Russo-Turkish War
In the 1877–78 Russo-Turkish War Kemball resumed his role as a British military commissioner with the Turkish Army, advising on, and inspecting, aspects of Turkish battle-readiness. During the 16 June 1877 battle at Zaidakan, Kemble and a Captain Norman were reconnoitering and observing hostilities on horseback. After the battle, they were confronted by a band of Russian Cossacks. Kemble decided to escape the situation, and he and Norman were chased by the Cossacks over twenty-five miles, with contemporary reports stating that a shell had exploded between them, wounding Norman in the arm, and that Kemble could have been shot in the head. They outran the Cossacks, and when at the Aras River swam across it to reach the Turkish camp.
Of Kemble's role in the Russo-Turkish War, The Times correspondent with Abdul-Kerim's army wrote:The position occupied by Sir Arnold Kemball is one of great importance, requiring much tact and discretion, a thorough knowledge of Oriental character, coupled with a keen appreciation of military difficulties. I doubt if there is another officer in Her Majesty's Army qualified to hold the post. A soldier by training and profession, yet a diplomatist from a thirteen years' experience as Consul-General at Bagdad, Sir Arnold possesses all the qualifications for his present responsible appointment. He possesses a thorough knowledge of Persian, Arabic, and Turkish, and can converse or correspond with equal fluency in either of these languages, while from his intimate knowledge of the customs of the people, he is able to gain their confidence. Sir Arnold is well content to sleep on the hill side, wrapped in a Turkish officer's coat, to share the greasy and innutritious food found in Turkish camps, to stand by the side of Turkish troops under a fire that our younger soldiers of Abyssinia and Ashantee do not dream of. It needs the constitution of a strong man to stand a ride of 259 miles in five consecutive days, with changes of temperature from snow-clad hills 9,000 feet above sea level to the dry and dusty plains of the Passin River. It needs a man with manly vigour to ride all day and write all night ; it needs a General with something more than his country's reputation at heart to travel about, occupying the position Sir Arnold Kemball does occupy here, unattended by an Aide-de-Camp, often accompanied only by a single Mahomedan horse-keeper, trusting to luck for his food and to the cold hill-side for his bed. By all this, by his simple unaffected manner, his unostentatious style of living, his warm sympathy for the Turkish soldiers, his severe condemnation of the conduct of many of their own officials, his indomitable energy and perseverance, his cheery spirits, and his gallant bearing on the field of battle, Sir Arnold has knitted to himself all with whom he has been thrown into contact, and while upholding in a pre-eminent degree the character of the British soldier, has never in the slightest degree given the Turkish officers reason to believe that his mission was to help them, or in any way to compromise the neutral position of our Government.
At the end of the War Kemble was awarded the KCB, promoted to general, and accompanied Lord Lyons in negotiations at the Berlin Congress.
