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police were unable to deal with the riots in Muharraq and withdrew. The BOAC’s

flats were robbed and set on fire. 834

According to Al-Bakir the first frontline member of the NUC to be arrested

was E Fakhroo. He was held with a group of other protestors as they attempted to

rescue a young boy who had been arrested by a British police officer. The officer

then informed Belgrave that E Fakhroo was among the protestors close to

Muharraq’s police station and that he had attacked the police. The Adviser then

ordered his arrest. 835 FO documents from the tribunal that was held later in

December against a number of the NUC’s frontline members gave similar accounts

about E Fakhroo’s arrest, saying inter alia that he had tried to help a man who was

being apprehended without giving further details of his age nor did it specify

whether or not Belgrave had ordered his arrest. 836 Sir Edward Boyle the Economic

Secretary to the Treasury and Nutting resigned from the British Cabinet in protest at

Britain’s involvement in the Suez invasion. 837

Patricia Thomas, the wife of Captain T Thomas of the Gulf Aviation Company

in Bahrain, posted a letter to Buckingham Palace on 7 November. She was living in

Muharraq during the attacks of 2 November and had sent a letter to complain

directly to HM Queen Elizabeth II. The letter provides a rare neutral eyewitness

account of events on Muharraq Island during that time as the captain’s wife lived in

the BOAC’s flats that came under attack. P Thomas said that the island had been

834 TNA, FO 371/120549, Gault’s Bahrain Monthly Intelligence Summary: November 1956, 5
December 1956.
835 Al-Bakir, From Bahrain to Exile, 216.
836 TNA, FO 371/126895, Résumé of the Proceedings against Five Members of the Committee of
National Union.
837 Heikal, Cutting the Lion’s Tail, 195.

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