'Memoirs and Recollections of An Officer of the Indian Political Service' [‎15r] (29/156)

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bring the train into the city station in the dead of night, quickly disembark the troops
into lorries and vans (to be requisitioned from the Indian merchants), and then drive
them through the city to the Legation quarter. To ensure that the convoy was not
spotted or disturbed on the way, the Minister persuaded the still very reluctant
Emperor to order a night curfew in the City which would at least keep people off the
streets and away from the railway station.
Early on the morning of the 4th September, I travelled by train for twenty miles down
the line to where the troop train had been halted, shuttered down and immobile. On
the way down we passed batches of expectant journalists and film people clustered at
strategic points. Major Charter had been informed of my arrival, and to him I explained
the new plan and impressed upon him the need to act with the greatest circumspection.
I then returned with him to the capital by the normal up-passenger train. The journal
ists were still there, but that evening had to make their own way back to the city
before the curfew came down. At 4.00 a.m. we were back at the railway station, and
the troop train moved in. It all worked like clockwork; thanks to the curfew, the
streets were deserted, and the convoy of vehicles got the contingent to the Legation
before dawn, leaving the stores to be unloaded and brought up later. We had pulled
off a difficult operation. A day or two later, the press and the photographers were
invited to the Legation to see for themselves the smartly turned out Sikh sepoys Term used in English to refer to an Indian infantryman. Carries some derogatory connotations as sometimes used as a means of othering and emphasising race, colour, origins, or rank. ,
going about their guard duties and fatigues, and to meet the officers. No-one had
scooped the event, but the local telegraph office was besieged by disgruntled corres
pondents belatedly telling their editors what they already knew from the Foreign Office
in London. There was much "sour grapes" evinced, and some British newspapers hit back
by criticising the so-called panic measures of the British Minister in sending for
re-inforcements. So insistent were the allegations of British loss of face that, in
time, the whole operation came to be known as "Barton’s Folly".
About the same time, the Bartons were in the news for another reason. They had two
grown-up daughters with them in Ethiopia, when I was there. Esme, who was un-married,
had been living with her parents at the Legation for the past few years. She was
pretty, vivacious and a great social asset to her parents. Years earlier, she had
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been caricatured by Evely/ Waugh in his book "Black Mischief" as the adventurous
daughter of the fictional British Minister to the Emperor of Azania, an imaginary
African island kingdom. Her sister, Marion, was married to Baron Muzzi, an Italian
career diplomat, who was serving at the time as his country's Consul at Debra Markos
in the interior of Ethiopia, not far from Lake Tsana. Eventually as the tension
increased, Count Vinci, the Italian Minister, instructed Muzzi to close his Consulate
and return with his wife to the capital. Whether by design or delayed perhaps by the
difficulties of travel, the Muzzis came in very slowly indeed. It was generally