Taking this port 160km (100 miles) north of Medina was a tremendous strategic victory for the Arab cause. It placed a large force effectively behind the Ottoman garrison at Medina, between them and the rest of the Ottoman Army. A stretch of 320km (200 miles) of their sole supply line, the Hedjaz railway, now lay open to Arab attack. With this life-line under threat, the Ottomans were forced onto the defensive, and the Arabs could take the initiative. Raids began on the Hedjaz railway; Bimbashi Garland had laid the first mine at a point 240km (150 miles) south-east of Wejh on the night of 12/13 February, while Lawrence was back in Cairo.180
The question now loomed as to what should be done next. With the revolt taking hold and beginning to spread outside the immediate area of Medina and Mecca, the leaders found themselves at a series of crossroads regarding the future conduct of the campaign, and even its ultimate goals. By moving to the north, the Arabs were now within easy range of the tribes of the Hedjaz and northern Arabia, and of those of Syria. Raising and then uniting these tribes would be hard work; an intricate web of blood feuds, rivalries and quarrels flowed between them, while a recent proclamation by the Sharif had managed to alienate many. In October 1916 he had been declared King of the Arab Nation at Mecca. The announcement threw the British government into a panic, as it did the French. The title implied sovereignty over vast areas well outside the confines of the Arab Peninsula, including Syria. It also threw many of the fearsomely independent Arab tribes into uproar, and some refused to recognise the title. Abdul Aziz Ibn Saud, for example, was a strong rival of the Sharif and controlled the Nejd region of central Arabia. He refused to recognise the Sharif’s new title, and although the British managed to maintain strong links with the sheikh, any hopes of uniting the Sharifian and Saudi forces were destroyed. After much debate, the British official response was to recognise the Sharif as King of the Hedjaz, a title that clearly stated where they saw the limits of the revolt as being.181
While Ibn Saud refused to actively join the revolt under the Sharif’s leadership, other of the great sheikhs even worked against it. Ibn Rashid, the Emir of Hail, ruled an area to the north of the Nejd, and had been a close ally of the Ottomans since the 1890s. His forces worked to keep the Ottomans in Medina supplied, although these efforts ended in April 1917 when a large convoy was ambushed near Hanakiye by the pro-Sharifian Emir of Zeid. Four mountain guns, over 3,000 fully laden camels, over 3,000 sheep, and hundreds of prisoners were taken, after which Ibn Rashid withdrew his forces to join the Ottoman garrison at Madain Salih, on the railway 320km (200 miles) north of Medina. Here he gradually lost both prestige and support, and turned from a source of supplies into a drain on already scant Ottoman resources.182
However, there was enough support being offered to the Sharifians by tribes to the north to encourage plans for expansion in that direction, and this drew greater international attention to the revolt. The French had been monitoring progress, and had sent small numbers of troops and advisors to assist the Arabs, but the British had worked hard to keep them at a distance. Now that Damascus lay within the possible scope of the revolt, an area that the French had already, under the Sykes–Picot agreement, ear-marked for their own occupation, that interest was renewed. Lawrence had returned to Cairo after the capture of Wejh, and was there accosted by Edouard Brémond, the Chief of the French Military Mission to the Hedjaz. Brémond wanted to land an Anglo-French force at Aqaba, on the tip of the eastern fork of the Red Sea, and then advancing inland to take Ma’an, where a garrison of 6,000 Ottomans stood astride the railway. Lawrence opposed the idea on two counts. Firstly, Aqaba stood between high cliffs that were heavily defended against attack from the sea, and secondly, by placing an Anglo-French armed force at Ma’an the revolt would be blocked from moving further north, and he suspected that this containment of the Arabs was the true purpose of the French. Rebuffed, Brémond nevertheless travelled to Arabia to visit Feisal, who also refused to countenance the idea, although small numbers of French Algerian troops continued to serve with the Arabs. What Feisal did instead, at the end of February, was to ask Cairo formally for Lawrence to be returned to him as liaison officer.183
This Lawrence was happy to do. He had already identified Feisal as the most promising Arab commander, from the British point of view, being open to outside aid and advice, with an aggressive streak (although equally prone to bouts of doubt, which Lawrence felt he could handle), and a conviction that the revolt should move as far north as it could to include the fullest possible amount of the Arab world. The British High Command was also happy for a man with proven influence over Feisal to return to the field. Intelligence had reported that the Ottomans were considering pulling their garrison out of Medina. Between the garrison and the Hedjaz Expeditionary Force, guarding the railway and keeping communications open, somewhere over 15,000 Ottoman troops were tied up by their decision to maintain a presence in the holy city. For General Murray, gathering his forces to attack Gaza, the sudden appearance of this many Ottoman troops either on his open right flank, or even behind Gaza itself, was a dangerous prospect. For the British it was far preferable to keep these troops pinned down in a strategic dead-end, where the Ottomans could not make any serious gains; indeed, if the situation was handled correctly, even more Ottoman troops could be sucked in. Therefore it was imperative that everything should be done to make withdrawal as difficult as possible, while at the same time easing the direct pressure on the Medina garrison. Sending back to Arabia a man with proven influence over at least one of the Arab leaders was an excellent idea.
Lawrence talked Feisal into keeping his focus on moving north, in part by disclosing the existence and basics of the Sykes-Picot agreement. The only way to prevent the French from taking Damascus and Syria in any post-war arrangements would be for the Arabs to physically move north and seize those areas for themselves. Having convinced Feisal, Lawrence set out to visit Abdullah at his camp in Wadi Ais, in order to attempt to talk him around as well. The journey would involve crossing the railway, which could be attacked on the way.
It took five days to reach Abdullah’s camp, and it was a nightmarish journey for Lawrence, who fell ill on the way. Boils and dysentery plagued him to the extent that, after reaching his destination on 15 March 1917, he spent ten days prostrate in his tent. Abdullah was deeply suspicious of all European attempts to meddle in Arabian affairs, and any attempts to persuade him to bring his force north failed, while any urging to attack the railway was wasted. His men had already destroyed a railway bridge 113km (70 miles) north of Medina a few weeks earlier.184 With that part of his mission a failure, a still weakened and sickly Lawrence turned his party for home on 26 March. He was joined by Sharif Shakir and some men from his Utaybah tribe and a single field gun. Two days later they arrived near the station of Abu an Naam, a typical post consisting of a water tower, the station buildings, and a small garrisoned fort, made of barracks and storerooms built around a central courtyard, with a parapet along their roofs. The garrisons of these posts were usually quite small, although they were generally active. Stations were 21km (13 miles) apart, and parties from each fort patrolled to the halfway points to the next station to the north and south each day. At Abu an Naam, though, extra tents stood around a nearby mosque, enough for an estimated 300 Ottoman soldiers. This was too strong a force for the Arabs to attack directly, so instead mines were laid on the rails to the south and the telegraph wires were cut. At dawn, the field gun opened fire on the station, damaging the buildings and the water tower and causing casualties among the troops. Soon after, a train in the station tried to escape, but hit the mine. However, the Arab machine-gunners left to cover the site had disappeared in the night, and the crew were able to edge the locomotive back onto the tracks and make good their escape. While not a complete success, Lawrence reckoned they had caused about seventy casualties and closed the line for three days.185
Lawrence set another mine – which initially failed to explode – and blew up a bridge and around 200 rails o
n the rest of the journey home to Wejh. His mission had not been a success; Abdullah had refused to come north and instead remained focused on Medina, and his attacks on the railway had been fairly small affairs. However, the question of preventing the withdrawal of the Medina garrison soon became moot. Although orders had been sent to the garrison to evacuate, the military commander, Fakhreddin (‘Fakhri’) Pasha, and the new Emir of Mecca (Constantinople had, understandably, publicly renounced Hussein), Sharif Ali Haider, protested the order vociferously, believing that the symbolic and religious importance of Medina outweighed any military effort needed to maintain the garrison. Even before Lawrence had set out to see Abdullah, the order to withdraw had been rescinded.186 On the other hand, the Arab forces in the field around Medina remained incapable of taking the city by force.
While the flap over Medina had ultimately been a non-event, it had allowed Lawrence time to assess the ability of the Arabs for field operations, and it was during this time that he formed his doctrine for using the tribesmen for guerrilla raids. The Arabs could not face heavy weapons fire or even massed infantry, especially not in prepared defensive positions. But they could do valuable work in hit-and-run raiding, stinging and hurting the Ottomans in small actions along a considerable frontage before disappearing back into the desert, and thus tying down large numbers of regular troops and substantial resources in defending the railway. Already Bimbashi Garland and Lieutenant Colonel Stewart Newcombe were busy leading bands attacking the railway, as were the Arab forces further south. Other British officers were soon to arrive to help with the raids, while still more worked coordinating logistics and organising the forces at Wejh, where British troops, including armoured cars, were beginning to arrive, and where the flight from No. 14 Squadron RFC had moved from Yanbu. Although the year had started on a slightly shaky note, the tools needed to turn the Arabs into a formidable fighting force were now at hand.
But the question as to where that force should be directed remained. For several months discussions dragged on, but increasingly Feisal, under Lawrence’s influence, was preparing to break with the pattern on which the British, French, and even his father and brothers, were intent. In mid May Lawrence embarked on the first stage of a journey that, he hoped, would lead to delivering Aqaba into Arab hands. With him were Sharif Nasir, brother of the Emir of Medina and a man who had already been scouting and raiding to the north, and more importantly Auda Abu Tayyi, whose Howaytat tribe owned large swathes of the land through which they were about to travel, and who had a fearsome reputation as a warrior, cut-throat and bandit.187 Neither Lawrence nor Feisal let Colonel Cyril Wilson, Britain’s political officer with the Arabs, know of their plans. While he may well have sympathised, Wilson would have had to have told Cairo, who would not. Britain had already identified Aqaba as an important spot for themselves to occupy after the war, to help secure the approaches to the Suez Canal.188
It would, by any stretch of the imagination, be a hard march to reach Aqaba. None of the Bedouin currently serving the revolt would move so far north out of their tribal lands, and so Lawrence, Nasir and Auda had, apart from servants, just seventeen men with them, mercenaries from the Agayl tribe. They would ride north-east, across the railway and deep enough inland to mislead any Ottoman spies as to their intentions, before sweeping back down on Aqaba. This circular route would also allow the group to raise supporters and troops on the way, for which purpose they carried a considerable amount of gold. This would be the only heavy baggage they would take, though. The route would be long and harsh, including a five-day trek across the waterless wasteland known as al-Houl (‘The Terror’), and so no machine guns, artillery or baggage train could be taken.
The Terror lived up to its name. ‘We, ourselves, felt tiny in it, and our urgent progress across its immensity was a stillness or immobility of futile effort,’189 Lawrence wrote later about marching:
Over monotonous, glittering sand; and over those worse stretches, ‘Giaan’, of polished mud, nearly as white and smooth as laid paper, and often whole miles square. They blazed back the sun into our faces with glassy vigour, so we rode with its light raining direct arrows upon our heads, and its reflection glancing up through our inadequate eyelids.190
Eventually the party reached the far side, although Lawrence at one point had to turn back to rescue an Arab who had fallen from his camel, and for which act Auda roundly berated him for being so foolish.191 Fresh water was found in the Wadi Sirhan, and for several days the party moved north down the wadi, regaining their strength and looking for Howaytat camps. Along the way various members of the party rode off to search the surrounding area and visit and talk to different groups to raise support. After finally settling at Nabk, Lawrence himself left the camp on 5 June to scout north to Damascus. His intention was to gain intelligence on both the Arab and the Ottoman situations in eastern Syria, although he took the opportunity to strike at the railway on the way. On a loop of over 885km (550 miles), he destroyed a railway bridge and met with tribal leaders, returning to Nabk on 18 June 1917.192 A second, shorter, trip ended with a failed attack on a railway station at Atwi, but, with 700 Arabs now under arms, everything was set to begin the operations against Aqaba.
To start with, a force of Howaytat under Sheikh Gasim Abu Daumayk attacked the Ottoman force at Fuweilah, which guarded the road south-west from Ma’an through the Jabal al Batra hills and into the Wadi Itm, which in turn led to Aqaba. The attack initially went badly, but then an Ottoman counter-attack struck the Arab camp and a dozen women and children were killed. Enraged, the Arabs renewed their attack, taking the fort and killing all inside. With the road now open, Lawrence, Nasir and Auda struck at the railway to the east, destroying ten bridges in the hope of distracting the Ottomans from the actions to the west. This part of the plan failed, and a battalion of 460 Ottoman troops, from the 178th (OT) Regiment, was dispatched from Ma’an to recapture Fuweilah and reopen the road to Aqaba, which they did before camping outside the fort. By chance, this camp was only 3.2km (2 miles) from Aba al Lissan, where the two Arab forces were to rendezvous after their raids. At dawn on 2 July, the reunited Arab forces attacked.
The Ottoman battalion was taken by surprise, but soon rallied and took up defensive positions. The Arabs, scattered in a loose cordon around the Ottomans, kept up a hot fire all day, but this was exactly the kind of pitched battle that Lawrence had previously decided that the Arabs should avoid. Thankfully for the Arabs, the Ottoman artillery rapidly ran out of ammunition, but the small arms fire was still enough to keep the attackers pinned down, unable to move as they lay under the hot summer sun all day. Lawrence and many others had to at least temporarily withdraw from the firing line suffering from the heat. But the Ottoman troops were just as pinned down, unable to move, and one side or the other would need to make a radical move to break the deadlock. This came late in the day, after Auda asked Lawrence of his opinion of his tribesmen, and Lawrence replied that ‘they shoot a lot and hit little’. Enraged by the insult to his men’s abilities, Auda gathered fifty of them and charged down the slope towards the enemy. Behind him, Nasir and Lawrence quickly gathered a further 400 men and followed in a pell-mell rush into the Ottoman positions. In the process, Lawrence accidentally shot his camel in the back of the head, and by the time he recovered his senses from the tumble it was all over. Some 160 Ottomans had been killed, and 300 captured.
Over the next four days, the Arab forces advanced down the Wadi Itm, clearing out a series of Ottoman outposts along the way. The first, the telegraph station at Quwayrah, surrendered without a fight, while the second, at Khadra, had to be stormed. The others between there and the main Aqaba defences, at the mouth of the Wadi above the port, were abandoned. The whole time the Arab forces were swelled by more and more tribesmen, attracted by success and the scent of plunder. According to Lawrence, his force doubled by the time they reached Aqaba on 5 July, and doubled again by the time they could persuade the garrison to surrender the following day. On 6 July 1917
the Arabs occupied Aqaba, just 275km (170 miles) south of the British Army outside Gaza, and 1,125km (700 miles) north of Medina.193
That night, Stewart Newcombe and Captain Henry Hogarth led a series of raids along the railway either side of Al Ula, about 320km (200 miles) north of Medina. They led a mixed force of Arabs, Egyptian and Indian soldiers, French Algerian troops, and, perhaps most surprisingly of all, the newly arrived Ja’far al-Askari. This Arab officer had been in the Ottoman Army and had led the Senussi for the bulk of their campaign against the British, before being captured. As a prisoner, he had seen reports of Djemal Pasha’s execution of Arab nationalists in Syria, and had volunteered to join the Arab Revolt. That night, they destroyed some 4.8km (3 miles) of rails, and made further attacks on the nights of 8 and 10 July. Al Ula itself was not attacked, although a small flight from No. 14 Squadron RFC bombed the station on 11, 12 and 16 July.194
Meanwhile, Lawrence had struck off north to carry the good news to Cairo. Whatever concerns there may have been about post-war politics were rapidly overcome once the fait accompli was presented. Lawrence arrived on 10 July, and met with Gilbert Clayton, head of the Arab Bureau. Just two days later, he was in front of General Sir Edmund Allenby, who had arrived two weeks earlier to replace General Murray. Taking time out of what must have been an extremely busy schedule, Allenby listened to all that Lawrence had to say, and promised to give his report full consideration. After another two weeks in Cairo, Lawrence returned to Arabia with a new plan, worked out by himself and Allenby. Feisal’s forces would now become a distinctive group, the Northern Army, effectively an army corps separate from the other Arab forces. The base at Wejh would be closed and Aqaba would become the new base of operations (supplies had begun to arrive by sea as early as 13 July), and the whole force would become northern-facing. Fresh troops and resources were quick to arrive, include Ja’far to train and lead a small cadre of regular Arab troops. This force contained small numbers of other former Ottoman prisoners of war, including Nuri Bey, another Ottoman officer who had led the Senussi. Lawrence was to write to Clayton that Ja’far was:
From Gaza to Jerusalem Page 13
