FOOTNOTES:

AT"AT 1,000 FEET." BOMBS BURSTING N.W. OF TALE.(By permission of the Air Ministry.)

"AT 1,000 FEET." BOMBS BURSTING N.W. OF TALE.(By permission of the Air Ministry.)

"AT 1,000 FEET." BOMBS BURSTING N.W. OF TALE.

(By permission of the Air Ministry.)

Swish—whew-w-w bang! The observer above had pulled the lever, and the first bomb burst in Medishe.The magic of the Mad Mullah, that had for so long held his followers together, was useless against the magic of the bird-men above. This was the first bomb that broke the dervish cause, for, though it did not kill the Mullah, it came so near doing so that the old villain was thoroughly demoralised, and completely lost his head. His nephew, the Amir Abdillai, a powerful dervish, was killed by his side, and his Madness's clothes catching fire, he turned and ran for his life to the funk-holes he had prepared in the caves of a ravine. From these he did not reappear until he fled, a few hours later, on learning that the Camel Corps had arrived at Jidali, a thoroughly broken and discredited man.

On the 22nd, the bulk of the dervish troops were frustrated in an attempt to get away their camels loaded with their worldly goods, by the reappearance of the aeroplanes, which put in some excellent work with the machine guns. It was then that the Mullah adopted the policy of every man for himself, and showed the others how to do it.

His baggage camels, loaded with personal effects and two Maxim guns captured from the British in past wars, he decided should follow on behind, whilst he made his way South with some of his wives and female relations, and a party of mounted fighting men. Among the latter was a man called Ibrahim, his wife and sister.

As the party left the hills at night for the open plateau, Ibrahim slipped off his pony, permitted his wife to pass, but as his sister rode up, silently pressed her big toe. The lady dismounted from her pony, allowing the cavalcade to move on.

Ibrahim, and his sister, reported to Colonel Summers that the Mullah had gone.

The lady informed me that the Mullah had changed his mind about the Maxim guns and had sent instructions that they were to be hidden in a cave at Helas, where they were later discovered by Somali scouts and handed to the O.C. King's African Rifles. It was discovered that one of these was the identical gun captured from the regiment when Colonel Plunkett met with disaster in 1906. Thus did Time bring revenge, and I was proud that my old regiment, fourteen years later, was there to receive back one of the very few guns it had lost in action.

On the 3rd February, Captain Cross returned from Medishe, bringing in as loot five hundred and twenty-two rifles and much native equipment and stores. As I had flown from El-dur-Elan to Al Afwenia I had been obliged to leave my camp equipment behind, and was overjoyed to find, amongst the latter, several pots, two good frying-pans and a tea kettle. There was also, amongst other things, a sextant marked with an R.N. officer'sname; part of the diary of the German, Emil Kirsch, who, in 1916, was sent by Lij Yassu, the fugitive ex-king of Abyssinia, to repair the Mullah's machine guns and rifles. Swords, revolvers, double-barrelled pistols, one of which bore the name of a well-known gunmaker in the Strand; every make of rifle known in Europe was there for the curio-hunter to annex. Cross reported that Medishe had been evacuated hurriedly, and there was no doubt that the dervishes were thoroughly demoralised. He was much impressed by the strength of the place, the excellent buildings and the general sanitary arrangements. A dam had been built across the stream, and an excellent garden had been laid out. There was no doubt about it, he stated, that the Mullah was a thoroughly capable man.

Before leaving Medishe the Grenadiers razed the forts to the ground with gun cotton. The fort at Jidali, however, was less easy to dispose of, and successfully resisted several attempts to blow it up. The stone walls were nine feet thick, solidly built, and it would have required heavy artillery to have made much impression upon it. The roof, the weakest part of the structure, successfully withstood the Stokes bombs aimed at it by the Camel Corps. Jidali Fort is similar to all other forts built by the Mullah. Inside it is a perfect rabbit warren among which it would have been highly dangerous tothe throwers themselves had hand-grenades been used.

In one of the forts at Medishe Cross found a particularly gruesome sight, and typical of the methods of the Mad Mullah. At the end of a rope, suspended from the roof over a slow fire, hung by the waist, were the remains of a dervish who had thus been done to death for some petty crime or neglect of duty.

Shortly after Cross's return Ibrahim's wife arrived. On learning of her husband's defection the dervishes had stripped and beaten her, but sighting the planes, had abandoned her to die. She was followed by a stream of dervish women and children who stated that the men refused to give them food, and had ordered them to shift for themselves. Amongst them were many slave women dragging at their ankles heavy chains with weights attached. They were soon set free, and though our commissariat arrangements were strained to breaking point we did the best we could for them, and all the women were cared for.

Meanwhile on the 2nd of February the King's African Rifles arrived at Jidali from Baran. This latter fort had put up a stiff fight. Finding that the loopholes of the fort restricted the line of fire to the front, and did not allow for angle fire, the officer commanding had advanced on each side at an angle,suffering no serious casualties. For two days the beleaguered garrison held out under a heavy fire from Stokes guns, which dropped their bombs on the roof, though making no impression whatever. All loopholes, and the parapets, were commanded by the K.A.R. machine guns. Finding that the firing from the fort had weakened a party was pushed up to the door, against which a case of gun cotton was exploded, without effect. At last, apparently only one of the defenders was left alive, and the besiegers, who had drawn in, demanded his surrender, assuring him his life was safe.

"I shall surrender," he answered.

"Then throw your rifle and belt over the walls," he was ordered.

The dervish complied, but as an askari ran up to collect it, seized another rifle and shot the soldier through the back.

And that was the end of Baran. Clean fighters, enraged by this act of treachery, and as one man, the K.A.R. sprang to their feet, and no door built by the hand of man could deny them their revenge.

It was found later that, though the firing from inside the fort had slackened, it was not owing to the casualties suffered by the dervishes from direct hits. The concussion of the exploding Stokes bombs on the roof had stunned the defenders, who, though treacherous murderers of women and of littlechildren, apostles of the doctrine of frightfulness as we understand them, yet proved themselves, in this little fight, to be brave men.

After the arrival of the K.A.R., at Jidali, the dismounted column left on its return march. It was obvious that the escarpment above Las Khorai—the plateau around Jidali stretching far to the South which holds the best grazing grounds in Somaliland—was free of dervishes, and once more, after many years, accessible to the poor wretches of friendlies who had been driven forth like pariahs from their beloved haunts by that robber-tiger, Hassan Abdullah, the Mad Mullah. It is indeed a splendid country for the pastoralist, in spite of the burning days and the bitterly cold nights—nights during which the hardiest European, covered by three or four good blankets, finds it hard to keep warm.

Meanwhile, we learned from fugitives that the Mullahs baggage had been captured: that the aeroplanes had harassed his fleeing stock, which ran at last into a transport column, under Captain Allden, at Eil Der, and was ignominiously captured after a sharp fight. Tale the wretched old man had succeeded in entering, but the Camel Corps was hard on his heels, and the friendlies, under Captain Gibb, were at the gates.

JIDJIDALI FORT FROM THE GROUND.(By permission of the Air Ministry.)

JIDALI FORT FROM THE GROUND.(By permission of the Air Ministry.)

JIDALI FORT FROM THE GROUND.

(By permission of the Air Ministry.)

From the wireless we learned, by interceptedmessages, that Tale had been attacked by the airmen, who reported it as a very strongly fortified centre, consisting of one very large and five other forts encircling the village, which was composed of native gurgis (Somal tents or wigwams) and a large number of huts. Letters and messages were dropped in its vicinity. Previously a machine had spotted about one hundred ponies and dervishes at Daringahiye, near Al Afweina, believed to belong to the Mullah's party, and, coming down to one hundred feet above, had scattered them in all directions. The country being intersected with deep nullahs favoured small parties of fugitives in their attempt to escape, but no large body of men could hope to get away unharassed.

We, who had seen Medishe, realised that it was now only a question of days before the "show" would be over, and when, on the 12th February, I entered Al Afweina I surmised correctly that the work concerning myself mostly was that of winding up the transport, and getting rid of the large dumps of stores collected there, and at El-dur-Elan. A few days later I received the necessary orders to proceed with this clearing up.

Meanwhile, to return to the Somaliland Camel Corps and the friendlies, the latter of whom were watching the gates of Tale, where the Mullah was now definitely located. On the night of the 5/6thFebruary, in a fight outside the walls, Haji Sudi and Ibrahim Boghl, two of the dervish leaders, right-hand men of the Mullah, were killed. No serious attack was made on the forts by our mounted men, as, had they been seriously held, the Government troops must have suffered heavy casualties; a most serious matter in a country like Somaliland, owing to the lack of conveniences and difficulty of transport.

The Camel Corps policy was to play a waiting game, and on Monday, the 9th February, when it was some miles away at a water hole, the dervishes, seizing their opportunity, launched an attack on the friendlies watching them. During the fighting the Mullah escaped, and shortly before the Camel Corps arrived on the scene, by which time it was too dark to follow on his tracks. Dismounted scouts were sent out and next morning, at dawn, the mounted troops picking up the tracks from the friendlies some four or five miles on, turned North East towards Lower Halin, which they passed, and arrived, on Tuesday evening, at an unknown well some forty-eight miles from their starting point. Starting early on Wednesday they arrived, at three-forty-five p.m., at Bihan on a hot scent, having captured en route the Mullah's wives, children and near relatives, during a sharp running fight with the escort of thirty mounted men, all of whom werekilled, their ponies and rifles being captured. It had been ascertained at Halin, on the previous day, that a party of dervishes had branched off from the main body; the Camel Corps therefore detached a party of fifteen rifles in pursuit.

On Thursday, having no information of the Mullah, a strong reconnaissance was made towards Gerrowei, and a patrol sent out to the South East. This latter party reported a body of dervishes advancing on Gerrowei; so the Camel Corps, leaving twenty rifles at Bihan, moved quickly out, and coming up with the dervishes in broken ground North of Gerrowei, attacked at once. The mounted dervishes fled; the footmen showed fight, and were galloped down by a pony company who were joined by the reconnoitring party from Gerrowei. The enemy horsemen were pursued, rounded up, and their horses captured, although some of the riders succeeded in escaping on foot. But few of the footmen, who broke at the first charge, escaped.

Shortly afterwards, before midday, a small party of enemy horsemen, with a few camels, moving towards the Haud were reported by scouts, so leaving the main body to mopping-up operations, the fittest ponies of the Camel Corps were sent in pursuit, a difficult one over rough country. This party accounted for the remainder, eight men killedand two captured, one of the former being an Abyssinian of some rank.

It was then ascertained that the Mullah was still unaccounted for. He had slipped off to one side with three or four followers, and had arrived at a well. This was found to be almost dry, but sufficient water was obtained by the party to give the broken and tired old man, and his pony, a drink. He lay down on the desert to rest, whilst the few survivors of his bodyguard pushed on to find water. On their return the Mullah had gone. Where? No one knows!

Better that he had remained alive, and had pushed far South to join his brother Khalifa, and so to relate at first hand the tale of his own defeat, ruin, and utter degradation. For now the few surviving men who still believe in him will say, should he have perished in the desert, that Allah at the last sent angels to lift him up and bear him away to Paradise.

The men who carried back the water came into the British lines and surrendered, knowing that the game was up. Knowing, as all men who have knowledge of Somaliland know, that the Mad Mullah's career of cruelty, rapine and crime was at last at an end.

Garabghari had fallen to a naval landing party from H.M.S.Odin. The friendlies had entered Tale. Gibb, led by the Mullah's favourite son,went round the forts and ordered the broken dervishes out. They came without firing a shot, marvelling that they, who had never shown mercy nor spared a life, should be so humanely treated.

The Camel Corps, leading their tired animals, returned on foot to Hudin. On the 24th February the last air-force load was cleared from El-dur-Elan on the return journey to Berbera, and the expedition was over. Somals of the West hearing, by the wonderful native system of communication, that the Mullah was broken, vied with one another in their expressions of loyalty to the Government. A man who attempted to murder an official in 1916 near Zeila, came in from Abyssinia and surrendered for fear that the terrible bird-men should come to find him. British prestige in Somaliland had been entirely restored and the country, after twenty years of unrest, is at last at peace.

PRINTED IN GREAT BRITAIN BY THE NORTHUMBERLAND PRESS, WATERLOO HOUSE, THORNTON STREET, NEWCASTLE-UPON-TYNE

FOOTNOTES:[1]God.[2]Prison.[3]Dagger.[4]Old man.[5]Somal tent or wigwam.[6]Somal wigwam, a shelter of mats.[7]Mahomedan law.[8]Caravan.

[1]God.

[2]Prison.

[3]Dagger.

[4]Old man.

[5]Somal tent or wigwam.

[6]Somal wigwam, a shelter of mats.

[7]Mahomedan law.

[8]Caravan.

Transcriber'snote:Minor typographical and punctuation errors have been corrected without note. Irregularities and inconsistencies in the text have been retained as printed.The illustrations have been moved so that they do not break up paragraphs, thus the page number of the illustration might not match the page number in the List of Illustrations.Page 48: "The transcriber has added the word "off"—"Fined one rupee each, and cautioned that they will not get off lightly next time."Also, "means" has been replaced with "mean"—"to the mean unhappy wretches".

Minor typographical and punctuation errors have been corrected without note. Irregularities and inconsistencies in the text have been retained as printed.

The illustrations have been moved so that they do not break up paragraphs, thus the page number of the illustration might not match the page number in the List of Illustrations.

Page 48: "The transcriber has added the word "off"—"Fined one rupee each, and cautioned that they will not get off lightly next time."

Also, "means" has been replaced with "mean"—"to the mean unhappy wretches".

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