Extracts from the Royal Corps of Signals Journal UK
Disaster at Quetta—
The Great Earthquake of 1935

Columnist Capt (Retd) A A JILANI goes down memory lane.

Quetta, the capital of Balochistan, was one of the largest cantonments in British India, and an important railway centre, with a garrison of about 12,000 troops. At about 3.03 am on 31 May 1935 the city was devastated by a severe earthquake, lasting about 30 seconds, followed later by some after-shocks. Within seconds a city of some 50,000 inhabitants lay in ruins, along with towns and villages for a hundred miles on the fault line.
On the night of the earthquake the British infantry and artillery units were on a night exercise, and the nearest major unit was the 2nd Indian Divisional Signals, quartered about 4 miles from the city. The unit, under its C.O, Lt Col W. T. Howe OBE, immediately turned out and formed two relief columns, proceeding to the city, and commencing rescue operations.
The road into the city was cleared of rubble, ambulance convoys were organized for transporting the injured to dressing stations, and with civilian guides small parties of soldiers were dispatched to aid in digging out victims from the ruins of their homes.
It soon became apparent that the civilian Posts and Telegraph centre was severely damaged, and the city cut off from the outside world. The GOC Quetta District then ordered Col Howe to withdraw his men and concentrate on restoring communications. A signal office was established on the lawns of the Quetta Club, and wireless communications were opened with Army HQ at Simla, Karachi and Lahore. The P&T staff, who had suffered many casualties, were assisted with the repair of telephone lines and restoring circuits to Karachi. During the afternoon the GOC was on a telephone circuit to the London Evening News for about twenty five minutes. At the end of the call he put the phone down and asked Howe over.
“It puzzles me Bill” he said with a straight frace,” You fix up a line all the way to London and I can hear the fellow at the other end as clearly as I can hear you now. But on a Division. exercise you lay me a line to a spot two fields away and I am damned if I can hear a thing.”
Major G.E.G.Brown was O.C. of the line section. He was despatched to find the nearest undamaged overhead line, about twenty miles away, and with communications to the outside world restored, personally handed the telephone to the GOC when the call came through. He later wrote:-
“The Staff College was furthest from the town and they did not even know it had happened. Our barracks were next. It was the start of the hot weather and we were sleeping on the tennis court of the officer’s mess. I think I was tipped out of bed. The guard room alarm sounded. We got out some lorries and went down to the town. The whole town was flat. The dentist had been sleeping on the roof of a four floor building, and he arrived, still in his bed, at ground level on top of the rubble. We pulled out all the survivors we could find, and sent the lorries upto the hospital with the injured. The gunners were doing the same. I was surprised to see the British infantry in full marching order with fixed bayonets. General Kerslake was first class; he had them there to prevent looting, and he had the Gurkhas manning the perimeter to stop the tribesmen coming in”
The Corps Signals wireless detachment under Lt H. Prince played an important part in the immediate hours after the earthquake, sending the first messages and reports on the disaster to the outside world. The Daily Telegraph of 1 June reported:-
‘The wireless station is the only link between the stricken city and the outside world. Its messages, at first almost unintelligible, are now clearer. They tell us that the earliest news of the great earthquake which shook British Baluchistan at 3.04 am Friday had greatly underestimated the effects. It is now declared that in the important military and railway centre alone some 20,000 have lost their lives.’
The disaster was extensively reported in the British press. The Daily Telegraph of 1 June, had a two column headline:-
‘53 Britons among 20,000 dead at Quetta. Air Force men buried in collapse of building. Famous Hill Station in ruins.’
‘Twenty thousand are dead in Quetta, the important military station in British Baluchistan, as a result of an earthquake which devastated the town and 100 miles of neighbouring country. Forty three British airmen, including one officer, who were stationed there, are among the victims. Between twenty and thirty others are missing, and believed dead. The RAF Headquarters and civil stations are in ruins. Towns and villages have been obliterated, two relief trains are on their way from Karachi with doctors, nurses and medical supplies.’
On June 4 The Times reported a new shock as:-
‘There was another shock of moderate intensity at Quetta today (June 3) and survivors of Friday’s disaster stood fearfully spellbound while a large distant hill, which was a landmark of the district, was seen to split in two. From its bowels vast clouds of pulverized earth rose which hung in the air for several hours, spoiling the visibility for the aircraft arriving with serums and medical relief. Where the peak was is now a depression.’
A subaltern’s letter to his mother was quoted. He was on a night march at the time and was probably a member of one of the British units on exercise:-
‘Funny things had been happening all evening. One minute it was very cold, and the next too hot to be pleasant. The wind suddenly changed and came from exactly the opposite direction.
Then a moaning noise started, which I personally thought was the wind. At about 2.45 am the stars were shining more brightly and it struck me that the surrounding hills looked nearer than usual, and somewhat weird for some reason — probably due to a mirage effect caused by the hot air rising from the ground. But this didn’t seem unusual. Things seem different in the course of a night march across country, particularly in this case, when we had covered the best part of 30 miles.
At about 3 am we struck the main road and started the homeward journey. I suddenly realized that the road was subsiding. A second before this happened the whole column had stopped dead as though they had a premonition! Then there was a concerted rush to the side, but that was no use, because the trees seemed to be sweeping down towards us. Then the telegraph poles, which could just be distinguished in the dim light, began to perform the most amazing evolutions — wires whining overhead as they broke, and sparks from them running along the side of the road. It then dawned on me what was happening, and I dashed back to the road, and the whole of the surface of the ground turned into a rough sea ! Two hugh waves, just like Atlantic rollers, travelled along the road. I tried to lie down gracefully, but hit the ground with an awful smack as it was coming up to meet me at the same time.! One of the most unnerving things was the crackling, roaring noise which seemed to come from the depths of the earth. How long we all lay there I don’t know — it seemed like an hour. I’ve thought I’ve been frightened before, but now I really know what fear is like! On arising I didn’t dare to speak, as I couldn’t trust by voice, and my knees were literally knocking together. Of all he terrible experiences, one’s first real earthquake must be the worst — one feels so impotent and insignificant.’
The city was placed under martial law. In the military garrison the RAF had suffered the most and lost one killed and 60 injured, their barracks almost completely destroyed. The Army lines, on the other side of the city, suffered much less and there were no serious casualties. The Staff College was quite unaffected.
In the days that followed it became apparent that the huge number of dead under the ruins presented a serious health problem. A refugee camp was established on the Quetta racecourse, known as Epsom Downs, and the evacuation of thousands of refugees to other parts of the Punjab and Sindh began by rail. The city was sealed off under the military, and entirely evacuated. Meanwhile, trains and aircraft brought police reinforcements and medical staff. A total of 10,000 refugees were fed and cared for at the refugee camp at one time. The military hospital treated 10,000 injured. Maj-Gen-Kerslake, the District Commander, earned wide praise for his control of the rescue operations and prompt action on security. Commenting on the imposition of martial law the Times of 8 June said:-
Martial law has disclosed none of the evils frequently associated with military control. Not one shot has been fired, except to destroy suffering animals, not one civilian has been Court-martialled, and no soldier has been guilty of any misdemeanour, The Indian troops, like the British, show amazing fortitude. The whole force responded with enthusiasm to the sudden call.’
The final death toll was estimated as 30,000, including the surrounding towns and villages. The Geological Survey of India in a report on the disaster by Mr W.D.West, said that for mortality it must rank as the most disastrous earthquake in India within historic times, the nearest approach being the Kangra earthquake of 1905, when 20,000 people perished. The most striking feature was the very short time the earthquake lasted, probably less than 30 seconds. During this time the ground was viciously shaken in a horizontal plane at high speed. Discussing the cause of the earthquake Mr West said:-
“The hills of Baluchistan have been folded by a compression coming from the north-west. The softer rocks have been folded and pushed southwards towards the rest of India, in a way that a person might push a cloth on a table horizontally, causing the cloth to pucker up into long folds in front of his hand.”
He concludes his report with this observation:-
“It seems clear, however, that the correct way of anticipating further earthquakes and of minimising their disastrous effects, both in Baluchistan and elsewhere in India, is to construct buildings which will withstand these severe shocks.”
The C-in-C, F.M. Sir Philip Chetwode afterwards wrote to the Signal Officer-in-Chief as follows:-
“The work of the Signal Corps in this emergency has been altogether admirable. Without it I scarcely like to think what might have happened. All soldiers responded to the call, but it was Signals who enabled the work to be coordinated and effective. Please tell them how much I admire their work.”
The rebuilding of Quetta began within six months, and the city and its garrison were to play an important part in the defence of India’s northern frontier during the coming war. Today, it is a thriving and important garrison and commercial centre in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan.
Note. Although contemporary reports do not appear to have used the Richter scale of measurement as Dr Richter had only devised his scale in 1935 (a logarithmic measure of the surface wave amplitude) the Quetta earthquake is recorded in present day reference books as 7.5 R. This falls just short of the official measure for a ‘great earthquake’ at 8 R.

J.R.T.P.