War on Mad Mullah

Experiences of a St. Louisan Who Fought El Mahdi.

A Fanatic of the Same Sort.

Frederick Quelch Tells of the British Task in Somaliland Fighting Uphill against Moslem Hordes Who Want to Die, in a Sandy Country, Far from Supplies.

Frederick Quelch of St. Louis is in a position to appreciate the dangers and the privations that will beset the British troops to be sent to crush the Mad Mollah. He spent three years chasing El Mahdi in northeastern Africa, and he knows from experience how the fanatical Moslem hordes can fight against a Christian army.

"I believe that the Mad Mollah will give the British as much trouble as the mahdi did," Mr. Quelch said to a St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter, "and he gave them trouble for ten years.

"The followers of the Mad Mollah are the same kind of people as the Sudanese who followed the mahdi. They are Arabians with a trace of negro in their blood. They are all Mohammedans and fight with religious frenzy born of the religion that teaches them that if they die fighting Christians, or Franks, as they call us, they will go straight into the presence of Allah and into bliss everlasting.

"Ever since the British government began its protectorate over India and African countries it has had trouble with leaders of fanatic hordes. The mahdi was much like the present Mad Mollah. The mollahs originated in India. They are generally Mohammedan priests and fakirs. They are wild fanatics, known to be insane, but therefore believed to be sacred. They fire their followers by preaching a jehad, or holy war. They usually attempt some fake miracle to assure the Moslems of their divine inspiration, and then their followers believe that a new mollah has arrived. If he is successful, his onslaughts on Christians or other tribes soon give him the title of Mad Mollah.

"If the Mad Mollah wins a victory, the other Mohammedans are at once more impressed with the divine character of his leadership, and they flock to his standard where they might otherwise have remained passive. The recent victory of the Mad Mollah over Colonel Swayne's detachment presages, therefore, large fanatic hordes to his forces. The trouble the British will have in subduing him will be proportionately increased by each victory.

"Then the British this time are going to have more trouble with the Somalis than Kitchener or his predecessors had in subduing the Sudanese and taking Khartum. I think the British will find this time that the Mad Mollah's followers are equipped with rifles probably as good as their own. In the early eighties, when the British force to which I was attached invaded the Sudanese country, the natives were not so well equipped. I remember distinctly they attacked us with spears and swords. They had two kinds of swords—a short one and a long two edged sword. They wielded them with fanatical fury right in the face of our bullets.

"The detachment I was with made an overland march from the seaport of Suakin to Berber, a distance of 1,000 miles. Berber is on the Nile, 300 miles from Khartum. On the way we had two or three scraps. I was in a battalion of marine artillery, and we had with us a Gatling gun and a number of other guns from our man-of-war. None of them bluffed the mahdi's followers. They came right into our lines and attacked us with their swords. Once they even broke a hollow square of British soldiers four deep. To one who knows anything about military formations this is something of a feat, considering the difference of their arms.

"If the British column sent after the latest Mad Mollah ever meets his Moslem followers hand to hand, it will have to reckon with these swords and spears as well as bullets. And they are cruel and barbarous too. They believe they are doing a religious duty if they butcher white soldiers who are fighting them.

"I understand that Somaliland is much like the adjoining portions of Africa. It is mainly barren, full of ravines, and what little vegetation is there is small sandy scrub brush. The country rises gradually up from the Red sea back forty or fifty miles to a plateau 6,000 feet above the sea level. The only means of transportation is by camel. But camels are plentiful.

"Somaliland is on the coast. The British soldiers will find it necessary very likely to chase the Mad Mollah up toward the top of the plateau and bring their supplies after them.

"In the British army the work of handling supplies is attended to entirely by the army service corps. Men are specially enlisted for the work. They are called noncombatants. The combatants need bother little about food except in cases where their commissary stores are in danger of destruction or capture or are inaccessible.

"The followers of the mahdi in the eighties had not learned the art of destroying supply trains. If they haven't acquired the trick from the Boers, the British will have little to fear on that scone.

"The Moslem followers of the Mad Mollah might make it interesting for the ammunition wagons that get too far away from the main body of the expedition. The supply trains usually follow about a day behind the forward column. If the Mad Mollah ever got between the two, what his fanatical followers would do to the supplies would be a plenty."