In the Shadow of the Crescent: Stewart Francis Newcombe

INTRODUCTION

Colonel Stewart Francis Newcombe was already a legend in the deserts of Arabia before he was joined in Cairo during the early months of the First World War by a group of extraordinary specialists in Middle Eastern affairs. One member of this group was T.E. Lawrence who went on to achieve worldwide fame. Colonel Newcombe's story, like those of other unsung figures in the Anglo-Arabian panoply, has been eclipsed by the legend of ´Lawrence of Arabia´, and has languished in the dusty recesses of regimental records, government files or in the elliptical words of Lawrence’s book Seven Pillars of Wisdom. However, S.F. Newcombe´s untold story is there to be told. IN THE SHADOW OF THE CRESCENT is a story of extraordinary exploits and courage, coupled with Newcombe's own legendary and inexhaustible supply of energy and of remarkable adventures under the very noses of the Ottoman authorities – full of danger, intrigue and perhaps more surprisingly, of romance during Newcombe's captivity in Turkey.

Stewart Francis Newcombe - A Short Biography

S.F. Newcombe & T.E. Lawrence:

Beyond Arabia

By Kerry Webber

The spread of global railways and the creation of the Suez Canal were two major factors which helped shape future British colonial policy from the mid-19th Century onward. At the beginning of the next century and with the inevitable collapse of the Ottoman Empire, men such as Stewart Newcombe, T.E. Lawrence and others were called upon to explore and map previously uncharted regions to help defend the lifelines of the British Empire, as well as surveying the future battlefields on which they themselves would later fight. When the cry of battle died down, there came the clamour for peace, independence and a new world order. This is the story of a friendship that took place during those turbulent years, a narrative set against the backdrop of vanishing empires, uneasy nation-building, and within the legends of Arabia.

The early years

Stewart Francis Newcombe grew up in a family with strong ties to the early development of railways. It could be said that the oil and coal dust of steam locomotion were in the DNA of the Newcombe family with his father and grandfather both playing important roles in the development and expansion of railway systems both at home and abroad.

His father helped build the first railways in Japan under the accelerated industrialisation during the Meiji Restoration before returning with his wife and two sons to Britain in 1878. The family settled in the market town of Brecon where Edward was employed by the Midlands Railway as resident engineer overseeing the railway extensions serving the growing industrial areas of South Wales. The Newcombe family was living at 3 Mount Street which overlooked the railway when their third son, Stewart Francis, was born on 9 July 1878. The following year, the Newcombe’s fourth and final child, George Harley, was born, commonly known by his middle name.[i]

In 1886, Edward contracted pneumonia and died at the age of 43.[ii] Stewart, then aged 7, and Harley, aged 6, were subsequently sent to board at Christ’s Hospital, the first of the charitable bluecoat schools which was founded in 1552 and located in Newgate Street, London. Newcombe completed his general education at Felsted School in Essex, another well-established institution and steeped in similar traditions.[iii] In 1896, following in the footsteps of his elder brothers, he entered the Royal Military Academy in Woolwich, known as “the Shop”, as a Gentleman Cadet after achieving the rare distinction of 100 per cent in mathematics during his entrance examinations.

Newcombe proved to be an extremely able student. A combination of the strength of mind, tenacity and diligence that would be the hallmark of his later career culminated in his graduation from the Shop and the presentation of one of the highest awards the Academy could bestow, the coveted Sword of Honour presented during the final Passing Out parade on Wednesday 22 June 1898 by Field Marshal Viscount Garnet Wolseley, Commander-in-Chief of the British Army.[iv] To complete his training he was sent to the School of Military Engineering at Brompton Barracks in Chatham, Kent, to begin a course for young officers with the Corps of Royal Engineers where he was especially interested in the study of experimental sciences which had made the school the leading scientific military establishment in Europe. His army career would be dominated by these early studies in surveying, bridging, demolitions, mining and railway work, while in his later years his interests would continue to be influenced by his time at Chatham, especially in photography, electricity, building construction and heating.

Newcombe’s resolute character was forged in the halls and classrooms and on the fields and training grounds of Woolwich and Chatham. His capabilities as a soldier and as an officer were developed in two of the best military institutions in the world and built on a strong foundation of general education in two well-respected schools. He was now well-equipped to be a leader of men, but a leader that would not shrink from waiving his seniority and giving the better man his chance.

On the eve of the new century he was duly posted to the 29th Fortress Company based at Cape Town, South Africa, in time to participate in operations during the Second Anglo-Boer War, seeing action at Dreifontein, Karee Siding and during the Relief of Kimberley.[v]

Egyptian Army, 1901 – 1911

On 2 April 1901 Newcombe transferred to the Egyptian Army before being seconded to the Sudan Government Railways where during the next ten years he built a reputation as a reliable and competent surveyor, helping to build many of the railways in northern and southern Sudan, taking tracks that now reached the Red Sea at the newly constructed Port Sudan into provinces that were rich in cattle, food-crops, gum and cotton. At the end of 1903, he delineated the provisionally agreed frontier between Abyssinia and the Sudan. Further surveys were carried out in the following years, most notably in the Congo. At the end of his African service Newcombe accompanied a commission charged with solving the problem of the Lado enclave.[vi] When on leave he explored Greater Syria, sending back intelligence reports on the Berlin to Baghdad railway and the Damascus to Medina line through the Hejaz Desert.

A prelude to war

In 1911, Newcombe left the Egyptian Army and rejoined the British Army but was soon bored with sitting still in England and eager for another overseas posting. While kicking his heels at Longmoor Military Training Camp he sought assistance from an influential acquaintance he first met some twelve years previously during the Anglo-Boer War.

A chance encounter with the distinguished writer Rudyard Kipling took place during the Battle of Karee Siding where the writer was reporting on the slow progress of the campaign against a mobile and determined enemy that had adopted guerilla tactics during the final phase of the war. Newcombe happened upon Kipling when the writer strayed too far towards the front line and was in danger of being caught in crossfire. Kipling later claimed he had been advised by Newcombe that there was absolutely no danger in the forward position and was subsequently forced to lie low for hours until the danger passed. He described the moment the nasty little one-pound pompoms opened up. “On soft ground they merely thudded,” Kipling explained. “On rock-face the shell breaks up and yells like a cat.” Despite being a successful author of books on soldiering in India and Afghanistan it was his first time under fire.[vii]

Having very nearly got Kipling shot, years later Newcombe recalled the encounter and chanced his arm by seeking the author’s assistance to secure a more suitable posting. Kipling was well connected within military circles and duly wrote to the Under Secretary of State for War, Colonel Ward. In a cleverly crafted and humorous letter, this master of the short story put forward a request for assistance to help Newcombe return to overseas service.

"About twelve years ago a subaltern of engineers called Stewart Newcombe got me very nearly shot at Karree Siding by telling me that some scrub in front of me was “all clear” whereas it was anything but cleared and I had to lie on my tummy in great bodily and mental distress for some hours. I have owed that boy something ever since but haven’t set eyes on him.

Now he has come to England a captain of Sappers with, I am sorry to say, about ten years of uncommonly good African work to his credit...He is in the Intelligence (a branch of the service which I should not naturally connect with Sappers) and he does not have the intelligence enough to want to stay in England. He wants to get back to his Africa and, I believe, to Egypt for choice. He is now at Longmoor doing nothing in particular – not even recovering from fever because, I gather, the African climate has not affected his health.

I repeat I know nothing about him except his record which is a fine one - so I am not swayed by any personal bias. Isn’t there any way by which you could set him on his return to Africa? If he dies there I shall be revenged for his attempt on my life at Karree Siding. If he lives I fancy the service will be richer by his work."[viii]

The letter had the desired effect and within a few weeks Newcombe had his application accepted to survey the Sinai Peninsula on the eastern frontier of Egypt, a country nominally under the protection of Britain. The work suited his organisational skills and planning, as well as his longing to be out in the field.

The presence of his teams along the Egypt-Ottoman frontier, however, almost caused a diplomatic incident. London was informed by their embassy in Constantinople of reports that Britain was massing troops, a serious matter which could upset fragile relations. Kitchener was furious and refused to believe Newcombe had not crossed the border, ordering him in no uncertain terms to pull back immediately.[ix]

Wilderness of Zin, 1913 – 1914

While the teams completed the Sinai survey there remained only one uncharted triangle of land south of the Gaza-Beersheba line in southern Palestine down to the Gulf of Akaba, known since Biblical times as the Wilderness of Zin, an area considered to be of military importance in any future conflict with Turkey. Despite his run in with Kitchener, Newcombe was tasked with carrying out a clandestine survey under the auspices of the Palestine Exploration Fund with assistance from two civilian archaeologists, Charles Leonard Woolley and Thomas Edward Lawrence, who were excavating for the British Museum at the ancient Hittite capital of Carchemish. The archaeologists had been looking forward to a peaceful existence until the following season when Woolley unexpectedly received a message from the Museum requesting that the two men join the Royal Engineers in the south.[x]

When Newcombe joined Woolley and Lawrence on 10 January 1914 he was expecting a couple of grey beards. “I rode northwards to Beersheba from my Survey camp,” he recalled, “to meet the two eminent scientists...I was younger then than I am now and expected to meet two somewhat elderly people; I found C.L. Woolley and T.E. Lawrence, who looked about twenty-four years of age and eighteen respectively, though both were some six years older. My letters to them arranging for their reception had clearly been too polite. Undue deference ceased forthwith. I soon found that my rather primitive ways of living and ideas of comfort were not too far below their standards, and questions of transport, food, etc, were quickly settled.”[xi]

Despite their apparent youthfulness, Newcombe was impressed by their knowledge. “Both Woolley and TEL enthralled me at night by their archaeological and Biblical history,” he recalled, joking that he had been elevated to the position of Moses by Lawrence’s leg-pull of a dedication in The Wilderness of Zin report:

To Captain S.F. Newcombe, R.E.

Who showed them “the way wherein they must walk, and the work that they must do.”[xii]

(After Exodus Chapter 18:20)

Lawrence was equally impressed by Newcombe and paid him the following compliment in the introduction to the Zin report: “He was ambassador for all of us to Arab tribes and to Turkish officials, and managed both, leaving behind him a reputation which will smooth the way of any future English traveller in the desert.”[xiii] Newcombe ran a tightly organised outfit, not sparing himself and not expecting his men to do any less but he was also keen to discover something of the history of the region he was mapping. “I used to return from field work earlier and listen to either or both of them on the biblical and archaeological history of these areas till midnight,” he recalled. In Newcombe, the archaeologists found a willing pupil.[xiv]

Exploring Akaba

While Woolley went north Lawrence and a young Syrian Arab assistant named Dahoum were left in charge of a team of camels to travel south to rendezvous with Newcombe. Lawrence had no particular affection for his means of transportation and wrote: “Over the consequences of much riding of camels I draw thick veils: but take it as a summing up that we are very unhappy.” [xv] On 15 February Newcombe reported that Lawrence and his caravan had arrived from Ain Kadeis.

Newcombe was keen to explore the Akaba hinterland but a German newspaper spread exaggerated accounts of his team’s activities setting off diplomatic alarm bells with telegrams flying between Constantinople and Cairo.[xvi] Turkey was evidently fully aware of the official character of the survey. Kitchener was informed that for the second time Newcombe had overstepped the mark.[xvii] While Newcombe waited for orders, Kitchener delayed. Lawrence on the other hand was under no such constraints and wrote: “I photographed what I could, I archaeologised everywhere.”[xviii] By the time Newcombe received instructions to confine his surveys to the Gaza district he had all the intelligence he needed. Once again Newcombe’s actions brought him to the attention of his superiors but with the political situation rapidly changing, Kitchener was beginning to appreciate his junior officer’s maverick temperament.

Newcombe departed to continue his Sinai surveys while Lawrence and Dahoum left Akaba finally shaking off a Turkish escort around the ravines leading to Mount Hor where they rested at Aaron’s tomb, the white-washed dome previously used by Newcombe to take one of his big triangulations in the area. Lawrence’s persistence resulted in a discovery that would interest Newcombe: an east-west split through the twin hill ranges that formed the edges of the Wadi Arabah and a convenient crossing point for the raiding parties of the Howeitat tribe living to the east.

Spying on the railway

Newcombe shut down his surveys in May 1914 and took up an invitation from Woolley and Lawrence to visit Carchemish to compare notes while memories were fresh. He was keen to travel through areas that might yield significant military and local intelligence and had discussed the journey with Kitchener. Information could also be gained from a further detour 150 miles west of Jerablus to the construction route of the Constantinople-Baghdad Railway where it passed through the difficult terrain of the Taurus Mountains. Up-to-date intelligence reports were needed on its progress, with specific instructions to discover what problems had been encountered, any delays in construction, funding difficulties, workforce issues, estimated completion dates etc.[xix]

Briefed in Cairo, Newcombe set off accompanied by his assistant Lieutenant Greig on an intelligence gathering mission that took them to Jaffa, Haifa, Damascus, Beirut, Tripoli and Aleppo before arriving at the dig on 20 May. The lively and learned discussions on the forty years’ Wanderings of the Israelites that had enthralled Newcombe during the Zin survey were now replaced with a discourse on the history of a later civilization. “Here we learnt from them something about Hittite remains,” Newcombe recalled, “but more about the local tribes and Turkish rule. Lawrence gave us vivid and amusing accounts of their dealings with the German engineers, then working on the Jerablus bridge close by, and on the Baghdad Railway. Woolley added interesting detail to make the story more complete.”[xx] In fact Woolley and Lawrence were able to furnish Newcombe with enough information to compile a lengthy intelligence report on the political sentiments of the Kurds.[xxi] From Aleppo, Newcombe and Greig journeyed through the Belan Pass to Alexandretta[xxii] and were back in London in time for Newcombe to present an account of his survey to the 49th Annual General Meeting of the P.E.F. held on 16 June in Burlington House, Piccadilly.[xxiii]

Early that same month Woolley and Lawrence took leave of the men of Jerablus at the end of another season. Following a request from Newcombe they diverted their homeward journey to gather additional intelligence on the road the Germans had built across the Taurus Mountains by which to send supplies for the construction of the railway. They were lucky to encounter a disgruntled Italian engineer who had been dismissed by the Germans. Woolley was fluent in the language and managed to persuade him to give them all the information that Newcombe wanted.

The results of the archaeological element of the rushed Zin survey remained inconclusive but set the foundation for further study. On a personal level it saw Lawrence gradually changing from an “archaeological sort of man” into an accomplished and skilled field officer. What he could not have foreseen is that he would never return to Carchemish nor see Dahoum again. In fact, by the end of the war, Lawrence’s immense fame would prohibit him from ever being able to continue with his archaeological career in a post-Versailles world riddled with a suspicion of king-makers.

Looking back from beyond the war years Lawrence remembered the time spent digging at Carchemish as a golden age with Dahoum as his almost constant companion. “We were there for four years,” he recalled, “and it was the best life I ever lived.”[xxiv]

Opening moves

During the opening moves of the First World War, Newcombe was sent to the Franco-Belgium border where the Royal Engineers supported the Allied retreat following the Battle of Mons. General Edmund Allenby was the Commander of the Cavalry Division whose role was to hold up the advancing enemy forces where mobility was best suited to a rearguard action. A constant stream of men, horses and guns made their way south, their backs to the enemy and closing doors where possible behind them. One line of retreat was across the magnificent stone bridge at Compiegne. This was permanently closed by Newcombe in a spectacular demolition that proved to be a classic example of the art of bridge blowing.[xxv]

While the Allies regrouped, Newcombe and Lawrence were at the War Office in London completing their reports and maps of Sinai and Southern Palestine. When Turkey entered the war on the side of Germany they were ordered to Egypt to be joined by Woolley and other specialists in Middle Eastern affairs. Newcombe was tasked with organising a new Military Intelligence Branch under Gilbert ‘Bertie’ Clayton, director of both Military and Political Intelligence Services. Lawrence was in charge of maps, although as Newcombe revealed, he read all the reports which were discussed within the group, so ‘maps’ was only a nominal part of his job. “He was in fact as much in the picture as any of us,” Newcombe pointed out.[xxvi] Thereafter, Newcombe and Lawrence spent the next nine months together living and dining at the Grand Continental Hotel and working daily at the department in the nearby Savoy. At the beginning of February Lawrence explained the structure of the office: “Woolley sits all day doing précis, and writing windy concealers of truth for the press.... Newcombe runs a gang of most offensive spies, and talks to the General. I am map officer, and write geographical reports, trying to persuade 'em that Syria is not peopled entirely by Turks....” [xxvii] The department was not without its tensions but Lawrence steadfastly remained a Newcombe ally and wrote to his friend Charles Bell: “Newcombe...is a most heavenly person. He runs all the spies, and curses all the subordinates who don’t do their duty, and takes off the raw edges of generals and things. Without that I should have gone mad, I think.”[xxviii]

While Lawrence worked at his maps and reports, his brothers, Frank and William, were fighting on the Western Front. By the end of that first year both had been killed in action. Lawrence and Newcombe remained stoical but were experiencing a dilemma felt by many stuck in Cairo. Living in luxury at the Continental on a special rate of 10/- a day it was hard to see that they were contributing anything worthwhile to the war effort when so many were dying in France and the Dardanelles. Newcombe had hoped that the Gallipoli show would be over in a matter of weeks which would make a big impact on the future course of a war that was commonly thought had another year to run. But the campaign dragged on into the winter and it was deemed necessary to send reinforcements from Egypt.

Newcombe, who was never completely happy stuck in an office, was put in command of an Australian division of Engineers attached to the Imperial Army.[xxix] “I don't like the look of things up there,” Lawrence wrote home, “and the worst is, it was such an easy business till we blundered.”[xxx] Gallipoli had become a digger’s war and much of the fighting took place underground. Due to the nature of the terrain one of the key tactics was to fire mines strategically placed in the warren of tunnels cut into the hillside when the enemy was believed to be from two to six feet from the Allied workings. Following an earlier detonation of an ammonal charge, Lieutenant Frederick Bowra had descended the shaft of a tunnel coded C2 where he expected to see significant rupturing of the ceiling. However, he was knocked back when the candle he carried caused an explosion. Undeterred, he continued to inspect the shaft until he was overcome by carbon monoxide fumes that had built up in the sealed tunnel. When Bowra failed to return, two men descended to rescue him but were quickly disabled themselves. As soon as he heard the news of the difficulties, Newcombe raced across from 4th Company’s H.Q and led several parties to bring out the stricken men until he too collapsed under the effects of the gas. Along with Bowra, four men died in the rescue attempt.[xxxi] For his actions, Newcombe was awarded the Distinguished Service Order.[xxxii]

With further progress impossible and with casualties mounting, the Gallipoli scheme was abandoned. Newcombe remained on the peninsula to oversee the secret evacuation of Anzac troops on 21 December 1915. He and one other officer were left behind to oversee the preparation of charges in the four longest tunnels under the enemy’s trenches as a back line of defence to cover the embarkation if the Turks followed up. They gave the remaining Anzacs a fair start before heading to the beach themselves and getting away on one of the last boats.[xxxiii]

Newcombe returned to Cairo where on New Year’s Eve he dined with Lawrence to see out the old year. Gertrude Bell was among the party and knew both men from before the war. It was to be a brief respite. Gerty, as she was called by Lawrence, was already a legend in the East and was currently in town passing on her knowledge of tribal and regional politics to the Intelligence Department. Most of it would find its way into the archives of a new organisation named the Arab Bureau whose creation was only a few weeks away. As friends and colleagues gathered for what was a muted celebration, no one could say with any certainty what the future would hold except that the old world was in turmoil and Lord Kitchener’s prophesy of a three year war looked ever more likely.

After a short period strengthening the canal defences, Newcombe was given command of the 2nd Australian Divisional Engineers and told to prepare them for transportation to France where during the coming Somme offensive he and his corps gave support during the battle for Pozieres Ridge. If Gallipoli was where the Anzac spirit was born then Pozieres was where the young men came of age and where the Australian official historian, Charles Bean, said “was more densely sown with Australian sacrifice than any other place on earth."[xxxiv]

The war in the desert

Clandestine overtures for supporting an Arab uprising against the Ottomans were made as early as April 1914 when Emir Abdullah, second son of Hussein, the Sherif of Mecca, discussed with Ronald Storrs, Kitchener’s Oriental Secretary, the need for both financial and materiel support in the event of any action in the sacred land of the Hejaz. Storrs politely parried the request for weaponry by pointing out that Britain could never supply arms for use against a Friendly Power. This last point was not lost upon the Emir who had only a few months to wait before Turkey yielded to German influence and joined the Central Powers.[xxxv]

It would be a further two years before the Sherif raised the standard of revolt after protracted negotiations on a long list of demands that included expanded territorial claims under his rule as King of the Arabs, a pretentious and inflammatory title that Storrs thought verged on the tragi-comic given the disparate nature of the region and its peoples. The revolt enjoyed early success when on 16 June 1916 the Turkish garrison at Jeddah was taken with British naval assistance. After three weeks of stubborn resistance Mecca finally surrendered on 4 July. Thereafter the revolt stalled.

Clayton was keen to see what could be done and sent Storrs and Lawrence to appreciate the situation.[xxxvi] Lawrence quickly identified Feisal, Hussein’s third son, as the military leader to bring the revolt to full glory and reported back to his chiefs in Khartoum and Cairo.[xxxvii] As the year drew to a close it was obvious that aggressive action was necessary; without it the revolt would fail. Some British officers believed that the only way to prevent the Turks from retaking Mecca and replacing Hussein with an Emir of their own choosing was to land a British force at the coastal city of Rabegh. It was a contentious view and the Rabegh question rapidly developed into a crisis exposing ignorance and deep divisions of policy among British decision-makers. Those in favour stressed the moral impact of a British presence while those against saw the landing of Christian troops so close to the Holy Places as inflammatory throughout the Muslim world.

Having considered Lawrence’s reports General Wingate, the Governor-General of the Sudan, immediately cabled Clayton: “I propose to send Newcombe to Yenbo but in view of possible delay of his arrival I think Lawrence would do the work excellently as a temporary arrangement.” Having just secured Lawrence’s services for the Arab Bureau, Clayton was against the idea and thought he would be of far greater value at headquarters than in the field. Lawrence agreed and pointed out his “complete unfitness for the job”. Wingate persisted. “It is vitally important to have an officer of his exceptional knowledge of Arabs in close touch with Feisal at this critical juncture,” he argued.[xxxviii]

A coordinated military plan was agreed with the Sherifian leaders setting their sights on a northern advance to the port of Wejh from where they could attack the Hejaz Railway, a vital lifeline of the Ottomans out of reach of the Medina garrison under the command of the redoubtable Fakhri Pasha. In consideration of Muslim sensibilities the British Military Mission to the Hejaz was initially limited to a handful of advisors and trainers supported where necessary by the Red Sea Navy Patrol and four aircraft from ‘C’ Flight, No. 14 Squadron of the Royal Flying Corps based at Rabegh.

Newcombe was finally released from French duties on 9 December 1916 and ordered to Cairo to be briefed on his role as head of the Mission. Clayton’s view was to attack the Hejaz Railway decisively “without which we cannot really expect the Sherif’s prestige and that of his sons to make much headway.” He predicted the fall of Medina would be a “tremendous advertisement” and further proof of the success of the movement.[xxxix]

Akaba had long been identified as an obvious Allied target and plans for its capture were discussed in Cairo. Newcombe originally saw its occupation as essential to the successful prosecution of the war against the railway and had his own ideas on how to achieve it: “The whole movement to Akaba depends on ships,” he wrote, “movement by land will be too slow and laborious.” Lawrence, who had recently returned to the Hejaz as Newcombe’s temporary substitute, saw Akaba as a base to move the Arab movement north to Damascus to secure a far greater political victory and knew it could be taken from the land with a mobile force. Newcombe would soon be in agreement.

With Newcombe’s arrival delayed, Lawrence decided to remain with Feisal’s army until his replacement caught up. Newcombe landed the next afternoon soon after the Arab army broke camp before the long march north to attack Wejh in a coordinated land-sea operation with 500 of Feisal’s men who had sailed with a small British fleet as advance party. Feisal’s call-to-arms: “Make God your agent!” inspired the adventure with a sense of righteousness as the rising camels jostled for the best positions behind the crimson banners.[xl] The war-songs had hardly started before Lawrence spotted two horsemen approaching from the west.

“Afterwards in a broad flat, two horsemen came cantering across from the left to greet Feisal,” Lawrence wrote in his war-time book, Seven Pillars of Wisdom. “I knew the first one, dirty old blear-eyed Mohammed Ali el Beidawi, Emir of the Juheina: but the second looked strange. When he came nearer I saw he was in khaki uniform, with a cloak to cover it and a silk head-cloth and head-rope, much awry. He looked up, and there was Newcombe's red and peeling face, with straining eyes and vehement mouth, a strong, humorous grin between the jaws.{...}

I offered him my spare camel and an introduction to Feisal, whom he greeted like an old school-friend; and at once they plunged into the midst of things, suggesting, debating, planning at lightning speed. Newcombe's initial velocity was enormous, and the freshness of the day and the life and happiness of the Army gave inspiration to the march and brought the future bubbling out of us without pain.”[xli]

Lawrence had expected that upon Newcombe’s arrival he would no longer be required but Newcombe proposed to retain his services up to Wejh to apprise himself of the situation and to ease the handover of duties. It was just what Lawrence wanted. Fortunately, Feisal also saw the advantage of having Lawrence by his side and sent a request for his continued service as liaison officer. The application coming directly from the Emir could hardly be refused.

After an initial period of planning, Newcombe and Lawrence’s operations in the field took different directions. Newcombe took to tearing up the rails of the Hejaz in a frenzy of destruction. He had a habit of doing four times more than any other Englishman and ten times more than what the Arabs thought wise or needful. Lawrence said the Bedu compared him to fire, “he burns friend and enemy”, they said.[xlii] Newcombe took that as a compliment but he could see them shrinking from him in case they were his next victims. The raw material he was given was invariably poor and he was never able to attack the line with vigour and hold it for any significant length of time. Gallipoli and the Somme weighed heavy on Newcombe’s participation. His desire to get at the enemy became legendary but it was an approach that caused problems, not least to Lawrence who had formed his own ideas on the future direction of the campaign. [xliii]

As the year wore on Newcombe was increasingly feeling less popular as he once was. Cairo noted that his reports consisted mainly of missed opportunities and disappointments with descriptions of “good plans spoilt by the indiscipline, instability of purpose, cowardice and general untrustworthiness, not only of the Bedouin forces accompanying him, but also of the Sheikhs at their head.” On more than one occasion Newcombe reported that the obstacles put by the Turks in the way of his efforts were far less serious than those from his own men. “I don’t know when I have been so disappointed and angry,” he concluded.

There had been talks of Newcombe accompanying the Howeitat chief, Auda Abu Tayi, to the Jebel Druze to gauge local sympathies but in the end it was Lawrence who set off on a clandestine mission on 9 May with the old warrior and a small camel-mounted force of Ageyl mercenaries in a circuitous route to the north while Newcombe continued to tear at the rails and grow in frustration.[xliv] Feisal had been necessarily privy to the planning of the operation and had put his trusted deputy, Sherif Nasir ibn Ali, in command of the force while Auda was to muster extra men and supplies from among the Howeitat tribesmen as they pushed north. The third key man was an Arab nationalist from Damascus, Nasib al-Bakri, who was to garner support from like-minded rebels and represent Feisal to the villagers in Syria. The plan was to move Feisal’s army up in stages to be in a position to strike Aqaba. “The importance of Aqaba is both political and tactical,” Newcombe wrote on 24 May. “Feisal considers it indispensable politically to encourage the Beni Sakhr, Howeitat and Druzes.”[xlv]

While Lawrence and the rebels gathered strength a change in command had taken place in Cairo. On 27 June, General Sir Edmund Allenby replaced Sir Archibald Murray as commander-in-chief of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force. His arrival gave fresh impetus to the Allied push to finally take Gaza but the Prime Minister, Lloyd George, had his eyes on a greater prize - Jerusalem by Christmas. Unbeknown to his superiors Lawrence was poised to strike Aqaba from the interior and help deliver a key objective in Allenby’s advance.

On 9 July Newcombe was carrying out a stunt on the line when he turned thirty-nine-years old. Meanwhile, Auda and Lawrence had taken matters into their own hands and had captured Akaba at a stroke three days earlier. Their approach had taken them through the Nefud Desert to arrive at the rear of the town taking Akaba’s Turkish garrison at Abu El Lissan by surprise. The port itself fell with little resistance.[xlvi]

While Newcombe was still focussed on the primary military aim of his mission, namely to take and hold the Hejaz Railway, Lawrence was already the talk of the town in Cairo having hoodwinked not only the Turks but his own superiors. After being debriefed by Allenby and arranging supplies, money and munitions for Aqaba he returned to the Hejaz where on 19 July he flew from Wejh to Jeida to meet Feisal and Newcombe to brief them on his extraordinary achievements and to set out his vision for the future. Despite sharing Feisal’s elation, Newcombe’s enthusiasm for his own predicament understandably took a severe blow. In an extraordinary unsent letter to Lawrence written shortly after Lawrence’s announcement, Newcombe describes himself as a "washed up old man....with no physical guts left". He congratulated Lawrence on his tremendous results which he admitted no one else could have achieved. “We others can't disguise the fact that we are British and it’s no use trying to be unnaturally Arab when one can't: and I've not succeeded," he confessed. His frustrations also spilled over into his private journals which hinted at discord between the two men, but typically the feeling was short-lived.[xlvii] Newcombe’s generosity is evident in his praise for Lawrence’s remarkable achievement but it must have rankled to have been sidelined. Despite his disappointments in the field he remained Lawrence’s staunchest supporter.

By the end of the month and with the campaign already so far beyond the northern limits of the Military Mission to the Hejaz, Newcombe was ready to quit the scene. He and Lawrence both knew he was not suited to the role of base commander in Aqaba and was “rather played out,” as he put it, “and have been for the last 6 weeks and cannot do much without decent rest...before I can take on anything else.” Two weeks later he was back in Cairo, his Arabian adventure over after eight intense months with what he called “many successes but few results”.[xlviii]

Captivity and Escape 1917-18

Back in Egypt, Newcombe contributed to Allenby’s military preparations for the Third Battle of Gaza. As part of the deception to trick the Turks into thinking the main thrust was to attack Beersheba, he devised a covert operation not dissimilar to Lawrence’s Aqaba stunt.[xlix] It was during this daring raid behind enemy lines north of the town, while commanding a heavily-armed camel-mounted group, that his mission to cut communications and the enemy’s line of retreat became itself encircled and outnumbered by superior forces. With casualties increasing, Newcombe was forced to surrender.[l] Lawrence later wrote that Newcombe had shown imagination in the stunt but had been “brave for six hours too long”.[li]

While captivity for an officer of Newcombe’s rank afforded some degree of comfort, his men fared less well and were forced to march to prison camps where some died en route or in work gangs during railway construction or in the salt mines of Anatolia. For Newcombe, the following months were full of danger, intrigue and perhaps more surprisingly, of romance. He was not a passive prisoner and made several attempts to escape, finally succeeding with the help of a brave young woman named Elsie (or Elizabeth) Chaki, whom he had befriended in Constantinople. Incredibly, the pair fell in love while Newcombe was being treated in hospital for smallpox. When he recovered she followed him to the spa town of Bursa across the Sea of Marmara where he was held in a prison camp for officers. Through a series of clandestine messages and the occasional furtive meeting at a prominent clock tower in the town they were able to arrange an audacious escape plan whereby he would return to Constantinople by boat while passing himself off as an Arab fisherman. After many mishaps the plan worked and once back in town and relying on his disguise, he nervously approached Elsie’s house. When she set eyes on him she adamantly refused to have anything to do with him. He was tired and hungry and worn thin by the planning and execution of his Boy’s Own adventure with its dangers and anxieties and now with freedom almost within his grasp he was in danger of being rebuffed with the very real possibility that he would be apprehended and sent back to prison. After his many ordeals what happened next can only be described as the stuff of romantic fiction. When Elsie eventually recognised him beneath the clothes, the dirt and the beard he was ushered safely inside. “I suddenly had the delightful feeling of being free from the Turks,” he later wrote, before adding mischievously that he was now Elsie’s prisoner. Appearing slightly bemused by the course of events, he announced, “and then somehow I got engaged to be married.”[lii]

As the centuries-old domination of the Ottomans rapidly unravelled Newcombe decided to remain undercover to liaise on possible allied peace terms with members of the emerging political powers which rose and fell during the turbulent weeks leading to the Armistice. After reaching an agreement on key points he finally got away and travelled overland on an agonisingly slow train to the port of Smyrna where he caught a trawler that was carrying the Turkish delegates to what had now become formal and binding negotiations on board a British ship, HMS Agamemnon, anchored in Mudros harbour off the island of Lemnos. He arrived on 27 October and found much to his dismay that General Townshend, as the senior officer to be recently released from captivity, was now conducting the talks on behalf of the Allies. After being debriefed by Townshend on his negotiations and being too late to help draft the final peace agreement he left two days later and went directly to Alexandria and thence to GHQ in Ludd, Palestine, to report to Allenby’s staff. He arrived exactly one year to the day since his capture.[liii]

Newcombe’s memoirs only hints at the level of disappointment he must have felt in missing the advance in Syria, the taking of Jerusalem, the capture of Damascus, and finally in not being fully involved in the armistice negotiations, especially as he had risked so much in setting the groundwork behind the scenes in Constantinople. Lawrence was already in London and had addressed the Eastern Committee of the War Cabinet while Newcombe was at sea suffering from mal de mer; Feisal was established in Damascus as the undisputed leader of the Arabs of Syria and intent on setting up an Arab authority with ambitions well beyond the town. The French meanwhile were just as intent on adhering to the terms of the Sykes-Picot Agreement which hung over the region like a sword and threatened Feisal’s efforts at creating a united front to press for Arab demands at the future peace conference. Newcombe’s first action, however, was to fulfil an undertaking that had been ever-present in his mind since his capture. He returned to the prison camps of Anatolia to see to the well-being of his men and arrange their safe passage home. It was typical of the man.

Within a few months of the war’s end, Newcombe and Elsie were reunited and were married on 16 April 1919 in St. Margaret’s, a small church nestling in the shadow of Westminster Abbey, London. If Newcombe wanted to impress his young bride he could not have picked a more magnificent location, situated at the spiritual and political epicentre of the capital.[liv] However, not everyone was pleased to hear he had married. Gertrude Bell bemoaned the fact after meeting the couple in Damascus later in the year: “...Colonel Newcombe is the kind of man who never ought to have married at all. He is an adventurer and really good at the job.”[lv] Lawrence, though, was delighted. It was a bright moment in an otherwise challenging year. Their past differences of policy in the Hejaz had been forgotten. After all, Newcombe treated Lawrence like a younger brother, and arguments are commonplace between siblings. “Our family affairs are our own,” was how Lawrence described relations within the British mission and the two men moved onto the next phase of their friendship.[lvi]

Final Eastern duties

For Lawrence, the agreements of the 1919 Paris Peace Conference gave scant concessions to the Arabs for their war effort in support of the Allied campaign. On a personal level the cost was high; promises made by Lawrence to coerce the Arabs to fight and die for their freedom were shown to be empty and contrary to the Anglo-French agreement of 1916. The resultant anguish would drive him into a political association with Churchill to seek a solution from which England could emerge from the Arab affair with clean hands.[lvii] As a cathartic exercise he also began to write his monumental war memoirs, Seven Pillars of Wisdom; it was an additional strain his weakened psychological state could ill afford. Meanwhile, an American journalist named Lowell Thomas had captured the imagination of the public with an extravagant multi-media entertainment called “With Allenby in Palestine and Lawrence in Arabia”. Shown to millions of people in theatres in New York, London and the English-speaking world, Lowell’s storytelling presented Lawrence as a young man “who will go down in history alongside Francis Drake, ‘Chinese’ Gordon and Kitchener of Khartoum”. In one of the most impressive examples of hero-making ‘Lawrence of Arabia’ became a household name overnight.[lviii]

At the beginning of 1920 the Newcombes were in Cairo where their son Stewart Lawrence was born on 23 January, named in recognition of his father’s friendship with Lawrence who was asked to become the boy’s godfather. “Of course Lawrence may have been the name of your absolutely favourite cousin or aunt, (observe my adroitness in sex),” wrote Lawrence, “and if so I will be dropping an immodest brick by blushing – but if it isn’t, aren’t you handicapping ‘it’?” He went on to explain his wider predicament: “In the history of the world (cheap edition) I’m a sublimated Aladdin, the thousand and second Knight, a Strand-Magazine strummer. In the eyes of ‘those who know’ I failed badly in attempting a piece of work which a little more resolution would have pushed through, or left un-touched. So either case it is bad for the sprig, unless, as I said, there is a really decent aunt.” [lix]

Events were moving fast in Syria when the San Remo Conference of 1920 overturned Feisal’s Arab government in favour of a French Mandate. Feisal had no alternative but to capitulate in the face of overwhelming pressure, his denouement finally sealed at the Battle of Maysalun where French legitimacy to the occupation of the country was tested in the face of courageous but ill-fated resistance. Feisal had been cast adrift, chastened but wiser in the ways of the Great Powers.

Newcombe leaves Cairo

Newcombe left Egypt in 1920 armed with a pile of notebooks containing his research into an emerging science that was seeking to develop a method of creating cost-effective mapping for civil and military purposes from aerial photographs. As an experienced surveyor Newcombe had long seen the advantages of combining conventional mapping techniques with the recent developments in aviation and photography that had taken place as a result of rapid progress during the last war. In this he was not alone but the science was fragmented and uncoordinated. His aim was to bring together the experts and their research and to develop the idea under one authority.[lx] For this he needed to be in London and so in July he took up temporary residence at 25 Courtfield Gardens, South Kensington. Although he was still effectively under the colours of the Royal Engineers his future remained undecided. In one week he was offered two jobs, as commanding officer of the Gendarmerie in Turkey and the rather more surprising role as financial advisor to the Armenian government. Of the two options, Newcombe favoured the latter and sought Lawrence’s advice. Lawrence was doing all he could to help his friend secure something more in line with his expertise but could only push at events from the sidelines.

In October Newcombe was given a temporary posting to Renmore Barracks in Galway on the west coast of Ireland. Feisal’s future also occupied his thoughts as he was increasingly concerned about the legacy of their war work in Arabia following Feisal’s expulsion. “What is happening to Feisal?” he asked Lawrence. “I wish one could do something to retrieve or make good promises.”[lxi] Lawrence knew more than he let on but would not, or could not, inform his friend without divulging secret discussions going on behind the scenes.

Newcombe had recently written an article on the merits of surveying by aerial photogrammetry and was having trouble in getting it published. Along with Lawrence’s new-found celebrity status there was the advantage of having access to the editors of Fleet Street. When Newcombe sought his friend’s help he was surprised to find that his article subsequently appeared in the Daily Telegraph under Lawrence’s name. Lawrence apologised immediately, genuinely upset. “This is a most ghastly business: and I suppose the result is to undo all that you had been doing.”[lxii] Newcombe, gracious as ever, forgave the mistake. After trying to get it published for so long he simply made a light-hearted reference to its poor literary merits and reminded Lawrence of when they worked together in Cairo. “Was really not a bit worried,” he wrote, “in fact quite amused at your name heading that article; after all, very many of your articles appeared with my signature below them in 1915 so that’s quits!”[lxiii]

An Irish interlude

Newcombe’s duties in Ireland were light allowing time for him to take Elsie on a tour of the west coast despite an increase in violence by Sin Féin agitators that inevitably drew a brutal retaliatory response. He wrote to Lawrence suggesting he come across to study another rebellion. “There may be an analogy between the Arab one and this if looked at with a very one sided light,” he wrote.[lxiv] But Lawrence had no time or desires to study another uprising, least of all an Irish one, and drew parallels with their recent experience reminding Newcombe that you can’t make wars on rebellions. “Rebellions are made by 2% active, and 98% passive or sympathetic,” he wrote, “...after all how many Arabs were really keen to shoot Turks.”[lxv]

By September, Lawrence had completed the second draft version of the Seven Pillars, his first attempt having been lost at Reading Station the previous December. Newcombe was premature when he wrote to say Elsie had suggested a photo of baby Jimbo as the frontispiece. Jimbo would turn six-years-old before the privately printed edition was finally produced.[lxvi]

Feisal as King

Concealed in Lawrence’s long periods of silence and absence was his persistent influencing of policy behind the scenes. On 8 February 1921, Feisal arrived at Lord Winterton’s country house for discussions on whether he would accept the crown of Iraq if offered. Previous attempts to raise the subject had been countered by Feisal who reiterated his claim that his brother Abdullah took precedent over him and in any case, their father, Sherif Hussein, had the final word. “I was driven out of Syria,” Feisal said, “so how can I accept that it be said of me that I am seeking a throne at the expense of my brother.”[lxvii] Finally he assented to their request and Churchill, as Colonial Secretary with kingdoms to bestow, convened a conference in Cairo in March where the decision was ratified.[lxviii] On 23 June Feisal disembarked from a British motorboat in Basra to begin the next phase of his life. It was his first visit to Iraq.

On 19 July 1921, Elsie gave birth to a second child, a girl they named Diana.[lxix] They settled into family quarters in Devonport where Newcombe continued with engineering duties. Thereafter, Lawrence of Arabia returned to his war memoirs and played an unsuccessful game of hide-and-seek with the public. George Bernard Shaw, friend and literary advisor, was less than helpful: “You created him, and now you must put up with him.” Lawrence thought otherwise and sought refuge in the RAF under the name of Ross. In time even he saw the absurdity of the situation: “It’s like having a unicorn in a racing stable,” he remarked.[lxx]

Newcombe had long realised something was up and offered Lawrence peace and quiet in his house in Devonport, although with two small children he thought that perhaps he would prefer one of the empty married quarters on Drake Island in Plymouth if he wished to be by himself. Then out of the blue he received the following reply: “I’ve behaved scummishly, I’m afraid,” Lawrence wrote, “and in reparation had better tell you plainly that I’ve enlisted (under another name, of course)...Otherwise I’d have liked very much to have come down to Devonport for a while.”[lxxi]

Letters to ‘Monster’

On 10 March 1926, Lawrence wrote to his godson, Stewart Lawrence Newcombe, aged 6, regarding the need to change their names. The letter was addressed to ‘My Lord Duke’; just one of the many pet names Lawrence called young Stewart who was variously known as James, Jimbo or Jimmy by the family but addressed by Lawrence as Monster, Horror and Object. “It is time for you to change your name once more,” he wrote. “In 1920 Lawrence was current. In 1921 our names became Ross. In 1923 we changed to Shaw. What shall we become next year?”

The inevitable publicity surrounding the publication of Revolt in the Desert, an abridgment to the Seven Pillars, meant that an overseas posting kept Lawrence out of the spotlight until interest died down. “Hurry up and learn to read. I have written a book: a long book,” he explained to Monster. “One copy is to go to your father, since it says rude things about his face and character. One copy is to go to you: so that you shall know what your father is like.” He signed himself ‘Your worm, Shaw’.[lxxii]

Plans were already well advanced for Lawrence to be posted later that same year to the RAF Depot at Drigh Road some six miles outside of Karachi in what was then India. Lawrence hoped that Newcombe would be in London in July so that the two men might meet before he sailed. Failing that, he wrote asking if he would still be in Ismailia in the winter to get him off the boat, “for five minutes of dry land and quietude”.[lxxiii]

Newcombe’s entreaties to the authorities in Port Said drew a blank and he was told that under no circumstances were troops or airmen allowed to leave the ship while in port.[lxxiv] Determined to catch a glimpse of his friend, even if it was just from the quayside, he scanned the decks of the ship as it docked and was extremely surprised when he spotted Lawrence walking boldly down the gangplank under his own initiative.

Taking him off for tea at the house of a Dr. Stevens, Newcombe could not help but notice that Lawrence was clearly showing signs of being overstrained. He tried pulling his leg for not earning his pay as a higher ranking airman, and enquired as to why he had not considered taking up air surveying which they had both carried out at the Egyptian Survey Office in 1915. Lawrence confessed to being in a state of exhaustion after the enormous effort of getting out the Seven Pillars, saying that he felt like a hungry beggar who saw a loaf of bread on the side of the road but could not be bothered to go and pick it up as he was too tired. Newcombe was sufficiently concerned to discuss his condition later with the doctor who judged that Lawrence was overwrought and was trying hard to suppress any outward signs of strain.[lxxv]

Lawrence continued to write to his godson from India and when at last he was able, Monster wrote back. In one letter the youngster included a photo of himself with a toy rifle. Lawrence called him a ‘ferocious imp’ and promised a similar picture in return. “I look bloodthirsty too,’ he announced, signing off with, “Love and brickbats to yourself. Tell your father I salute him with both hands.”[lxxvi] In a letter thanking Monster for sending a large tin of caramels he enclosed some grains from the Sind desert. “We eat them here nearly every day,” he wrote.[lxxvii] Lawrence’s relationship with the boy was clearly special. Perhaps he was reminded of his youngest brother at a similar age when Arnie was also a ‘Worm’ and was greeted with loud worms. Lawrence’s innate impishness is evident in these letters, only drifting into seriousness when he was reminded of his predicament. “Life rolls on. Soon you will be lucky, and will go to England. I will not.”[lxxviii]

Malta

1929 was a turning point for both men. Newcombe left Egypt to become Chief Engineer of the Mediterranean fortress island of Malta. Improvements to the civil and military infrastructure and a steady flow of visitors were the only distractions to a period of peace on the island. Lawrence, on the other hand, had a surprising start to the year when local suspicions of his activities in India turned international with claims that Britain’s imperialist intentions in Afghanistan were being led by the most mysterious man in the Empire. Lawrence flatly denied the rumours but was shipped back to England and a quieter posting at RAF Cattewater in Plymouth leading to a productive period of translating Homer’s Odyssey, assisting in the organisation of the Schneider Trophy and ultimately working on the design and development of high-speed air sea rescue boats after he had witnessed an RAF Iris III flying boat crash into the sea.

Newcombe’s letters continued to chase Lawrence all over England. “How many times does my silly conscience suggest that I write to you?” Lawrence wrote on 20 April 1931. “Hundreds of times, for every score the beast gets.” He asked after Newcombe’s plans: “How much more of Malta for you? I was expecting to hear of you home on a pension. There are no better things than adequate pensions. If only someone would pension me.”

Lawrence described work on a new type of motor boat engine for the R.A.F. “Hard work, cold work, wet work,” he explained, adding it was best suited to the Mediterranean. “If your hopeful ever comes to Plymouth let me know, and I’ll try to meet the little beast’s ship and half-drown him.” Lawrence of Arabia was now Shaw of Plymouth and had grown web-footed. “Nowt else,” he signed off breezily. “I am wet, cold and tired. Be good.”[lxxix]

After re-establishing contact, a playful banter returned to their regular correspondence with Lawrence addressing his friend as Magnificence, Munificence, Majesty and even Your Lord Duke.

The end of the year saw Newcombe’s military service drawing to a close. Arrangements for the education of his children remained a priority. Diana would be privately education in Paris and Florence but for his son Newcombe enlisted Lawrence’s assistance in acquiring a place for him in England’s most prestigious public school, Eton College.

Lawrence’s friendship with Eton house-master, A.F.G. Kerry, went back to their childhood in Oxford when the Lawrence and the Kerry families were close neighbours. Lawrence sent him a letter but informed Newcombe that he was not sure what effect it would have as he understood that all the schools were well subscribed. Perhaps the introduction did some good as Monster, then aged 12, was duly accepted for consideration.[lxxx] Several months later, Lawrence wrote congratulating Newcombe on his son’s success: “Very good...your imp has got an Eton scholarship first go,” but adding a word of caution against the Eton ‘type’: “Poor kid! I hope he avoids the manner...a nice kid, James.”[lxxxi]

During a recent trip to London Newcombe secured a property at 30 Brechin Place, South Kensington. He had been in service since 1898, amounting to thirty-four years spent largely overseas. “You will be home this month for good! I am glad and sorry,’ Lawrence wrote, adding that he thought it would be difficult to make a go of civilian life after long years of soldiering. “I should funk it, anyway.”[lxxxii]

For Newcombe, retirement from the military meant new opportunities to develop private interests. In 1932 he joined Turner and Newall, a leading manufacturer of asbestos-based products, to develop his ideas on heat retention in domestic property. Having settled in London he was at last able to take active participation on the committees of several clubs and associations, becoming Vice President and later Honorary Secretary of the Royal Central Asian Society and Treasurer of the Palestine Exploration Fund.

Death of Feisal

In June 1933, Feisal travelled to Britain on an official state visit and dined with Newcombe, Lawrence and others at the Hyde Park Hotel, where no doubt Newcombe discussed with Feisal the urgent need to expand the Iraqi rail network. Lawrence had been reticent about the reunion and had to be coaxed out of his refuge by Feisal who arranged with the Air Ministry to set him free from duties.[lxxxiii] In the end it turned out to be a happy occasion with everyone on good form but was the last time the three men would meet together. Feisal was forced to return to Baghdad to deal with escalating political problems before exhaustion from a weak heart caused him to travel to Switzerland for treatment where he died suddenly on the 8 September 1933. He had been on the throne for twelve years. The strain of steering a difficult path through the demands of his mandatory protectors and the constant threat of inherent sectarianism had finally taken its toll.[lxxxiv] Newcombe expressed his deep regret at his death in a letter to Lawrence with a request from the secretary of the Royal Central Asian Society, Miss Kennedy, for a written appreciation for their journal.[lxxxv] In the end, Lawrence kept his distance but corrected Miss Kennedy’s draft attempt.

Preparing to leave

By 1934 Lawrence was preparing for his own dreaded retirement from the RAF which had been his home, on and off, since 1922. “For myself I am going to taste the flavour of true leisure,” he wrote to his biographer, Liddell Hart. “For 46 years have I worked and been worked. Remaineth 23 years (of expectancy), May they be like Flecker’s ‘a great Sunday that goes on and on’”.[lxxxvi] But behind the sentiment he was unsure about the future beyond returning to his cottage, Clouds Hill in Dorset. This is where his books were, twelve hundred of them, each read at least once and worth reading again, and a gramophone to play music on. At last, perhaps this could be his refuge, a sanctuary from fame.

In the final weeks of his RAF service Lawrence took time out of a busy schedule to write a charming seasonal letter to Monster who was now old enough to be called James. In fact James probably had as many name changes as his godfather and it remained a running joke between them: “Dear James, (alias Stewart a word I only cry out when about to be sick - alias Monster, plus or minus other things. Merry Christmas. No, I don’t really mean that. I follow the Golden Rule. May you have a quiet Christmas with nothing abnormal to eat. Avoid gluttony, above all. Remember your figure, and the figures your parents ought to have.” [lxxxvii]

He asked James to congratulate his father on the balance sheet of Turner and Newell before requesting more building materials for Clouds Hill, such as rolls of foil and asbestos slates. He was concerned about heath fires and chose products specifically for their flame-retardant and insulating properties. He was obviously aware of the inherent dangers of the materials which he called that ‘beastly stuff’.[lxxxviii]

Discharged

Lawrence took his discharge from the R.A.F. on Monday 25 February 1935 in front of his Commanding Officer, Pilot-Officer Manning. The next morning, Manning and a few colleagues gathered at Bridlington harbour-side to see him off. Wearing his familiar civvies of sports jacket and flannel trousers, held in place at the ankles by bicycle clips, Lawrence had knotted a checked scarf at his neck and tucked the ends into the front of his jacket. It was a crisp sunny day and he had a plan to cycle south by stages, meeting friends and family on the way. It would be a long journey over a few days and he was keen to be on his way, partly to start eating up the distance, but mostly to face the dreaded moment that would severe him from the service that had been his home and refuge for the past twelve years.

A colleague, the civilian boat contractor Ian Daheer, requested a photograph of Lawrence sitting astride his bike. Resting one hand against the brick wall of the harbour to steady himself Lawrence allowed himself to be captured by Daheer in the last moments before he pedalled off, squinting with hooded eyes in the sunlight as he must have done in the desert.[lxxxix] A final wave and a whimsical half-smile and he had gone, once again just ‘a small cloud of dust’ on the horizon of his friends’ lives.[xc]

Shaw of Clouds Hill

Cloud’s Hill beckoned. How important that tranquil cottage must have seemed to him as he left behind one life and took up another. With many alterations already completed there were more plans in hand. Yet when Lawrence arrived he found the place besieged by ‘press hounds’ looking for a story after being alerted to his discharge by a careless correspondent. He immediately fled to London and took up lodgings in Waterloo. After writing to Churchill to call in a favour he enlisted the help of the chairman of the Newspaper Proprietors Association to persuade the press people to leave him alone.[xci] It took a couple of weeks before his plea was actioned but by the evening of 26 March he was back at the Clouds Hill, deserted except for his near neighbour, Patrick Knowles, who had been busy preparing the cottage prior to his arrival.

Newcombe was also on hand to help with more building supplies, keen to play his part in Lawrence’s transition from airman to what? Lawrence was unsure. He summed up the feeling in a letter to the artist, Eric Kennington: “Have you ever been a leaf and fallen from your tree in autumn and been really puzzled about it? That’s the feeling.”[xcii]

Having settled into the cottage Lawrence kept himself busy planning and executing the finishing touches to its refurbishment. He was corresponding with Newcombe on an almost daily basis seeking advice on methods and materials. In this way Clouds Hill was slowly becoming a one man house and an earthly paradise which wild mares could not take him away from until he was, as he put it, ‘qualified for it’.[xciii]

“Mr. Newell’s christian name must be Lightening,” he wrote to Newcombe, congratulating one half of the firm for a prompt delivery, before adding mockingly, “In this he compares most favourably with your Mr. Turnall,” when a second delivery went astray and was delayed.[xciv]

Newcombe later remarked that during this period he noticed a change in Lawrence from his younger self. What he called more natural; he found him “more human” than he had been for many years.[xcv] It seems that Lawrence was for now content to sit under his own roof and do nothing until he wanted to do something. “Is that a programme,” he once asked.[xcvi]

A Fallen Leaf

On 13 May 1935, after posting a telegram to the writer Henry Williamson, Lawrence was riding his powerful Brough motorcycle back across the heath towards Clouds Hill when he was surprised by two errand boys on bicycles riding towards him out of a dip in the road. In avoiding the boys he went head first onto the gravelled road. After six days in a coma he finally surrendered a fragile hold on life and died. It was a Sunday - one last “Sunday that goes on and on.”

Newcombe had stayed with him the last few days in the hospital until he died. Thereafter, Arnie was named as heir and joint executor in Lawrence’s will and took on the daunting task of settling his brother’s estate. Newcombe remained on hand to help and opened a dedicated account with Martins Bank in London to pay for medical and funeral costs which after specialist attention and care amounted to £449.[xcvii] He later accompanied Arnold to the inquest. He felt it was the least he could do; it was like losing a brother. On the day of the funeral he was one of six pall bearers, each man signifying a different period of Lawrence’s life, with Newcombe representing the Arabian years. Newcombe, positioned to the right and in the middle of the bier, helped steady the coffin with his left hand as it was pulled along the church path and out onto the usually quiet country lane, now lined with cameramen and onlookers, leading to the small graveyard extension.[xcviii]

Palestine and beyond

In the years following Lawrence’s death, Newcombe renewed his efforts to seek a solution to the unresolved state of affairs in Palestine. As an Arabist, his feet were most firmly planted in the Muslim camp. His subsequent actions, motives and pronouncements were in defence of and in unequivocal support of his Muslim friends and the newly created countries that were struggling to move beyond the tutelage and protection of their British and French administrators or to free themselves from the League of Nations mandatory system and towards a new era of self-government.

Although he maintained contact with his many Jewish friends his viewpoint became increasingly anti-Zionist and between the years of 1937 and 1948 he was active in several organisations promoting and publicising a Palestinian point of view and solution. In 1937 he became the Honorary Secretary of the Palestine Information Centre in London and later advisor to the Committee for Arab Affairs. He was very active in helping to push forward the aims and desires of a growing movement of orthodox Muslims and non-Muslims in creating a fitting place of worship within the British capital, the first of its kind. The initiative was successful and became the East London Mosque and Islamic Cultural Centre. In its early years Newcombe sat on its committee as Joint Honorary Secretary.[xcix]

Aldington

In 1954, news emerged that a book was to be published that would rock the reputation of Lawrence sufficiently enough, so the publishers claimed, to ‘erase him from the pages of history’.[c] The book was Lawrence of Arabia: A Biographical Enquiry by Richard Aldington. Its first appearance, however, would be in France, where a more provocative title would read like a declaration of war - Lawrence, L’Imposteur.

Aldington’s experiences as an officer on the Western Front had a major influence on his career as a writer. In 1919, he published a collection of poetry, Images of War, but it was his first novel, Death of a Hero, that made his reputation, the semi-autobiographical novel reflecting the disillusionment of the generation that fought through World War One and a savage satire of the society that Aldington felt was responsible for it. Europe, he once said, had committed suicide in 1914. “They say I am bitter,” he wrote. “The trouble is that I am not bitter enough.”[ci]

A further clue to his motivation to discredit Lawrence is shown in the following admission: “I have tried...,” he wrote, “to give the evidence...fairly and in such a way that it can be instantly verified, though not without some indignation that such a man should have been given the fame and glory of the real heroes of 1914-1918.”[cii]

When news of the book broke the Newcombe family was living in Oxford at 300 Woodstock Road. Newcombe was 76-years-old and unwell. The years of physical exertion in the desert of Africa and Arabia had taken their toll; he was hard of hearing and suffered from impetigo and a nagging kidney infection that had affected him for many months.[ciii] With so much lobbying going on in the background by what Aldington called the ‘Lawrence Bureau’, Newcombe’s robust approach to the unfolding drama was confined to directing operations from his sick bed where he received visitors, gave good advice, offered to read the draft manuscript, wrote and responded to hundreds of letters and urged others to come forward in the name of truth and accurate scholarship. His major concern was the effect revelations of Lawrence’s illegitimacy would have on his mother aged ninety-two and still very active. But he knew Lawrence well enough to state that “T.E. would have been amused by fair debunking, however erratic.” Indeed, he claimed Lawrence would have met many of Aldington’s claims with a cryptic smile. But like many reviewers, and even some of Aldington’s own supporters, he was dismayed by the vindictiveness and hostility contained within the book, the acerbic, bitingly-satirical writing style revealing more about the writer’s own condition than his subject.[civ]

Despite the concerted efforts to stop or delay its British publication, the book was published by Collins on 31 January 1955. If the French version carried a provocative title, the English version set the tone by a quotation chosen by Aldington from The Importance of Being Ernest by Oscar Wilde, discreetly placed on the title page: “Untruthful! My nephew Algernon? Impossible! He is an Oxonian.”[cv]

A week after publication Newcombe drew a line under the whole sorry business and urged Liddell Hart to do the same: “Aldington is a poor man who sacrifices decency for something to eat: he’ll get enough to pay for food, so let’s leave him in the gutter….Aldington has lost the reputation he had. Let him be.”[cvi] It was good advice, but too late for Aldington who lost his once loyal readership at a single blow. Newcombe’s accurate summation of Aldington’s predicament was confirmed two years later by the writer Lawrence Durrell, a friend and near neighbour of the beleaguered writer, who noted that Aldington had been virtually boycotted by publishers and editors who refused to print. “He has pulled the whole house down about his ears and is virtually under a boycott,” Durrell observed.[cvii]

On 27 July 1962 Aldington collapsed on the doorstep of his French cottage and died later that day. Durrell summed up the reaction of Aldington’s admirers: “Well, he is dead, this old British grumpy; subtract what you will on the account of wrong-headedness, of intemperateness of judgement, and so on. There remains a good deal which those who knew him will always remember with affection: great generosities, great quixotries, great gallantries.”[cviii] But the prevailing view was that he was an ‘angry young man’ as one obituary described him, and an ‘angry old man to the end’.[cix]

Although many future war poem anthologies continued to omit his contribution to the genre, a partial rehabilitation of Aldington into the ranks of truly important English writers took place on Armistice Day, 11 November 1985, when he was among sixteen Great War poets commemorated on a slate tablet and unveiled in Westminster Abbey’s Poet’s Corner. The inscription on the stone was written by a fellow Great War poet, Wilfred Owen, and reads: “My subject is War, and the pity of War. The Poetry is in the pity."

Aldington once said that he had wanted to see the removal of Lawrence’s bust from the crypt of St. Paul’s Cathedral, ‘where it insults the tombs of Nelson and Wellington.’ That both Lawrence and Aldington achieved recognition in two of England’s most hallowed shrines is perhaps a fitting epitaph to these two complex men who shared a common wound, hidden from our understanding and sympathy until a more enlightened world learnt to recognise the signs.

Death

On 9 July Newcombe celebrated his seventy-eighth birthday. Just nine days later he died in the Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford, after a lingering illness.

The first public notice appeared two days later in The Times in which Liddell Hart gave a brief outline of Newcombe’s life and distinguished war record. In it he accurately and succinctly encapsulated Newcombe’s twin dilemma - a condition that had once guided his every action, whether on the ground or at the committee table: “His sympathy with and desire to help both the Arab and the Jewish peoples were deep and sincere. At the same time his devotion to British interests was above question.”[cx]

He concluded with this summary, especially pertinent after the bruising Aldington campaign: “While Newcombe’s war career provided an outstanding demonstration of the power of audacity, it was accompanied by a degree of sagacity uncommon in men of such adventurous spirit. His balance and fairness of judgment were as impressive as his exceptional blend of moral and physical courage.”[cxi]

Reputation

Stewart Newcombe died just days before Gamal Nasser of Egypt nationalised the Suez Canal and three months before the Suez Crisis set off alarm bells across the region. The débacle helped bring about the abandonment of the British policy of slowly nurturing the colonised people of Africa to self-determination. The cry now was for Britain’s immediate departure. Suez had been fought over by Britain for the last time; the crisis would prove to be the death knell not just of the British Empire but of all the empires of Western Europe.

Newcombe had lived through the reign of six monarchs from Victoria to Elizabeth and was first and foremost a loyal agent of Empire; he was also an unashamed Arabist in his stance on Middle Eastern matters. He maintained strong views on what he considered were acceptable levels of Jewish immigration to Mandatory Palestine in the years between the World Wars, based on his long study of the region, its people, infrastructure and resources. Believing the Arabs of Palestine would not vanish like the mist before the sun of Zion he therefore thought it imperative they had fair representation in the contest for the hearts and minds of those in power who would ultimately bring about the fulfilment of the Balfour Declaration, with all its stipulations – important provisos which supported his firm belief that only by respecting native interests could you achieve a lasting consensus. He worked tirelessly towards that aim after consulting the opinions of his many Jewish and Moslem friends before reaching proposals for what might be termed a bi-nation state solution. His convictions, once reached, never wavered.

Whatever his lasting impact on the region of the Middle East or his interest and involvement in Islamic affairs, it is as a loyal friend to Lawrence, a loyalty that remained steadfast to the end, that Newcombe is best remembered. In a letter written in 1955 during the furore over Aldington’s forthcoming biography, Newcombe explained his unique relationship with Lawrence. Using a sporting analogy, it was a succinct and accurate appraisal which illustrated Newcombe’s understanding and admiration for someone who was clearly more than just a friend:

“My own view of Lawrence has always been that of an elder brother to a younger one who was far quicker than I, a cricketer top of the list 1st class averager, who sometimes drops catches; compared to a slow 5th class. We both understood each other’s humour.”[cxii]

It was a typical observation, a perceptive and honest appreciation of their individual qualities. It illustrated a good humoured acceptance of their weaknesses and an acute awareness that in life some things cannot always be taken too seriously.

Stewart Newcombe was someone who displayed that rare gift of combining an independent spirit with the practical and disciplined role of an engineer. His approach was direct and purposeful – just like the railway lines he built – and with a quiet determination to do what he believed was right while recognising the risks and possible consequences; a man of integrity who was not afraid to pin his flag to the mast, to get the job done and point the way by example and encouragement.

He was above all else a decent man who once exclaimed in regards to the Palestine question, “I wish I could have done more,” yet his achievements, if they fell short by his own high standards, would have satisfied most men.

NOTES

[i] Welsh Census 1881, Brecon

[ii] Supplement to the Brecon County Times, Friday 22.1.1886; General Register Office, Christchurch, Hants, Death certificate 17.1.1886.

[iii] C. Chittock, Alumni Felstedienses 1890-1950 (Old Festedian Society 1951, 7th Edition) p.40

[iv] Capt. F.G. Guggisberg, R.E., “The Shop” The Story of the Royal Military Academy (Cassell, 1900) p. 272

[v] Royal Engineers Museum, Library and Archive, Gillingham, Kent

[vi] Lt.-Col. E.W.C. Sandes, D.S.O. M.C, The Royal Engineers in Egypt and the Sudan (Institute of Royal Engineers, Chatham, 1937) pp.392-403

[vii] Rudyard Kipling: Something of Myself and Other Autobiographical Writings (Cambridge University Press, 1990) p.93

[viii] Rudyard Kipling to E.D. Ward, 4.6.12, Kipling, The Letters of Rudyard Kipling, Vol. 4 1911-1919 (University of Iowa Press) p.116, and ALS Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[ix] Reginald Wingate to Lee Stack 14.4.1913, Wingate Papers, Sudan Archives Durham University, 186/1/217

[x] S.F. Newcombe, PEF/ZIN/37/1-4 (Archives of the Palestine Exploration Fund)

[xi] S.F. Newcombe, T.E. Lawrence By His Friends (Jonathan Cape 1937) p.105

[xii] T.E. Lawrence, Palestine Exploration Annual 1914-15, Introduction to the Wilderness of Zin Report (Harrisons & Sons 1914) Dedication page

[xiii] T.E. Lawrence, Palestine Exploration Annual 1914-15, Introduction to the Wilderness of Zin Report (Harrisons & Sons 1914) p. xvi

[xiv] S.F. Newcombe, T.E. Lawrence By His Friends (Jonathan Cape 1937) p.105

[xv] T.E. Lawrence to E.T. Leeds 24.1.1914, T.E. Lawrence, The Selected Letters (Norton & Co 1989), p.56

[xvi] Louis Mallet, FO 371/2128, 5.2.1914, The National Archives

[xvii] H.H. Kitchener to Edward Grey, FO 371/2128, 22.2.1914; S.F. Newcombe, T.E. Lawrence By His Friends (Jonathan Cape 1937) p.107

[xviii] T.E. Lawrence to ‘A Friend’ (E.T. Leeds) 28.2.1914, The Letters of T.E. Lawrence (Jonathan Cape 1938) p.165

[xix] Stewart Newcombe, Memorandum on Syria, Palestine 26.5.1914, Wingate Papers, Sudan Archives Durham University, 190/2/38-41

[xx] S.F. Newcombe, T.E. Lawrence By His Friends (Jonathan Cape 1937) p.107

[xxi] S.F. Newcombe, Notes on Kurds, Wingate Papers, Sudan Archives Durham University, 190/2/34-37

[xxii] S.F. Newcombe and J.P.S. Greig, The Baghdad Railway, The Geographical Journal December 1914, (Royal Geographical Society), p.577; Belan Pass, known in antiquity as the Syrian Gates; Alexandretta (Mod. Iskenderun) named after Alexander the Great.

[xxiii]Held on Tuesday 16 June 1914 at the Society of Antiquities; Quarterly Statement of the Palestine Exploration Fund, October 1914 (PEF)

[xxiv] B. H. Liddell Hart, T.E. Lawrence to his Biographers (Cassell 1963) p.84

[xxv] Mons and the retreat, History of the Corps of the Royal Engineers (1952) p. 189-90

[xxvi] S.F. Newcombe, Notes in response to Aldington’s claims, p. 210, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[xxvii] T.E. Lawrence to D.G. Hogarth 2.2.1915, The Letters of T.E. Lawrence (Jonathan Cape 1938) p.192

[xxviii] T.E. Lawrence to C.F. Bell 18.4.1915, T.E. Lawrence, The Selected Letters (Norton & Co 1989) p.71

[xxix] War Diaries of the 4th Field Company, Australian Engineers, September 1915, Official Histories of the Australian War Memorial

[xxx] T.E. Lawrence to his parents 31.8.1915, The Home Letters of T.E. Lawrence and His Brothers (Basil Blackwell 1954) p.307

[xxxi] Newcombe’s War Diary, Archives of the Australian War Memorial, AWM4/14/23/3

[xxxii] London Gazette 22 January 1916

[xxxiii] Newsletter of the Vietnam Veterans Association, Wollongong NSW Branch, May/June 2010

[xxxiv] Records of C.E.W. Bean, Official War Historian, Archives of the Australian War Memorial AWM38-3DRL606/246/1

[xxxv] Ronald Storrs, Orientations (Nicholson & Watson 1937) p.142; Kitchener to Storrs FO 371/2768

[xxxvi] Clayton to Wingate 9.10.1916, Wingate Papers, Sudan Archives Durham University, W/141/3/34-5

[xxxvii] T.E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom ((Jonathan Cape 1935) p.91

[xxxviii] Reginald Wingate to Gilbert Clayton, Wingate Papers, Sudan Archives Durham University, 141/4/

[xxxix] The National Archives FO 882/6/28

[xl] T .E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom ((Jonathan Cape 1935) p.147

[xli] Ibid. p.149

[xlii] Ibid. p 239

[xliii] The National Archives FO 882/6/359-361

[xliv] Clayton to Wilson, FO 882/6 p383, The National Archives

[xlv] Notes by Colonel Newcombe, 24.5.1917, FO 882/6363-366, The National Archives

[xlvi] FO 882/7 p. 1-27, The National Archives

[xlvii] S.F. Newcombe to T.E. Lawrence, Bonhams Auction Catalogue (Knightsbridge Sale 2176, Wednesday 19.3.2014), p.110

[xlviii] B. H. Liddell Hart, T.E. Lawrence to his Biographers (Cassell 1963) p.104; SFN to Colonel (Wilson?) 27.7.1917, Bonhams Auction Catalogue (Knightsbridge Sale 2176, Wednesday 19.3.2014), p.110

[xlix] TNA WO95/4368, Newcombe’s operational orders from General Staff

[l] Newcombe’s force was captured on 2 November 1917. The History of the Corps of Royal Engineers, Vol. 6, 1914-1918 (Institute of the RE, Chatham 1952) p.314; A Brief Record of the Advance of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force (Govt Press and Survey of Egypt 1919); The capture of Newcombe and his men are described in the Special Issue of Barrak, The Irregular Newsletter of the Old Boys of the Imperial Camel Corps, August 1971

[li] B. H. Liddell Hart, T.E. Lawrence to his Biographers (Cassell 1963), p.103

[lii] Newcombe’s unpublished memoirs in the author’s collection.

[liii] Ibid.

[liv] News of the World, 19.7.1919; the relationship of Newcombe and Elsie was widely covered in national and commonwealth newspapers following their marriage on 15 April 1919.

[lv] Gertrude Bell to her family 12.10.1919, www.gertrudebell.ncl.ac.uk

[lvi] T.E. Lawrence, Seven Pillars of Wisdom 1922 Text (Castle Hill Press 1997) p.6

[lvii] Draft preface to an abridgement of Seven Pillars of Wisdom, 18.11.1922, The Letters of T.E. Lawrence (Jonathan Cape 1938) p.345

[lviii] www.cliohistory.org/thomas-lawrence/ Accessed February 2019

[lix] TEL to S.F. Newcombe 16.2.20, The Letters of T.E. Lawrence (Jonathan Cape 1938) p.298

[lx] S.F. Newcombe, The Practical Limits of Aeroplane Photography for Mapping, The Geographical Journal Vol. LVI No.3, September 1920

[lxi] S.F. Newcombe to T.E. Lawrence 6.9.1920, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxii] T.E. Lawrence to S.F. Newcombe, Undated but November 1920, 26, Lawrence Collection at the Harry Ramson Center, University of Texas at Austin

[lxiii] S.F. Newcombe to T.E. Lawrence 25.11.20, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxiv] S.F. Newcombe to T.E. Lawrence 6.9.1920, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxv] T.E. Lawrence to S.F. Newcombe 11.10.20, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxvi] S.F. Newcombe to T.E. Lawrence 15.10.20, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxvii] Alan Houghton Brodrick, Near to Greatness: A Life of Earl Winterton (Hutchinson 1963), p.17; Ali A. Allawi, Feisal I of Iraq, (Yale 2014), p.320, 321

[lxviii] Earl Winterton, Orders of the Day (Cassell 1953) p.100; Cairo Conference opened on 21 March 1921.

[lxix] Diana Louie Maude, Baroness Elles (1921-2009), barrister and politician.

[lxx] T.E. Lawrence to an Air Marshall, The Letters of T.E. Lawrence (Jonathan Cape 1938) p.351

[lxxi] T.E. Lawrence to S.F. Newcombe 15.10.1922, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxxii] T.E. Lawrence to ‘My Lord Duke’ (S.L. Newcombe) 10.3.1926, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxxiii] T.E. Lawrence to S.F. Newcombe 5.7.1926, Lawrence Collection at the Harry Ramson Center, University of Texas at Austin

[lxxiv] T.E. Lawrence to S.F. Newcombe 26.10.1926, Lawrence Collection at the Harry Ramson Center, University of Texas at Austin, “I believe we are not allowed on shore (wicked place?)”

[lxxv] S.F. Newcombe to Flora Armitage 20.5.1951, Texas State University, USA, Flora Armitage T.E. Lawrence Collection

[lxxvi] T.E. Lawrence to ‘Monster’ (S.L. Newcombe) 24.21927, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxxvii] T.E. Lawrence to ‘Monster’ (S.L. Newcombe) 27.4.1927, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxxviii] T.E. Lawrence to (S.L. Newcombe) Lawrence Collection at the Harry Ramson Center, University of Texas at Austin

[lxxix] T.E. Lawrence to S.F. Newcombe 20.4.1931, Lawrence Collection at the Harry Ramson Center, University of Texas at Austin

[lxxx] T.E. Lawrence to S.F. Newcombe undated, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxxxi]T .E. Lawrence to S.F. Newcombe 22.6.1932, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxxxii] T.E. Lawrence to S.F. Newcombe 6.9.1932, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxxxiii] T.E. Lawrence to S.F. Newcombe 14.6.1934, Lawrence Collection at the Harry Ramson Center, University of Texas at Austin

[lxxxiv] Ali A. Allawi, Feisal I of Iraq (Yale 2014) p.553 and p. xx

[lxxxv] S.F. Newcombe to T.E. Lawrence 8.9.33, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[lxxxvi] T.E. Lawrence to B. H. Liddell Hart, 31.12.1934, T.E. Lawrence to his Biographers (Cassell 1963) p.229

[lxxxvii] T.E. Lawrence to “James” (S.L. Newcombe) 20.12.1934, Lawrence Collection at the Harry Ramson Center, University of Texas at Austin

[lxxxviii] While most people had no ethical problems working with asbestos at this time it was already known to be highly dangerous, especially to those who worked with it directly, but so were a lot of other jobs like coal. There was an obvious trade off for having such a useful and profitable product.

[lxxxix] A.W. Lawrence, Edited, T.E. Lawrence by his Friends (Cape 1937), photograph of TEL leaving the Air Force on his bicycle by Ian Daheer, frontispiece

[xc] A.W. Lawrence, Edited, T.E. Lawrence by his Friends (Cape 1937), contribution by Winston Churchill, p.199, for the TEL quote, “All you will see of me is a small cloud of dust on the horizon.”

[xci] T.E. Lawrence to Winston Churchill 19.3.1935, T.E. Lawrence, The Selected Letters (Norton & Co 1989) p.528

[xcii] T.E. Lawrence to Eric Kennington 6.5.1935, The Letters of T.E. Lawrence (Jonathan Cape 1938) p.870

[xciii] T.E. Lawrence to Lady Astor 8.5.1935, The Letters of T.E. Lawrence (Jonathan Cape 1938) p.872

[xciv] T.E. Lawrence to S.F. Newcombe 10.4.1935, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[xcv] S.F. Newcombe to Ronald Storrs 28.11.1953, copy in author’s collection

[xcvi] T.E. Lawrence to Henry Williamson 11.12.34, The Letters of T.E. Lawrence (Jonathan Cape 1938) p.833

[xcvii] Correspondence between Arnold Lawrence and Newcombe, Lawrence Papers Bodleian Library

[xcviii] British Pathé news reel 1935, https://www.britishpathe.com/video/lawrence-of-arabia-simple-funeral

[xcix] Author’s correspondence with Hamzah Foreman, Archivist of the East London Mosque

[c] Fred Crawford, Richard Aldington & Lawrence of Arabia, A Cautionary Tale (Southern Illinois University Press 1998) p. 93

[ci] Richard Aldington, Life for Life’s Sake (Viking Press 1941) p.190

[cii] Richard Aldington, Lawrence of Arabia, A Biographical Enquiry (Collins 1955) dedicatory letter to Alister Kershaw

[ciii] Texas State University, USA, Flora Armitage T.E. Lawrence Collection: The state of Newcombe’s health was noted by Flora Armitage at a meeting on 22 June 1947. “Newcombe is an interesting, likeable old gentleman, rather broken up for his age.”

[civ] S.F. Newcombe to B. H. Liddell Hart , Liddell Hart Military Archives, King’s College London, LH 9/13/61, 28.6.1954

[cv] Richard Aldington, Lawrence of Arabia, A Biographical Enquiry (Collins 1955) title page

[cvi] S.F. Newcombe to B.H. Liddell Hart 8.5.1955, Lawrence Collection at the Harry Ramson Center, University of Texas at Austin

[cvii] Lawrence Durrell, Spirit of Place (Faber & Faber 1969)

[cviii] Kershaw & Temple (Editors), Richard Aldington: An Intimate Portrait (Southern Illinois University Press 1998)

[cix] Obituary, The Times, 30.7.1932

[cx] B. H. Liddell Hart, The Times, Friday 20.7.1955

[cxi] B. H. Liddell Hart, The Times, Wednesday 25.7.1955

[cxii] S.F. Newcombe to B. H. Liddell Hart, 20.4.1955, Liddell Hart Military Archives, King’s College London, LH 9/13/61

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BEYOND ARABIA

Colonel Stewart Francis Newcombe of the Royal Engineers was already a legend in the deserts of Arabia before he was joined in Cairo during the early months of the First World War by a group of extraordinary specialists in Middle Eastern affairs. One member of this group was T.E. Lawrence who went on to achieve worldwide fame. Newcombe's story, like those of other unsung figures in the Anglo-Arabian panoply, has been eclipsed by the legend of ´Lawrence of Arabia´, and has languished in the dusty recesses of regimental records, government files or in the elliptical words of Lawrence’s book Seven Pillars of Wisdom. However, Newcombe´s untold story is there to be told. It is a story of extraordinary exploits and courage, coupled with his own legendary and inexhaustible supply of energy. Lawrence was later to describe him in Seven Pillars: 'Newcombe is like fire,' they (the Arabs) used to complain; ‘he burns friend and enemy’.

It is as a loyal friend to Lawrence – a loyalty that remained steadfast to the end – that Newcombe is best remembered. But his own story is one of remarkable adventures under the very noses of the Ottoman authorities – full of danger, intrigue and perhaps more surprisingly, of romance during Newcombe's captivity in Turkey. His post-war work for the Boundary Commission in Palestine and his efforts at securing a lasting peace for his friends in the region have gone largely unrecorded or mis-represented. The aim of this biography is to set that record straight and to help restore Newcombe to his rightful place - recognised among those who played an important part in the Great War during the Palestine campaigns and as someone who made a significant contribution to the peace negotiations with Turkey while under cover in Constantinople. Later, his post-war work helped shape the history and politics of the modern Middle East through his work with the Boundary Commission and his life-long friendship with many of the key personalities within the Arab and Jewish communities. Above all, he should be remembered as someone who contributed to the legends of Arabian exploration through exhaustive survey work in Sinai and Palestine, mapping the past as well as the future.

BEYOND ARABIA is in preparation.

WILLIAM ROBERTS R.A.

William Roberts (5 June 1895 - 20 January 1980) was an English painter and war artist. He was a founder member of the influential Vorticist group, a powerful recorder of the front-line battles of the First World War, and a unique observer of the foibles and activities of Britain at leisure over almost fifty years. In 1922–6 he was commissioned to produce illustrations and decorations for Lawrence's Seven Pillars of Wisdom including this pencil drawing of S.F. Newcombe.

This from William Roberts, Five Posthumous Essays and Other Writings (Valencia, 1990).

"In 1920 Colin Gill, who had been a fellow-student at the Slade, sent me a note saying 'Colonel Lawrence is seeking artists to make portrait drawings for a book he is producing; get in touch with him.' I wrote to Lawrence and as a result I contributed several portrait drawings to 'Seven Pillars of Wisdom,' besides a painting of Lawrence in his Royal Air Force uniform. He sat for this portrait in a room I was using at Coleherne Terrace, Earl's Court. Sometimes if I was late for our meeting I found him sitting on the dark stairs that led to my temporary studio. He lent me during several Summers his small woodman's cottage at Clouds Hill in Dorset."

John Mansfield CREALOCK, R.H.A., 1871-1959

This fabulous oil painting by the artist John Crealock was painted in 1938 when Newcombe was aged sixty and working on proposals for what may be called a bi-nation state in Palestine, with limited and controlled immigration and absorption of Jews according to the physical and economic capacity of the country. Newcombe argued and lobbied this position to whoever in authority would listen. He set up committees to counter-balance the Zionist message, gaining access to high level ministers of state including the Prime Minister. He submitted his evidence to the Palestine Royal Commission, invited guests sympathetic to the cause to the Royal Central Asian Society Dinner Club, of which he was Honorary Secretary, and wrote articles for magazines and periodicals such as The Empire Review under the auspices of the Palestine Information Centre, where he also held the post of Honorary Secretary.

For more information on the artist, please see the blog entry 18 November 2011 entitled, ‘Recently discovered oil painting of Colonel S.F. Newcombe.’

Lawrence and staff at Aqaba

AQABA: Lawrence and his colleagues set up quite decent camping arrangements. With a Persian carpet at its hearth entrance this tent was equipped with beds and rudimentary washing facilities. The guy-lines of the tent were secured with pegs and with the additional weight of a sand bag at each corner, evidence that the weather in the desert could whip up quite a strong wind. Lawrence’s tent also possessed a gramophone player which was put outside on a tall table during the regular gatherings with fellow British officers. A box of records kept the men entertained and one or two pets were introduced for added distraction. Major Scott, base commander at Aqaba, holds a terrier name "Robert". Captain Goslett strokes a saluki named "Shorter".

CHRONOLOGY: Part One

S.F. Newcombe (1878 - 1956)

9 July 1878 - Born at Brecon, Wales.

1886 - Newcombe's father, Edward, dies and he is sent to board at Christ's Hospital School with younger brother Harley.

1893 - Attended Felstead School.

1896 - Enters the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich as a Gentleman Cadet. Awarded the Sword of Honoue at the RMA.

1898 - Commissioned into the Royal Engineers at Chatham.

1900 - Joins the 29th Fortress Company at Cape Town, South Africa.

1901 - Joins the Egyptian Army and posted to Sudan. Reconnoitered route for proposed railway east and west of the Nile.

Queen Victoria dies on 22 January.

1907 - Journeyed to upper waters of the Nile to recon and discuss with Belgians possible rail route from Lado Enclave to Belgian Congo.

1909 - Sends secret report on Alexandretta and Baghdad Railway to the War Office.

1911 - Preliminary survey of railway from Abyssinia to Khatoum.

Leaves Egyptian Army. Short spell in the War Office.

1912 - Longmoor Military Railway Training Camp.

1913 - Begins surveys in area of Beersheba, Palestine.

1914 - Surveys in South West Palestine south to Egyptian border. For six weeks he and his men are accompanied by C.L. Woolley and T.E. Lawrence, two archaeologists from the British Museum. Addresses the 49th Annual Meeting of the Palestine Exploration Fund.

Outbeak of World War 1.

August 1914 - At Compiegne during the retreat from Mons. Successfully blows up the bridge.

Recalled from France he travels with T.E. Lawrence from Marseilles to Alexandria and then onto Cairo by train.

1915 - Appointed as Commander in the 2nd Australian Division Royal Engineers during the Dardenelles campaign.

1916 - Awarded DSO for rescue attempt in a tunnelling operation.

Returns to the Western Front and distinguishes himself during the battle for Pozieres Ridge.

Sherif Hussein of Mecca launches the Arab Revolt.

1917 - Joins T.E. Lawrence in the Hejaz as head of the Military Mission. Commences raids against the Hejaz Railway.

In late October he takes command of a small mobile force and initiates a raid behind enemy lines during the Third Battle of Gaza. His force is overwhelmed and he and his men are taken into captivity.

1918 - Escaped from prison camp at Brusa with assistance from Elizabeth Chaki. Returns to Constantinople to help broker peace negotiations with the Turks.

11 November 1918 - The Armistice comes into effect.

1919 - Briefly joins Lawrence at the Paris Peace Conference.

15 April 1919 - Marries Elizabeth (Elsie) Chaki in the Registry Office at Henrietta Street, Covent Garden and the following day is blessed in a religious service in St. Margaret's in the grounds of Westminster Abbey.

In the Shadow of the Crescent

INTRODUCTION

Stewart Francis Newcombe - A Short Biography

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