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'"NO MEDALS THIS TIME" by Sir Tom Hickinbotham, KCMG, KCVO, CIE, OBE' [93r] (185/336)
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.
91
as the sea coast and thereafter in one of the lorries which ran along the
beach road between the territory of the Fadli Sultan and the Colony. Two
and a half hours later Ahmad and I had reached the top and we were exhausted
with our effort. It is at any time a hard climb and at the height of the
summer particularly trying. Luckily the rain had provided us with a continu
ous supply of water. Everywhere clean, clear water was lying in the hollows
amid the rocks. We were helped too by the change in the temperature as we
climbed higher and higher and at the top were enclosed again in mist and it
was distinctly chilly. We both lay on the flat rocks and when we had recov
ered sufficiently, sat up and ate the bread and boiled eggs we had brought
with us from Naser's house. After I had finished my eggs, I lay down again
and went to sleep.
I must have been asleep for half an hour when I was awakened by the noisy
clamour of a party of travellers coming up the pass. I sat up and out of the
mist there came five or six men carrying a lad of about sixteen years of age
on a roughly made stretcher. How they had managed to carry him up I have no
idea and when later I went to see the boy I don’t know how to survived the
journey. I learnt that he had been working as a
coolie
A term used to describe labourers from a number of Asian countries, now considered derogatory.
in the docks at Assab
in Eritria and had ricked or strained his back. He had been treated locally
and in Aden but the treatment had made matters worse and he v/as being brought
home to his village on the plateau where it was hoped he would recover in the
cooler atmosphere. The stretcher-bearers rested for a few minutes an' then
took up their burden and went on their way, advising me as they did so not to
delay as it was sure to rain again after midday. I gave them a start of a
couple of hundred yards and then, stiff and weary, tottered after tiem.
At Hilas we went to the house of an old woman who ran the local equivalent of
a cafe and drank the local coffee and rested for an hour. The donkeys with
my kit overtook us and we sent them on ahead, following more slowly along the
path we had taken in the opposite direction two days before. When within
sight of Aryab the rain overtook us and Ahmad and I crept into a small bee
hive shaped hut overlooking some uncultivated fields. The place was built
for the storage of food for men working in the fields at the tine of harvest.
The women would bring out the midday meal for the men and leave it there until
the harvesters had time to eat. We spent half an hour squeezed into this
bee-hive until the rain moderated and then went on to Sultan Abdullah bin
Ahmad's house where I was shown to a small, clean-looking room across a
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' [93r] (185/336), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F226/13, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100094411638.0x0000ba> [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.