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James Stejskal - Masters of Mayhem: Lawrence of Arabia and the British Military Mission to the Hejaz

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Book:
Masters of Mayhem: Lawrence of Arabia and the British Military Mission to the Hejaz
Author:
James Stejskal
Publisher:
Casemate Publishers
Genre:
Books / History
Year:
2018
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Shortlisted for the Military History Monthly Book of the Year Award 2018 (winner announced February 2019)

Striking where the enemy is weakest and melting away into the darkness before he can react. Never confronting a stronger force directly, but willing to use audacity and surprise to confound and demoralize an opponent. Operations driven by good intelligence, area knowledge, mobility, speed, firepower, and detailed planning and executed by a few specialists with indigenous warriors - this is unconventional warfare.
T. E. Lawrence was one of the earliest practitioners of modern unconventional warfare. His tactics and strategies were used by men like Mao and Giap in their wars of liberation. Both kept Lawrences Seven Pillars of Wisdom close at hand. This book looks at the creation of the HEDGEHOG force, the formation of armoured car sections and other units, and focuses the Hejaz Operations Staff, the Allied officers and men who took Lawrences idea and prosecuted it against the Ottoman Turkish army assisting Field Marshal Allenby to achieve victory in 1918.
Stejskal concludes with an examination of how HEDGEHOG has influenced special operations and unconventional warfare, including Field Marshal Wavell, the Long Range Desert Group, and David Stirlings SAS

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MASTERS OF MAYHEM

Lawrence of Arabia and the British Military Mission to the Hejaz

JAMES STEJSKAL

Masters of Mayhem Lawrence of Arabia and the British Military Mission to the Hejaz - image 2

Philadelphia & Oxford

Published in Great Britain and the United States of America in 2018 by

CASEMATE PUBLISHERS

1950 Lawrence Road, Havertown, PA 19083, US

and

The Old Music Hall, 106108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JE, UK

Hardback Edition: ISBN 978-1-61200-574-4

Digital Edition: ISBN 978-1-61200-452-5

Digital Edition: ISBN 978-1-612005-75-1(epub)

Kindle Edition: ISBN 978-1-612005-75-1(mobi)

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission from the publisher in writing.

For a complete list of Casemate titles, please contact:

CASEMATE PUBLISHERS (US)

Telephone (610) 853-9131

Fax (610) 853-9146

Email:

www.casematepublishers.com

CASEMATE PUBLISHERS (UK)

Telephone (01865) 241249

Email:

www.casematepublishers.co.uk

Every effort has been made to trace the copyright holders and obtain permission to reproduce the materials reproduced in this book. In the event of any oversight, please contact the Publishers.

Front cover image : The Hejaz Armoured Car Section and RFA 10-Pounder Motor Section in Wadi Rum. MarApril 1917. (Harry Chase, Photographer, James A. Cannavino Library, Archives & Special Collections, Marist College, USA)

Back cover image: Buxton, Brodie, Marshall, Stirling, in mufti, head out to reconnoitre Mudowarra in one of the RFA Talbots. (Edward Metcalf Collection, The Huntington Library, San Marino, California.)

To those who went before us

and those yet to begin the journey.

They were not soldiers, but pilgrims, intent always to go the little farther.

T. E. LAWRENCE AFTER JAMES ELROY FLECKER

Contents

Authors Note

It has been one hundred years since the Great War of 191418 took place. Although recent events have brought some place names back into focus, many of the locations and borders mentioned in the book have long ago changed or been forgotten. So too, have the geopolitical players changed. Both the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Ottoman Empire disappeared after the war to be replaced by new states.

The Ottoman Empire was founded by the Osmanli Dynasty circa 1299 and was built by the Turkman peoples. But the Ottoman Empire comprised a vast territory and incorporated many of its subject peoples into its government and army, including the Kurds and the Arabs.

In this work I refer both to the Ottoman Empire, its proper name, as well as the more commonly used name of Turkey. As Edward Erickson pointed out in his book Ordered to Die , the enemies of the Ottoman Empire usually referred to their opponent as Turks .

Accordingly, I also refer to the Ottoman Army as the Turkish Army, whether its units and soldiers were of Turkish, Arab, or Circassian origin.

My thanks go out to Valerie Gilman who was of great assistance sharing the stories and photos of Leofric Gilman, John Ansley and his staff at Marist College, Stephen Tabor and his staff at the Huntington Library, Katrina DiMuro and Lianne Smith at Kings College London Archives, as well as the invisible people behind the online archives at Kew (The National Archives), and the British Library.

I am also indebted to fellow historians Philip Walker, Joe Berton, Charles Eilers, and Kerry Webber; as well as conflict-archaeologists John Winterburn (and John Pascoe) and Neil Faulkner for their help. The people at Casemate Publishers in Oxford including Ruth Sheppard, Clare Litt, Tom Bonnington, Isobel Nettleton, and Katie Allen deserve a great deal of credit for supporting this project.

Most of all, this book would never have been possible without the help, patience, and counsel of my wife and best friend, Wanda.

Introduction

Surveyor-Generals Office, Cairo 1914

A shadow momentarily blocked the light streaming in through the doorframe. Ernest Dowson looked up to see the outline of a diminutive man in a rumpled uniform. He couldnt tell if it was regulation uniform or just a khaki suit, but what he could divine was the man seemed half amused, half embarrassed to be interrupting the operations of the office. Dowson would later remember that impetuous grin as well as the man himself. At that moment, however, he just thought, Whoever can this extraordinary pipsqueak be?

The man turned out to be Thomas Edward Lawrence. He was part of a team enlisted by the British government to survey the area in anticipation of possible, future enemy action against Egypt. Lawrence had spent much time in the region and spoke Arabic and several dialects used by the local populace.

In 1909, he made a personal pilgrimage to Palestine and Syria to survey Crusader castles. He used the notes and sketches he wrote and drew on that trip to write a thesis for his final history examinations at Oxford University. He returned in 1911 to work on the British Museums archaeological excavations at Carchemish, Syria, under the tutelage of David Hogarth. During his last trip to Carchemish, he had worked with C. Leonard Woolley, who described Lawrence as impish and disdainful of work he felt could be done differently and more efficiently. What impressed Woolley was Lawrences ability to work with the locals on the dig. His language skills were buttressed by his empathy for the indigenous peoples. Sometimes, at the expense of the dig, he would sit for hours with the workers and talk about customs or language.

Lawrences first foray into intelligence work began shortly thereafter. In December 1913, Captain Stewart Francis Newcombe, Royal Engineers, was tasked to conduct a survey of Palestine near Beersheba, an area that was mostly unknown to British mapmakers. Newcombe was an experienced military engineer and adventurer and had already surveyed railway routes in Abyssinia, Sudan and Egypt. Ostensibly, the survey was for archaeological purposes and conducted under the auspices of the Palestinian Exploration Fund (PEF) in the northern Sinai and southern Negev deserts. In reality, however, the survey was to service War Office needs for up-to-date maps of the region; they would be critical to the defence of the Suez Canal. The inclusion of Woolley and Lawrence in the expedition lent a fig-leaf of cover that actually resulted in a well-respected study called The Wilderness of Zin , published by the PEF as its annual for 1914/15. Lawrence wrote in a letter home that they (he and Woolley) were meant to be red herrings for what was basically a political job.

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