Fighting in the Siwa Oasis

At nine in the morning of 3 February 1917 a column of British armoured cars descended from the plateau of the Western Desert into the Siwa oasis near the border with Italian Libya and attacked the camp of the Senussi order at Girba, on the western edge of the oasis. It was the last stronghold in Egypt of the order’s leader, Sayyid Ahmad al-Sharif. The fighting lasted until dawn the next day, after which the Senussi slipped away westwards, and on 5 February the British entered Siwa itself without resistance. The British chronology of the war records the start of operations in the oasis under 3 February and their end under 5 February.

A raid by cars alone

After losing the oases of Dakhla and Bahariya in the autumn of 1916, Sayyid Ahmad had little left. In January 1917 General Archibald Murray, commander of the forces in Egypt, learned that the sheikh did not feel safe even in Siwa and intended to leave with his commander-in-chief Muhammad Salih and about 1,200 regular soldiers for the oasis of Jaghbub, the order’s holy place. On 21 January Murray ordered an expedition of armoured cars and the Camel Corps to be prepared, which was to capture the sheikh and inflict the heaviest possible losses on his men. The march of such a column across the roughly 320 kilometres of waterless desert separating Mersa Matruh from Siwa would, however, have required at least a month of preparation, and at the end of January news came that Sayyid Ahmad was about to set out at any moment. Murray therefore decided on a bold step and sent the cars alone against Siwa.

The column was commanded by Brigadier-General H. W. Hodgson. Its fighting strength consisted of three batteries of light Rolls-Royce armoured cars and three light car patrols, each of six Ford Model Ts. Supplies were carried by 40 Ford vans and a column of lorries, whose arrival from Dabaa at Matruh was delayed by a sandstorm. The supply Fords left on 31 January, and the fighting cars the next day. At noon on 2 February the whole column stood at the assembly point on the plateau, about 300 kilometres south-west of Matruh. The British government had excluded Jaghbub itself from operations, because it was negotiating with the sheikh’s cousin, Sayyid Muhammad Idris, and did not want to offend the order by attacking its holy place. Hodgson therefore decided to strike at Girba with his main force and send a smaller detachment to the Munasib pass, about 40 kilometres north-west of Girba, through which ran the only route to Jaghbub practicable for camels. It was to lie in wait for the fugitives and drive them into the waterless dunes of the Great Sand Sea. The British official history compares this plan to manoeuvres of the Boer War, except that the cars made it possible to carry it out over an incomparably greater distance.

The fight at Girba

On the morning of 3 February the cars descended into the oasis by a pass later named Royle’s Pass, after the guide. The advanced guard was divided into three pairs of armoured cars, one for each of the three reconnoitred camps of the order. Sayyid Ahmad’s men were taken completely by surprise, but quickly took cover among the rocks below the escarpment and returned fire with two guns and two machine guns. The ground was so stony that the armoured cars could not get closer than about 730 metres, and the light Fords no closer than about 370 metres. From deserters the British learned that there were about 850 men at Girba, and that Sayyid Ahmad himself was at Siwa with Muhammad Salih and 400–500 soldiers. As it later turned out, Muhammad Salih had gone at the start of the fighting to take command at Girba, while the sheikh and his detachment had set off westwards at once. Hodgson, who had to reckon with a blow from the direction of Siwa against his flank and rear, kept up a fire fight all day.

The night passed relatively quietly. At five in the morning of 4 February the enemy fired the last shots from his guns and machine guns, and fires flared up behind his camp. Explosions of burning ammunition could be heard. At dawn the British saw the Senussi withdrawing through a pass behind their position, and soon the whole Girba garrison had vanished. That day the cars destroyed the abandoned camp and reconnoitred towards Siwa.

On the morning of 5 February the column entered Siwa without resistance. A parade was held in front of the court house, attended by the assembled local sheikhs, and a nine-gun salute was fired from a Krupp gun brought from Matruh on a lorry. According to Murray’s report the inhabitants received the soldiers in a friendly way and were evidently glad to be rid of Sayyid Ahmad. The British ordered arms to be surrendered and left the oasis that same afternoon.

The ambush at Munasib

The detachment sent to the Munasib pass was unable to carry out its task fully. The armoured cars could not get down the steep escarpment and had to stop about 29 kilometres from the pass. Only the light Fords and one car went down. On 4 February they intercepted a small caravan carrying mail from the west to Siwa, and on 5 February they scattered the leading groups fleeing from Girba. The enemy, however, quickly posted a picket beyond the range of the cars and warned the following columns to turn into the dunes before reaching the pass. Sayyid Ahmad and Muhammad Salih escaped with most of their men, struggling through heavy sand to Jaghbub. According to British estimates the Senussi lost about 40 killed and 200 wounded, among the wounded reportedly five Turkish officers. The British lost only three lightly wounded officers. The order had lost the last oasis it held in Egypt apart from holy Jaghbub.