THE CHINA MAIE, MONDAY, NOVEMBER 24, 1958.
MY INCREDIBLE ESCAPE
THE CHINA MAIL alone has secured the story of the royal murder that shocked the world, by the English- woman who was there. After the murder of King Faisal and other members of the royal family, she, her em- ployers, and their children fled from their villa to escape. Here is Nanny Hazeldine's story as it was told to
FRANK GOLDSWORTHY
LAUSANNE.
WHEN the escaping palace official had told us of the merciless way in which the king and his household had been slaughtered, the Sherif Hussein, my employer, had no doubt that we must leave at once.
By
Nanny Hazeldine
would sit in the back with tie atopped the ear, hammering un children.
tho windows with their Oste, peering at the passengers' and, opening the doors.
Little All screamed and would not be parted from me. So he stayed behind with the Shorit and myself a decision which troubled my conscience very much in the next hour,
Sanctuary
We left the car 200 yards away and set off to walk to the Saudi Erabassy, The Sherif, who had thrown away his the and jacket, carried All, I could that not carry him and keep troublesome abhn In place,
us, A villa within 600 yards of the palace was no place for the king's aunt and her children.
the At any moment the mob or the army might come rushing down our quiet suburban street in search of the surviving royalty. Princess Badła and the boys must be got away, and her husband began giving orders at once.
rad
and
He found
only bread cheese, but we were satisfied.
The Sherif was wonderful through it all. He kept calm. He told the servants they must disperse to their homes but they stayed, weeping to bld un goodbye.
The Sherif quickly
We saw re-
a European couple moved the royal court num-
standing of their garden gate in ** otherwise deserted ber plates from the ear in 774- Sherif stopper the ear which
luggage niready packed, in the ex- pectation of accompanying the king into exile.
was and went over to them.
- ገነ
rebels ha
duurdere i
everyone at the royal palues" I told thera "My wife 14 JETE The Sherif drove. First, nt of the king.
the lives of our SOULS
Be collected 100 portable radio which we still have. Apart from the bags, rady packed when it all began, that radio Is the only possession he has saved from his Iraqi home.
I felt everyone was watching At last wo reached the The next 80 minutes were the
gute, and
It found unbisay longest hour of my life. At last
his
Sherif friend and
wife closed and locked. The
with returned. They said they had began a bitter argument left the car 200 yards from the the gate-kooper, demanding Saudi Embassy and walked entrance. unhindered and
apparently unnoticed,
Finally milling
through
nol
For the princess it was the first time she hne appeared unveiled In a public place In her own country.
once
the gatekeeper sald we must go to the door on the other side of the compound.
A relief
We had gone only a few steps when we were called back. The scen us from un princess had
window and sent upstairs messenger to the gate. What a relief it was to hear that gate
the
11 things ..
A
Before he left the villa Sherif telephones a friend
rendezvous muide
for followhg morning.
the
the
The Saudi Ambassador had al to give them agreed
But sanctuary.
while the embassy friend was inside the the situation in the streets be suddenly changed drastically.
Over
radio the new Government offered a reward to of 10,000 diners (£10,000). anyone cupluring Nuri es Sald, many Premier, and fer and the
years the strong man of Iraq.
For
tho
In
we went to a neighbour's danger. "Will you give them_und house, then <lerited! we our English nanny shelter for a
Su few Pors should soon be traced.
desar off we went aguin.
The children, frightened now and crying, were told to lie on the fear of the car. The princess and 1 were in the back. In the suburbs There were no mobs, but little groups were gathering
on the corners.
No shelter
We knew of nowhere to go. So the Sherif headed away into the desert.
We branched off the main roud and drove five miles along a rough truck into a wilderness of blazing heat.
We had no water. The
The man refusand potrat-blank he was p don't know who I don't want to know. I am glad
say he was not British.
We did not usk anyone else
We drove round seeking shade and water A hair-lit house provided both. It was deserted,
and in the rubble outside was a tap the workers had been us ng to provide water for content
The cur, always Haul to #ract attention because of its missing number plates, parked a few streets away.
Groups
The Sherif went
was happening at
From a stance
WAX
to ser wh
our villa he could tell that, although the house itself
No sleep
on
The three bʊys slept, but we could not. It was still stiflingly hut and our nerves were
Talking in whispers In edge. that dusty, half-built house, the and Princess Badia Sherif decided the best chance
of
Afety for them and their sons
In
the Saudi- reaching iny Arablan Embassy.
Custom lays on Araba an obli- Sution of hospitality towards The Saudis Lefugees.
are the most Arab of all the Arabs and they would not turn us away. The problem was to get to the mbassy without being spotted.
I had been conspicuous many thues Ay Princess Badia's English nanny.
My conspicuous white hair
was undisturbed, there were had been in the royal
in the pictures many Limes.
Kru
The
children had not eaten since inte groups of people their very early breakfast. road and we could not possibly princess's most effective dis- Poor little Ali — only two return,
years ok, bless him was He gume back to the empty. pleading for a drink, crying and screaming.
We could not keep the three young children there long, so we turned back.
house.
After dark, with a cy-wide
curfew in force, he drove the car without lights to the vicinity
The villa and sneaked!
77
get food for his hungry children
guise was to unveil; and my white hair and fair complexion mal be hidden at any cost.
So i was decided that the Ar drive the friend should
princess and the children to the embassy, the princess alting
if unveiled beside him is
wife; his real were his
she wife
The soldiers had gone half- crazy in their anxiety to earn that money.
that we The friend advised
the should delay our trip to
Another and spend embassy night in the half-built house.
We might have done that but for little Al.
crash behind us.
next month
4
the
princess and her family were staff, guests in the embassy. For the
first fortnight 1 was with them. The situation was extremely dullente. For days the mobs ran riot in Bagdad.
The fewer people who knew that the princess and her children were still alive the So we nover. left the Letter. Umbassy or contacted any of our friends.
A time to laugh for a nanny and hor charges. Left to right: Mohammad,
now established in
An
hotel after the burning of the embassy,
was
The Sherif
beginning diplomatic negotiations for ni wife and family to be given safe conduct to Egypt and he wanted me safely out of Iraq first.
The Briush Ambassador was when I walked in, staggered
Ali, and Abdullah,
On July 30, wearing dark glasses and a start over my white hair, I was driven to the airport
had been warned to leave behind all photographs and any thing which might link me with the royal family.
Passed
Though ny
bags
were
The following day I was searched was passed through July 29, just 15 days after the without comment. A fortnight later, when we murder of King Fahal-1 sald We drove into town and I sat heard that planes were coming goodbye to my lovely le boys
from the Saut clutching to evacuate British women from and moved Sherif said I
to must Embassy
the home my face as rug, the silent and terrified, my black abba to
British Embassy British offeint for the night. and agalo report to the the soldiers Ume
of
Thirteen days Jater, Un August 12, the princes and the Sherif, with their children, were allowed to leave the Embassy 1ut Egypt.
IRELAND
WER
1 was in England then, still pledged to secrecy, awaiting news of their reaching Europe.
On September 30 the tele- phone rang et my daughter's It houso in Coulsdon, Surrey.
"Wo was the Shorif, saying: buve landed this afternoon in Switzerland. The boys
their Banny buck can you come?"
want How soon
1 think it was the niccal in- vention i ever had.
Two days later there they were, rushing into my arms- Mohammed, Abdullah, and little curly-headed All.
by GILES
DUBLIN
DODWELL & CO., LTD.
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́ELL, we got Mr Giles out of Doblin at last but he took some shifting because Mr
It
W Giles has a lot of nice friends in Doblin and Doblin has a lot of nice pubs,
was only when somebody told him that there were nice pubs all over Ireland that we got started on our tour.
I think Mr Giles has gone a bit light in the head since he has been in Ireland, because he keeps wanting to paint everything he sees which, I think, is silly, as everything looks very pretty to me the same colours as they are.
Another thing Mr Gles cen and Auntie Vern doem't is the roads.
They're long and smooth and straight and haven't got speed Nudis anywhere, and Mr G.
ke for drivers becouse he rays they can't be fast and bad because if they're bad they're not going to be AC:N Jong though to be fast, but Aumile Vera'n not very hot on opett and the don't like the way the cows and donkeys sit in the middle of the roads, in Ireland.
But Mr Giles says they're no worse than people, in fact cows have got more sense un they get out of the way quicker.
Cork is a lovely place and But he said plenty once he twine so much a touch a door- Mr look it for the same was out of carshot and gave us handle we get a thick ear. reasons on ho od Doblin, all the what-o for the next hour and the longer we stayed the or two, more he led it, although Cork THEN Unde George read a
The ext time the "Little TOW if anything goes wrong picco out of his book by was the first place where the Robert Gibbings which mild a "Talt ke Pooplo started playing People" got working on us was he blames on to the when Mr G left the ear to be "tle People," especially for Cork City policeman on point tricks on us.
wachet When he went to col keeping him out late. duty "displays a mere varied
Leab night onɑ of Mr CHIes' repertoire of mimo in half on The first trick they played 1pot It he found that the "Titule
Mingutsed KA little Irish friends gave the frown-ups hour them a London policeman was when one of the "Little. People,"
which could demonstrate in 20 years, People" dingufond me a Enrage Cork beyn dhla time, had been a toont after dinner
"And, no doubt influenced by mechanie accidentally poked a climbing on top of the car, wendi This epirit of ballet, All peded screwdriver through our wind which has a lovely long sloping trian move about the streets hereen and broke it. with on little regard for traffe Ан Катту стность Track."
Auntie Vera sald it tasted ever so nice.
You have it in a big pint glass and it's made with a lot of black coffee with ice-cream floating on top. Then a fisher- man named Shamus O'Sullivan, who I think was born in Ire- land, told us it was the Irish whiskey in the baltom that made it taste nlee now we are all back on hot milit except Grandma and Me Giles,
And Auntie Vera's got an- other headache.
WELL, I must close now
we have to be up early to- tu going
the
morrow as
we a
Blarney Chello to Blarney Stone and Mr G. saya 1 Blancy is only half as nice
as Cork it will suit him.
He saya the only thing ho
doesn't like about Ireland Is Grandma whistling "Cocklen and Mussels" all day long.
Yours truly
Giles Junior
Health and long life to you, 11 bock, and sliding down
land without rent to you, making a lot of litle scratches
A child every year to you, And may you die in Ireland, meulafn But Mr Gilen likes Ireland with their little boots.
Auntie Vern went up to Ro much that he didn't may
And now I know Ireland bæ · Then Although I didn't under- anything while the KATRSE made Mr C, a bit light in the bed with one of her headaches.
Since wo came here wa PB-Ma and the twins stand what that was all about man was listening and just head because I thought it was
drinking gallona have joined the 1.R.A. but we
even haven't told anybody,
I saw what he meant when drove off saying, ah, well, it over so funny and roared with have been we got to Cork
flater, whereas If me or the of Irish coffee, and
was only an accident.'