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'"NO MEDALS THIS TIME" by Sir Tom Hickinbotham, KCMG, KCVO, CIE, OBE' [14r] (27/336)
The record is made up of 1 volume (168 folios). It was created in 1982?. It was written in English. The original is part of the British Library: India Office The department of the British Government to which the Government of India reported between 1858 and 1947. The successor to the Court of Directors. Records and Private Papers Documents collected in a private capacity. .
Transcription
This transcription is created automatically. It may contain errors.
12
really begun to feel the full effect of the War, I should have had great
difficulty in assembling a suitable wardrobe.
Early on the morning of 20th May I drove out of the
Agency
An office of the East India Company and, later, of the British Raj, headed by an agent.
in my station-
wagon, accompanied by a "Dodge" lorry, with three-hundred-and-ninety miles
of desert and the Dhahna sands of sinister reputation in front of ne. So
difficult are these sands to negotiate without oversize balloon tyres that
my driver, Naser, was so sure that we should get stuck that he ventured to
offer a bet. He himself had spent two days in their midst some months
earlier when he was on his way back from the Pilgrimage. With 700 x 15
tyres and a heavily-laden car, my chances of getting through were not very
good but determination and confidence with just a little luck can overcome
most obstacles, so I took the bet.
Naser and his brother, Mohammed, were with me in my car as also was the
celebrated Naser bin Gawan of the Ajman tribe, a guide of great renown and
one leg, the other having been amputated as a result of a wound received in
the Ikhwan troubles. In the lorry were, besides the driver and his assistant,
Adas bin Saleh of the Rashaida, a trusted follower of His Highness the Sheikh.
The presence of Adas indicated that His Highness approved of me and my
journey. In fact it went further than that and was in the nature of an ins
urance policy. Since the troubles in Iraq, the desert was less safe than
normally and small bands of wandering tribesmen were at large whose allegi
ance to any particular sheikh was vague in the extreme. Should we meet with
any of these gentlemen, Adas would be invaluable. He was known to very many
bedouin and identifiable by all as of the Rashaida. It was one thing to
molest an unknown "foreigner" travelling over the desert with two or three
servants, but to interfere with someone travelling under the auspices of the
Sheikh of Kuwait was a very different matter. Any discourtesy or worse
would bring down on the perpetrators and all their relatives and their
flocks of sheep and herds of camels the wrath of Kuwait, and what was as
important the powerful Rashaida tribe would certainly not allow dishonour to
Adas and those he was responsible for to go unavenged for long. He, as him
self, was a very nice person and as Adas of the Rashaida, a most valuable
companion on my journey.
About this item
- Content
This volume is a set of typewritten memoirs by Sir Tom Hickinbotham, a retired officer of the British Indian Army and the Indian Political Service The branch of the British Government of India with responsibility for managing political relations between British-ruled India and its surrounding states, and by extension the Gulf, during the period 1937-47. . Hickinbotham held various positions in India and in the Middle East, and these memoirs recount stories from his time in Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Quetta, Persia [Iran], Aden, Audhali, Bahrain and North Waziristan.
The memoirs were most likely completed in 1982-83; they cover the period 1927-1982, although most of the chapters relate to events from the 1930s and 1940s.
Hickinbotham writes not only about his official duties but also about various trips taken during periods of leave. Below is a list of the chapters, with a short summary of each:
- 'No Medals This Time' (ff 3-6) – details of an incident in Kuwait involving a dhow A term adopted by British officials to refer to local sailing vessels in the western Indian Ocean. that caught fire off the foreshore at Shuwaik [Ash Shuwaykh]
- 'The Silver Coin' (ff 7-10) – thoughts on the use of the Maria Theresa thaler in Arabia
- 'The Golden Dagger' (ff 11-36) – an account of Hickinbotham's unofficial visit to Riyadh to meet Ibn Saud [‘Abd al-‘Azīz bin ‘Abd al-Raḥmān bin Fayṣal Āl Sa‘ūd] in May 1942
- 'The Brass Pencase' (ff 37-53) – memories of a journey undertaken from Quetta to Europe via north Persia in 1927, travelling in a Fiat Tourer with Colonel T Nisbet (also referred to as the 'purple emperor'), on what Hickinbotham claims to have been the first trip taken by car from India to the Mediterranean
- 'The Bronze Boy' (ff 54-72) – reminiscences of weekends spent in 'Little Aden' (a rocky peninsula seven miles west of Aden), in 1938, and a later visit, in December 1961
- 'The Silver Letter Case' (ff 73-118) – details of a ten-day trip on the Audhali plateau in the summer of 1938, and a return visit, in December 1960 (the chapter ends with remarks on the situation in Yemen generally from the late sixties to the time of writing, i.e. 1982)
- 'The Agate Ring' (ff 119-144) – memories of travelling in Oman during the summer of 1940 and how this compared with Hickinbotham's last visit to the country in 1980
- 'The Pearl Tie Pin' (ff 145-151) – thoughts and anecdotes on the pearl trade in Bahrain
- 'A Point of View' (ff 152-157) – a story told to Hickinbotham, possibly fictional, of a pearl trader in the Gulf who lost his fortune and livelihood, and eventually his sanity
- 'Snakes Alive!!' (ff 158-161) – an account of a near-fatal encounter with a krite [krait] in Waziristan
- 'The Queen's Visit' (ff 162-168) – memories of the Queen's visit to the Aden Protectorate in 1954, where Hickinbotham was serving as Governor.
- Extent and format
- 1 volume (168 folios)
- Arrangement
The volume contains an index of chapter headings on folio 2, which includes some handwritten corrections and annotations.
- Physical characteristics
Foliation: the foliation sequence (used for referencing) commences at the first folio with 1, and terminates at the last folio with 168; these numbers are written in pencil, are circled, and are located in the top right corner of the recto The front of a sheet of paper or leaf, often abbreviated to 'r'. side of each folio. An additional mixed foliation/pagination sequence is also present in parallel between ff 3-168.
Condition: The original plastic comb binding ring has been replaced with a wider one to facilitate flat opening of the volume. Polyester film covers have been added to protect the first and last folios.
- Written in
- English in Latin script View the complete information for this record
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'"NO MEDALS THIS TIME" by Sir Tom Hickinbotham, KCMG, KCVO, CIE, OBE' [14r] (27/336), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F226/13, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100094411638.0x00001c> [accessed 1 April 2025]
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Copyright: How to use this content
- Reference
- Mss Eur F226/13
- Title
- '"NO MEDALS THIS TIME" by Sir Tom Hickinbotham, KCMG, KCVO, CIE, OBE'
- Pages
- 1r:168v
- Author
- Hickinbotham, Sir Tom
- Usage terms
- The copyright status is unknown. Please contact [email protected] with any information you have regarding this item.