On the Road to Bagdad: A Story of Townshend's Gallant Advance on the Tigris

Geoff brought his hand down on the Armenian's back with a smack, and smiled encouragingly at him.

"You've done splendidly, Esbul," he told him, "and you shall see that I will make the most of this message. Now let us make our way to Head-quarters."

Still riding slowly side by side, so as to give their horses an opportunity of cooling, they crossed the desert over which the Turks had retired, in many cases so precipitately, passing many dead and wounded. Then they rode their horses over the vacated trenches – that is, vacated by living men, and now tenanted only by the dead who had so bravely held them. Beyond, there was the space across which those British and Indian troops had come hurtling in their mad charge, as they threw themselves toward the enemy trenches. A little while ago the desert here had been dotted with figures, some lying prone and stiff and stark, while others were sitting up and looking about them, and others, yet again, crawling towards the position now captured by their comrades. A little farther and Geoff and his companion reached the broad belt of palms which clung to either side of the broad stretch of the Shatt-el-Arab, to find horses picketed in the shade, munching contentedly at their daily rations, to see carts of every description parked beneath the trees, while, in the open, motor ambulance-wagons purred their way to and fro, as they brought in the wounded or went off across the hard, sandy desert in search of others. And in a retired part, just beyond the wagon-park, they came upon and halted beside a huge tent, over which flew the flag of the Red Cross. British and Indian orderlies were moving briskly about, while through the open sides of the tent Geoff caught a glimpse of stretchers laid in rows, and upon them bandaged soldiers lying very contentedly, out of the heat of the sun and with the cool breeze playing in upon them. And out in front of the tent, with the shadows of the trees cast across it, stood a table whereon lay a wounded man in the hands of the surgeon. Geoff shuddered, and then looked again; looked and admired the calmness and unconcern of the officers attending to that wounded man, their dexterity, the swiftness and silence of the orderlies who assisted; and then, catching the eye of the wounded man himself – one of the Dorsets – he returned with a grin the wink with which that incorrigible individual greeted him.

Geoff turned away, and, dropping from his saddle, hunted up his friend of the Head-quarters Staff, to whom he presented his message.

"Hum! Douglas Pasha! Glad to know that he is alive. But in prison; eh, Keith! And he's your guardian!"

For a while the officer looked at the message, and from the message to Keith, studying his every expression, and then back again to the message, pursing up his lips and wrinkling his brows thoughtfully.

"Of course," he said, "if this expedition fights its way to the neighbourhood of Bagdad it might give us an opportunity of relieving the Major; but then Bagdad happens to be far away."

"Yes, sir," agreed Geoff, vainly attempting to make his voice sound jubilant and hopeful.

"A long way," repeated the officer, "and we may never cover the distance; in that case – But of course," he added thoughtfully, looking again at Geoff, "of course, seeing that you know the country and can speak the language, you might – eh? – you might make the attempt yourself, if you could get permission. But such permission is out of the question now, and you must leave it to the future."

And leave it to the future Geoff had to be content to do, though by night and by day he still remembered that message, and indeed discussed it and a prospective journey to Bagdad threadbare with his chum, Philip, and with Esbul.

"Of course I shall go the first moment I get the opportunity," he told them both.

"And, with you, Esbul," the Armenian answered him immediately.

"And what about me?" asked Philip. "Ain't I good enough for such a job? Don't I begin to know Mesopotamia by heart by this time?"

"We'll see," rejoined Geoff enigmatically. "If there's a chance though – well, you may be sure that I'll go, and take anyone I can with me."

CHAPTER XIII
An Amphibious Expedition

"Garden of Eden, indeed!" growled Philip, some few weeks after that fine combat in which the Indian Expeditionary Force had proved so successful, and had cleared the road to Kurnah. "Where's the garden?"

The disdainful Mahratta subaltern looked round him from the doorstep of the house in which he and a few of his brother officers had taken up their quarters, and to which at that moment his chum Geoff had paid a visit. And well might the youthful and disgusted Phil have turned up his nose, have scoffed, and have shown the most infinite displeasure, for rains had set in since the occupation of Kurnah, and the whole country-side was soaked. That smooth, sandy, and gravelly desert was covered a foot deep in sticky, sandy mud, different from any mud encountered elsewhere; mud which clung to the boots, which piled up on the feet of those who trudged about the camp, and who must needs therefore carry about with them so much extra weight.

A hot, stifling mist hung over the country and blotted out the River Tigris. For, bear in mind, the Expedition had now advanced beyond the junction of the Euphrates and the Tigris Rivers, and had camped on the banks of the latter. Time was, centuries before, when these two historic rivers had come together in the neighbourhood of Kurnah – the little town now captured – where the country-side was drained, and fertile, and productive, and where, no doubt, date-palms had offered grateful shade, and patches of green had relieved the dull, dirty yellow of the desert. But that was in days gone by. Now, a change in the course of the River Euphrates – a river which, like many a one in China, changes its course in the most fickle and unforeseen manner – had cut a channel for itself farther to the south, where it now met the Tigris. "Garden indeed!" The place was a muddy swamp, set amidst the most depressing surroundings.

"Not so very cheerful," Geoff had to agree, as he puffed at a cigarette and smiled at the indignant Philip; "but then we're campaigning, my dear fellow, and soldiers should take things as they come, and not grouse and grumble."

"Shut up!" Philip told him. "None of your Head-quarters airs for me! What's doing?"

It was always the way with Philip to demand of his chum what movements might be expected, as if indeed, though attached to the Head-quarters, Geoff was likely to be in the confidence of his seniors. Yet he knew something of their intentions at times, and knew well enough that further movement was anticipated.

"You see, it's like this," he told Philip, there being no one else about. "The party we sent off along the Karun River and the pipe-line into Persia have seized Ahwaz, and have secured the oil-supply for our battleships. Just look at this map I am making in the mud! Rather a good place for drawing one, ain't it? Now, here's the Tigris and Kurnah, and there are the swamps that we went into with Commander Houston. By the way, glad to hear that he's doing well. He's on his way to India now, and good reports have been received about him. Well, there are the marshes."

"Where our good friend the Turk did us the honour of joining us, eh!" grinned Philip. "What an adventure that was, Geoff! Wish we could have more of 'em!"

It was Geoff's turn to tell his friend to "Shut up!"

"Don't interrupt!" he said irritably, thrusting the point of his stick deep into the mud, and pointing impatiently to the map which he had been outlining. "Let a fellow get on with his description. There's the Tigris."

"You've said that already," grumbled Philip.

"Well, I say it again! There it is!"

"Yes, the Tigris, we all know that! Put a T against it!"

That made Geoff laugh, and obediently he sketched a huge T in the sand and mud before him.

"Right oh!" he said. "Tigris."

"Get on," growled Philip. "Here are the marshes," and bending swiftly he scraped a row of lines in the mud. "Marshes – M – there we are, and just about here, I suppose, will be the spot where our dear friend the Turk joined us."

He dug a finger deep into the mud in the midst of the patch which he had designated "marshes", and then, standing up, grinned irritatingly at Geoff.

"We know all about that," he went on. "T for Tigris, M for marshes! What next? K for Kurnah, I suppose."

"It's there – K!" said Geoff, laughing, for who could allow himself to be irritated with Philip? "K for Kurnah, and B for Basra. There's the head of the Persian Gulf, and there's Ahwaz. Now let's move up this line we call the Tigris. Perhaps a hundred miles up there is a place called Amara, from which the enemy can easily reinforce the troops they have in front of Ahwaz; there's nothing to prevent them but marshes and desert, and seeing that they've lived all their lives in such surroundings they know all about them. So the next move is there, to seize Amara, and make doubly secure that our pipe-line cannot be cut or damaged."

As a matter of fact, the sketch-map which Geoff had drawn in the mud for the edification of his chum, was not entirely complete or informative, and we hasten at this point to supplement the information he had given. Had he prolonged the line which represented the Tigris River farther to the north and west, as it bent in that direction, he would, when he had covered sufficient space to indicate perhaps another hundred miles of desert country, have come to a place called Kut-el-Amara, where at that very moment Turks were in force; and, arrived at Kut, he would no doubt have carried on the line, making it twirl and twist in many directions – for above Kut-el-Amara the Tigris winds considerably and is most difficult of navigation – to Bagdad, that city where Major Joseph Douglas had taken up his quarters, and where the onset of this huge world war had found him an alien in a nest of enemies.

Going farther, Geoff's stick would have scratched the line in an almost due southerly direction till it struck that broad patch which Philip had contemptuously designated marshes. Unknown then to the leaders of the Indian Expeditionary Force, a channel runs from Kut-el-Amara down to the head of those marshes into the midst of which Geoff and his chum had so recently ventured, and ends at a spot on the River Euphrates where that broad, sluggish, and ever-changing stream plunges into the mass of sandy and reed-covered islets which form the marshes at Nasiriyeh, where at that very moment Turks were collecting. Not, let us add, that the Indian Expeditionary Force was entirely ignorant of their situation, for, indeed, the Intelligence Branch, thanks to the capture of that fat Turkish officer, had considerable news of a force of Turks collecting at Nasiriyeh. Yet they did not know of the Kut-el-Hai, connecting Nasiriyeh and Kut-el-Amara, and therefore were not aware that the Turks could reinforce the garrison already collected at the head of the marshes, and were at that moment hastily doing so. This force, joined by numbers of Arabs and tribesmen, was even then moving down beside the marshes, following their edge, and taking advantage of the drier parts where the desert was not submerged, their objective being Shaiba, hardly ten miles to the south-west of Basra.

Information of their coming reached the Head-quarters of the division within a few hours, in fact, at the moment when Geoff and Philip were so eagerly discussing the situation, and the blare of bugles, and the stir in the camp, immediately gave occasion to Philip to demand once more of his friend: "What's up?"

"Remember that old Turk?" asked Geoff.

"Not 'arf!" grinned Philip.

"And the tale he gave us of the Turks at the head of the marshes?"

"Get along with it!" Philip told him.

"Well, the enemy are said to be now at Shaiba, within striking distance of Basra, and we are sending back to reinforce our troops there."

"Mahrattas?" asked Philip eagerly.

"Can't say," came the short answer. "You'll know precious soon. So long, Philip! I'm busy."

Geoff was, as a matter of fact, frantically busy; so busy, and so engaged in carrying messages, that he might, had he been inclined to arrogance, have suddenly formed the idea that he was the most important individual with the division. Dashing backwards and forwards on Sultan's back, he had hardly time to think of the Mahrattas, of Philip, or of anything else but his present duties; and it was not until some days later that the two met in the neighbourhood of Shaiba.

"Somewhere about twenty thousand Turks opposite us," Geoff was able to tell his friend, "and plenty of guns. We're moving out to attack them. The beggars are entrenched at the foot of a slope along a line about two miles in length, and their supports occupy the high ground behind them. Of course there are German officers with them."

That early morning, was repeated in the neighbourhood of Shaiba the action which the Indian Expeditionary Force had fought on its way to Kurnah; for the troops advanced over the open, there being not a vestige of cover, while the cavalry manœuvred towards the flank of the enemy; a guard of Arab horsemen, and amongst them the chief whose acquaintance we have already made, supporting the regular cavalry and making ready for a dash upon the enemy.

To hardened campaigners, as Geoff and Philip had now become, the roar of guns, the splash of shells, and the detonations about them made hardly any difference; they were as cool as cucumbers, and went on with their work as though nothing were happening. And gradually, as the hours flew on, Indian and British – those gallant troops who had invaded Mesopotamia – advanced upon the Turks by little rushes, advanced, and then lay down, throwing up a parapet of sand in front of them to give them some protection, while British guns thundered in the rear and plumped shells into the Turkish trenches. And then that long blast was repeated, that shout down the line of attacking troops, the shrill shriek of officers' whistles, and the charge which was to carry our men into the enemy's position had begun. With those shouts there mingled the shrieks of hundreds of Arab horsemen – those excited individuals manœuvring at that moment towards the flank of the Turkish trenches. Their shrill cries could be heard right across the field of battle, while their robed figures, their waving arms, and their gesticulations could be observed from the far distance. Waiting till the British troops had plunged into the Turkish trenches, and until the enemy were broken and were fleeing, the Arabs burst like a bolt towards the open, and, swinging in behind those trenches, went charging amongst the enemy, cutting them down, shouting as they rode, riding over the unfortunate subjects of the Sultan and those scheming German officers who had come to train the enemy. One moment there was Bedlam – shouts and shrieks, the rattle of rifles, the sharp splutter of machine-guns and the deeper roar of cannon – and the next there was almost complete silence, save for the distant calls of those fierce Arab horsemen wreaking vengeance upon the Turks.

"And now commences the march on Amara," Geoff was able to tell his friend a few days later. "We've got the Turks running, and I expect the G.O.C. will make the most of it. A sharp and rapid advance might allow us to capture Amara with little opposition, and then we should be firmly posted on the river and able to take up a defensive position."

As a matter of fact, the capture of Amara was, in its way, a startling and most dramatic affair, and proved, if proof were necessary, that the nerves of the Turks had been considerably shaken. For though the advance-guard of the Expeditionary Force advancing towards Amara was of but slender proportions, it met detachments of Turkish troops coming towards it, troops anxious to surrender, so that the town of Amara was seized without so much as a shot being fired, and was promptly occupied by the British.

But the task of the Expeditionary Force to Mesopotamia was not yet completed, not by a great deal, for now there came news of that channel, the Kut-el-Hai, leading from Kut-el-Amara to Nasiriyeh, and it became necessary to seize both points before our troops could have any security. Preparations were therefore made to attack both places, and, to the delight of Geoff and Philip, they were both detailed to accompany an expedition, designed to strike at Nasiriyeh, through those marshes which they had already penetrated.

Meanwhile, to bring our tale up to date, one needs to mention that, as the months had gone by, as that trench line had been dug firmly across Belgium and France, and had held up the advance of the Germans on Calais and Paris, the Russian line too had checked the enemy, had advanced across Poland and into Galicia, and was within an ace of invading Austria-Hungary. In the Caucasus, a Turkish army corps had been severely dealt with by the Tsar's forces called to that inhospitable region; while an ambitious if reckless attempt on the Suez Canal, on the part of Turkey, had met with dismal failure.

The taking of Amara, in fact, coincides with the period when Britain had recovered from the first shock of this sudden and unexpected conflict, when she was training those hundreds of thousands of volunteers who had answered the call of their country, and when, while fighting beside the French in France, she still had troops sufficient to attack the enemy elsewhere. Even as those gallant Indian and British troops with the Mesopotamia Force charged down upon the trenches at Shaiba, other British troops – men from England, from Australia, and New Zealand – were gathering in the neighbourhood of Egypt. Indeed, within a few days there occurred a landing on the Peninsula of Gallipoli, a most desperate and gallant undertaking, which launched Great Britain and France into a conflict the difficulty of which was stupendous, and the result of which cannot be said to have been altogether a failure, though it failed to gain for us the capture of those forts which line the approach to Constantinople. A conflict, in fact, abortive, as it proved, yet one which struck the Turks an exceedingly heavy blow, and set up a record of bravery and determination on the part of British and French which will never be exceeded.

Was there ever such an expedition as that which set out for Nasiriyeh?

"Queer, ain't it?" remarked Philip, on the point of embarking with his chum Geoff on board the steam-launch which they had captured from the enemy in the midst of the same marshes whither they were now bound. "Did you ever see such a collection of boats and fellows? and the navy look as though they meant to make a race of the business."

There was a string of bellums – the shallow light craft common to that part of Mesopotamia, and used by the natives for progress through the marshes – towing at the tail end of the steam-launch – bellums crammed with British soldiers and with Indians. There were motor-boats near at hand, pushing their busy way across the Shatt-el-Arab; there were shallow-draft steamers brought from India, cranky, dilapidated, rusty vessels, which looked as though they had done long service, and had arrived at a time when they were fit for the scrap-heap only, or to be relegated to long and continuous rest. As a matter of fact, many of these curious craft – long since abandoned as useless by their owners – had been brought across from India, surviving in a most extraordinary manner a voyage which might have been expected to smash them to pieces, and to shake their already quivering sides so severely that if they had been swamped, if the ocean had poured through many a crevice, it would have been a wonder to no one. And there they were, at anchor in the river, their decks packed with men of the navy – men in duck white or in khaki, grinning fellows, who shouted to their comrades of the army.

"Cheer oh, navy'll be in first!" they bellowed. "We're in for the Turkish stakes, and back ourselves to beat the army."

What a scene it was when the expedition set off at length! The lighter craft finding their way through the marshes, and steering an irregular course amongst the muddy islets, whilst the vessels drawing deeper water ploughed their way along the uncertain course of the Euphrates, and stemmed the gentle flood down which Phil and Geoff had steamed with their Turkish prisoner. Little tails of open boats trailed at the stern of every steamer, while not a few, manned by natives, with soldiers aboard them, were paddled into the marshes farther afield on the outskirts of this huge inundation. There were other troops wading knee-deep, all with the one objective – Nasiriyeh and the Turkish camp. Perhaps never before had such an amazingly curious, amphibious expedition been undertaken, and it is quite certain that never before had British and Indian sailors and soldiers enjoyed a thing more hugely.

"A regular sort of mud lark," Phil called out as the launch ran on a submerged bank of mud, and came to an abrupt halt, causing the bellum towing nearest to her to collide violently with her stern and capsize promptly. There were roars of laughter as the men fell into the water and got to their feet again, dripping, and standing there with the water hardly higher than their knees, grimacing and shaking themselves like dogs.

"All overboard!" cried Geoff, who was in command of the launch. "There's no use in trying to pole her off, for she's hard and fast. Overboard with you!"

Pulling his long boots off and his breeches higher up his legs, he was over the side in a twinkling, while the crew, enjoying the experience amazingly, followed him, Phil helping to set an example.

"Now, all together, boys!" shouted Geoff. "Pull her off! Pull her back! That's done it; she's moving!"

Not once, but half a dozen times, in the next two or three days, were they forced to extricate themselves from a similar sort of situation by similar methods. For, let us explain, there was no opportunity to take careful account of the obstacles before them, to steer a slow and cautious course, and to make a complete reconnaissance of the route they were to follow. Under ordinary conditions, with time at their disposal, Geoff would have steered his launch at a placid pace, and would have avoided enclosed waters where islands of mud abounded; but now, with this expedition, it was a case of each man for himself, of push ahead all the time. It was a race, in fact, a friendly race, between the army and the navy, each service vying with the other in its efforts to push onward, and each secretly determined to get to the goal before the other.

"If we don't look out we shall be running our heads into a hornets' nest," Geoff cried irritably, when, for the fifth time at least, he and his crew had had to leap into the shallow water and pull their vessel free of a mud-bank. "This sort of headlong course will not help us to beat the enemy, but will give them an enormous opportunity."

Whereat Phil grinned. He was one of those incautious, careless, happy-go-lucky sort of subalterns who never think of consequences, and who, perhaps for that very reason, so seldom come to grief. Perhaps it was a lucky star which always watched over Phil's progress, for, in any case, happy-go-lucky though he was, careless to an irritating degree, he yet had so far come through many a little adventure unscathed.

"Tremendous opportunity – yes!" he told Geoff. "But – but will they take it? Bet you they're already thinking of bolting; for don't forget, my boy, we've given them a pretty hard hammering. Besides, an expedition such as this is, spread out through the marshes, ain't so jolly easy to tackle. You could stop a portion, perhaps – say one flank, or the portion in the centre of the ground, or rather the water. What do you Head-quarters chaps call it? It would be called terrain if it was a question of land operations, and I don't happen to know the term under these conditions. But that's what might happen; one portion of our spread-out front might get stopped, but the others would push on like blazes! Cheer up, Geoff! It'll all come right, and you'll earn promotion yet."

It always ended like that with such a fellow as Phil, and Geoff, cautious and earnest young officer though he was, was forced to laugh uproariously, and join in Phil's merriment. And, after all, if caution had been thrown to the winds by all of them – which was far from being the case – caution on his part would hardly remedy the situation. Pushing on, therefore, and taking the most out of his steam-launch, thrashing her across every open strip of water till her bow waves washed almost aboard, and until the rope to which the bellums were attached was drawn like a bow-string, and the unfortunate individuals aboard those craft drenched with spray, he wriggled his way forward with other boats of the expedition, determined to be well in the van at the coming conflict. Then, as the dusk fell, and the boats tied up or anchored for the night, he selected a likely spot towards the edge of the marshes, and dropped anchor. Entering a bellum, he went off towards one of the bigger craft, aboard which the Staff conducting this extraordinary expedition were quartered.

"What's up?" asked Philip on his return, the inevitable question that young officer fired at his comrade. "Of course, everyone knows that we're jolly near this Nasiriyeh, so to-morrow there'll be something doing, eh?"

"Come over here," Geoff said, nodding towards the stern of the vessel.

"Secrets, eh?" grinned Philip, yet wonderfully eager to hear what Geoff had to say. "Now then, what's the business?"

"A forward move to-morrow, as you might expect, but before that a reconnaissance."

"A re – con – nais – sance! Jingo! Ain't that a mouthful? Put in simpler language, a sort of scouting expedition," smiled Philip, sucking furiously at a cigarette.

"Just that; an expedition by a small party to discover the actual site of the Turkish camp and to hear what they are saying."

"Oh! And – but you don't mean – George! That would be ripping!"

Geoff cooled his ardour most brutally. "What would be?" he asked curtly enough – coldly, in fact, knowing full well what would be the result of such action.

And, indeed, in a moment the hitherto eager and impulsive Phil was reduced to a condition almost of despair, was grumbling, was far less elated; and then, in the dim light which still existed, he caught just a glimpse of Geoff's bantering smile, and gripped him by the shoulder.

"So you're pulling my leg, eh? It – it – There's a job for us to do? Something special?"

"There is for me. I have orders to make my way forward as quickly as possible, and learn all that I can of the enemy. Of course, if you cared – "

"Cared!" Phil almost shouted, though Geoff warned him instantly to subdue his tone. For let us explain that if, during the first stage of this expedition, the rush and hurry and scurry of the navy and army had been accompanied by cheery calls, by shouts and laughter, by whistling and singing for some hours, now, at least, silence had been enjoined upon every man in the marshes. Orders were given by signs, men whispered to one another, while not an unnecessary shout came from the vessels of the expedition.

"You'll call the enemy down on us," said Geoff severely. "Of course you'll come. Everyone knows that, I more than anyone. We'll take Esbul with us to paddle the bellum, and with a little luck and a little care I think we shall be able to discover something. You see, Phil, we have, as it were, a better chance than the other fellows, for we've been in these marshes before, and know quite a heap about them."

Standing aboard the steam-launch, now that darkness had settled down over the River Euphrates and the stagnant marshes stretched out to the south of it, one would have found it difficult indeed, on this particular night, to imagine that there were other inhabitants of this inundated area. Broken up as the surface of the water was, by innumerable muddy islands, by heaped-up patches of sand, and by banks of reeds, it was difficult enough even in the daytime to catch a full view of any other vessel, and now that the night had fallen and hidden the ships entirely not one was to be seen, though here and there, in fifty odd places, perhaps, the ruddy glow of pipes could be seen as the men smoked tranquilly. A gentle hum rose, too, above the water and the islets – the hum of voices of men of the expedition, men who talked in undertones, who giggled and laughed and joked only just above a whisper, and who, eager for the success of the morrow and for the defeat of the enemy, implicitly obeyed the orders which had been issued.

Geoff stripped off his service-coat and put his belt round his shoulder, thus raising his revolver well above the water. Pulling off his long boots, he donned a pair of tennis shoes – the only change he had from the heavy pair he wore during the daytime – then, followed by Phil, he stepped into a bellum, which had been drawn alongside the steam-launch, and, pushing away from her, at once felt the thrust of Esbul's paddle.

"Directly ahead!" he told the Armenian; "and don't stop unless we are brought up by a mud-bank, or unless I snap my fingers."

It was uncannily still all round them, once they had got some two hundred yards from the somewhat irregular position taken up by the expeditionary vessels, and banks of reeds and columns of mist seemed to spring up out of the darkness at them, to hover round them, and to settle right over them in the most ghostly and inexplicable manner. Once Geoff snapped his fingers with unexpected suddenness, and gripped Phil by the wrist to enjoin silence upon him.

"Eh?" asked that young officer rather breathlessly a few moments later.

"Thought I saw something," said Geoff.

"So did I. I thought I saw somebody or something half an hour ago. I've thought it every moment since we left the steam-launch. Bogies, Geoff?"