'History of the Indian Navy. (1613-1863).' [‎376] (395/622)

376
HISTORY OF THE INDIAN NAVT.
rank, received that distinction, viz., Captain Kemball,* whom
no one will deny was well deserving the honour, and Captain
* Some notice of this now famous officer is not out of place here, as from the
year 1842 up to the date of the abolition of the Indian Navy, he was brouelit
into intimate relations with the officers of the Service, and his name has frequently
appeared in the preceding pages. Captain Arnold Burrowes Kemball was
educated at Addiscombe, and entered the Bombay Artillery on the 11th of
December, 1837. He saw service in the Afghan Campaign in 1839 at Ghuznee
and in 1842 was appointed Assistant Political Eesident in the Persian Grulf'
after ten years' service he became Political Eesident at Bushire, and in 1855
was transferred to Bagdad as Consul-Greneral and Political Agent A mid-ranking political representative (equivalent to a Consul) from the diplomatic corps of the Government of India or one of its subordinate provincial governments, in charge of a Political Agency. in Turkish
Arabia. He received the thanks of Sir James Outram and Acting-Commodore
Eennie, for his services up the Karoon, and Lord Canning, in his notification of
the 18th of June, 1857, thanked him for his services " afforded on every occasion
of difficulty and danger, and especially in the brilliant expedition against Ahwaz."
He remained thirteen years at Bagdad, showing himself a worthy successor of
such men as Taylor, Eich, and Eawlinson. In 1866 he was nominated a Knight
of the Star of India, and in 1874 was promoted to General Officer's rank, ante
dated to March, 1868. Sir Arnold was elected to attend upon the Shah during
that potentate's visit to England in 1873 ; and from April, 1875, he was employed
on the Turco-Persian Boundary Commission until the summer of 1876, when he
was sent as British Commissioner to the Turkish Army, and accompanied Abdul-
Kerim through the Servian Campaign. On the outbreak of war between Eussia
and Turkey he was despatched by the Foreign Office to the Turkish Army in
Asia Minor as British Commissioner. After the battle of Zaidakan he only
escaped death or capture at the hands of the Cossacks, who chased him and
Captain Norman for twenty-five miles, by the speed of his charger. The ' Times'
Correspondent with Mukhtar Pasha An Ottoman title used after the names of certain provincial governors, high-ranking officials and military commanders. 's Army, says of him :—" The position
occupied by Sir Arnold Kemball is one of great importance, requiring much tact
and discretion, a thorough knowledge of Oriental character, coupled with a keen
appreciation of military difficulties. I doubt if there is another officer in Her
Majesty's Army qualified to hold the post. A soldier by training and profession,
yet a diplomatist from a thirteen years' experience as Consul-General at Bagdad,
Sir Arnold possesses all the qualifications for his present responsible appointment.
He possesses a thorough knowledge of Persian, Arabic, and Turkish, and can
converse or correspond with equal fluency in either of these languages, while
from his intimate knowledge of the customs of the people, he is able to gain their
confidence. Sir Arnold is well content to sleep on the hill side, wrapped in a
Turkish officer's coat, to share the greasy and unnutritious food found in Turkish
camps, to stand by the side of Turkish troops under a fire that our younger
soldiers of Abyssinia and Ashantee do not dream of. It needs the constitution
of a strong man to stand a ride of 259 miles in five consecutive days, with changes
of temperature from snow-clad hills 9,000 feet above sea level to the dry and dusty
plains of the Passin Eiver. It needs a man with manly vigour to ride all day and
write all night; it needs a General with something more than his country's
reputation at heart to travel about, occupying the position Sir Arnold
Kemball does occupy here, unattended by an Aide-de Camp, often accompanied
only by a single Mahomedan.horse-keeper, trusting to luck for his food and to
the cold hill-side for his bed. By all this, by his simple unaffected manner, his
unostentatious style of living, his warm sympathy for the Turkish soldiers, his
severe condemnation of the conduct of many of their own officials, his indomit
able energy and perseverance, his cheery spirits, and his gallant bearing on the
field of battle. Sir Arnold has knitted to himself all with whom he has been
thrown into contact, and while upholding in a pre-eminent degree the character
of the British soldier, has never in the slightest degree given the Turkish officers
reason to believe that his mission was to help them, or in any way to compro
mise the neutral position of our Government." This eulogium on Sir Arnold
Kemball is not overdrawn, and we, retaining a pleasant memory of a pleasant
Christmas passed under the roof of the Bagdad Eesidency in the year 1855, can
vouch that to his other virtues he adds those of geniality and old -fashioned
Indian hospitality.