BELL, GERTRUDE MARGARET LOWTHIAN (1868-1926), English traveller and administrator, daughter of Sir Hugh Bell, Bart., by his first marriage, was one of the most re markable women of her time. Her childhood was spent in the charming surroundings and liberal atmosphere of the Yorkshire home of her father and step-mother, Florence Bell, with both of whom she maintained affectionate and intellectual sympathy. With them and many others she carried on a correspondence of ex traordinary spirit and distinction. A comparatively small part was edited by Lady Bell with cramping respect for the political exigencies of the day, and published in 1927 in two volumes under the title of The Letters of Gertrude Bell. A brilliant academic career at Oxford, where she took a First in History in 1887, was followed by more than a decade of intimate association with the best intellectual society. While she had opportunities of making herself familiar with the political life of several European coun tries, her life-work began during a visit to her uncle, Sir Frank Lascelles, then British Minister at Tehran. The spell of the East claimed her for good. To this period we owe her translations of Hafidh, already foreshadowing the literary power and sympathy with orientalism manifest in works following at intervals. The fullness of her knowledge and strength were shown in an official report on the administration of Mesopotamia during the difficult period between the Armistice of 1918 and the rebellion of 1920.
At the end of 1899 Gertrude Bell entered on the Arabian ac tivities which made her one of the memorable travellers. In that year she visited Jerusalem, travelling widely in Syria and Pales tine. The next decade saw her back in those parts on frequent occasions. Her experiences, archaeological exploration playing an important part, were recorded in an admirable series of works: Safar-Nama; Amurath to Amurath; Syria, the Desert and the Sown; and, in conjunction with Sir William Ramsay, The Thou sand and One Churches. By this time she was an acknowledged authority on Asia Minor and the northern borderlands of Arabia, but her heart was set on a journey into the interior of Arabia. In spite of many obstacles she embarked on this venture in 1913, travelling from Damascus and eventually reaching Hail, whither only one European woman (Lady Anne Blunt) had ever pene trated before her. Received coldly by the authorities of Hall and prevented from travelling farther south, she returned to Baghdad and thence across country to Damascus.
In ordinary circumstances this remarkable journey might have stood out as the chief feat of her life. But its results she never was to have time to publish. Soon after her return to civilization in 1914 the World War began and Gertrude Bell, after a short spell of war work in England and France, returned to the East. A short period in the Arab Bureau and a visit to the viceroy of India were preliminary steps to an appointment in Mesopotamia which in various guises she retained to the day of her death. At first she worked with conspicuous success on the collection and collation of intelligence respecting the Arab tribes. In March 1917 she joined Sir Percy Cox at Baghdad in the actual, though not nom inal, capacity of political secretary and played a strong part in the moulding of a scheme for the post-war administration of Mesopotamia. She next served Sir Arnold Wilson in a similar capacity, but her lack of sympathy with his policy manifested itself in almost open insubordination and in direct correspondence with the political chiefs in London. The situation had become acute when the rebellion once more threw the whole Mesopotamian problem into the melting pot. Sir Arnold Wilson was replaced by Sir Percy Cox and Gertrude Bell again assumed a dominating in fluence on affairs. For some months all went well with the pro visional Arab Government set up in fulfilment of British promises, but no one played a more vigorous part than Gertrude Bell in upsetting this arrangement in favour of a Sharifian regime. Her notorious antipathy to Saiyid Talib Pasha, principal factor in the provisional Government, ranged her with friends of Feisul, re cently ejected by the French from his Syrian throne. She worked powerfully at the Conference of Cairo (1921) to secure that Feisul should be offered the throne of `Iraq and, on her return to Baghdad, she brought about the exile of Saiyid Talib. Feisul be came king and for the next two years Gertrude Bell was the life and soul of a regime often shaken but left standing, thanks largely to her. By 1923, when Sir Percy Cox was succeeded by Sir Henry Dobbs, Gertrude Bell's work was done. Unable, however, to leave the country to which she was passionately devoted, she accepted the post of Honorary Director of Antiquities, and lavished all her zeal on the creation of a museum at Baghdad. There, in July 1926, worn out by years of strenuous work, she died and was buried.