Reviews of A Narrative of a Year's Journey through Central and Eastern Arabia, 1862-63 by William Gifford Palgrave, Published 1865 [‎15r] (29/42)

Palgraves Arabia, 207
the siege of El Rass in Kaseem, but as lie soon after cap
tured Aneyza, the principal town of the district, the whole
of Kaseem submitted. Ibraheem next attacked Shakra: after
a siege of six days it capitulated. The direct road to Dereeyeh,
the capital of the Wahabees, was then open to him, but he
preferred to take the more circuitous route by Dhoroma, a
large town, with a population of eight thousand souls, which
was not fortified and from which the capital drew a great part of
its supplies. At Dhoroma he encountered an unexpected and
obstinate resistance, which so irritated him that he ordered his
troops to massacre the whole of the inhabitants and to spare no
one,—an order which was immediately executed:—
'.Us firent (says M. Mengin) main-basse sur les hahitans. La
fusillade fat si vive, qu'en mains de deux heures la plupart perirent
dans leurs maisons. II ne resta que quelques centaines de femmes,
de filles et d'enfans qu'epargna la pitie du soldat. Le sang coulait
dans les rues encombrees par les morts.'
The governor Saood, a son of Abdallah, retired to his house
with some faithful followers, and artillery was brought up to
batter it; but Ibraheem, knowing that it contained precious
articles, especially horses of almost inestimable value, considered
it more profitable to allow Saood and his followers to capi
tulate :—
' Satisfait d'avoir assouvi sa vengeance, Ibrahym Pacha permit aux
femmes et a leurs enfans de rester au milieu des mines de leur patrie,
apres avoir ete les objets de la brutalite des soldats. A peine ce
carnage etait-il acheve, qu'un orage mele de pluie, de grele et de
tonnerre vint encore ajouter a cette scene de desolation, et porter la
terreur dans Tame des Turks.'
Dereeyah surrendered after a siege which endured for six
months—from the 12th of April to the 9th of September, 1818
—and, although the fall of the capital did not immediately
involve the submission of the whole principality, the power of
the Wahabees was broken. Their Prince was a prisoner; his
eldest son, Saood, having been taken prisoner while attempting
to make his escape before his father surrendered, had been put
to death by order of Ibraheem, and the Wahabees had no army
in the field that could offer any effectual resistance.
Mr. Palgrave (vol. ii. pp. 55, 56) gives a somewhat detailed
account of a great battle fought at Koreyn, a few leagues from
Shakra, on the route to Dereeyeh. He says, speaking of Ab
dallah, the Wahabee chief :—
£ His outposts were soon driven in by the Egyptian columns, and
some skirmishes brought Ibraheem to Shakra', a town then as now
unwarlike and commercial; she readily opened her gates to the Basha*
But