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'"NO MEDALS THIS TIME" by Sir Tom Hickinbotham, KCMG, KCVO, CIE, OBE' [140r] (279/336)
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.
138 -
negotiated perpetual peace agreements between the leaders of the four quar
ters of the town and has appointed a sheikh who is not from any of the fac
tions as the overlord of the town and who is responsible directly to himself.
The Sheikh is in sole charge of the town when the Governor is at his perman
ent headquarters at Bllad Sur, a village surrounded by date gardens an hour
and a half by camel from Sur over the low hills to the south of the town.
Here the Governor lives in a dilapidated castle which houses such government
departments as exist and which commands the approaches to Sur from the
interior. Sur has one great drawback. There are no drinking water wells in
the town and water has to be brought from Bilad Sur by donkey and camel.
The business of Sur is considerable as it is the outlet for the produce of
the date gardens of the Sharkiyah. The trade is almost exclusively in the
hands of thirty or forty Hindu merchants who do a very profitable business
exporting ’'wet" and "dry” dates and importing sugar, cereals and piece-goods.
I have met and talked with many businessmen and had to do with many business
communities of different colours and creeds but Sur is the only place I know
where the merchants were prepared to admit that business was good. No-one
says "I cannot think why I stay, much better to cut my losses and clear out".
They know why they stay, and have every intention of staying as long as pos
sible. How long that will be is doubtful because the tribes in the interior
are usually at loggerheads with one another and there was no saying that they
will not try in the future, as they have in the past, to bring their troubles
into town as it were. The safety of these British Indian subjects was a
serious responsibility of which I was but too well aware in those troublesome
times when our Naval and Air Forces were no longer available at a moment's
notice to come to our assistance.
Besides its importance as a trading centre, Sur is famous for its
dhow
A term adopted by British officials to refer to local sailing vessels in the western Indian Ocean.
build
ing yards. Nine-tenths of the population make their living on or by the sea
and Suri dhows are famous from Malabar to Basra and from Dar-es-Salem to Aden,
which brings me back to my own craft. I ordered the helmsman to steer for
the beach close to the house of the Hindu community where I could see people
were gathering on the sea front. A man detached himself from the waiting
group and ran off along the beach in the direction of the Sultan's Rest House,
probably to warn the Governor of my arrival. I had no doubt in my mind that
news of my slow progress along the coast would have reached the ears of that
very astute gentleman and that he would have come in from Bilad Sur to meet
me. The canoe was lowered over the side and, dressed in my best suit, I
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' [140r] (279/336), British Library: India Office Records and Private Papers, Mss Eur F226/13, in Qatar Digital Library <https://www.qdl.qa/archive/81055/vdc_100094411639.0x000050> [accessed 15 June 2026]
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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.