GERTRUDE BELL

Gertrude Bell was an English writer, traveller, and government official. She travelled
throughout the Middle East in the early 1900s and played an important role in the
establishment of the country of Iraq. She was known as ​Queen of the Desert​.

Early Years
Gertrude Bell was born on July 14, 1868, in Durham, England. Her grandfather, Sir Isaac
Lowthian Bell, was a member of Parliament who worked alongside Prime Minister Benjamin
Disraeli. She grew up in a wealthy family in Redcar, a Yorkshire town, in a home built by her
father, businessman and industrialist Sir Thomas Hugh Bell. Her mother Mary died in 1871
after giving birth to her younger brother Maurice. Gertrude Bell gained her first exposure to
politics and world affairs through her grandfather and his associates. Her father married
Florence Bell when Gertrude was still a young child and the union added a half-brother and
two half-sisters to the family. Bell would go on to attend Oxford University, where she studied
history.

In 1892 Bell graduated with honors from Oxford (first woman who got this distinction) and
shortly thereafter traveled to Tehran, Iran, where her uncle, Sir Frank Lascelles, was serving
as British minister. This trip sparked her interest in the Middle East, the region on which she
would focus much of her energy for the remainder of her life.

A skilled Mountaineer
During all her life, Bell developed a passion for climbing. She started climbing during a
family holiday in La Grave, France, in 1897. She tackled greater heights with her 1899
ascents in the French region of the Alps. Bell continued to challenge herself with other peaks
in the Swiss Alps. Becoming one of the leading female climbers of her day, she helped
tackle some of the virgin peaks of the Engelhorner range. One of its peaks was named
Gertrudspitze in her honor.
In 1902 she spent more than 50 hours on a rope on the mountain’s northeast side before
she was able to make it back to a local village with her guides. The experience left Bell with
frostbitten hands and feet, but it did not end her love of climbing.

Writings and political career

In 1899, Gertrude Bell returned to the Middle East and visited Palestine and Syria, touching
off a period of sustained travel there and in Asia and Europe. Her writings on her
experiences across the globe informed British audiences about the distant parts of their
empire. Bell's works published during the two decades preceding World War I include Safar
Nameh (1894) and Poems from the Divan of Hafiz (1897).

World War I
During World War I, Bell worked for the Red Cross in France before joining the a British
intelligence unit in Cairo, Egypt, known as the Arab Bureau. There, she collaborated with
famed British traveler T. E. Lawrence to try to forge alliances with Arab tribes.
British forces eventually captured Baghdad in 1917 and Bell became involved in the political
reinvention of Mesopotamia, where she helped colonial authorities install ruler Faisal I as
monarch of Iraq. Fluent in Arabic and Persian, Bell helped British diplomats and local rulers
in the construction of a stable government infrastructure. She was the only woman present
at the 1921 Conference in Cairo, convened by Winston Churchill to determine the
boundaries of the Iraqi state.

Bell stayed in Bagdag for the rest of her life, and she was one of the most important people
involved in the establishment of Iraq. She even constructed the National Museum of Iraq.
Bell was found dead in her room in Baghdad in 1926. It is believed that she had taken an
overdose of sleeping pills. It was a fittingly mysterious end to an extraordinary and exotic life.

Love
What she never achieved was lasting love. On that first trip to Tehran, she feel in love with
Henry Cadogan, a member of the foreign service staff. Alas, Cadogan had no fortune and
though Bell travelled back to England to persuade her father to approve the match, she
conceded, “Henry and I are not allowed to consider ourselves engaged”. She never saw him
again; he died a few months later.

The only other man she loved, Charles Doughty, was already married. Bell wanted
Doughty-Wylie to leave his wife for her, but his wife threatened suicide if he did. They
exchanged passionate letters but accepted they could never be together.