Page 20 - Personal Column (Charles Belgrave)_Neat

I rushed into the house to see if Marjorie was safe, then went into the
were two ex-Indian Army Punjabi officers and several Indian N.C.O.s, barracks.
who looked down on the raw material which they had to train. The Daly had been talking to one of the Indian officers in the Orderly
British police officer was returning to his regiment, so the Shaikh decided Room when a Baluchi Lcvyman crept to the open window and shot the
that ‘for the time being’ I should take over his duties—I held the post of Indian in the back, the bullet went through him and nicked off* a piece of
Commandant of the State Police till 1955! Daly’s ear. The other Indian officer ran up and he too was shot. Daly
...TheTbrt, a romantic-looking building, was behind Manama. It was tried, very bravely, to tackle the man, but was stabbed in half a dozen
built in the first half of the eighteenth century, in the reign of Nadir Shah. places with a bayonet. Both the Indian officers died but Daly recovered.
It consisted of four round towers joined by crenellated walls. In the middle The man then surrendered and when I arrived 1 found him firmly
of the north wall, facing the town, was the ‘fort bungalow’. It was not, pinioned in one of the cells. It has always been my belief that this was an
strictly speaking, a ‘bungalow’ as our rooms were on the first floor; they isolated incident due to the Baluchi believing that he had been ill-treated
opened on to a wide veranda where we slept, but some of the rooms over­ by the Indians.
looked the barrack yard and the jail. It was luxurious when compared to On November 22nd, 1957, thirty-one years later, a Baluchi police­
our first house. man, who thought he was being oppressed by an Iraqi officer, walked
The weather was hot and sticky and we began to realize what the into the Orderly Room at the fort and shot the Iraqi officer who was
summer was like in the Gulf. It was so humid that it was impossible to sitting at a desk. An Arab officer who was in the room advanced towards
keep dry. Sweat coursed down one’s body, sometimes it felt like a the man; he too was shot and killed. The Baluchi fired at the sentry at
creeping insect. There was a punkah in one of the rooms, operated by a the gate, wounding him slightly, then gave himself up. Both he and his
prisoner outside, but at night the prisoner, and the sentry who was sup­ compatriot in 1926 were tried, found guilty of murder and sentenced to
posed to keep an eye on him, usually went to sleep. Added to the un­ death.
pleasant weather was a feeling of tension in the town and an outburst of The 1926 affair caused great excitement in the town. Crowds of Arabs
anonymous letters, to which Bahrain Arabs have always been addicted. rushed to the quay, seized boats and crossed to Muharraq, believing that
They were tied round stones and thrown on to the veranda. Most of them the Levies had run amuck and were going to loot the bazaar. I and de
contained attacks on local people. At night I often heard shots in the Grenier, the Customs Officer, walked round the bazaars and tried to
distance, which were never explained. Every morning I walked through calm the people by telling them what had actually happened. Eventually
the bazaar to the Shaikh’s office on the sea front; pariah dogs lived above f the situation returned to normal. August 6th was Marjorie’s birthday. I
the matting roofs in the narrow lanes, with sometimes unpleasant results had spent all day taking down evidence and in the afternoon we took our
l
for people walking below. tea and went in a sailing-boat to visit a police post in one of the islands.
On August 3rd the Chief of the Town Police, a small, locally enlisted On our way back the wind dropped and the tide was against us. We
body, was shot and wounded by an unknown assailant. Next day the landed far down the coast and did not get back to the fort till long after
shooting at the fort occurred. Marjorie was having a bath; Suddenly she midnight, by which time the rumour started that we had been murdered.
heard a crackle of shots outside the bathroom window, then shouts and Meanwhile the British Navy arrived in two sloops, ‘longing to be at
screams. As soon as she could she ran out on to the veranda and saw Daly, ’em*. Naval guards with rifles and machine-guns were posted at the
as she told me later, ‘driving his car towards the town, with a red muffler Agency and the fort. Once or twice a naval sentry let off a rifle by mis­
round his. neck’. It was not a red muffler. It was blood. But she did not take, which caused alarm and consternation. Suddenly it was decided
realize this at the time. She sent the cook, the only servant in the house, that we should move immediately to the Agency, leaving our belongings '
to fetch me. at the fort bungalow, which was taken over by some young naval officers,
He burst into my office, incoherent with excitement. ‘There is shoot­ who had no idea how to look after other people’s possessions. When
ing at the fort,’ he gasped. ‘Who is shot? Who is shooting?’ I asked. He Marjorie went to the house to get some clothes she found indescribable
did not seem to know, but he kept on repeating, ‘People are being shot.’ chaos. There were raw potatoes on a silver salver, shoes on the sideboard,
I ran most of the way to the fort. When I got near I heard women wailing; 35
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