CHAPTER XVIII

A NIGHTMARE CAMP

We had been warned to be ready to start on _safari_ on the morning of Saturday, September 16th, and only two nights before that date five of the prisoners escaped. Their preparations had been made with the utmost secrecy, and not even I knew anything of their plans. In a corner of one of the sheds a hole had been made in the mud wall and hidden by one of the beds, and a tunnel had been constructed through the thorn-bush which was piled all round the outside of the camp buildings. The attempt was timed for about 6 p.m.—between the evening roll-call and the placing of the Askari sentries, who nightly patrolled the four walls of our prison. That evening the roll was called fairly early, and as soon as it was over the adventurers picked up their ready-packed bags, went through the hole, darted across the small space of open ground, and disappeared into the scrub beyond. Had anyone from the Boma been watching that stretch of ground the fugitives _must_ have been spotted, but, as it was, the luck was with them and they got clear away. There was a great element of chance in the whole affair, and they were only just in time, for not ten minutes after the last man had gone through the Askari guard came on duty, and his lynx-eyes instantly detected the trail left by the runaways. He immediately reported to the white guard, and since we in camp could hear all that passed we were in despair, for we felt they were sure to be caught. But instead of at once following up the trail—the obvious thing to do in the circumstances—the Germans came in and proceeded to take the roll-call again, in this way wasting about fifteen minutes in ascertaining which particular prisoners were missing. By the time this was accomplished it was nearly dark, and a very little later it became impossible for even the natives to follow the tracks. So our comrades got away all right—but, alas! their pluck and enterprise availed them nothing, for some time afterwards we heard that four of them were recaptured several miles away, and a fifth died in the bush from blackwater-fever.

The rest of us duly left Mahenge on the Saturday morning, and travelled for two and a half hours in a north-easterly direction. We climbed down from the plateau by a different and less precipitous track than the one by which we had started on our way to Kidote, and on the Monday halted on the banks of a shallow stream. Our camp was merely an enclosure of grass huts or sheds built in the forest and far from any village, but here we remained for six days, and found life more tolerable than we had found it for a long time. The camp was so near the stream that we could bathe every day and all day if we wished, as it was easy for the guard to keep us in view, and this bathing was a great luxury. Also we fared well in the matter of meat, for the forest was full of game, and Müller went shooting daily, always returning with a good bag of antelope, buck, or wild pig.

The reason for our long halt was that Colzau thought he had appendicitis coming on, and was unwilling to wander further into the wilds away from medical aid. Also he was doubtful of the water-supply on the route we were to take. He told me that he had been instructed to escort us to Uteti across the Rufigi plain—a district practically unknown save to a few hunters and old campaigners. He had a sketch-map on which water-holes, etc., were indicated, but since setting out he had heard from a German whom we met on the way, and who had travelled over our destined route several years before, that although there was water to be found, a native of the district was needed to discover the holes, and further, that at many of them there was only water sufficient for fifty men at one time—and here were we numbering over a hundred whites, without counting all the native porters. I don’t wonder Colzau shirked the job!

While we here awaited his successor, a telephone-laying party arrived and passed on towards the plain. They were laying a wire to connect Mahenge with a camp on the Rufigi. The trees were so numerous that it was but rarely necessary to erect poles, the wire being simply stretched from tree to tree and insulated by means of the broken-off necks of old bottles. Some thousands of them must have been utilised in this way, and even before we left Kilimatinde they had become very expensive, the Government offering as much as twenty-five cents apiece for empties.

At this time one of the prisoners developed cerebral malaria, and was unconscious for nearly twenty-four hours. Fortunately I had a few capsules of quinine for injection, and this undoubtedly saved his life.

When Colzau, on account of his appendicitis, returned to Mahenge, I got him to take this man with him.

Freiherr von Neuenstein, an Austrian who had been given the rank of Vize-Feldwebel, arrived on Friday, September 22nd, and took over command of our party, and on the next morning we resumed our travels.

On Sunday we camped on the banks of the River Ulanga, the same that we had crossed previously at Ifakara, but this time we were much lower down. As the water swarmed with crocodiles we could not bathe. That evening Müller had a shot at one which was basking on the opposite bank; it reared up and dived in, but must have been mortally wounded, for it was next day found floating dead on the surface. Müller also shot a hippopotamus out in mid-stream; it sank at once, but the carcase eventually came up and was recovered two days later. This was fortunate, as hippo fat is greatly esteemed for cooking purposes, being in taste not unlike pork. We had _mandazes_, or rice-cakes, fried in it, and they were delicious.

The next day our route lay for some distance along the banks of the river until we came to the Luwego, another and shallower stream which joins the Ulanga, and the two together eventually flow into the Rufigi. We took off boots and socks and waded across. Even at the deepest part the water did not come above our knees, but the current was very swift—the river-bed full of boulders and sharp stones—and more than one of us came to grief and got a ducking. We camped on the opposite bank, and, as the water was not deep enough to harbour crocodiles, we were able to have a bathe that evening.

Here, too, we found a German _lager_ and telephone-post connected by wire with the force in the neighbourhood of Kissaki, where the Commander-in-Chief, Von Lettow Vorbeck, and the Governor, Dr. Schnee, were then stationed.

Our next camp after this was in the _pori_, as the natives would say, meaning in the wilderness and far from any habitation. The only water available was drawn from holes in the bed of a dried water-course—the stagnant remains from the previous rainy season, full of rotting leaves, and covered with green scum—and even this was limited in quantity. There were three or four of these holes, the largest being reserved for Europeans, and an Askari guard mounted over it to prevent the porters from washing in it, or otherwise contaminating it. An admirable precaution, but unfortunately no guarantee that some tired and dusty native runner had not enjoyed a dip there a day or two before! However, anyone travelling in Equatorial Africa had best set a curb on his imagination, and leave all æsthetic and other scruples behind him. Water is the first requisite, its colour and consistency a secondary consideration! The Freiherr described this particular vintage as _ausgezeichnet_, _i.e._, excellent, and while I cannot conscientiously endorse that opinion, the coffee made from it was at least drinkable.

On Wednesday, September 27th, we arrived at Madaba, the site of our permanent camp. It is a small native village of poor, mean-looking huts set in a vast rolling plain covered with long elephant-grass and sparsely dotted with stunted trees. A few banana and mango trees and some fields of matama and maize surround the village, but beyond these, far as the eye can see, all is desolate. The country abounds in game, and wild pig, bush buck, elephants, lions, and an occasional rhinoceros may be seen.

Our camp was a very simple affair, just open-fronted shelters built round four sides of a square, with slanting roofs supported on poles and a single wall enclosing all. The sheds were very low, having been constructed by native labour under the direction of an extremely short German, who had evidently considered that his height was normal; but the average man could not stand upright in them.

Here there was a small German outpost, and the doctor in charge proved to be that same Herr Stabsarzt Manteufel whom I had already met at Morogoro. He was one of the very few Germans with the instincts of a white man I had yet come across. In anticipation of fighting in the north along the banks of the Rufigi, he had prepared a small hospital for the reception of Europeans, and I was able to make use of his stores in the treatment of some of my dysentery cases. Further, he replenished my stock of quinine. It was due to Herr Manteufel’s kind offices that I was here allowed my parole—a parole I felt to be especially binding, as, although I had not signed a paper, I knew that he had undertaken to stand surety for my good behaviour; not that he ever even mentioned the subject to me.

The conditions of life at Madaba were most primitive. We lived practically in the open air—no hardship this, rather the reverse, but it forbade any attempt at privacy. The prisoners had to prepare their own food and cook it over an open wood fire—just a bonfire. As a rule each mess possessed only one cooking-pot, so everything had to go in together. For breakfast we had a sort of porridge of mealy-meal—most unpalatable stuff, especially as the sugar supply soon ran out and there was no more to be had. If one felt hungry after the porridge—and one generally did—a piece of dry matama bread was all there was to fill up with. For the midday meal we were supposed to have meat, but it was by no means always available. Madaba is in the heart of the tse-tse fly district, and there are no cattle. Some of the natives kept a few goats, but were very reluctant to part with them; and the game district lies half a day’s journey away, so that even that enthusiastic sportsman Müller did not feel like trekking so far to shoot meat for prisoners. When there was a day’s shooting we had to be content with any bits left over after all the Germans in the place had had their pick, and since they are great meat-eaters little remained for us. Well, when we had meat we were thankful; when we had not we made shift with boiled rice, beans, or chirocco, which latter is a native vegetable somewhat resembling dried peas.

Our evening meal was a repetition of the midday repast, and our drink at all times coffee without either milk or sugar. The only alternative was _aqua_—by no means _pura_!—and it was not safe to drink it unless boiled.

You dwellers in the British Isles who, in this year of war, 1918, grumble at a small measure of enforced rationing, and that applied only to a limited number of commodities—pause and consider! Are you indeed so badly off?

Our mornings were spent in cooking and making bread from the meal supplied to us, in which there was not sufficient gluten to make a dough when mixed with water. We had no means of making our bread “rise” except by the use of stale dough, which gave a sour taste to the whole loaf. Then the baking presented many difficulties, for we had no oven, and no means of making one, so the stuff had to be put into a pot, covered with a lid or a piece of sheet iron, and glowing ashes heaped all round and on top of it. Considering all the difficulties, some of the men achieved remarkably good results.

In the afternoons we slept; there was nothing else to do. The few books we possessed had been read and re-read over and over again. Our tempers were so irritable that we could not converse without quarrelling; and, after all, what was there to talk about? The war and its progress in the Colony was the only topic which interested us, and we had had no fresh news for months and months. As day succeeded day our hopes of release dwindled to vanishing-point, for nothing ever happened to prove to us the reality of the British advance. Sometimes—very rarely—we did get hold of a bit of news, and then we discussed it from every point of view, and lived on it for days; lived on it, in fact, until there was nothing of it left, and any hopes it had raised faded like a mirage in the desert. As time went on it became the settled conviction of the majority that the Colony would never be conquered by the British, and that we should not be released until the war had come to an end in Europe.

Although Madaba was supposed to be more or less of a permanent camp for us, the porters were ordered to remain in case it should become necessary to move us again in a hurry. There had been considerable trouble in collecting them at Mahenge, and on _safari_ they had all been roped together in batches of ten and twelve, and even when we had arrived at our destination they were still kept tied together; but all the same, one night a hundred and fifty of them bolted and escaped into the jungle. And it is not to be wondered at, for they were treated like slaves. They received no pay, not even the worthless paper money, but each man had a card on which a mark was made for each day’s work. Their daily _posho_, or ration, consisted of a cupful of rice measured in one of the small aluminium cups which fitted on to the German water-bottles, and later on even this meagre allowance was reduced by half. But the being roped together was to them the crowning indignity; and later on, when I made my next _safari_, they were chained together by means of iron rings round their necks. If this does not constitute “slave-driving,” by what name can it be called? This is no prejudiced hearsay evidence; it is what my own eyes have seen.

On Friday, the 29th, the Freiherr informed us that anyone who would sign an oath not to again take up arms in the present war against Germany and her allies would be set free; and the following oath was presented to us for signature—

EID!

Ich schwöre bei Gott dem Allmächtigen und Allwissenden, dass ich in diesem Kriege zwischen Deutschland und England mich jeder feindlichen Handlung gegen die Deutschen und deren Verbundeten auch im Schutzgebiete insbesondere auch jeder Unterstütsung der Engländer und ihrer Bundesgenossen durch Führerdienste und Nachrichtenvermittlung enhalten werde, ferner über gesehene militärische Stellungen, Anlagen, Bewegungen zu schweigen, so wahr mir Gott helfe durch Jesus Christus zur Seligkeit. Amen.

This may be rendered in English as follows—

OATH!

I swear by Almighty God that in this war between Germany and England I will refrain from all hostile action against the Germans and their allies at home or abroad. I will not render any assistance to the English or their Allies by acting as a guide or supplying information; moreover, I will keep silence with reference to all military positions, posts and movements that I may have seen. So help me God. Amen.

Naturally there was much speculation in the camp as to what this new development might portend, and we came to the conclusion that the Germans, knowing that it would be impossible to keep us much longer, wanted to jockey us into taking this oath before setting us free. We all decided we would have nothing to do with it, hoping that they would, in a week or two, be obliged to let us go unfettered by any promise. However, as there were among our number several men the nature of whose wounds would in any case prevent them from bearing arms in the future, I advised these to sign the oath and so set an end to their wretched captivity. But before tendering this advice I tried to get the Germans to release them unconditionally, pointing out that they were incapacitated from further service in any case, one being minus an arm and others crippled in various ways. But my request was refused, and so next day ten of our comrades signed the oath and departed for freedom. This was on Saturday, the last day of September.

We wished them Godspeed and saw them off with only a twinge of envy, quickly suppressed, for we felt confident our turn would come very soon, and that without galling restrictions on our future course of action. We had endured so long, surely we could endure yet longer rather than abate one jot or tittle of that which none can wrest from a man save with his own consent—the sovereignty of his own soul.

On October 1st I heard privately from a German that another British officer was at Madaba. He had seemingly been captured near Kissaki, and was confined in a separate hut at some distance from the camp. I applied for permission to see him but was refused, and for a time the Germans even denied his existence. It was evident that they wanted to prevent him from imparting any information to us, but that very fact gave us renewed hope, and made us feel sure that our forces could not be very far away. Very shortly afterwards he was removed and taken south; I imagine to Liwali, where the other officers were confined. Of them I had heard nothing since we parted at Tabora.

In the afternoon of the 4th of October when we were all lying down, and most of us asleep, a spark from one of the cooking fires—built too close to the inflammable grass huts—set the roof in a blaze. We rushed to save our few belongings from the flames, which spread with incredible rapidity. Fortunately the fire had started at the opposite end of the camp, but even so there was not time to get everything out by the one entrance, and we had to break an opening through the wall. All the Germans in the place turned out in quick time armed with rifles, and set the Askaris to work pulling down portions of the sheds to stop the spread of the fire. We were too far from water for that to be any use, and they only managed to save one side of the camp, the other three being burnt to the ground. We managed to salve most of our belongings, and the only thing I lost was a box of matches—a most precious possession, for it was one of three I had hoarded carefully from the days of plenty. We never used a match except in the last extremity. In camp our pipes were always lighted by means of a brand from the fire, and when, on _safari_, we halted for a brief rest the word would be passed, “The Doctor is going to light a match!” and then everyone would gather round me to get a light.

As soon as the fire had been got under, the roll was called, with most satisfactory results for our jailors, for no one had run away. Indeed, the outbreak had been so sudden that it had not occurred to anyone to make use of the opportunity to escape. In any case there would not have been time to make even the roughest preparations for such an attempt, and most of us were in various stages of undress. I remember I had on neither shirt nor tunic—only shorts and slippers!

That night the prisoners slept round a large fire with a ring of Askaris surrounding them. Dr. Manteufel very kindly offered me a place in his hospital, and I dined with him that night. The fare was little better than what we had in camp, but the bread was a decided improvement, as a small amount of wheat flour had been used in its composition. After the meal we had a liqueur-glass of the local _Kummel_ and a pipeful of native tobacco.

The Germans at once started to construct a new camp, setting it on the bank of the dried-up river. A well was sunk within the boundary-fence to enable prisoners to draw water as required, and the sheds were made much higher than the old ones, so it was possible to go in and out without stooping. A corner of one of them was partitioned off for my use.