accuse the Commandant of starving us should enquiries come on the compassionate release plan. It could be made to serve either purpose.
35. The author has taken the liberty of altering the names in paragraphs 1, 3 and 4 of the Pimple’s letter, as he sees no necessity for making public the identity of those two ladies.
36. One of our principal assets was Raymond, which reached the camp about the end of February 1918. Moïse translated it to the Commandant, and read it himself, by order of the Spook.
37. The phrase is borrowed from Spink’s Armenian Phrase Book, which he compiled from a study of Lavengro and a dictionary.
38. See Raymond, pp. 360–1.
39. Such a secret organization of Armenians actually existed.
40. ‘Sup.’ – ‘the Superior’. The Spook’s name for the Commandant.
41. Since the 14th, the Spook had controlled our diet, allowing us no meat, but ‘tomorrow’ (20th March) was the Ski Club dinner, and we wanted a ‘bust’ before going on to bare bread. We were starving in preparation for a medical examination, should the ‘escape’ plan fail. We tried (by secret signal to Matthews) to stop Posh Castle from sending us food from the 14th March, but our friend Price insisted on continuing until after the big dinner at least, and would have gone on for ever in the face of any opposition but our own.
42. The greyhounds were expensive – about £T20 each, I believe.
43. Spink was the originator of skiing in Yozgad, and to his tact in dealing with the Commandant the credit of the Ski Club is due.
44. Really because time was getting short and we must soon face the doctors.
45. The curious will find a description in 450 Miles to Freedom.
46. POSTSCRIPT. Gedos was the camp used for officer prisoners of war who had given their word of honour (‘parole’) not to attempt to escape.
47. This, we believe, is the first instance in modern times of correspondence between a spook and a Government office.
48. A most unfortunate explanation, as events proved.
49. The telegram was dispatched from Constantinople on 29th March and reached Yozgad on the afternoon of 1st April. It was in cipher, and read as follows: ‘With reference to your letter of March 18th, 1334’ (i.e., the report of the trial dictated by the Spook) ‘the two officers who have been communicating with the townspeople should be released from imprisonment, and their punishment should be to stop them writing letters to their relations for one month.’ POSTSCRIPT. No letters were believed to have been written after 30th March 1918 and the last one known contained the message from Jones to his wife not to worry – see the Supplementary Material on the website accompanying this book.
50. See our previous arrangement with O’Farrell, p. 147.
51. POSTSCRIPT. The complete original séance records copied by Hill in micro-writing from the Pimple’s originals can be found in the Supplementary Material on the website accompanying this book.
52. POSTSCRIPT. Literally, ‘ran headlong to the top of the stairs’.
53. POSTSCRIPT. See Endnote 49.
54. POSTSCRIPT. Literally, ‘To write to Constantinople declaring that two officers, as the result of their ability to communicate by telepathy and having abused this power, are in an agitated mental state which could have a harmful influence on their physical or mental state. Consequently, please send them to Constantinople in order that they can be examined by specialists and determine how they may be cured. Since the Interpreter knows all the background, it would be useful to send him with them, both to prevent them from trying to communicate and to supervise them more effectively’.
55. Pure water is useful on a voyage to Cyprus.
56. POSTSCRIPT. The only other escape from Yozgad, published as 450 Miles to Freedom by Captain M.A.B. Johnston and Captain K.D. Yearsley.
57. POSTSCRIPT. Believed to be Captain C.B. Mundey, 1st Oxford and Bucks.
58. POSTSCRIPT. See the Postcard C in Appendix V written on 15th March 1918 by Captain C.B. Mundey to E.H. Jones’s father, Sir Henry Jones which contains the coded message.
59. See p.232.
60. Acting under the Spook’s order, Moïse had previously cross-examined Doc. O’Farrell, who, by agreement with us, had shown confusion and hesitation when asked if he thought we were mad, and had finally denied our insanity.
61. Of course no such letters were ever written. Moïse was willing to lie as much as the Spook wanted.
62. We had to provide against the danger of independent enquiry by the doctors amongst our fellow prisoners. Therefore, wherever possible, we distorted facts so that enquiry, if made, would reveal as a basis for our delusions some incident which had really occurred and which had (apparently) been misunderstood by us. Thus, in the present instance, Colbeck did threaten (jokingly, of course) to take us out by force when we refused his invitation to tea.
63. He did – a friendly visit to support Colbeck’s invitation to tea. At this visit he gave me permission to say what I liked about him to the Turks. I used it freely to name him as my principal ‘persecutor’ and my ‘would-be murderer’.
64. This was founded on fact. The Turkish officials who were unpacking my
parcel said waterproof sheets were ‘yessack’ (forbidden), and seized it for their own use. A tug-of-war developed between me and the Cook for possession of the sheet, and when the officer in charge ordered me to surrender it, and showed signs of joining in the struggle, I cut it into ribbons to render it valueless to our enemies. This was in the early days, before the treasure hunt began.
65. The performance was so amusing that I repeated it at every possible opportunity on our 120-mile road journey to Angora, and the poor Pimple was in and out of his cart like a Jack-in-the-box. To his credit be it said that he succeeded in getting back most of the notes I distributed so lavishly, and he was perfectly honest in returning them to us in Constantinople.
66. From the point of view of the professional medium the slower methods have another advantage. Very little ground is covered at a single table-rapping séance, and at the end of the allotted hour the sitter has usually a number of questions he still wishes to put. So he is likely to come back for a second guinea’s worth.
67. POSTSCRIPT. Mardeen is believed to be the town of Danek Madeni, or Marden, now the modern town of Keskin, located south-east of Ankara.
68. POSTSCRIPT. The story of the fate of the men captured at Kut-el-Amarah on 29th April 1916 and their terrible march across the deserts to imprisonment has been recorded in several books. E.H. Jones himself wrote a moving short story of the death march. For this, see ‘Harry’s Story’ in the Supplementary Material on the website accompanying this book which also includes a bibliography of other material.
69. I apologise to the inhabitants of Togoland for comparing their music (whatever it may be) to the abominable noises made by our sentries.
70. Before leaving Yozgad we had come to an arrangement with Price. If questioned he was to say that while digging in the garden at the spot mentioned above he had come on a tin with a false bottom, on opening which he found a gold lira and a circular piece of paper with curious hieroglyphics on it. The lira he had kept (we gave him one to produce), but he had lost the paper.
71. A type of nomenclature common amongst Turkish peasantry. ‘Hassan’s boy Ahmed’ was a very incongruous name for a Pasha.
72. I gave the name of a well-known Scottish expert on nervous diseases – an old college friend of mine. It had the effect I desired. Whether they looked him up afterwards in some medical list or whether, as is more probable, they already knew of his writings and his reputation in the treatment of nervous diseases, I do not know. But some days later the chief doctor, Mazhar Osman Bey, tried to question me about ‘the Doctor Bey, M –, of Glasgow.’ The ‘of Glasgow’ showed me my friend was known to them, so assuming as cunning a look as I could, I denied ever having heard the name before. The Chief smiled to himself and went away.
73. A pamphlet of his (later, when I had become his favourite patient, he presented me with an autograph copy of it) was entitled, Spiritism Aleyhindé (Against Spiritualism). So far as I could understand it (it was written in very technical Turkish), he sought to prove that the proper abode for spiritualists is a private asylum, and the so-called ‘subconscious’ replies to questions given in automatic writing, table-rapping, etc., and similar phenomena, are as much due to nervous derangement as are the conversations with spirits indulged in by sufferers from G.P.I. He challenged me to write a reply to his pamphlet from the spiritualist point of view. Perhaps this book will do instead.
74. On the strength of Mazhar Osman Bey’s suggestion to learn Turkish I promptly ordered ‘a hundred books on the Turkish language’, and gave nobody any rest until I was provided with one (at my own expense, of course). It was Hagopian’s Conversation Grammar – a most excellent book. I had plenty of teachers – every patient in the hospital and most of the doctors were delighted to give me a lesson whenever I asked for one – and to the delight of Mazhar Osman Bey I made rapid strides in Turkish. Needless to say, a sane occupation of this sort was of the utmost value to me, and my only regret was that, as a madman, my study of this most interesting language had to be spasmodic and irregular. Still, I learned enough to become something of a ‘show patient’, and to gain from the Dutch Embassy at Constantinople, whose medical representatives visited us about July, the following quite unsolicited and rather amusing ‘testimonial’. It was sent as a ‘Report’ by the Embassy, and reached my family through the India Office:
‘Haidar Pasha Hospital. – We found here Lieut. Henry Elias Jones, Artillery Battery (volunteer). The 10 of May, 1918, he was sent down from Yozgad with mental disturbance. He was quite content and we had a long talk with him. He wants to be a Turk, and mistrusts all English, and will not take anything if it comes from his parents or from England. He wants a Turkish uniform and will settle down in Turkey. Intelligent as he is, he learnt Turkish with an astonishing good accent in an exceedingly short time. He will probably be sent back to England with the first exchange.’
POSTSCRIPT. See the letter dated 3rd November 1918 from E.H. Jones’s mother, Lady Jones, in the Supplementary Material on the web-site accompanying this book.
75. This referred to a large drawing of a monstrous machine which was placed in my (Jones’s) kit for the doctors to find. The machine was designed to flatten out capes, fill up bays, and uproot all islands, thereby straightening the coastline and making the sea safe for navigation. The power was to be derived from the weight of the Great Pyramid, which was to be removed from Egypt and placed on a raft 500 feet long. The raft would rise and fall with the motion of the waves, and operate an enormous knife which would cut away capes, islands, etc. One of the uses to which the machine was to be put was to slice under the island of Great Britain. We would then turn it over and start a new England on the other side!
76. Somewhere in Hill’s kit (I don’t know if the doctors ever saw it), was the following incoherent document, written in a very scrawly hand:
I, Elias Henry Jones, Master of Arts Assistant Commissioner in the Indian Civil Service Deputy Commissioner of Kyaukse District Upper Burma and Headquarters Assistant Moulmein Lieutenant Indian Army Reserve of Officers in the Volunteer Artillery Battery born at Aberystwyth and educated at Glasgow University and Balliol College Oxford CERTIFY and PROMISE by ALMIGHTY GOD that if you will assist me in my great scheme and do everything I require of you including draw and inventions of MACHINERY I certainly will be converted by you and give up all wickedness as you say as soon as my great scheme is finished and until then you must help me with designs and drawings and inventions of NECESSARY MACHINERY.
Signed E.H. JONES.
77. I think our traps were on the whole more successful than those of the medical men. The most amusing, perhaps, was what we called ‘the chocolate test’. Chocolate at this time was practically unobtainable in Constantinople. Indeed, anything of that nature was immensely expensive. Now one of the junior doctors, who had a room in the hospital, had a sweet tooth. Hill and I had hoped for this, and had arranged the test before we entered the hospital.
I let it be known in the mad ward that we had a large supply of ‘stores’ in the depot. (We had saved them up from parcels which arrived during our starvation period at Yozgad.) This aroused great enthusiasm amongst the other patients, who suggested they should be brought up. They were fetched by Ibrahim, the good-natured attendant who happened to be on duty at the time. When the case arrived I pretended to change my mind. I refused to allow it to be opened, because for all we knew the stores might be poisoned. A malingering epileptic, to whom I had promised some tea, said the doctor could examine them for us and find out if they contained poison or not. This was what we wanted. One of the junior doctors was then brought in, and pretended to examine the stores. He declared them all fit for human consumption. With my customary lavish generosity (generosity was one of my symptoms), I started handing tins of tea, coffee, sugar, etc., to all the patients, keeping nothing for myself. (A pound of tea in those days cost a thousand piastres – about £9.) The doctor stopped this mad act, took charge of the stores, and said he would issue them to Hill and
myself little by little. He took them to his private room upstairs.
A week later, with the freedom of a lunatic, I burst into his room unannounced, and found him with his mouth full of our chocolate. He blushed, said he was ‘testing our chocolate for poison’, and asked me if I knew how many tins I had. I said I did not know at all.
‘You have two,’ he said, looking relieved. (We really had ten, but he had already eaten eight, I suppose.) ‘And here they are.’ He handed me two tins, assured me they were not poisoned, and told me to give one to Hill. He also gave me a little tea and a tin of condensed milk. That was all we ever saw of the stores. I pretended to forget about them, but used to make incursions into the private room to note the rate at which our junior doctor was getting through them. Hill and I were delighted at the success of our little plot, for we knew that this man at least would be anything but anxious to prove our sanity to his Chief, and as he was more often about the ward than any other doctor, the sacrifice was well worth while.
I purposely do not give his name. In the main he was a good fellow enough, and in the half-starved state of Constantinople the temptation to which he was subjected was very severe, while he was very young. But I hope that, like a good Mohammedan, he thoroughly enjoyed the tins of ‘Pork and Beans,’ and that he suffered no indigestion from the bacon.
Later, when fresh parcels arrived, we tried the same trick with Chouaïe Bey, a new doctor whose attitude towards us we wanted to know. It failed utterly, I am glad to say, not because he suspected us, nor yet because his mouth did not water over the dainties, but because he was an exceedingly fine man in every way. It was only with immense difficulty that I got him to accept a tin of cocoa as a gift, and he insisted on repaying us by sending us delicacies from his private house. He was also the only doctor amongst them all who tried hard to induce me to send a note to my wife and relieve her anxiety by saying I was quite well. (I refused, because my wife knew this already.)