by Peter Rees
The precise number of casualties in the massacre is unknown, but various accounts put it between thirty and sixty men killed or badly injured. Others put it even higher, but suggestions that some Arabs were castrated and thrown down a well are unsubstantiated. Next morning, GHQ finally acted—but not against the Arabs who had allegedly hidden the killer. Each brigade in the Anzac Mounted Division immediately convened a Court of Inquiry, but the men closed ranks and professed ignorance of the whole incident. Arab survivors failed to identify any offenders, nor could anyone else. General Allenby, commander of the Allied troops, confined the Anzacs to their tent lines. On parade, he said that ‘they were murderers and cowards and by killing the Bedouin had taken away the good name of Anzac.’
In writing the history of the campaign, Gullett knew he had to deal with the incident or be accused of a cover-up. He wrote to Bean about the issue, saying that Brudenell White, who was now Chief of the General Staff, and the Defence Minister and Defence Department secretary ‘were all strong in favour of dropping it:’
They object not only to the affair itself but also to the reflection upon the Australian Government. I agree entirely with you that it should come in in some shape or form, but I am not prepared to deal with it in a small way. It should either be complete or it should be dropped, and I will take an opportunity of publishing the story as it stands and explaining that it was omitted from the history under protest. I think this is the only proper course.
Alarmed, Bean wrote to Gullett, saying he believed the Surafend incident had to be included ‘because some reference or other to it is sure to get into future histories; and it will appear to have been hushed up.’ He also wrote to White, saying he had heard that Gullett had ‘omitted all reference to Surafend and to the impression prevalent among the Light Horse in Palestine that they were neglected by their government. I do not believe that this is the right way to solve any objections to those two references, and I am writing to Gullett asking him if he will have the matter reconsidered.’ White immediately sought to reassure Bean, but it was clear that he was sensitive about the incident. ‘I did not wish Gullett entirely to omit all reference to the Surafend incident, but I thought that his very detailed appendix was neither necessary nor in the same good taste as the remainder of his criticisms. I think that he might in the text say briefly all that is necessary to record the matter and I will speak to the Secretary to this end.’ White also disagreed with the suggestion that the Government had neglected the Light Horse in Palestine, but conceded that it was ‘not wholly satisfactory’ that Birdwood had been the commander of troops and based in France when an independent GOC might have been better. Bean’s commitment to freedom from censorship cleared the way for Gullett to tell the full story.
However, all this meant that the Christmas sales Bean had hoped for in 1922 were lost, since Gullett’s volume, Volume VII,
The Australian Imperial Force in Sinai and Palestine 1914–1918, did not appear until April 1923. The historian H.M. Green rated Sinai and Palestine behind Bean’s work. It was, he wrote, ‘much nearer the conventional than Bean’s and . . . much more obviously the work of a journalist than Bean’s . . . the reader has not the same feeling of being part of the experiences described.’ Gullett’s ability did not transcend that of a good journalist nor was he as sharp an observer as Bean. Green criticised the banalities and clichés of Gullett’s ‘overcoloured’ style, which nevertheless was ‘light and fluent and seldom dull . . . a capable example of its kind.’
Arthur Jose was a key player in the Official History, not just with Gullett’s volume but also with the naval volume that Bean wanted his old friend to write. Bean wrote to the secretary of the newly established Navy Department, George Macandie, that Jose was ‘one of the greatest of Australian living authors—and the greatest Australian historian.’ But his involvement challenged Bean’s determination that there should be no censorship, for the Naval Board’s conception of an official history was one that expressed government-approved views. This was at odds not only with Bean’s wish but with the Government’s promise that the official histories should be free from censorship.
No one was better placed than Jose to write the naval history—since September 1915, he had been writing a history for the Commonwealth Naval Board as well as undertaking intelligence work. But delays upset the publication timetable. Jose’s volume was pushed back and by the end of 1920 he was hard at work editing the Australian Encyclopaedia for Angus & Robertson.
In June 1921 Bean complained to the Acting Naval Secretary, Captain Alfred Treacy, that Jose did ‘not know the extent of the nature of the censorship to be exercised.’ He reminded Treacy that the official history was supposed to be free of censorship and that Jose’s dealings with the Naval Board were ‘quite different’ from what he and Prime Minister Hughes had agreed to. The only censorship Bean would accept was of technical secrets, inventions and some battle tactics. He would not accept attempts to restrict Jose’s reasonable arguments and conclusions. ‘The nation requires the historians above everything to be free, even, if necessary, to criticise the authorities of their own or any country,’ he asserted.
Bean also complained to Defence Minister George Pearce, who, in turn, wrote to the Navy Minister, W.H. Laird Smith, reminding him that the historian’s contract specifically stated that the government would ‘not censor or alter the national Histories as written, annotated or edited by the Historian.’ Pearce said that despite this he understood from Bean that the Naval Board had informed Jose that his work was to be subjected to what might amount to rigorous censorship. Laird Smith was a weak minister, and heavily influenced by the Naval Board; its members remained unrepentant. Laird Smith told Pearce the Naval Board believed they could ‘not agree to give official recognition to the opinions which are based on insufficient knowledge of the facts, and are produced by a gentleman who, by training and experience, is perhaps not properly qualified to form a sound judgement.’ The only course open to the Naval Board, said Laird Smith, was to require Jose to amend his manuscript accordingly.
To Bean, there was a principle at stake from which he could not budge. In a letter to Pearce, he rebutted the Naval Board’s view of what constituted an official history, pointing out that the principle the Australian Government had adopted in regard to the Official History was different from that adopted by the British.
The British Government is not pretending to publish a completely frank account of the war, but is preparing an ‘intermediate’ or ‘popular’ account under certain conditions of censorship. This is quite in accordance with the traditions of the British War Office, but the work is not one in which it would be possible for the Government to obtain the services of the leading British writers . . . no leading author would consent to spend years of his life after the war in writing a history which was not to be of permanent value.
Bean pointed out that the Australian Government, in reaching its position on freedom from censorship, had acted ‘in complete consonance with Australian principles.’ In Britain, a ‘hush-up’ policy was the norm. Jose had no doubt what the problem was. As he told Bean, any true history of the early months of the war would reveal negligence by the British Admiralty. ‘I know that pukka Australian naval officers have read and approved of my work; it is the imported element that is trying to suppress it.’ Indeed, former Royal Navy officers holding senior positions in the Australian Navy were behind the push for censorship. (The First Naval Member, Rear Admiral Percy Grant, the Second Naval Member, Captain Charles Hardy, and Commodore John Dumaresq, who was Australian-born, were all former Royal Navy officers.)
Unlike the Army, which had emerged from the war its own master, the Navy was widely seen as being under British influence. Criticism of the Navy increased when news began to leak of the fate of Jose’s naval history. The Naval Board, however, remained intransigent, asserting its ownership of the history. In October 1921, Bean sought to reassure Jose, telling him that the more the histories were read, ‘the
stronger will become the public dislike to censorship except within necessary limits.’ He promised Jose that when he finished the manuscript, he would ‘throw all my weight, both with the PM and with the other ministers, into obtaining you as far as possible freedom from censorship.’
The opportunity came sooner than expected. On 3 November 1921, Laird Smith blundered in the House of Representatives. Questioned about the naval volume, he said that only after the complete manuscript had been received would the issue of censorship be considered. In fact, the Naval Office had had eight of Jose’s chapters for twelve months, and its internal review had found that the draft was ‘not suitable for publication’ and should be referred to the Admiralty—the very body which Jose had strongly criticised over its ineffective management of the Australian Fleet in the Pacific. Perhaps fearing his influence, the Board banned Jose from showing the draft to Bean. However, soon afterwards the Navy Department was subsumed into the Defence Department. Pearce, although no longer Defence Minister, was given responsibility for deciding the extent of censorship. Few of the Naval Board’s key objections were upheld, giving Bean and Jose a crucial victory.
Ironically, it was not the Royal Navy officers but Bean who most effectively censored Jose’s history, by moderating his acid pen and altering his more critical opinions ‘to avoid offence.’ Bean wrote, ‘I think we must be particularly careful to be within the limits of truth when criticising outside governments and authorities . . . In criticism, while stating the case strongly and clearly, we have to avoid [being aggressive].’ Jose responded tartly. ‘I do not always see eye to eye with you about criticism of persons in authority, and the mistakes made in the early months were in some cases so glaring—and might have been disastrous—that it is worthwhile using the strongest language to guard against any repetition of them in future wars. Further, my language ran the gauntlet of a hostile Board—and was deliberately reinstated by Pearce, so that I had thought it censor-proof.’
After the publication of German naval histories, Bean extensively altered Jose’s draft. With Jose now in Britain, documents continued to trickle out from the Admiralty, causing further delays. In London, Jose was beginning to wonder whether he would recognise the volume when he saw it again. Volume IX, The Royal Australian Navy, 1914–1918, finally appeared in September 1928, and Jose generously acknowledged Bean’s many improvements.
Bean was faced with the challenge of writing four more volumes himself—the story of the AIF in France—while working as general editor for not just the volumes by Gullett and Jose, but also volumes on other important areas of the war. His close friend, Fred Cutlack, was writing Volume VIII, The Australian Flying Corps in the Western and Eastern Theatres of War, 1914–1918. Bean knew the book was in safe hands and thought it ‘excellent’ when it was published in 1923. However, with Volumes X and XI the story was far different.
Volume X, The Australians at Rabaul. The Capture and Administration of the German Possessions in the South Pacific, was entrusted to Colonel Seaforth Mackenzie, a lawyer who worked in the Federal Attorney-General’s Department in Melbourne. A published poet, he was regarded as a minor literary figure. In 1915 he had been appointed the senior legal officer with the Australian forces in German New Guinea, and served two terms as acting Administrator. Writing about events in which he was involved complicated his task, but he was optimistic that he would be finished by September 1920. However, that month he told Bean he would not be submitting the manuscript until December. The material he had collected, he explained, was ‘so excellent’ that he hoped Bean would agree that the delay was worthwhile. Little did Bean realise that a pattern had been set: Mackenzie named a deadline he could not meet, gave a brief reason for delay, and set another date which was also unrealistic.
In 1922 Mackenzie became principal registrar of the High Court, and the same pattern continued, with the same excuses. Bean became exasperated as the completion date for the volume was pushed further and further back. By March 1922 relations between the men had become fraught, and Bean said that if he did not receive manuscript within ten days, ‘I shall have to propose to the Minister for Defence the name of another writer for this volume, a step you will realise, I should on many grounds be exceedingly sorry to take.’ This did not work either. The best that Mackenzie could do was to offer to provide the manuscript by instalments. Mackenzie wrote to the Defence Department Secretary, Thomas Trumble, undertaking ‘to deliver the whole of the manuscript of the volume not later than 30 June 1922.’ The department warned Mackenzie ‘that the time had gone by when any idle promises would be tolerated and that he must fulfil his promise otherwise the matter would be placed in other hands and his reputation would thereby be tarnished beyond repair.’
Three years later, the position remained unchanged. By then, Mackenzie was using all the evasion and deception in his repertoire to avoid sending Bean the final chapters. Bean rebuked him, warning that he could not spend any more of his time ‘in making apparently useless appeals.’ His only recourse now was to inform the Minister and arrange for a new writer to complete the volume.
This time Mackenzie did post the second-last chapter, but requested a further few days to complete the final chapter. The matter dragged on into 1926. Bean warned Mackenzie in mid-February that his final chapter and passages were urgently needed. Mackenzie promised to travel from Melbourne to Sydney to meet Bean—but didn’t turn up. ‘Much regret,’ he telegrammed Bean, who was so exasperated that he appealed to the Minister ‘to do something.’ Finally, in October 1926, he received the last chapter—five years after the first instalment.
There was a final irony to Volume X: in 1926 Mackenzie had purchased three overvalued ex-German coconut plantations in New Guinea, borrowing heavily for the deposit. By 1932, with eight court judgements for debt against him, he owed £19,000 to the Commonwealth for the plantations and another £7000 for money lent and accumulated losses. On 28 August 1936 he was charged with forging and uttering seals of the High Court. Found guilty, he was sentenced to four and a half years’ jail, thus bringing to a close the tragi-farce of Volume X.
The story surrounding the writing of Volume XI was sheer tragedy. It involved Bean’s former editor at The Sydney Morning Herald, Thomas Heney, who had been chosen to write the story of the war on the home front. Bean had not originally envisaged that the history would include such an account, but William Watt, the Acting Prime Minister, and George Pearce urged him on. Watt, on the recommendation of the Repatriation Minister, Edward Millen, selected Heney as author. Bean went along with this, but with some reluctance. When Heney was commissioned, in October 1919, Bean believed the manuscript would run to around 120,000 words—a relatively small volume—and thought it should take no more than nine months to write. But Bean had underestimated the complexity of the task involved and the time it would take.
When Heney’s first chapters arrived in June 1920, Bean was unimpressed. He wrote to Heney, saying he had to be frank with all contributors to the history: ‘In several important matters in the chapters already submitted this volume takes no account of the evidence and data which is surely now available and upon which the history for the sake of completeness ought to be based. The result is that it lacks detail and does not give the reader the information which I think he could be entitled to expect.’ Bean cited the Premiers’ Conference at the beginning of the war, and the question of enemy subjects. He said Heney appeared to have relied only upon newspaper accounts on these two issues, and failed to use official papers. As well, Heney had devoted ‘too much space and attention to what happened outside of Australia,’ his chronology was flawed and his prose was ungrammatical.
Heney was miffed, telling Bean there was not room for everything. ‘The art of being a bore is to say everything,’ he wrote acidly, asserting that ‘to a reader even ten years hence what matters is the action taken and its result, not the steps and considerations antecedent to action.’ Bean rejected this view of history outright. ‘I do not think that we can
ignore the steps and considerations antecedent to action. Logically that would reduce a history of the war to a statement of the terms of peace.’
Bean sent Heney’s manuscript to Defence, telling the department it was not ‘nearly up to the standard required of writers of this history.’ The most serious defect was ‘the skimpiness of its matter and the amount of irrelevant writing contained in it. But the publishers are almost certain to damn it also upon its style which is almost beyond remedy.’ Bean hoped that Heney would rectify the problems, ‘but you will see by Mr Heney’s reply that it appears uncertain whether he will do this.’ He wanted the issue to remain confidential, as Heney was ‘an old friend of mine, formerly my own editor, and a man to whom I owe something and for whom I feel a considerable respect.’
Bean sensed he had hurt Heney’s pride, and he was right. Heney wrote to him again, denying that his work was compiled with ‘scissors and paste, cut out of old newspapers.’ Relations were becoming strained, and meanwhile Heney had taken on a new job as editor of the Brisbane Telegraph, which would further reduce the time he had to work on the volume. When shown the manuscript, Tucker told Bean it needed stringent revision. Tucker declined the job, explaining that only when he came to the actual revision did he realise ‘how atrociously bad’ much of the manuscript was. The work was ‘puerile, mawkish, loose in construction, padded and written in a style unworthy of any man of letters.’ He reminded Bean that as the history as a whole would be judged on its weakest part, Heney’s work might undermine the entire project.