With the least possible delay the Turks moved their prisoners from Kut-el-Amara to Bagdad and from there to Constantinople, from which place it was reported on June 11, 1916, that General Townshend had arrived and, after having been received with military honors, had been permitted to visit the United States ambassador who looked after British interests in Turkey during the war. An official Turkish statement announced that together with General Townshend four other generals had been captured as well as 551 other officers, of whom about one-half were Europeans and another half Indians. The same announcement also claimed that the British had destroyed most of their guns and other arms, but that in spite of this the Turks captured about forty cannon, twenty machine guns, almost 5,000 rifles, large amounts of ammunition, two ships, four automobiles, and three aeroplanes. It was only after the capitulation of General Townshend that details became available concerning the suffering to which the besieged army was subjected and the heroism with which all this was borne by officers and men, whites and Hindus alike. An especially clear picture of conditions existing in Kut-el-Amara during the siege may be gained from a letter sent to Bombay by a member of the Indian force and later published in various newspapers. It says in part: "Wounded and diseased British and native troops are arriving from Kut-el-Amara, having been exchanged for an equal number of Turkish prisoners. They bring accounts of Townshend's gallant defense of Mesopotamia's great strategic point. Some are mere youngsters while others were soldiers before the war. "All are frightfully emaciated and are veritable skeletons as the result of their starvation and sufferings. The absolute exhaustion of food necessitated the capitulation, and if General Townshend had not surrendered nearly the whole force would have died of starvation within a week. "The Turkish General Khalil Pasha provided a river steamer for the unexchanged badly wounded, the others marching overland. Because of the wasted condition of the prisoners the marches were limited to five miles a day. "When the capitulation was signed only six mules were left alive to feed a garrison and civilian population of nearly 20,000 persons. "In the early stages of the siege, the Arab traders sold stocks of jam, biscuits, and canned fish at exorbitant prices. The stores were soon exhausted and all were forced to depend upon the army commissariat. Later a dead officer's kit was sold at auction. Eighty dollars was paid for a box of twenty-five cigars and twenty dollars for fifty American cigarettes.