World War I–dated ALS, signed "T. E. Lawrence," one page, 8.25 x 6.5, Military Intelligence Office, War Office, Cairo letterhead, November 4, 1915. Handwritten letter to legal academic and Zionist activist Norman Bentwich, in full: "Illegibility is a hard word in which we all run risk of judgement: let us say that I misread the fatal thing: I searched for it just now, & couldn't find it. The word 'tea' is obvious in the 2nd fragment, & I think I'll clutch at that for a beginning: If you are always in for tea you are a monster: and I won't find a time, for I'm home every afternoon, and some moment when I'm back I'll fly over, & sit with one ear on a telephone! One cup only please. Seriously, things are boiling over this week end, & we have never been so busy before! This is a good omen, & a thing to make me very content." Lawrence also adds an inquiry at the top of the sheet: "Are you a pro-Jerusalemito, or an anti-Jerusalemite? And do you like Jemal Pasha's schemes of land settlement, or are you a legalist?" In fine condition.
Written from the Military Intelligence Office in Cairo, this letter dates from the formative period of T. E. Lawrence’s wartime service, before his emergence as 'Lawrence of Arabia,' and offers a rare glimpse into his early role within British intelligence in the Middle East. At this moment, Cairo functioned as the strategic center of British operations against the Ottoman Empire, and Lawrence—then an intelligence officer and noted Arabist—was deeply engaged in the political and intelligence ferment that would soon culminate in the Arab Revolt. His remark that “things are boiling over” reflects the escalating urgency of British efforts in the region and his own growing involvement in events of historic consequence.
Addressed to Norman Bentwich, a British legal scholar and influential figure in emerging Zionist and Palestinian legal affairs, the letter is notable for its probing political inquiry. Lawrence’s question regarding attitudes toward Jerusalem and Ottoman statesman Jemal Pasha’s land-settlement schemes reveals that debates over the city’s future governance and land law in Palestine were already actively underway—nearly two years before the Balfour Declaration. In 1920, Bentwich would become the British-appointed attorney-general of Mandatory Palestine. Combining wit with political insight, the letter captures Lawrence at a pivotal early stage: intellectually engaged, politically perceptive, and already participating in conversations that would help shape the postwar Middle East.
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