Contents lists
Updated June 2012
T. E. Lawrence to Clare Sydney Smith
Mount Batten:
16.I.33.
I was asking about the weather prospects, and wondering if I should wire and suggest the past week-end when Iris crashed - and we have been working since. The last of her wreck was pulled into the hangar yesterday. Now there is the Court of Inquiry and then the Inquest. I seem to specialise in Iris crashes.
The power-boat did well. From our breakwater she reached the crash (⅞ths of a mile) in 1 m. 58 secs. This is a 400 per cent improvement on the 238 crash, when 700 yards took 4 minutes. As usual, having arrived, there was nothing to be done. I am putting in another moan upon salvage equipment.
Now the coming week-end is impossible, there being a board (T.T.) at Calshot, and half the Marine Section at it. The week-end after next, the last of the month is my next chance. Let me know by the Wednesday before if it is convenient, please. Rough arrangements with the G.C. were for me to reach Worthydown under my own steam, and then be picked up by a Moth. I think 2 p.m. should be our time of leaving Worthydown. It will take me quite a while (170 miles) to get there - starting at 9. I should do it by 1.15.
I'll try and get news of the quarantine. I have never heard of a loophole to avoid it: but I believe you have a choice of vets with whom to leave the dog.
Very busy,
T.E.S.
Notes
TT - Technical Training
GC - Group-Captain
| Source: | GR 199-200 |
| Checked: | jw/ |
| Last revised: | 3 July 2006 |
T. E. Lawrence chronology
1888 16 August: born at Tremadoc, Wales
1896-1907: City of Oxford High School for Boys
1907-9: Jesus College, Oxford, B.A., 1st Class Hons, 1909
1910-14: Magdalen College, Oxford (Senior Demy), while working at the British Museum's excavations at Carchemish
1915-16: Military Intelligence Dept, Cairo
1916-18: Liaison Officer with the Arab Revolt
1919: Attended the Paris Peace Conference
1919-22: wrote Seven Pillars of Wisdom
1921-2: Adviser on Arab Affairs to Winston Churchill at the Colonial Office
1922 August: Enlisted in the Ranks of the RAF
1923 January: discharged from the RAF
1923 March: enlisted in the Tank Corps
1923: translated a French novel, The Forest Giant
1924-6: prepared the subscribers' abridgement of Seven Pillars of Wisdom
1927-8: stationed at Karachi, then Miranshah
1927 March: Revolt in the Desert, an abridgement of Seven Pillars, published
1928: completed The Mint, began translating Homer's Odyssey
1929-33: stationed at Plymouth
1931: started working on RAF boats
1932: his translation of the Odyssey published
1933-5: attached to MAEE, Felixstowe
1935 February: retired from the RAF
1935 19 May: died from injuries received in a motor-cycle crash on 13 May
1935 21 May: buried at Moreton, Dorset