16 أغسطس 1888 ذكرى مولد لورنس العرب الحقيقى ( الجاسوس الناعم ) Lawrence of Arabia

حدث في مثل هذا اليوم 16 أغسطس 1888 مولد لورنس العرب ( الجاسوس الناعم )

"توماس إدوارد لورنس"هو ضابط بريطاني نال شهرة كبيرة و خلد إسمه في التاريخ العربي بسبب مساعدته للقوات العربية خلال الثورة العربية الكبرى عام 1916 ضد الإمبراطورية العثمانية لأنه أدرك أنها الخطوة الأولى التي ستمكن بلاده من إحكام قبضتها على الدول العربية و قيام دولة لليهود بفلسطين.

و قد صُور عن حياته فيلم شهير حمل اسم "لورنس العرب" أنتج عام 1962م من بطولة النجم العالمي عمر الشريف و الممثل الإيرلندي بيتر أوتول .. 

Lawrence in 1919

Thomas Edward Lawrence, CB, DSO (16 August 1888 – 19 May 1935) was a British archaeologist, military officer, diplomat, and writer. He was renowned for his liaison role during the Sinai and Palestine Campaign and the Arab Revolt against the Ottoman Empire during the First World War.

The breadth and variety of his activities and associations, and his ability to describe them vividly in writing, earned him international fame as Lawrence of Arabia—a title used for the 1962 film based on his wartime activities.

Lawrence's birthplace, Gorphwysfa, Tremadog, Carnarvonshire, Wales

بدا لورنس مولعًا بحضارة الشرق منذ البداية حتى أنه اقترح على استاذه العالم الأثري المعروف "هو غارت" أن يقوم بزيارة لمنطقة الشرق لأنها مشهورة بحضاراتها و حفرياتها ، و قام لورنس بالاعداد لرحلته بتعلم بعض قواعد اللغة العربية التي تساعده على التواصل مع الآخرين ، و تقدم لمدير الكلية الياسوعية بجامعة أكسفورد بطلب للاتصال بالسلطات التركية بهدف تزويده بكتاب تاريخي و أثري يسهل مهمته ..

Lawrence was born out of wedlock in Tremadog, Wales, in August 1888 to Thomas Chapman (who became, in 1914, Sir Thomas Chapman, 7th Baronet), an Anglo-Irish nobleman from County Westmeath, and Sarah Junner, a Scottish governess who was herself illegitimate.

Chapman had left his wife and first family in Ireland to live with Junner, and they called themselves Mr and Mrs Lawrence. In 1896, the Lawrences moved to Oxford, where Lawrence attended the High School and in 1907–1910 studied History at Jesus College, Oxford. Between 1910 and 1914 he worked as an archaeologist, chiefly at Carchemish, in what is now Syria.

Lawrence memorial plaque at Oxford Boys' High School

و عند اندلاع الحرب العالمية الأولى راحت كل من الدول الكبرى : فرنسا و بريطانيا و روسيا و ألمانيا تسعى لتحقيق مصالحها الخاصة و التي منها : توسيع رقعة نفوذها و السيطرة على الأماكن الإستراتيجية و على منابع النفط .

لذلك أخذت بريطانيا ترسل عملاءها إلى المنطقة ، فاستدعت القيادة الإنكليزية أصحاب الخبرة في البلاد العربية و منهم "لورنس" الذي التحق بسلك المخابرات العسكرية.

و عندما دخلت تركيا الحرب ضد الإنجليز في أواخر عام 1913 عُيّن لورنس في القاهرة مشرفاً على شبكة للتجسس كان هو يختار أعضاءها بنفسه ، و لكي يقوم بوظيفته تلك على أكمل وجه تمّ إعداده ، فنُظِّمت مطالعاته لاسيما فيما يتعلّق بالتاريخ الحربي حتى يقال إنّه قرأ كل ما له علاقة بالفروسية و بحروب القرون الوسطى ، و قرأ حوالي 25 مجلّداً خاصاً بنابليون بونابرت ..

Soon after the outbreak of war he volunteered for the British Army and was stationed in Egypt. In 1916, he was sent to Arabia on an intelligence mission and quickly became involved with the Arab Revolt, serving, along with other British officers, as a liaison to the Arab forces. Working closely with Emir Faisal, a leader of the revolt, he participated in and sometimes led military activities against the Ottoman armed forces, culminating in the capture of Damascus in October 1918.

Leonard Woolley (left) and Lawrence in their excavation house at Carchemish, c. 1912

دخل لورنس العرب الجزيرة العربية و بالطبع كان الهدف الأساسي أمامه طرد الأتراك من الجزيرة العربية و هيمنة القوات البريطانية و التمهيد لمشروع الدولة اليهودية الذي صاغه ثيودور هرتزل و وعد به آرثر جيمس بلفور وزير خارجية إنجلترا في سنة 1917 فيما يعرف بوعد بلفور ..

After the war, Lawrence joined the Foreign Office, working with both the British government and with Faisal. In 1922, he retreated from public life and spent the years until 1935 serving as an enlisted man, mostly in the Royal Air Force, with a brief stint in the Army. During this time, he wrote and published his best-known work, Seven Pillars of Wisdom, an autobiographical account of his participation in the Arab Revolt.

He also translated books into English and wrote The Mint, which was published posthumously and detailed his time in the Royal Air Force working as an ordinary aircraftman. He corresponded extensively and was friendly with well-known artists, writers, and politicians. For the Royal Air Force, he participated in the development of rescue motorboats.

Lawrence and Woolley (right) at Carchemish, spring 1913

و بمبادرة من الشريف حسين أمير مكة و بالتحالف مع الأمير فيصل و نوري السعيد بدأت الشرارة الأولى للثورة العربية الكبرى في الحجاز و التي كان من الأحرى تسميتها بالخديعة الكبرى ، و هي ثورة مسلحة قامت ضد الخلافة العثمانية ، و ذلك قبل فجر يوم التاسع من شعبان 1334هـ - الثاني من يونيو 1916 و امتدت الثورة ضد العثمانيين بعد إخراجهم من الحجاز حتى وصلت سوريا العثمانية ، و تم إسقاط الخلافة فيها ، و في العراق ..

Lawrence's public image resulted in part from the sensationalised reporting of the Arab revolt by American journalist Lowell Thomas, as well as from Seven Pillars of Wisdom. In 1935, Lawrence was fatally injured in a motorcycle accident in Dorset.

إتفق لورنس مع الأمير فيصل على تنفيذ خطة معده مسبقاً ، تقوم الخطة على تنفيذ هجوم من بلدة أريحا في الخامس من مايو 1918 و احتلال مدينة السلط و بلدة معان و تدمير خط السكك الحديدة جنوب عمان ، و قد أعد لورنس مع "نوري السعيد" القوات المتأهبة للحرب .. 

Lawrence at Rabigh, north of Jeddah, 1917

Thomas Edward Lawrence was born on 16 August 1888 in Tremadog, Carnarvonshire (now Gwynedd), Wales in a house named Gorphwysfa, now known as Snowdon Lodge. His Anglo-Irish father Thomas Chapman had left his wife Edith after he fell in love and had a son with Sarah Junner, a young Scotswoman who had been engaged as governess to his daughters.

Sarah was the daughter of Elizabeth Junner and John Lawrence, who worked as a ship's carpenter and was a son of the household in which Elizabeth had been a servant. She was dismissed four months before Sarah was born. (Elizabeth identified Sarah's father as "John Junner – Shipwright journeyman".)

و قد شهدت هذه الحرب الكثير من المذابح التي يندى لها الجبين و التي راح ضحيتها الكثير من الأطفال و النساء دون أدنى احترام للعهود و المواثيق ..

Lawrence at Aqaba, 1917

Sarah and Thomas did not marry, but lived together under the name Lawrence. In 1914, Sir Thomas inherited the Chapman baronetcy based at Killua Castle, the ancestral family home in County Westmeath, Ireland; but he and Sarah continued to live in England.

They had five sons; Thomas Edward was the second eldest. From Wales the family moved to Kirkcudbright, Galloway in southwestern Scotland, then Dinard in Brittany, then to Jersey. In 1894–96, the family lived at Langley Lodge (now demolished), set in private woods between the eastern borders of the New Forest and Southampton Water in Hampshire.

The residence was isolated, and young "Ned" Lawrence had many opportunities for outdoor activities and waterfront visits. Victorian-Edwardian Britain was a very conservative society where the majority of people were God-fearing Christians with the corollary that premarital and extramarital sex were considered deeply shameful and those born illegitimate were born disgraced.

Despite having in many ways a happy childhood and youth, Lawrence was always something of an outsider, a bastard who could never hope to achieve the same level of social acceptance and success that those born legitimate could expect, and who was virtually unmarriageable as no girl from a respectable family would ever marry a bastard.

و هكذا نجح لورنس في مهمته التي جاء من أجلها و هي تحريض القبائل العربية و زعمائها ضد الدولة العثمانية و دفعها إلى التمرد عليها ، و بالفعل نجحت الثورة و انتهت بعد تنصيب فيصل ملكا على العراق و الأمير عبد الله ملكا على الأردن ..

Lawrence in British Army uniform, 1918

In the summer of 1896, the Lawrences moved to 2, Polstead Road in Oxford where they lived until 1921. Lawrence attended the City of Oxford High School for Boys from 1896 until 1907, where one of the four houses was later named "Lawrence" in his honour; the school closed in 1966. Lawrence and one of his brothers became commissioned officers in the Church Lads' Brigade at St Aldate's Church.

Lawrence claimed that he ran away from home circa 1905 and served for a few weeks as a boy soldier with the Royal Garrison Artillery at St Mawes Castle in Cornwall, from which he was bought out. No evidence of this appears in army records.

عاد لورنس إلى إنجلترا بعد أن أدى مهمته و التحق بعد ذلك تحت اسم مستعار بسلاح الجو الملكي ، و الواقع أنه عانى كثيرا من الضغط العصبي جراء الحياة الصعبة التي عاشها و خصوصاً بعد أن أصبح مطلوباً من العرب المعارضين لثورة الشريف حسين و انكشاف أنه عميل للمخابرات البريطانية و جاسوس ..

Map presented by Lawrence to the Eastern Committee of the War Cabinet in November 1918

At the age of 15, Lawrence and his schoolfriend Cyril Beeson cycled around Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, and Oxfordshire, visited almost every village's parish church, studied their monuments and antiquities, and made rubbings of their monumental brasses. Lawrence and Beeson monitored building sites in Oxford and presented their finds to the Ashmolean Museum.

The Ashmolean's Annual Report for 1906 said that the two teenage boys "by incessant watchfulness secured everything of antiquarian value which has been found." In the summers of 1906 and 1907, Lawrence and Beeson toured France by bicycle, collecting photographs, drawings, and measurements of medieval castles. In August 1907 Lawrence wrote home: "The Chaignons & the Lamballe people, complimented me on my wonderful French: I have been asked twice since I arrived what part of France I came from".

صدر له عام 1922 كتاب "أعمدة الحكمة السبعة" ( بالإنجليزية : Seven Pillars of Wisdom ) ، وضع فيه لورنس خلاصة تجربته السياسة في إدارة أنظمة دول الشرق الأوسط بعد قيام الثورة العربية و سقوط الدولة العثمانية ، و يدور في مجمله حول تاريخ الجزيرة العربية ..

Emir Faisal's party at Versailles, during the Paris Peace Conference of 1919. Left to right: Rustum Haidar, Nuri as-Said, Prince Faisal (front), Captain Pisani (rear), Lawrence, Faisal's servant (name unknown), Captain Hassan Khadri

From 1907 to 1910, Lawrence studied History at Jesus College, Oxford. In the summer of 1909, he set out alone on a three-month walking tour of crusader castles in Ottoman Syria, during which he travelled 1,000 mi (1,600 km) on foot.

Lawrence graduated with First Class Honours after submitting a thesis titled The Influence of the Crusades on European Military Architecture—to the End of the 12th Century, based on his field research with Beeson in France, notably in Châlus, and his solo research in the Middle East. Lawrence was fascinated by the Middle Ages with his brother Arnold writing in 1937 that for him "medieval researches" were a "dream way of escape from bourgeois England".

و في عام 1934 تم إعفائه من سلاح الجو الملكي مما أدى إلى إصابته بانهيار عصبي و قضي لورنس بقية حياته في كوخ في شمال "بوفينجتون" ، و في عام 1935 توفي عن ستة و أربعين عاما بعد سقوطه من دراجته النارية التي كان يقودها بسرعة كبيرة في محيط مدينة اكسفورد و هو عائد إلى منزله بحادث قيل وقتها أنه مدبرا ..

Lawrence, Emir Abdullah, Air Marshal Sir Geoffrey Salmond, Sir Herbert Samuel H.B.M. high commissioner and Sir Wyndham Deedes and others in Jerusalem

In 1910 Lawrence was offered the opportunity to become a practising archaeologist in the Middle East, at Carchemish, in the expedition that D. G. Hogarth was setting up on behalf of the British Museum. Hogarth arranged a "Senior Demyship", a form of scholarship, for Lawrence at Magdalen College, Oxford, to fund Lawrence's work at £100 a year.

In December 1910, he sailed for Beirut and on his arrival went to Jbail (Byblos), where he studied Arabic. He then went to work on the excavations at Carchemish, near Jerablus in northern Syria, where he worked under Hogarth, R. Campbell Thompson of the British Museum, and Leonard Woolley, until 1914. He later stated that everything which he had accomplished he owed to Hogarth. While excavating at Carchemish, Lawrence met Gertrude Bell. In 1912 Lawrence worked briefly with Flinders Petrie at Kafr Ammar in Egypt.

Lawrence on the Brough Superior SS100 that he called "George V"

دفن في مقبرة موريتون بعد تشييعه في جنازه مهيبه حضرها شخصيات سياسية و عسكرية مهمة و رموز للمجتمع البريطاني الأرستقراطي مثل ونستون شرشل ، لورد لويد ، ليدي آستور ، الجنرال وفل ، اغسطس جون و غيرهم ..

In January 1914, Woolley and Lawrence were co-opted by the British military as an archaeological smokescreen for a British military survey of the Negev Desert. They were funded by the Palestine Exploration Fund to search for an area referred to in the Bible as the Wilderness of Zin. Along the way, they made an archaeological survey of the Negev Desert.

The Negev was strategically important as, in the event of war, any Ottoman army attacking Egypt would have to cross it. Woolley and Lawrence subsequently published a report of the expedition's archaeological findings, but a more important result was updated mapping of the area, with special attention to features of military relevance such as water sources. Lawrence also visited Aqaba and Petra.

Lawrence's last Brough Superior SS100 while on loan to the Imperial War Museum, London

Following the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914, Lawrence did not immediately enlist in the British Army. On the advice of S. F. Newcombe, he held back until October, when he was commissioned on the General List and posted to the intelligence staff in Cairo before the end of the year. His extensive travel in the area and knowledge of Arabic made him an obvious choice.

Lawrence arrived in Cairo to take up service in the Arab Bureau on 15 December 1914. The Bureau's chief was Gilbert Clayton who reported to Egyptian High Commissioner Henry McMahon.

14 Barton Street, London SW1, where Lawrence lived while writing Seven Pillars

The situation during 1915 was complex. Within the Arabic-speaking Ottoman territories, there was a growing Arab-nationalist movement, including many Arabs serving in the Ottoman armed forces. They were in contact with Sharif Hussein, Emir of Mecca, who was negotiating with the British, offering to lead an Arab uprising against the Ottomans.

In exchange, he wanted a British guarantee of an independent Arab state including the Hejaz, Syria, and Mesopotamia. Such an uprising would have been very helpful to Britain in its war against the Ottomans, in particular greatly lessening the threat against the Suez Canal.

The roadside memorial near Clouds Hill, Wareham, Dorset

However, there was resistance from French diplomats, who insisted that Syria's future was as a French colony not an independent Arab state. There were also strong objections from the Government of India which, although nominally part of the British government, acted independently. Its vision was of Mesopotamia under British control serving as a granary for India; furthermore, it wanted to hold on to its Arabian outpost in Aden.

Portrait by Augustus John, 1919

At the Arab Bureau, Lawrence supervised the preparation of maps, produced a daily bulletin for the British generals operating in the theatre, and interviewed prisoners. He was an advocate of a British landing at Alexandretta, which never came to pass. He was also a consistent advocate of an independent Arab Syria.

و قد تم تشييد تمثال نصفي له أمام كاتدرائية القديس بول في لندن ..

In October 1915, the situation came to a crisis, as Sharif Hussein demanded an immediate commitment from Britain, with the threat that if this were denied, he would throw his weight behind the Ottomans. This would create a credible Pan-Islamic message that could have been very dangerous for Britain, which was under stress, at that moment in severe difficulties in the Gallipoli Campaign.

The British replied with a letter from High Commissioner McMahon that was generally agreeable, while reserving commitments concerning the Mediterranean coastline and Holy Land.

Eric Kennington's bust of Lawrence at St Paul's Cathedral

In the spring of 1916, Lawrence was dispatched to Mesopotamia to assist in relieving the Siege of Kut by some combination of starting an Arab uprising and bribing Ottoman officials. This mission produced no useful result. Meanwhile, unbeknown to the British officials in Cairo, the Sykes–Picot Agreement was being negotiated in London, which awarded a large proportion of Syria to France. Further, it implied that if the Arabs were to have any sort of state in Syria, they would have to conquer its four great cities: Damascus, Homs, Hama, and Aleppo. It is unclear at what point Lawrence became aware of the treaty's contents.

The head of Lawrence's effigy in St Martin's Church, Wareham

A bronze bust of Lawrence by Eric Kennington was placed in the crypt of St Paul's Cathedral, London, on 29 January 1936, alongside the tombs of Britain's greatest military leaders. A recumbent stone effigy by Kennington was installed in St Martin's Church, Wareham, Dorset, in 1939