Appendix 120: Sheikh Shakhbut's Return from London Aug. ‘53

Codrai witnessed Shaikh Shakhbut's return from London via Bahrain on 8 August 1953. Shaikh Shakhbut returned to Abu Dhabi on 8th August. He travelled back from Bahrain by a Gulf Aviation Aircraft, but the pilot was unwilling to land at Abu Dhabi, and put the Ruler down at Tarif. Most of the Ruler's close relatives, including all his brothers (Khalid among them with whom he had not spoken for nearly a year), and the Representative [PD(TC)] were awaiting his arrival at Abu Dhabi, and had to repair to Tarif, where they were feasted by the Company. The following day the Ruler and the whole party travelled by road to Abu Dhabi, where they narrowly missed disaster. Swiftly turning the corner of the Fort, to get through the sand, the leading car carrying the Ruler and the Representative was fired on at point blank range by one of a line of canons which had been loaded to fire a welcome. Fortunately the canon had been packed with nothing harder than palm fronds, which were sprayed all over the car. The following cars braked to a standstill alongside the canons, when suddenly the advancing committee of welcome, which had been waiting outside the Fort, took to its heels, and disappeared back into the Fort. At the same time the Ruler's party saw that one of the canons was furiously belching smoke out of its rear end, and everyone quickly dismounted and disappeared from sight round the corner of the Fort, until the canon, which had looked very much as if it would explode, had exhausted itself.

Shaikh Shakhbut claims to be feeling much better, although he still appears to be very weak.

Travellers to Abu Dhabi will have spent long hours waiting for the tide to recede, would now find the scene much changed. A causeway connects the island to the mainland, and there is a stone guards’ post a short distance from it, on the Abu Dhabi side. A two-storeyed post, with a majlis for the Shaikhs, has been completed at the end of the causeway, on the mainland.