* * * * *


NORFOLK HOUSE.
AMARAH, _September 13th_, 1915.

TO HIS FATHER.

As I have written the news to Mamma this week I will tell you what I
gather of the campaign and country generally.

There's no doubt that old Townshend, the G.O.C., means to push on to
Baghdad "ekdum"; and if the Foreign Office stops him there will be
huge indignâ. It seems to me that the F.O. should have made itself
quite explicit on the point, one way or the other months ago: to pull
up your general in full career is exasperating to him and very
wasteful, as he has accumulated six months' supplies for an army of
16,000 up here, which will have to be mostly shipped back if he is
pulled up at Kut. The soldiers all say the F.O. played the same trick
on Barratt in the cold weather. They let him get to Qurnah, and he
wanted and prepared to push on here and to Nasiryah, which were then
the Turkish bases. But the F.O. stopped him and consequently the Turks
could resume the offensive, and nearly beat us at Shaibah. The
_political_ people say that the soldiers had only themselves to thank
they were nearly beaten at Shaibah. They were warned in December that
the whole area between Sh. and Basrah would be flooded later on, and
were urged either to dig a canal or build a causeway; but they
pooh-poohed it: and consequently all supplies and ammunition at
Shaibah had to be carried across 8 miles of marsh, 4ft. to 1in. deep.