Extract from "The Syrian Desert"

After detailing so many projects which have not as yet materialized, it is a pleasure to be able to turn to certain transport schemes that have actually proved themselves a success. Shortly after the Great War, plans were made to bridge the Great Desert by air; and almost simultaneously motor transport was talked of across the Little Desert, and feasible motor routes were experimented with. The development land transport should be first described because. In journalistic language, it represents a more literal "conquest" of the desert than Arial transport. In addition to which, the motor companies which have established themselves on the desert are genuine desert services, whereas the trans-desert air lines are through services to the Far East and their Syrian Desert sections are but short and incidental pans of far-flung imperial routes. The following outline, necessarily compressed, can only indicate how much there is in the story to capture the imagination.

Early in 1923 several people collaborated to make an experi­mental trip between Damascus and Baghdad. Mr. C. E. S. Palmer, H.B.M.'s Consul at Damascus; Hajji Mohammed el-Bassam (called lbn Bassam by most of the Europeans in Syria), a wealthy Baghdad merchant; and Major D. McCallum, British liaison officer with the Haut-Commissariat at Beyrout, planned a joint expedition. They obtained the co-operation of Mr. Norman Nairn, of the Nairn Transport Company of Palestine and Syria, who loaned them cars and the services of the Company’s chief engineer­-mechanic, Mr Edward Lovell. El-Bassam, who was a personal friend of most of Aneza shaykhs, was well acquainted with the desert and its tracks. He, in partnership with a Syrian mer­chant, had run a contraband trade in gold to Irak, until the French intervened to prevent their smuggling gold out of Syria. Originally they had conveyed the contraband across the desert by camel via Deir ez-Zor, and thence down the Euphrates to Felluja. But as soon as el-Bassam conceived the idea of using motor cars to trans­port the gold, he began to look for a more direct (as well as a less frequent) way of reaching the Euphrates. It was only after several successful trips had been nude by motor car for this purpose that el-Bassam offered to assist Mr. Palmer in looking for the shortest route between Dumeir and Ramadi.

On 2nd April 1923 the reconnaissance party set out in three cars: a Buick, an Oldsmobile and a Lancia. They took enough food and water to last the party for ten days; and sufficient petrol and oil to carry the Cars well over 1000 miles - in case they might be forced to turn back when almost within reach of Baghdad. On the second day out their convoy came upon the "air-furrow” the Royal Air Force route-marking between Amman and Ramadi. Within three days they reached the Euphrates at Ramadi; and on the evening of the third day the citizens of Baghdad gave an enthusiastic welcome to the twelve members of the Palmer-­McCallum expedition. Incidentally, four of these twelve were English women. Their desert crossing had been uneventful, except for an accident to the Lancia that “Ted” Lovel was able to repair en route; and British officials were thereby convinced of the feasibility of establishing a motor route along the tracks made by these three cars . In particular, Major Douglas Gumbley, then Postmaster-General of the Irak Government, became keenly in­terested in the development of a new land route. Actually, it was at his request that the Nairn Transport Company subsequently organized their desert service. In spite of the enforced brevity of this outline, a word must be said about the Nalrns and their company.

Norman Nairn and his younger brother, Gerald are New Zealanders. During the war they served with the British forces in the Near East, and throughout the Palestine campaign they were both with the Mechanical Transport division of the R.A.S.C. After being demobilized in Palestine, they went into the motor­car business, and, in partnership with an Assyrian of Haifa by the name of Nasser, they instituted a Haifa-Beyrout service. In time they obtained mail contracts from the governments of Palestine, Egypt and Syria. In time, also, the Nasser-Naim concern liquidated, and a new all-British company was formed. The Nairn Transport Company, recruited entirely from among ex-Service men, instituted a daily passenger and mail service between Palestine and Syria. After 1922 this organization made a name for itself by carrying the Egyptian mails from Haifa to Beyrout in just over four hours.

When the Nairns were approached by sponsors of this projected desert route, Norman Nairn was not slow to grasp the potential­ities of the situation, and he lost no time in beginning a personal survey of the desert between the Anti-Lebanon Mountains and the river Euphrates. During the spring and summer five more trial trips were undertaken; in Nairn cars; and each one of these expeditions reconnoitred large areas of desert to the north of, as well to the south of, the first route that had been followed when el-Bassam led the way. It was thus established that the first route had in fact passed over the most easily traversable section of desert, and this was the track that was finally chosen for the Nairn convoys.

The Overland Desert Route, as it came to be called in the English press, follows the Damascus-Aleppo high-road north­wards for about fifteen miles before branching east to Dumeir. From Dumeir, Naim drivers steer south of east until they reach Rutba Welles in the Wadi Hauran, which their speedometers show to be 261 miles distant from Damascus. On their way to Rutba, Nairn cars pass to the south of Jebel Tenf, which is the only mountain landmark on the route. From Rutba, where the only wells now to be found on the route are situated (the only water if any kind, for that matter, until the river is reached), the “Naim Track” turns to tile north of east, and follows the “air-furrow” into Ramadi. At Ramadi the track joins the ordinary riverain road along the right bank of the Euphrates, and continues as far as Felluja. Until the spring of 1932 cars had to cross to Mesopotamia by a pontoon bridge, or - if this had been cut to save its being swept away in time of flood-cars were rafted over by ferry. Today a steel and concrete bridge spans the river at Felluja, so that one of the few hazards of the trip has been eliminated. A straight and dusty road covers the thirty-five miles between Felluja outskirts of west Baghdad. The total distance from Damascus to Baghdad is 534 miles; and from the sea-coast at Beyrout to Baghdad the milage is 606. As may well be imagined, the only metalled route is that between Beyrout and Damascus; and over this part of the route the desert buses never travel. This is also the only mountainous district that has to be crossed; and the two ranges which intervene between the desert and the sea, the Anti-Lebanon and the Lebanon Mountains, are crossed at an altitude of 4000 and 5000 feet respectively. They form a beautiful, almost a breath-taking contrast to the 445 miles of desert which lie to the east of Damascus.

As for the desert section of the route, drivers on the "Nairn Track" arc confronted with the few physical difficulties. The Wadi Hauran is the only deeply cut wadi that has to be crossed, and at Rutba its ravine is more easily traversable than it is at any other point nearer to the Euphrates. In dry weather the desert surface is smooth and hard-packed, covered in places with gravel and shale, and occasionally spattered with flints; its whole wide extend is a potential road-bed. Hundreds of heavy motor vehicles have gradually worn deep grooves in passing over this smooth surface; and these grooves constitute what is known generally as the "Nairn Track". In wet weather rain-water collects in the occasional depressions, and in these can are sometimes are mired. Also, about seventy miles east of Rutba Wells, are a series of mud-flats which the rains tender extremely treacherous, Lastly, whenever the Euphrates is in flood, convoys are unable to use the riverain road fnom Ramadi to Felluja; they are forced to make an eighty-mile detour around Lake  Habbania. The Habbanja track, which is strewn with pumice sand, has the name of being one of the worst of desert tracks.

It has already been mentioned that the Nairn desert service was organized at the request of the Irak Post Office. Early in October 1923; after the most efficient preparations had been made, the Nairn Transport Company opened a weekly service (between Damascus and Baghdad) that was scheduled to connect with the weekly Anglo-Indian (P. & O.) mails to and from London. An irregular, extra trip was also provided for passengers “when necessary”. Postal notices were duly published, informing the public that articles destined to be carried over the new route should be superscribed “Overland Mail Baghdad-Haifa”. At first there was a surcharge of three pence, no parcel post was accepted, and there was no insurance system – only ordinary registration. But eventually, of course, the surcharge system was abolished; and parcel post and insurance were undertaken, as by any normal postal service. The mail contract with the Irak Government was for a period of five years; and by its terms, the Nairn Transport Company was bound to deliver the mails between Baghdad and Port Said within a sixty-hour time limit. From Haifa to Egypt the mails were to be transported by rail. Provision was made for the payment of a fine – for every additional hour over the sixty - if ever the mails should be delayed; but such a fine was never imposed.

Of primary importance in the organizing of this desert service were the precautions that were taken for the safety of the convoys. The Nairns made a contract with Hajji el-Bassam to arrange for a safe-conduct for their cars across the Badia. He was to subsidize the Beduin tribes on behalf of the company, and his man – detailed to escort the convoys – were able to be refeeks as well as guides It was agreed that el-Bassam and the tribes should together receive a fixed percentage (on third, to be exact) of the mail-contract returns. This subsidy amounted to approximately £ 200 a year. Once this arrangement was made with el-Bassam, and through him with the Beduin tribes, Nairn drivers ands convoy leaders ceased to carry any fire-arms whatever.

To be continued...

First published in the book "The Syrian Desert" by Christiana Phelps Grant, New York, 1938, pages 270 - 289