FourFifty Miles to Freedom 10

FourFifty Miles to Freedom 10

At the same time efforts were made to build up the stamina necessary

for a 400-mile march by eating the most nourishing foods obtainable,

irrespective of the fact that the price of any food seemed to go up as

the cube of its body-building value. To give one instance, sugar at

this time cost a sovereign the pound.

 

It was almost inevitable that, with so many preparations in progress,

the secret of our intentions should leak out in the camp; and once

suspicions were aroused many of our actions would go to confirm them.

Thus it came about that a few days before the 30th July, the whole of

the camp at Yozgad knew pretty well that attempts to escape were on

foot; the shopping lists for the Changri division were alone enough

to have set people talking. Everybody wanted bootlaces, straps,

hobnails, rope, &c., in prodigious quantities. Unfortunately the Turks

also appeared to have got wind of it. For the last week of July,

sentries were visited and awakened with unheard-of frequency. Even the

commandant himself occasionally visited the different houses after

dark. In the case of one house, an extra sentry was suddenly posted in

the garden.

 

However, our preparations went quietly on; our "hosts" might have

nothing really definite to go upon, and the more keen the sentries were

now, the more weary they would be by the time the real day arrived.

We therefore continued to make holes in walls, loosen iron bars, dig

unnecessary irrigation channels in the garden, &c., &c., all as aids to

egress from one house or another on the final night.

 

In the particular house of our original six, (Cochrane and Ellis lived

in another), we had come to the conclusion that our best chance was to

prepare a hole through the outer wall of the kitchen belonging to our

mess. This kitchen, it is necessary to explain, was built along the

high enclosure wall of the garden, and was separated from the house

itself by a narrow alley-way, over which one of the sentries stood

guard. Next to the kitchen in the same outhouse was a little room with

one small window opening on to the alley, the entrance being _viâ_ the

kitchen itself. This second room was used as a fowl-house, and it was

here that we made up our minds to prepare a hole three-quarters of

the way through the outer wall. How exactly those escaping from our

house were to get across into the kitchen and finish off the hole on

the final night was a problem of which the solution was only settled

in detail at the last moment, and we will therefore leave our readers

in a similar state of suspense. The essential was that all should be

present at the evening roll-call, and yet the hole must be completed

and everybody be across at precisely 9.15 P.M.

 

So uncertain were we of the means of effecting this that we had a

second alternative in case the first scheme could not be carried out.

This involved getting over the wall by ladders.

 

A day or two before the 30th July, representatives of the various

parties met once again in solemn conclave to ensure that the various

plans should not clash, and a few general instructions were issued to

parties with a view to obtaining as long a start as possible. Every

one was to be represented in bed on the night by a dummy; boots were

to be padded, likewise the ends of khud-sticks (these were a _sine qua

non_ of our equipment for night-marching); water-bottles were not to be

filled because they gurgled; every man's equipment was to be finally

tried on to make certain that it would not make any noise.

 

Lastly, a lamp-signal was arranged between houses in case any party

should be caught just prior to leaving their house, for instance while

completing a hole. If that signal were given, it would no longer be

necessary for the other parties to wait until 9.15 before they started;

on the contrary, they were advised to start away at once before the

alarm reached the sentries in the other houses.

 

The 30th July arrived, but with it an unexpected complication. Vague

news had just come through that an exchange ship was being sent out

from England to fetch some of the worst cases of sick and wounded from

among the British prisoners in Turkey. The boat, said the rumour, was

due to arrive at some port at about the end of August, and the question

therefore arose at the eleventh hour whether, if we set off now, it

might not give the Turks the pretext that our Government had informed

us of the visit of this vessel, and that we were making off in the

hopes of getting aboard her secretly. The argument was of course, on

the face of it, ridiculous, but then so is the Turk, and it would be a

terrible responsibility for us if by our escape we destroyed the hopes

of these poor sick and wounded men. A vote was therefore taken as to

whether we would postpone the date, with the result that the motion was

carried by a small majority.

 

This was a terrible disappointment, for it meant, we thought, another

month of indecision. Moreover, there would be no hope of finding a boat

still awaiting us at Rendezvous X, and it would be too late in the year

for much chance of our finding crops to eat or hide in. It was the

moon, however, which in the end decided that the postponement could

not be for so long. On working out its time of rising, it was found

that if we waited till the end of August the moon would only rise late

enough to let us leave our houses at 9.15, when within four days of

its disappearance. In this way we should be handicapped by having the

maximum of dark, or practically dark, nights for our journey. The whole

question was therefore revised in this new light, and it was decided

that we must either start before the new moon came or else give up

all hope of leaving in this year at all. The night 7th-8th August was

then chosen. This would be a Wednesday, and the following morning a

hunt-day, when the check taken at dawn was confused by the movements of

thirty officers dressing in haste for the day's sport.

 

The week's grace was spent in perfecting all our arrangements. One

refinement was to collect our own and other people's hair when cut

by an officer barber, and paste it on to the outside of a cloth bag

stuffed with rubbish or towels made up to about the size of a man's

head. These were to be the heads of our dummies. Meanwhile we were more

careful with our shopping orders, and were relieved to find suspicions

in the camp dying down.

 

On the morning of the 31st July an officer, who was supposed to know

nothing of the escape, had been called by his orderly and told, "They

ain't gone after all, sir!"

 

FOOTNOTE:

 

[8] The following is a list of the officers who attempted to escape,

but were unhappily all recaptured, mostly within a few days of

starting, but in the case of one party not until they had been at large

for eighteen days and covered over 200 miles: Major C. H. Stockley,

66th Punjabis; Captains C. Manners, 104th Rifles; A. B. Matthews,

D.S.O., R.E.; E. W. Burdett and C. A. Raynor, 48th Pioneers; T. R.

Wells, R.A.F.; R. O. Chamier, 110th Mahrattas; H. H. Rich, 120th

Infantry; E. T. M. Patmore, Hants Regiment, T.F.; Lieutenants Tudway,

R.N.; J. H. Brabazon, Connaught Rangers; A. V. Barlow, R.A.F.; H.

D. Stearns, I.A.R., 117th Mahrattas; A. Macfadyen, I.A.R., 110th

Mahrattas; F. S. Sheridan, I.A.R., Gurkhas; J. Dooley, I.A.R., M.T.; M.

L. C. Smith, I.A.R., 7th Rajputs.

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER V.

 

THE FLAG FALLS.

 

 

At last the long-deferred day had dawned--the cause rather of relief

than excitement to our party, after their planning and scheming for

eleven long months and active preparations for as many weeks. Our only

prayer now was that we should at least have a run for our money, and be

spared the ignominy of being led back into the camp at Yozgad without

the taste of even a few days freedom.

 

The 7th August being a Wednesday, at 11 A.M. the usual picnic

party set off for the pine woods. The majority never dreamt for a

moment of the intention of twenty-five officers--a quarter of all the

officers in the camp--to escape that night. Their departure was the

signal for feverish activity in completing preparations which, by

their nature, had to be left until the last day. Such, in the house

then occupied by the present writers, called Hospital House, was the

screwing together of the ladders required in case an alternative

scheme for getting out of the camp should prove necessary. Then there

were rucksacks and haversacks to be finally made up, and the whole

"Christmas Tree" to be tried on to ensure that there was no rattling.

For reasons which will appear, it was necessary too for the Old Man

and Looney to convey their kits across the alley into the fowl-house

and there leave them concealed, the one in a blanket and the other

in a box. Meanwhile, Grunt and Perce put the finishing touches to

the hole commenced, as previously described, in the fowl-house wall,

until daylight could be seen through every joint in the outer skin of

masonry, and until it was as certain as such things could be that the

remaining stones would come away easily. Watches had to be synchronised

to ensure that all six parties should start simultaneously; the

fresh meat for the first two days to be issued, and so on almost _ad

infinitum_. It was at this stage that we discovered the maggots in the

"pastomar" or "biltong," to which reference has already been made.

 

That evening, before the hour when intercommunication between houses

was supposed to cease, there were many visits from well-wishers living

in other houses who knew of our intentions, and last arrangements were

made with our British orderlies to play their part. Doubtless they did

it well. One can imagine the delight with which they would put some of

our dummies to bed after our departure, and as we left we heard their

efforts in the house to cover our exit with the noise of a sing-song.

If no alarm occurred before daylight, they were to remove the dummies

after these had served their purpose at the 4 A.M. "rounds."

One orderly had also volunteered to build up the hole in the wall as

soon as the house and kitchen doors were unlocked next morning.

 

At last all was ready, and we sat down to what, we hoped, would be

our last full meal for many a day. Twenty minutes to eight came and

went, the time when the _onbashi_, or Turkish corporal, usually took

roll-call; but it was not till eight o'clock that evening that the six

of the party in our house, who, with a Major A---- and the "King of

Oireland," another escaper, formed the mess on the top floor, heard his

footsteps on the stairs. We returned his good-night with rather more

than usual gusto, and waited till he had disappeared, as his custom

was, into the next room. Now was the moment. Old Man and Looney slipped

out of the room and downstairs into the kitchen, the door of which,

with the side-door of the house, was allowed to remain open every night

until our orderlies had "washed up." These two were to go across in

their shirt sleeves and carrying plates, so that, if he noticed them

at all, the sentry posted over the alley separating the main building

from the outhouse would naturally mistake them for orderlies. In the

excitement of the moment, however, Old Man had forgotten to bring down

his coat; and Looney, now safely ensconced in the fowl-house, wondered

why he had not followed him across. Next minute there was a tremendous

crash and a tinkle of broken crockery. The Old Man, discovering his

loss, had turned back and slipped on the stairs. Nothing could have

exceeded in realism this unintentional imitation of an orderly. As

he picked himself up, he saw the feet of the _onbashi_ descending

the stairs above him, with the result that he lost no further time

in crossing to the kitchen. Orderly M---- was sent back to fetch the missing article, which arrived in due course.