Page 122 - Personal Column (Charles Belgrave)_Neat

When the strike began we had a house party of six people. One of
them was Sir Stewart Duke Elder, who had come to present the Shaikh
with the insignia of a Knight of the Order of St John. Owing to the
situation this had to be postponed, and after a day or two Sir Stewart left
our house, in an R.N. lorry, to drive through Muharraq, which was still
very lively, to the aerodrome. Wc had also Captain C. E. Kendall, the
Government’s agent in London, and his wife, and Highwood of the
British Council. Various ocher people who were concerned with the crisis
seemed to have their meals with us. The shops were shut, and although
many of our Arab friends served us ‘under the counter’ it was impossible
to get any fresh meat. When the position was becoming desperate I sent
an S O S to the Shaikh describing the domestic situation. At once he
dispatched a lorry, manned by armed Bedouin, containing a sheep, on
which we fed the house party until the strike was over.
Outside the town everything was quiet and the Residency and naval
people at Jufair were living normal lives. One evening we were invited
to go to Jufair for a drink. It was impossible for me to leave Manama, but
as I saw that the members of the house party were beginning to feel like
caged animals I agreed that my police driver should take Marjorie and
four of the party to Jufair. Besides, we had run out of paraffin, with which
we cooked and heated the water, and the Navy had offered to give us
some. They reached Jufair without any difficulty and after some time they
returned. Suddenly, on a road near the fort, they ran into a road block
manned by some tough hooligans who were out for mischief. With
great presence of mind my driver, Abdulla Mubarak, switched into
reverse and speeded, at about fifty miles an hour, back along the road
which led to the fort. Fortunately there was no traffic on the road. Having
arrived at the fort the party was sent back to the Adviserate—as my
house and office was called—escorted by two jeeps full of police. This was
the only unpleasant incident which occurred to us during the strike.
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Twenty-three
His rash fierce blaze of rioc cann- t last,
For violent fires soon bum out themselves;
Small showers last long, but sudden storms arc short;
He tires betimes that spurs too fist betimes.
Richard II. Shakespeare
There is, however, a limit at which forbearance ceases to be a
virtue. '
Edmund Burke. 1728-1797
AHRAIN Was full of journalists who swooped down like vultures on
a battlefield, quarrelling and arguing among themselves, and the
envelopes from the agency which supplied us with Press cuttings
became fat and bloated. Some papers, the Daily Mail for one, were reason­
ably accurate, but many reporters tried to sustain the tension for the sake
of news interest after conditions were normal. I took a newspaper man for
a drive round the villages after the strike. The people were friendly and
the.drive was quite uneventful, but from his description of it, which I
read later, it might have been a highly dangerous adventure.
A month before the strike the Shaikh had set up an Administrative
Council consisting of Khalifah Shaikhs who held important posts in the
Government and some heads of departments. He invited one of his uncles
to be President of the new council. The uncle replied, ‘I am seventy-five
years old, but I will do what you wish.’ The Shaikh answered, ‘Churchill
is eighty-two.’ ‘Yes,* said the uncle,"*but I am not a Churchill.’ However,
he accepted the post. At first the council was boycotted by The Com­
mittee, but.it now plays a useful, though restricted, role, dealing with
matters which are referred to it by the Shaikh.
In April The Higher Executive Committee ceased to exist, but
phoenix-like was bom again with the name ‘Committee of National
Union*, with seven instead of eight members, One Shia fell out. The
p.c,—p 22S