Stirring read worthy of a tepid shower
Canberra Times – Australasia
Jan 15, 2005
A ROOM in the miserable Kum Hotel on Gallipoli in mid-winter seems a
fitting place to have written this review of Fred and Elizabeth
Brenchley’s biography of T.W.White. A pioneering Australian airman,
captured in Mesopotamia, Tom White spent three years as a prisoner of
the Turks before escaping. He endured much worse than the Kum’s tepid
showers and monotonous breakfasts. As White recounted in Guests of the
Unspeakable, his vivid memoir of harsh captivity and daring escape,
being a prisoner of the Turks involved discomfort, danger and, for
many, death. The Brenchleys’ book reminds us of how terrible it was to
be a prisoner of the Turks: almost as bad as being captured by the
Japanese. Nearly one in three of the 268 Australians captured by the
Ottomans died in captivity: only two out of the nine air mechanics of
the Australian ”Half Flight” captured at Kut survived. And these
prisoners got help from friendly neutral diplomats: imagine if they
had not.
White’s Flight is a stirring read. White was one of several intrepid
officers who planned and executed escapes from Turkish captivity, only
three successfully. His escape entailed months of feigning illness to
secure a transfer from the notorious Afion camp in Anatolia to a
hospital in Constantinople, from where he found a ship sailing for
Odessa. There he saw the aftermath of the Bolshevik revolution before
reaching British troops in Bulgaria.
The Brenchleys tell an extraordinary story of cruelty and indifference
on the Ottoman side (including the great Armenian genocide which began
about April 25, 1915) and the unwavering optimism and courage of young
men who took on and outwitted the regime’s goons. White’s ability to
survive on the streets of Constantinople, amid the intrigues and
uncertainties of the final months of the Ottoman Empire, was an
astounding piece of effrontery.
The Brenchleys essentially paraphrase White’s own memoir, adding
little of interest except sentimental family and political
history. Soon after his liberation, White married Vera Deakin, who ran
the Australian Red Cross’s formidable London operation, one that did
so much to save the lives of prisoners of war in the Great War. It is
a great pity the Brenchleys contented them- selves with presenting
such a superficial picture of this determined woman, especially given
the abundant sources available.
White is one of those people whose main claim to our attention is an
escapade in his youth. As a federal politician from the 1930s, he was
notable only as an adversary of Menzies. Though admired for
championing various causes, his trenchant opposition ensured that he
was more often seen as a critic than as a creator. The Brenchleys are
sloppy over details – the Australian Flying Corps is referred to
variously as the RFC, the RAF and even the RAAF – and they don’t
explain why the Turks were regarded as ”unspeakable”. But they give
a fair picture of the spirited prisoners who refused to give in to
cruel and corrupt captivity.
Peter Stanley is principal historian of the Australian War
Memorial. His book, Quinn’s Post, Anzac, Gallipoli, will be published
in April.