NAM.2024-05-6-1-99

Photograph captioned ‘Commencement of Shropshire Post’, showing many soldiers milling around a camp, near the Bara river, Waziristan (Pakistan), 1930-31 (c). There are a couple of tents and a pumping machine can be seen to the left of the image. The reference to the ‘Shropshire Post’ is possibly Fort Salop - Salop being a word relating to Shropshire or its inhabitants. The construction of the Bara and Mazarai bridges in 1930-31 was the most important engineering work executed during the occupation of the Kajuri and Aka Khel Plains. After this, sites were selected for permanent camps and posts, including Samghakai Post, Jhansi Post, Nowshera Post and an enlarged Fort Salop. Taken by Bt Maj Cecil Wotton Toovey MC, 9th Battalion Middlesex Regiment attached to the 5/1st Punjab Regiment. Toovey was Brigade Major for the 2nd Rawalpindi Infantry Brigade, Northern Command between 1929 and 1931. From a photograph album of 139 images and one press cutting of India, Iraq, Waziristan, 1915-1939 (c), by Maj Gen C W Toovey MC, Middlesex Regiment and the 82nd Punjabis (later the 5/1st Punjab Regiment).

India, North West Frontier (1920-1937)