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sarcastic way, comparing them to ‘English barons who brought about the signing of

Magna Charta’. 242

The most striking feature of the demands according to Wall’s intelligence

was the information that reached him of the HEC’s plans in case the Ruler refused

their demands. The Party had planned to send representatives to Cairo and hire an

Egyptian lawyer to file a case in British courts in London against the Administration.

The Political Agent did not hide the Ruler’s suspicions of the Movement fearing that

the British might be enticed to intervene as they had in 1923 when they removed

his grandfather from power. Wall additionally blamed the Bahraini Administration

for its failure, since the attack on the fort, to display to the general public the steps it

had taken towards internal reform, due to it not having ‘any organ of publicity’.

Reforms before the incident were made by the Administration, but were not

announced publically. These reforms included the appointment of Geoffrey L Peace

as a Judicial Adviser and the hiring of Colonel Hamersley as an Assistant

Commandant to the Police. In addition to this, steps had been taken to arrange for

the compensation of the families of those who fell on 1 July. 243

Was it possible that the formation of the HEC, the courage to voice its

demands, and to challenge the Administration was merely a result of local

developments? It is highly unlikely to be the case, as the formation of the nationalist

party coincided with the announcement that the British would evacuate the Suez

Canal Zone. The declaration of withdrawal must have seemed to the nationalists in

242 Nutting, The Aftermath of Suez, 72.
243 TNA, FO 1016/309, Wall to Burrows on Public Sentiment for Representational Government, 25
October 1954.

© Hamad E. Abdulla 78