IOR/L/MIL/17/15/34

The file consists of a despatch from Lieutenant-General Richard Wapshare, General Officer Commanding, 4th (Quetta) Division to the Chief of General Staff, Army Headquarters, Delhi, dated 8 March 1919, concerning the organization and working of the East Persian line of communications, covering the period from 1 April 1918 to 15 January 1919.

It includes topics such as topography; the East Persian Cordon Field Force; administration; troop movements; railway defence troops; work on the railway; financial problems; road and rail lines of communications; supply areas; transport; trade; the capacity of the railway; supplies; medical and veterinary arrangements; and ordnance services.

Appendices 1 and 2 consist of maps and sketches not reproduced in this file.

Appendix 3 – Report on the working of the Nushki Extension Railway from 1st April 1918 to 15th January 1919, by Colonel Frederick Warner Allum, Engineer-in-Chief, Nushki Extension Railway, dated 6 February 1919.

Appendix 4 – Note on the Field Work of the Nushki Extension (Railway) Reconnaissance, June 1918 to January 1919, by Major Lewis Egerton Hopkins, Engineer-in-Chief, N. E. Reconnaissance, dated 6 February 1919. Covering the object and length of the survey; wells, tanks and water supply; transport; illness; list of officers and subordinates, etc., who served in Persia; and caravan routes.

Appendix 5 – Report on the working of the line of communications East Persia from September 1918 to January 15th 1919, by Brigadier-General William Edmund Ritchie Dickson, Inspector General of Communications, East Persia, dated 5 February 1919. It is broken down into the following topics: general; supply and transport; medical; ordnance; veterinary; works; surveys; finance; ecclesiastical; and posts and telegraphs.

It also includes a series of seventeen annexures with various tables covering: administrative standing orders; the transport situation and forecast of transport requirements; instructions for moving stores along the line of communications; the chain of supply and transport responsibility; transport units; distribution of supply units; supplies carried on lines of communication; medical requirements; clothing and ordnance stores; progress of building works; and finances.