Thus disappointed of two of our schemes, we looked around for other ways and means of escape. Nobby had another of his brain-waves. In search of dry firewood he had made several tours inside the roof of the barracks: for the ceilings and tiled slopes were carried not by modern trusses, but by the and means of trestles resting on enormous horizontal baulks, running across from wall to wall at close . Having entered the roof space by a trap-door in the ceiling, it was possible to walk on these completely round the barracks, and out the green firewood we collected ourselves by chips and odd ends of comparatively dry wood, left up there presumably several decades before, while the barracks were in building.
Why not, said Nobby, disappear up there one night and leave the Turks to infer that we had escaped, encouraging them in the belief by leaving the bars of some window cut and forced apart? We could then wait[40] until the rest had left for Yozgad and slip out from the barracks at our pleasure.
There were, however, two obvious objections to this scheme. It was hardly feasible as a means of escape for more than one or at most two parties: the Turk might be deceived into thinking half a dozen fellows had slipped past his , but hardly twenty or more. , it was quite conceivable that the escape of even a small party would lead to the move being cancelled altogether: it is true it would be possible for the to be fed in the roof by their companions below, but the of spending "three years or the duration of the war" in that dark and musty garret took away from the otherwise considerable attractions of the scheme.
In the end a very much modified form of the roof scheme was permitted by a committee of senior officers, and our party of six, having been adjudged by this committee to have the best chances of success on account of our prearranged scheme when we reached the coast, was given the privilege of making the attempt. As will be seen, however, it was less an actual attempt than a waiting upon circumstances which would arise should our captors make a certain mistake. In any country except Turkey the whole conception would have been absurd; but we had seen enough of Turkish methods to know that there anything is possible.
By good luck the party's preparations for[41] escape were already far advanced, although, apart from the move, we had not proposed starting until June: the rains continue off and on till then, and the crops would be in too a state at an earlier date.
At the cost of a good deal of time, temper, needles and thread, we had each succeeded in making ourselves a pack: to furnish the canvas we sacrificed our valises. Up till almost the last night, however, we were busy repeatedly cutting off and sewing them on again in a different place, in a wild endeavour to persuade our equipment to ride with a reasonable degree of comfort.
Food was an item of vital importance in any plan of escape, and we had to follow the example of Keeling's party and pin our faith mainly to a of biscuits. We had also for some months past been collecting from our parcels all tinned meat, condensed milk, and chocolate.
We brought our biscuit-making to a fine art. One of the ground-floor rooms had been set apart as the officers' shop for carpentry and bootmaking—for we had long taken to making our own furniture and repairing our own boots. Here then was started the "Bimbashi"[7] Biscuit Department of Escapers, Limited. At one bench would be and Johnny busily engaged in the uncongenial task of taking the stalks off sultanas, and the pleasanter one of eating a few. At another stood Perce with his bared forearms buried deep in a mixture of flour, sugar, and sultanas, to which from time to time Nobby would add the quantities of water and eggs. The Old Man presided at the scales and, weighing out the into lumps sufficient for twenty biscuits, passed them on to Looney. Armed with rolling-pin, carving-knife, and straight-edge, the latter would out each lump until it filled up the inside of a square frame which projected slightly above the bench to which it was . When a level had been obtained, the ruler would be placed against marks on the frame and the slab cut five times in one direction and four in the other. It then only remained to transfer the twenty little to boards, them with any fancy pattern with a nail, and send them to be baked by one of our orderlies. The biscuits were each about the size of a quarter-plate and half an inch thick, and when cooked weighed five to the pound, and were as hard as rocks. Their best testimonial was that, without being kept in tins, they remained good for six months.
[42]
The biscuit-making concern was run regardless of expense. A pound of flour was costing at that time two shillings, sugar ten shillings, sultanas five; and eggs three pence apiece. (These, by the way, were only about half of what we soon after found ourselves paying at Yozgad.) The final cost was something like half-a-crown a biscuit.
[43]
For their escapes Keeling and his companions had decided, if questioned, to say that they were a German survey party, and for this purpose had forged a letter to come from the commandant of the Angora Division, and ordering all whom it might concern to help them in every way. They had written to say this letter had been of the greatest assistance to them. As we were going in a different direction, we thought that the same story would serve again. Grunt, being the best Turkish scholar of the party, accordingly drafted a suitable legend in a crisp style such as might be expected to from Enver Pasha's pen; while Johnny, aided by infinite patience and a bit of blue carbon paper, set to work and produced a faithful imitation of an office stamp found on a Turkish receipt. We hoped that the elaborated lettering of such a would be as little to the average Ottoman as it was to ourselves, but as a matter of interest decided to show the original to our Greek interpreter and ask its meaning. It was as well we did so, for it was the stamp of the Prisoners-of-War Camp, Changri.
After this unfortunate set-back, our pair put their heads together, and finally evolved a design of their own, bearing the : "Office of the of War, Stamboul."
All this time, of course, we were subjecting[44] ourselves to a course of rigorous training—football, running in the early mornings, Müller's exercises, and cold baths. We spent half the day walking round and round the exercise-field, wearing waistcoats weighing twenty pounds. These, if disclosed from under the coat, would have reminded any one but a Turkish observer of one of those advertisements of a well-known firm of tyre-makers; for each waistcoat was lined with a series of cloth tubes filled with sand.
Nobby, who sewing more than any of us, went to the trouble of making a practice rucksack holding sixty pounds of earth. The whole of our last few weeks at Changri, one may say, were spent by the party in preparing for the escape in one way or another.
On the evening of the 10th April 1918 the cart transport for our journey drove into the barrack square and there parked for the night. Orders came from the commandant that we were to start next day, so we decided that before we went to bed our preparations should be completed.
A light ladder was made by which to climb up into the roof; drinking-water was taken up in buckets and hidden there; a window-frame in the east wing was prepared so that the iron bars could be ; and we made certain, by going through a list, that our packs contained all that we had decided to take. The latter were then and they and their contents placed in two boxes,[45] each of which had a false bottom. Here were our most incriminating and at the same time our most precious aids to escape: our maps, helio-mirrors, fezes, and compasses. The boxes were then locked, strongly bound with rope, and labelled very appropriately, " Stores."
For the work on hand that night the occasion was an excellent one. Every one was busy packing, having left this unpleasant duty till the carts actually arrived. There was a lot of noise being made—to wit, a blend of singing and sawing; and when at 1 A.M. we could at last go to bed, there was still much activity around us.
Next morning we showed ourselves as much as possible, and took care to find an opportunity of talking to the two camp interpreters. It was conceivable that they might take our names in the barracks as usual each morning, and the commandant, being satisfied that every one was present, might omit to call roll when the move actually took place; or alternately, in the excitement of the moment, there might be no roll-call .
On one or other of these possibilities depended the success of the modified scheme, which that until the carts were definitely on the move we were not to hide ourselves in the roof. Should the party go off without a roll-call, we were allowed to leave ourselves behind. If, on the other hand, roll was called, we had to turn up for[46] it. This explains the necessity for the two boxes of "Trek Stores": if we were left behind, these could be quickly taken up into the roof; and if roll should be called, we could hastily, and without losing our valuable escape , join the carts, carrying two boxes containing food only.
After loading up our own carts with the rest of our in case the scheme miscarried, we took these boxes into the mess-room at the S.E. corner of the barracks; and as the time of departure drew near, went there ourselves and sat round a few bits of bread and an empty jam-pot. Our excellent friend H—— promised to come and warn us should there be a call over.
From the windows facing south could be seen the Angora road, and this we watched eagerly. The barracks were quite quiet. After many minutes a loaded cart appeared on the road followed by another. Our hopes began to rise. The one-in-a-thousand chance might yet come off. There were more carts moving on the road now, but to our disappointment they suddenly stopped.
A few seconds later H—— dashed in. They were calling the roll. We carried the boxes outside, there to be met by several officers who had come back, so they said, to collect some firewood for the journey, but really to make our late appearance as unsuspicious as possible. No wonder we were as happy at Changri as it was possible[47] to be, having men like these for our companions.
You may think that it was not worth our while to have taken so much trouble for so small a chance, yet you probably take a ticket in the Derby Sweep. It was, we admit, a small chance, but the prize was a great one, so we were to let it slip by. Although a roll-call was held, we heard afterwards that it was only as an afterthought on the part of Sami Bey, and despite our disappointment after coming so near to success, we had at least the satisfaction of finding that our late arrival caused no suspicion in the minds of our captors. After a little difficulty in finding carts which were not too to take our two precious boxes, our party was soon marching southwards with the rest of the prisoners.
Although the direct distance from Changri to Yozgad, as the crow flies, is barely 80 miles, the only road open to our wheeled transport was that which runs by way of Angora: our march was then about 100 miles longer. For the first sixty, that is to say to Angora, the country was familiar to us, as we had marched along this route in the opposite direction on the way to our first camp, Kastamoni, nearly two years before. It was impossible, unfortunately, to induce our commandant to say beforehand each day where would be the halts for the midday meal and the next night; in fact, he did not know himself,[48] as this was a matter to be fought out with his brother officer in charge of the transport. In other respects this march, like that from Kastamoni, was a pleasing innovation after the monotony of our long . After the first few hours the escort wearied of their primary keenness, and allowed us to march pretty well at our own pace, except for occasional halts to allow the carts to come up. In fact, precautions against escaping en route were unexpectedly lax. On the very first day, for instance, it was not until after dark that we halted for the night, and a dozen officers might easily have slipped away from a party which went to the river a few hundred yards distant to fetch water: roll-call was not held until we marched off next morning. We had agreed amongst ourselves, however, that we would now wait until we reached Yozgad, and could some plan by which all parties might once more have an equal chance of escaping. It was for this reason that the above and later opportunities to make off while on trek were allowed to slip by.
Half-way to Angora we came to the village of Kalijik, where we were offered billets in the local jail, already well peopled with Turkish criminals. On our refusing this offer, we were housed for the night in an empty building on the edge of the village.
We reached Angora four days after leaving Changri, and were accommodated in up-to-date buildings, designed by Germans as a[49] hospital, but since used as Turkish barracks. Luckily the particular house in which we were billeted had not as yet been used by Turks. During our two days here, we were allowed very fair liberty in visiting the , the shops of which, after our six months at Changri, appeared almost magnificent in the of their .
In one of these Nobby a pair of real Goerz field-glasses. Telling his companion to away the posta who escorted them, he entered the shop, and succeeded in purchasing the glasses, and a schoolboy's in which to them, for about £18—a tall price, and yet, if the prices of other things had been in no higher proportion to their real value, living in Turkey would have been comparatively cheap. In the end these glasses were of inestimable value to our party.
While we were in Angora some of us went to see Sherif Bey, whose for epigram was touched upon in the opening words of our story. As second-in-command he had accompanied us in our move from Kastamoni to Changri. There he had been perpetually at loggerheads with our new, as indeed he had been with our two former, commandants. Having eventually his ambition of Sami Bey, he had recently accepted the less post of commandant of the British rank-and-file prisoners in the Angora district. Some of the[50] men whom we succeeded in meeting had certain complaints to make against their previous commandant. A deputation of officers, therefore, waited upon his successor, who received them with a show of great , and assured them that under his sway such things as the looting of parcels would be impossible. Whether he fulfilled his promises we are not yet in a position to say; the fact that he treated very badly the five officers who stayed behind a few extra days for dental and medical treatment, asserting that they had only stopped in Angora with a view to escape.
Moreover, there were at this very time under Sherif Bey's orders two submarine officers who had been sent from the camp at Afion-Kara-Hissar, and were to join our when it went on to Yozgad. Since their arrival in Angora a week before, they had been confined to the only hotel and had not once been allowed to visit the . One of the two was Lieut.-Commander A. D. Cochrane (now Commander Cochrane, D.S.O.), who was to play the leading rôle in the escape of our particular party. The other was Lieut.-Commander S——. These two had, with one other officer, attempted to escape from the camp at Kara-Hissar, but had been recaptured when within sight of the sea; they had since spent ten months in a common Turkish jail.
Lieut.-Commander S—— had also been[51] sent to Constantinople under somewhat amusing circumstances. Whilst he was in the P.O.W. camp at Kara-Hissar an order arrived one day ordering that two officers of high birth and closely connected with the British aristocracy should be selected and sent to Constantinople. Thereupon a list was prepared of officers related to Labour Candidates, Dukes, Members of Parliament, &c. Thinking that this promised at least a in Constantinople, S—— had claimed descent from the bluest blood of England. After consideration of the rival claims, he and one other were selected. Their self-congratulations, however, were a little , as the commandant now informed them that the Turkish Government, having heard that their own officer prisoners in India were being badly treated, proposed taking on these two until their powerful relations in England should think fit to remedy matters on both sides.
In vain the unfortunate dupes protested that the report was obviously false, asking that further should be made before reprisals were carried into effect. The reply was that the order was Enver Pasha's and could not be questioned, but that if they agreed to go quietly to Constantinople, they would at once be led into the presence of the Generalissimo, where they could forward their protest in person. To this they had perforce to agree, but on arrival in the capital were at once flung into prison, kept in confinement, and[52] fed on bread and water. In this state they remained for some three weeks, after which the Turkish authorities discovered, as was only natural, that there had not been an atom of truth in the report upon which they had acted. By way of they allowed the innocent sufferers six days' absolute freedom in Constantinople, after which they were taken back to their old camp.
From Angora onwards we were escorted by parties of the local gendarmerie; of the Changri guard who had so far accompanied us only a few came on with us to Yozgad; and they, ill-trained, ill-fed, and ill-clad, were rather passengers who called for our pity than guards capable of preventing us from decamping.
The were, for the most part, well mounted, and in charge of them was a benevolent old gentleman of the rank of bash-chaouse, or sergeant-major, who was for ever holding upon his friendship towards the English and his utter inability to understand why we were not fighting side by side in this war. The sergeant-major talked much to us, his remarks with "Jánom" (My dear). He was , he was pleasing to look at, he was interesting. He had been through several Turkish wars, and he discussed the Great War with more intelligence than many of the Turkish officers we had met.
One day as two of us were marching beside the horse he was riding, the dear old man[53] out a deep ravine some few hundred yards to our right. His face lighted up with pride of achievement and pleasant recollection. "Do you see that ravine?" he said. "Well, there I helped to 5000 Armenians. Allah be praised!"
The 120-mile march from Angora to Yozgad occupied eight days. As usual we bivouacked each night in the open, on one occasion coming in for a tremendous thunderstorm. Our best day's march was one of thirty miles, and brought us down to the Kizil Irmak, better known to Greek scholars as the ancient river Halys. We camped on the western bank opposite the village of Kopru-Keui (= Bridge-Village), so called from the old stone bridge which here spans the largest river in Asia . We were all glad of a bathe, although this was only safe close to the bank, where the water was hardly deep enough to swim in. The main stream was a of brown and muddy water, dashing between enormous rocks, which protected the bridge from its fury. It passed under only two of the nine arches and so onwards through a narrow between high precipitous cliffs. The bridge itself, with narrow and steeply cambered roadway, and pointed arches of varying height and span, seemed almost one with the rocky it spanned.
The rest of our trek to Yozgad was uneventful except for the upsetting of two carts,[54] owing to reckless driving on the part of the Turkish Jehus.
Our last day's march began on the 24th April 1918, when we set out from a small village twelve miles from our destination. The way climbed gradually till we topped a high . Over this we marched, swinging down the farther slope at a quicker step. The road curled round spurs and valleys, and from one such spur we obtained our first sight of the town of Yozgad.
Unprepossessing it looked lying in a valley surrounded by barren hills, a few poplars here and there, the usual timber-built houses, a few .
Four months later we looked at it for the last time. We could only see a few twinkling lights to the east in a curtain of starlit darkness; but we were well content as we turned away, for we had shaken the dust of prison from our feet.
FOOTNOTE:
[7]A Turkish word meaning "Major."