Whilst the main Gertrude Bell papers are held by the University of Newcastle (see http://gertrudebell.ncl.ac.uk/), the Hogarth papers contain a not insignificant collection of Gertrude Bell’s letters to Hogarth, which reveal her personal, political and professional interests, as well as her feelings and thoughts about Lawrence.
Photograph of Gertrude Bell c. 1910. Magdalen College Archives, Papers of David George Hogarth, P452.
Traces of Gertrude can also be found in the Jeremy Wilson Archive, which often acts like a map tracing the many characters in Lawrence’s story.
Gertrude Bell (1868-1926) was an Oxford-educated woman from a prominent manufacturing family in the north-east of England who became an archaeologist and traveller in the Middle East, and eventually became involved in its administration and politics, advocating Arab independence. She was the only female member of the Arab Bureau, and later held prominent roles in Iraq under its British Mandate, where she worked closely with Sir Percy Cox and King Faisal I. She was also instrumentally involved in setting up the Iraq Museum to display the country’s antiquities. Like Lawrence, she is often seen as a contradictory figure with fluctuating views embracing both Arab nationalism and British colonialism.
Bell’s letters to Hogarth address with surprising directness many of the subjects that would interest researchers today. We find her musing over the issues of Arab independence and administration in Iraq, contemplating archaeology and museums, and pondering the problems of Lawrence and his difficulties with writing and publishing Seven Pillars of Wisdom.
Bell often addresses Hogarth as “Arbur”, the shortened form of “Arab Bureau”, which was used in official documentation in the First World War. Hogarth became the Acting Director of the Bureau in 1916, but Bell continued to address him by this name long after the war had ended, suggesting a kind of preservation of their wartime relationship, and indicating her trust in Hogarth. In some of the letters, she discusses the work of the Bureau and apologises for neglecting her contributions, writing, “I’ll amend my ways with regard to A.B. reports”. Another time she is concerned to receive her copy of the Bureau’s publication, The Arab Bulletin: “It was a blow to find that while I had been pining for the Bulletin & wondering why it was no longer issued, my copy was lying at G.H.Q.”.
Bell discusses the political project of Arab independence, which she saw as compatible with a British mandate and influence. This proved to be an extremely difficult challenge, especially due to the many influences and groups in Iraq, which the British tried to manage and quell. Bell writes, “We’re trying to start an Arab state in the middle of pro-Turks & anarchic tribes, with every prospect of a Turko-Bolshevist Drive from the north before next summer, if not earlier. And every one comes in to give his opinion, or to seek consolation, or (but more rarely) to ask advice. In between their visits you try to get a little work done.” Other letters detail her excursions out of Baghdad “doing tribal geography & history”, and describe the assassination of the British officer Captain W.M. Marshall, the Political Officer in Najaf, as “a terrible loss”.
The letters also cover Bell’s archaeological and writing work. In a pre-War letter to Hogarth, she discusses the title of a book on architecture, suggesting “Palace and Mosque, a study in early M. architecture I, that too grandiloquent?”. The book was published as “Palace and Mosque at Ukhaidir” in 1914.
