and a row of lookers which as a concession on Christmas ran along the walls, were day were the only occasions raised platforms affording on which we saw the outside about six feet of useful width. of our dwelling-place for three Each platform was divided in long months. Nor was there two by a single partition half- anything in the way of comfort way along the room. Viewed within. The number of trees from one end the general effect allotted to us was small, and resembled that of stables, to the daily wood ration we which use indeed all the lower allowed ourselves only sufficed rooms had been put previous to keep the stoves going in our to our arrival. Each length rooms for a few hours each of platform was allotted to a day. The fuel, moreover, being group of three or four officers, green, was difficult to keep who were were then at liberty alight, so that we spent many to beautify their new homes hours that winter blowing at as ingenuity might suggest. the doors of stoves. And the Planks were hard to come by, stoker on duty had to give so for the most part old valises, the fire his undivided attenblankets, and ourtains were tion if he wished to avoid strung from post to post the sarcastic comments of his to screen the "rooms" from chilled companions. It was the passage, and thereby gain a special treat reserved for for the occupants a little Sundays to have our stoves privacy. burning for an hour in the afternoon. For over a month the temperature remained night and day below freezing-point, and the thermometer on one occasion registered 36 degrees of frost. As the severity of the winter increased caulking floor-boards became a profitable occupation, for an icy draught now swept up through the gaping oracks. By the time the financial difficulties to which we have re- But enough of the miseries ferred were at an end, it was of that winter: in spite of no longer possible to obtain in such unfavourable conditions the bazaar a sufficient quantity the camp was a cheerful one. of firewood for anything ex- We were all good friends, and cept our kitchen stoves. It united in our determination was not, however, until snow not to knuckle under to the was lying deep upon the Turk. Our senior officer, ground, that Sami Bey could Colonel A. Moore of the 66th be prevailed upon to let us Punjabis, was largely instruout down a few of the neigh- mental in making our lot an bouring willow-trees, for which easier one. This he did by it need hardly be said we had fighting our many battles to pay heavily. Apart from against an unreasonable and the exercise thus obtained-and apathetic commandant, and it was good exercise carrying in all our sohemes for escape the wood into the barracks-an he gave us his sound advice odd visit or two to the bazaar and ready support. and a few hours tobogganing Ours claimed to have been the first party formed with a view to escape, but it was not long before there were several others, and it became evident that some plan would have to be devised by which a large number might hope to make their way out of the barracks fairly simultaneously. Since these had been designed for Turkish soldiers, every window was already barred. We were, moreover, a camp of suspects, who had refused to give their parole, so at night, in addition to sentries being posted at every corner, visiting patrols went round the building at frequent intervals. Three or four fellows, of course, might out the bars of a window and slip through, but hardly five or six parties. At this moment an old American magazine came into our hands containing an article which described how thirty or forty Federal officers had escaped from a Confederate Confederate prison by means of a tunnel. This was at once recognised as the ideal solution of our problem, if only we could find a suitable outlet and the means of disposing the earth. While the general plan was still under discussion, we were reinforced by the arrival of three officers from Geddos, who had there refused to give their parole in spite of the Turks' threat that they would be moved to Changri if they did not change their minds. Here, then, they arrived one cold December morning, looking very racy in their check overcoats supplied to them by the Datoh Legation. These coats were doubtless the last word in Constantinople fashions, and in the shop windows had probably been marked "Très civilisé.' Amongst the three was one Tweedledum, so named for 8 certain rotundity of figure, which even the scanty provisions said to be obtainable in Geddos had failed to reduce. From his lips we first heard of the wonderful capabilities of the HandleyPage passenger aeroplane. Such machines, he said, could carry fifteen to sixteen passengers, and three of them had recently flown from England to Mudros with only one intermediate landing in Italy. The pilot of one of them had been a prisoner with him at Geddos. A few evenings later Nobby had a great brain-wave; fetohing a 'Pears' Annual,' he turned up the maps of Europe and Asia Minor, and after a few hurried measurements unfolded to his stable companions, Perce and Looney, what was afterwards known 88 the "Aeroplane Scheme." These three had, with much expense and trouble, managed to colleot enough planks for a real wooden partition to their "room," and it was behind this screen that this and many another devilish plot was hatched. Briefly, Nobby's idea was for a flight of five or six HandleyPages to be sent from Cyprus, swoop down on Changri and pick up the whole camp, both officers and men,-and Sami too. We should, of course, have to take over the barracks from our guards, but this should easily be effected by a coup-demain and probably without having to resort to bloodshed. At first the idea appeared a trifle fantastio, for after being out off from the outside world for two whole years, it took time for us to assimilate the wonderful advance of aeronautical science which the soheme assumed: but given that Tweedledum's statement was correct, the scheme was feasible, and we soon took up the question seriously. Our representative of the R.F.C. pronounced the surrounding fields practicable landinggrounds: a committee confirmed the possibility of taking over the barracks by surprise; and the whole scheme, illustrated by a small sketch of the vicinity, was soon on its way home. We were fortunate in having by now a method of communicating secret information without much risk of detection: for the censorship of our letters, like most things in Turkey, was not very efficient. Unfortunately it used to take at least four months to receive a reply to a letter. For this reason we could not afford to wait until a definite date was communicated to us, so we ourselves named the first fifteen days of May as suitable for us, and agreed, from 6 to 8 A.M. on each of those days, to remain in a state of instant readiness to seize the barracks should an aeroplane appear. For the sake of secrecy, the details of the coup-de-main itself were left to be worked out by a small committee, and the report spread amongst the rest of the camp that the scheme had been dropped. The true state of affairs would not be divulged until a few days before the first of May. There were now at Changri 47 officers and 28 orderliesa total force of 75 unarmed men with which to take over the barracks. Our guard, all told, numbered 70 men. At any one time during daylight there were seven Turkish sentries on duty: one outside each corner of the barracks, one inside the square which had an open staircase at each corner, one at the arched entrance in the centre of the north face, and the seventh stood guard over the commandant's office. This was a room in the upper storey over the archway and facing on to the square. On each side of the commandant's office, therefore, were the barrack-rooms inhabited by the British officers, and to go from one side to the other it was necessary to pass the sentry standing at his post in the landing in between. From here a flight of steps gave on to the road through the main archway; on the other side of this again, and facing the stairs, was the door of the groundfloor barrack-room used by our guard. This room was similar to those in the upper storey already described, and we found out by looking through a hole made for the purpose in the floor of the room above, and by casual visits when wanted an escort for the bazaar, that the rifles of the occupants were kept in a row of racks on either side of the central passage-way. Each morning of the first fifteen days of May we were to be ready from 6 to 8 A.M. to take over the barracks. The committee's plan was this. By 6 A.M. every one was to be dressed, but those who had no specific job to do were to get back into bed again in case suspicion should be caused in the mind of any one who happened to come round. The aeroplanes, if they came, would arrive from the south. Two look-out parties of three therefore were to be at their posts by 6 A.M., one in the officers' mess in the S.E. and the other in the Padre's room next to the chapel in the S.W. corner of the barracks. The staircases at these two corners of the square were to be watched by two sentries, one in each half of the north wing. When the lookouts in the south wing had either distinctly heard or seen an aeroplane, they were to come to their staircase and start walking down it to the square. The sentries in the north wing would give the alarm, and the officer, who had the honour of doing verger to the Padre, and who used to ring a handbell before services, would run down the north-western staircase and walk diagonally across the square towards the chapel, ringing the bell for exactly thirty seconds. The stopping of the bell was to be the signal for simultaneous action. The sentry on the landing could be easily disposed of by three officers; most of the rest were to run down certain staircases, cross the archway, dash into the barrack-room and get hold of all the rifles; a small party at the same moment tackling the sentry on the main entrance. On seeing the rush through the archway, the look-out parties from the south wing would overpower the sentry in the square. The arms belonging to the three sentries and one other rifle were to be immediately taken to the corners of the barracks and the outside sentries covered. The orderlies, under an officer, would meanwhile form up in the square as a reserve. Surprise was to be our greatest ally, and we hoped that within a minute of the bell stopping the barracks would be in our hands. Having herded our Turkish guard into a big cellar and looked them in there, we would then signal to the aeroplanes that the barracks were in our possession, by sheets laid out in the square; while small picquets, armed with Turkish rifles and ammunition, would see to it that the aeroplanes on landing would be unmolested from the village. We are still convinced that the plan would have succeeded. Even those in the know, however, put little faith in the probability of the aeroplane scheme being carried out, realising that the machines necessary for such an enterprise were not likely to be available from the main battle-fronts. Preparations therefore tinued for working out our own salvation, as though this plan for outside help had not entered our heads. With the first signs of spring, the tunnel scheme began to take concrete form. As already mentioned in the description of the barracks, the ground to the west rose gently up to the Angora road. In this slope was a shallow cup-like depression at a distance of 40 yards from the building. If only a convenient point for starting a tunnel could be found in the nearest wall, the cup would form an ideal spot for breaking out to ground-level. A night reconnaissance was made, as the result of which there seemed a likelihood that, under the whole of the platform of the downstairs room on the western side of the barracks we should find a hollow space varying from one to three feet in depth; if the surmise were correct and a tunnel was run out from here, there would be no difficulty in getting rid of all the excavated earth into this hollow space. Unfortunately the lower room, though not in use, was kept looked. It was discovered, however, that the walls of the barracks consisted of an outer and inner skin, each a foot thick, and built of large sun-dried brioks, the space between being filled up with a mixture of rubble, mortar, and earth, and a few larger stones. This was in the bottom storey. Above this the construction of the wall changed to two thicknesses of lath and plaster attached to either side of a timber framing, and the thickness of the wall diminished to only nine inches. The total width of the wall below was five feet; therefore the lockers in the upper room were immediately above the rubble core of the heavier wall. It would thus be possible to get down through the lockers and sink a shaft through the rubble to a trifle below the level of the ground, and from there to break through the inner skin and come into the empty space below the ground floor. Work was commenced in the middle of February 1918. For the next few weeks an officer was usually to be seen lolling about at either end of the firstfloor rooms, and, on the approach of an interpreter or other intruder, would stroll leisurely down the passage, whistling the latest rag-time melody. Within the room all would now be silent; but when the coast was again clear there could perhaps be seen in the barrack-room a pair of weird figures, strangely garbed and white with dust. Somewhere in the line of lockers was the entrance to the shafthead. The looker doors being only a foot square, were too small to admit a man, and so the top planks at the place where we wished to work had been prised up and fitted with hinges to form a larger entrance. To give additional room inside, the partition between two consecutive lockers was also removed. The floor of one locker and the joints supporting the platform at this point were then cut away, and we were free to commence the shaft. For this job six officers were chosen, of whom three belonged to our escape party. The six were divided into three reliefs, and each |