Chapter XXXI

THE MASSACRE OF THE GREY RIVER (OUED ZERGA).

While M. Roustan was conducting General St. John to the audience-chamber at Goletta, to receive, within twenty-four hours of his arrival in the country, the highest honours of the Nichán Iftikhar, very alarming news reached Tunis.

It appeared that on the previous day the Arabs who had attacked Ali Bey afterwards surrounded Oued Zerga, the sixth station on the French railway, some seventy miles from Tunis. Having torn up the railway line on either side of the station, and thrown the rails into the river, they attacked the station buildings, setting them on fire. The station- master, M. Raimbert, was burnt alive, and ten other _employés_, nearly all Maltese and Italians, were massacred. Having accomplished this terrible act of vengeance, the Arabs retired. All traffic between Tunis and Ghardimaou was immediately stopped. The Minister Resident invited the English and Italian Consuls to assist at the official inquiry. Accordingly the English and Italian consular clerks, medical officers, and dragomans, proceeded to Oued Zerga by a special train, which conveyed the French authorities and a supply of coffins to the scene of the calamity. Six hundred French troops had already proceeded to the spot, but long before their arrival the Arabs had disappeared. The increased native ferment was undoubtedly caused to a great extent by the wholesale destruction of the olive forests, villages, and vineyards which General Sabatier considered necessary around Zaghouán, but this latest outrage was unexpected, and naturally caused intense excitement in Tunis itself.

The train which proceeded to the scene of the disaster did not return the same evening as was expected, thereby increasing the wide-spread anxiety of the European colonists. All that did come from Medjez was a small bag containing the supposed remains of M. Raimbert. They only consisted of some charred bones and a portion of burnt flesh, but they were, I believe, identified by the buttons of his uniform. Early the following morning they were interred in the Roman Catholic burial-ground of Saint Antonio. In the afternoon the English and Italian officials reached Tunis after a narrow escape of a rencontre with the Arabs; and the prevalence of various alarming rumours, added to the impossibility of placing any longer much reliance on the official reports industriously circulated by the Tunisian Government, induced me to visit Medjez-el-Bab. Medjez is a small town some fifty-five miles east of Tunis, and is situated exactly seventeen miles due west of Oued Zerga and fifteen miles to the north-west of Ali Bey’s camp at Testour. Medjez-el-Bab is the fifth station from Tunis on the French railway, and forms the eastern extremity of the vast and fertile valley of the Medjerdah, which stretches inland from the Mediterranean, and is traversed about twenty miles from the coast by the ruins of the great Roman aqueduct which once united Carthage and Zaghouán. At Medjez-el-Bab (Medjez-of-the-Gate) commences a series of wild mountain gorges and picturesque ravines, through which the Medjerdah river finds its way from the comparatively narrow Beja valley into the broader Tunis plain; while a spur of the same rocky hills separates Medjez from the half- ruined city of Testour. It was this district which now unexpectedly bade fair to become the first battlefield of the Tunisian campaign.

The extraordinary events of the past week, the practical defeat of Sy Ali Bey, followed by the daring raids of the insurgent Arabs on the French railway in the defiles of Oued Zerga, for a moment diverted public attention even from the coming march on Kairwán, and certainly taxed General Logerot’s military skill to the utmost. A month ago the plan for the expedition was simple enough. Ali Bey was to guard the French railway, and maintain order in the apparently pacified northern provinces of Tunis, while the French columns stamped out _manu militari_ the spirit of rebellion in the south. It now turned out that Ali Bey was powerless to effect anything; that the tribes of the north were gathering in thousands to create a diversion in aid of their brethren of the south; and that notwithstanding the immediate presence of Ali Bey’s troops, and the knowledge that there were 40,000 French troops in the Regency, the insurgents had managed to obtain possession of the most important strategic point on the French railway. There were hardly any passengers by the afternoon train on Sunday, October 2d, and at Manouba we received a guard of thirty soldiers, commanded by a lieutenant of the 73d Regiment. On passing Jedeida and Testour, the two villages which were pillaged by the insurgents during the previous week, I noticed a small camp of Tunisian soldiers near the railway. After three hours’ travelling the train reached Medjez-el-Bab. The station formed the headquarters of Colonel De Bord, and a battalion of the 8th Regiment was encamped on one side of it, and one of the 73d on the other. Water had apparently run short, and the train brought a large supply from Tunis, with which the railway reservoir was speedily filled. The soldiers were nearly all young, but of good physique, and looked little the worse for the hard fighting many of them had seen during the previous night, the details of which I had no difficulty in ascertaining.

As soon as news of the Oued Zerga massacre reached Manouba, General Logerot despatched a battalion of the 8th Regiment and two companies of the 73d Regiment to Medjez and Oued Zerga. The line was repaired under the protection of the men of the 73d Regiment, and, having effected a junction, the troops proceeded by train to Beja. Later in the afternoon a company of the 73d Regiment, escorting a number of invalid soldiers, set out for Medjez. On quitting the first tunnel from Beja they found the summit of the defile covered by Arabs, who commenced firing into the train. The rails were now covered with stones, and the woodwork of all the bridges was in flames. The French soldiers steadily returned the Arab fire till they arrived at kilomètre 95, when the train left the rails amid the shouts of the insurgents, who began rushing towards it. Colonel De Bord then ordered Commandant Guelfucci to attack the heights, and the Arabs were successfully dislodged from their position with some loss. With extraordinary courage, however, they charged to within 100 mètres of the French guns. One French soldier was mortally wounded, and two others injured. The Arabs ceased firing at dusk. An insurgent, who endeavoured to kill the engine-driver, was shot on the line itself. The young French troops, who were under fire for the first time, behaved well against terrible odds. A company of the 8th Regiment, who guarded a train sent in search of the missing soldiers, then arrived, and all the troops now retired to Medjez, being compelled to do so owing to their insufficient number, the presence of the invalids, and the want of provisions. They consequently abandoned Oued Zerga and the wrecked train, containing the bodies of the victims of last Friday’s massacre, and brought back the English and Italian Consular officers to Medjez.

The retreat to Medjez was undoubtedly a prudent measure, and it was probably owing to the Arabs’ ignorance of the exact number of the French troops that Colonel De Bord’s little band escaped annihilation. The officers seemed anxious that what had happened should be understood in Europe, and gave the most detailed account of the incidents which occurred on their journey from Beja. The order in the two camps was excellent. The goods-shed was guarded by about twoscore of Tunisian soldiers, who were in charge of the powder and stores which Ali Bey officially certified to have arrived at Testour some days before; but as many of them were smoking under the powder-waggons, the ultimate safety of the Tunisian magazine seemed very problematical. The weapons of the Bey’s contingent afforded great amusement to the French soldiers. I noticed one ragged little Arab wearing a large cavalry sabre marked G. R. 1792; and hardly two men were armed alike. The misfortunes of poor Ali Bey, on the other side of the blue hills to the east, were no secret at Medjez, and a very general feeling of generous indignation seemed to prevail that French troops were not at once sent to his aid. Diplomacy at Tunis and Paris was very heartily anathematised by the honest soldiers at Medjez. “We believe,” they said, “Ali Bey has done his best to fight for France, and how can France leave him to a certain destruction?” For two days previous to my arrival no communication had been received from him, although the frequent reports of his guns testified to a renewed attack, but to-day Colonel Allegro had arrived from Tunis with five Algerian horsemen, and early in the morning had left Medjez at full gallop in the direction of the Tunisian camp. During the afternoon I heard an interesting account of the Oued Zerga massacre from an eye-witness, Luigi Bisi, a foreman of platelayers, who himself had a very narrow escape. He was at work on Friday morning, September 30th, at kilomètre 98, and suddenly saw the cliffs near the line covered with Arab horsemen, one of whom was carrying a green standard. He first thought they were Ali Bey’s troops, but they descended to the railway, crossed the Medjerdah river, and attacked the workmen at kilomètre 97. Hearing several shots, he and his companions fled to Beja, being hotly pursued for four miles. Later on he proceeded, with a train guarded by soldiers, towards Oued Zerga. At kilomètre 99 he found the watchman’s house pillaged and destroyed; also the bodies of two Maltese brothers, named Farrugia, and of an Italian, burnt and horribly mutilated; in a cellar they found a wounded Italian, who has since died in the Tunis Hospital. At bridge No. 10 they discovered the foreman, Fiorali, an Italian, burnt to death. Sixty mètres beyond, three Maltese were found burnt and indescribably disfigured at kilomètre 95. The bridge No. 14 was on fire, and two other corpses were on the line. The rails here were destroyed. Having repaired the line the train approached Oued Zerga. He saw the station and several carriages burning. Suddenly the train left the rails. They went forward on foot, preceded by soldiers. Close to the station Bisi saw two bodies burning on a pile of tarred sleepers, over which several cans of oil and grease had been apparently emptied. Leaving Oued Zerga, they walked to Medjez, arriving early on Saturday morning. Of eleven victims whose bodies were recovered by Bisi six are Maltese, three are Italian, and two are French.

The official report presented to the British Consul-General contains some additional details. Mr. Carbonaro writes:—

“While I was waiting on Saturday for the special train which was to convey us to Medjez, the ordinary afternoon mail arrived. I saw the guard deliver to the station-master a bag containing about ten pounds weight of charred flesh, which he said formed the remains of the late M. Emile Raimbert. We did not reach Oued Zerga till dusk. The station and one of the carriages were still burning. Among the ashes of a large pile of sleepers, which had burnt fiercely, some carbonised bones were collected, but it was impossible to say if they belonged to the body of M. Raimbert or an Arab servant who had shared his fate. I observed that some tins of petroleum and grease had been used to facilitate the destruction of the buildings, and that the water-reservoir had been destroyed, apparently with a view of preventing any subsequent attempt to extinguish the fire. The only living being we found at Oued Zerga was a young negro, who had been employed at the station. He told me that while the Arabs were killing M. Raimbert, he succeeded in concealing himself in the cellar, but that another Mussulman, who had only been in the railway company’s service about fifteen days, discovered his hiding- place and shouted to the Arabs, ‘Here is another dog,’ whereupon he was seized and bound hand and foot. After a delay it was decided that the negro should remain a prisoner, and he was carried to a mountain near Beja, beyond Ain Tonga, where a large meeting of Arabs took place, and a discussion ensued as to whether they should join in an attack on Ali Bey or continue the destruction of the line. During the night he managed to escape, and returned to Oued Zerga, which he found deserted and in flames. He said that besides those known to have been killed, he saw several Maltese and Italians running before the Arabs, but of whom nothing had been heard since. After a long delay, we reached the waggon containing the bodies of the victims about midnight. The confusion that prevailed is beyond description; the French had been attacked during the evening, the Beja train had also gone off the rails, a fresh assault by the Arabs was momentarily expected, it was raining in torrents, and it was quite impossible to get the carriage containing the bodies across the broken lines. Within the waggon I distinctly saw eight bodies, three of them only superficially burnt, and still capable of being identified. They all bore marks of sword and gun-shot wounds. The following Maltese were recognised:—Giuseppe Farugia, of Cassal Zurrico; his brother, Vincenzo; one Pubblio, the son of Francesco; and Leonardo Scicluna.”

Shortly after five P.M. we observed Colonel Allegro and his companions riding swiftly towards Medjez from the hills, and he presently reached the station. He had succeeded in eluding the vigilance of the insurgents and had seen Ali Bey. I had a long conversation with Colonel Allegro, who was dressed as an Arab chief, and his description of his adventurous ride was very interesting. Colonel Allegro has a strong opinion on two points—first, that Tunis must be at once occupied; and, secondly, that Ali Bey must be of necessity relieved by French troops. His opinion should certainly have some weight with the authorities, but as the campaign seems to be partly directed by General Farre, partly by M. Saint-Hilaire, partly by M. Roustan, and partly by General Logerot, and, as none of them can agree on any one course of action, it is impossible to tell what will happen. One thing only is certain, and that is that Ali Ben Amar, the one-armed chief of the Ouled Ben Ayar, has by his attack on Ali Bey and his well-planned diversion on the French railway, caused the usually accepted plan for the winter campaign to tumble to pieces like a house of playing-cards, and postponed for a short time the fate of holy Kairwán. Ali Bey undertook to protect the line of railway from Ghardimaou to Tunis, while General Logerot advanced on Kairwán from Manouba, General Sabatier from Zaghouán, General Philibert from the Enfida, General Étienne from Susa, and General Saussier in person from Tebessa, but it now turns out that unless Ali Bey is himself protected, both he and his army are in danger of speedy destruction, and that unless Ali Ben Amar’s forces are defeated, three-fourths of the French railway will be hopelessly ruined. The Bone-Guelma Company ridicule as an absurdity the protection of Ali Bey and his mutinous followers, and declare that General Logerot’s plans will bring about the loss of their valuable line. The General is unwilling to change his original design, and everything has come to a temporary deadlock. Troops are hurrying in hot haste to Medjez; the railway authorities threaten to abandon their line unless General Logerot will efficiently protect it, and Ali Ben Amar is endeavouring to capture Ali Bey’s artillery. Before anything can be decided on, Ali Ben Amar and his army will have disappeared, but the necessity for a military demonstration in the north before one is attempted in the south will remain. Although the army of occupation will soon reach 50,000 men, the officers themselves believe that nothing can be done before the opening of the Chambers three weeks hence. The truth is, that nobody is sure of his position, and nobody is willing to incur present responsibility and possible blame. Meanwhile, the Arabs secretly rejoice in the visible discomfiture of the French councils, and regard Ali Ben Amar as a hero worthy of their old traditions. The non- occupation of Tunis is pointed out as a glaring sign of weakness, the unfortunate consequences of which may at any moment become a still more unfortunate reality.

In the evening I left Medjez and returned to Tunis.