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GALLIPOLI HISTORY
Military History Journal - Vol 6 No 4
Gallipoli: The Landings of 25 April 1915
by S. Monick
On 6 June 1944 there occurred widespread commemoration of the 40th
anniversary of the Allied invasion of France. However, the point is
frequently overlooked that the Allied invasions of enemy territory in World
War II (initiated by ‘Operation Torch’, the landings in North Africa in
1943) were anticipated by a major Allied landing on enemy territory in World
War I. The writer is referring, of course, to the landings on the Gallipoli
Peninsula by combined British, French, Australian and New Zealand forces,
with the object of eliminating Turkey as an enemy power. The strategic
reasons motivating this invasion have been discussed in a previous
article.(1) The invasion of the Gallipoli Peninsula may be said to represent
the ‘second key’ by which the straits of the Dardanelles were to be
‘unlocked’ by the Allied powers, with the resultant access to the Black Sea,
the ‘back door’ to Russia. The first key had been the endeavour to force
these straits by purely naval assault, culminating in the ill-fated action
of 18 March 1915, which forms the theme of an earlier article.(2) In the
following article it is not the intention of the writer to provide a
detailed analysis of the entire Gallipoli campaign from the time of the
landings of 25 April to the final evacuation of January 1916. Rather, it is
intended to analyze in depth the events of the first day of this invasion,
the strategic failures of which may be considered to be the root of the
ultimate frustration of the Allied endeavours in European Turkey. There are,
indeed, few episodes in military history, if any, which can compare with the
Gallipoli invasion of 25 April 1915 in illustrating the long term strategic
and political disasters which may accrue from the personality weakness of a
commander; in this instance Lt Gen Sir Ian Hamilton.
The Objective: The Topography of the Gallipoli Peninsula
The southern end of the Gallipoli Peninsula is dominated by the relatively
low bald hump of a ridge known to the Turks as Achi Tepe and to the British
(as a result of a map error) as Achi Baba. Although only approximately 210 m
high, it bestrides the peninsula and absolutely dominates the ground to the
south. The Achi Baba ridge rises in an extremely gentle slope. To the east
of the summit the Dardanelles is hidden from view until one traverses the
two kilometres to the lesser summit of Tenkir Kepe. From here it is possible
to see most of the Dardanelles up to the Narrows. But two deep-plunging
gorges — the Soghanli and Saghir Deres — lie between the Achi Baba ridge and
the Kilid Bahr plateau, some 6,4 km to the north-east. Thus, although the
distances on the Gallipoli Peninsula are short, the ground is so broken and
rough, and the paths so few, that progress north of Achi Baba and the Kilid
Bahr plateau is very slow indeed.
Approximately 16,1 km to the north-west from Achi Baba a much higher ridge,
almost 300 m in height, dominates the sky line. This is Sari Bair (Turkish
for the ‘yellow ridge’) which forms the vertebrae, so to speak, of this part
of the peninsula. It has three summits, all of approximately the same
height, separated from each other by a kilometre of undulating crest line.
The most northern summit, 381 m high, is called Koja Chemen Tepe; the next
highest, Besim Tepe, became known to the British as ‘Hill Q’; the third, 285
m high, is called Chunuk Bair. Between the southern Sari Bair foothills and
the western extremities of the Kilid Bahr plateau a low, bare and almost
flat plain stretches across the peninsula from the blunt promontory of Gaba
Tepe on the west coast to the small village of Maidos on the Dardanelles
shore. The Sair Bair hills climb gently westwards away from the Dardanelles
but, on the west coast, they collapse suddenly from the triple crests into
an impossible range of steep ravines, washaways and cliffs cascading
abruptly down to the Aegean. To the north of Sari Bair is Suvla Plain and a
great salt lake. A triangle of bleak hills surrounds Suvla Plain on three
sides, making it appear as an enormous natural amphitheatre (Map 1).
Prelude to Invasion: Allied Delays and Turkish Preparations
Kitchener ordered 70 000 troops to the Aegean with the simple instruction
‘to help the Navy to reap the fruits of success’. He had given command of
this force on 12 March 1915 to Lt Gen Sir Ian Hamilton, whose force
consisted of the experienced 29th Division, the untried ANZAC, the Royal
Naval Division, and the French Corps. His senior commanders were Lt Gen Sir
W. Birdwood (ANZAC), Maj Gen Sir Aylmer Hunter-Weston (29th Division), and
Maj Gen A. Paris (Royal Naval Division). The French Corp was commanded by
Gen A.G.L. d’Amade, and comprised a motley collection of Zouaves and
detachments from the Foreign Legion. The full order of battle of the
Mediterranean Expeditionary Force in April 1915 was as follows:
29th Division (Maj Gen A.G. Hunter-Weston)
86th Brigade
2 Royal Fusiliers
1 Lancashire Fusiliers
1 Royal Munster Fusiliers
1 Royal Dubtdn Fusiliers
87th Brigade
2 South Wales Borderers
1 King’s Own Scottish Borderers
1 Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers
1 Border Regiment
88th Brigade
4 Worcestershire Regiment
2 Hampshire Regiment
1 Essex Regiment
1/5 Royal Scots (Territorial Force)
XV Bde, Royal Horse Artillery (B, L and Y Batteries)
XVII Bde, Royal Field Artillery (13th, 26th and 92nd Btys)
CXLVII Bde, Royal Field Artillery (10th, 97th and 368th Btys)
460th (Howitzer) Bty, Royal Field Artillery
4th (Highland) Mountain Bde, Royal Garrison Artillery (Territorial Force)
90th Heavy Bty, Royal Garrison Artillery
14th Siege Bty, Royal Garrison Artillery
1/2 London, 1/2 Lowland and 1/1 West
Riding Field Coys, Royal Engineers (Territorial Force)
Divisional Cyclist Coy
Total personnel: 17 649
Royal Naval Division (Maj Gen A. Paris)
1st (Naval) Brigade (Brig Gen D. Mercer, RMLI)
Drake Battalion
Nelson Bn
Deal Bn, RMLI
2nd (Naval) Brigade (Cdre O. Blackhouse, RN)
Howe Rn
Hood Bn
Anson Bn
3rd (Royal Marines) Brigade (Brig Gen C.N. Trotman, RMLI)
Chatham Bn, RMLI
Portsmouth Bn, RMLI
Plymouth Bn, RMLI
Motor and Maxim Sqn (Royal Naval Air Service)
1st & 2nd Field Coys, Engineers
Divisional Cyclist Coy
Total personnel: 10 007
Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC)
(Lt Gen Sir W. Birdwood)
1st Australian Division (Maj Gen W.T. Bridges)
1st Australian Brigade
1st (NSW) Battalion
2nd (NSW) Bn
3rd (NSW) Bn
4th (NSW) Bn
2nd Australian Brigade
5th (Victoria) Bn
6th (Victoria) Bn
7th (Victoria) Bn
8th (Victoria) Bn
3rd Australian Brigade
9th (Queensland) Bn
10th (S. Australia) Bn
11th (W. Australia) Bn
12th (5. & W. Australia and Tasmania) Bn
I (NSW) Field Artillery Bde (1, 2 & 3 Btys)
II (Victoria) Field Artillery Bde (4, 5 & 6 Btys)
III (Queensland) Field Artillery Bde (7, 8 & 9 Btys)
1, 2 & 3 Field Coys, Engineers
New Zealand and Australian Division (Maj Gen Sir A. Godley)
New Zealand Brigade
Auckland Battalion
Canterbury Bn
Otago Bn
Wellington Bn
4th Australian Brigade
13th (NSW) Bn
14th (Victoria) Bn
15th (Queensland & Tasmania) Bn
16th (S. & W. Australia) Bn
New Zealand Field Artillery Brigade (1, 2 & 3 Btys)
New Zealand Field Howitzer Battery
Field Coy, New Zealand Engineers
Corps Troops
7th Indian Mountain Artillery Brigade
Ceylon Planters Rifle Corps
Total strength: 30 638
Corps Expeditionnaire D’Orient (Gen A.G.L. d’Amade)
1st Division (Gen Masnou)
175th Regiment
Regt de Marche d’Afrique (2 bns Zouaves, 1 bn Foreign Legion)
Colonial Brigade
4th Colonial Regt (2 bn Senegalese, 1 bn Colonial)
6th Colonial Regt (2 bns Senegalese, 1 bn Colonial)
6 Btys of artillery (75 mm)
2 Btys of artillery (65 mm)
Total strength: 16 762
Combined strength of total force: 75 056
The Royal Naval Division arrived at Alexandria in March 1915 with a bizarre
array of equipment, including Rolls Royce armoured cars, motor cars, motor
cycles, some machine guns of varying degrees of antiquity, two 12 pr guns,
one 6.7 inch howitzer, three 4.7 inch guns mounted on pontoons for river
operations and rifles of a different calibre from the remainder of the
Expeditionary Force. A curious feature of the RND was the large number of
literary men that it attracted. The most famous of them was, of course,
Rupert Brooke, the darling of the ‘new Georgians’ who died on a French
hospital ship on 23 April off Skyros from blood poisoning caused by an
insect bite. Another literary personality who was a member of the RND at
Gallipoli was Compton Mackenzie, who sailed for Cape Helles in May 1915.
Apart from command, Hamilton was given precious little else. He had a
hopelessly out-of-date map of the Dardanelles defences, an intelligence
report of the Turkish army as it was in 1903, and a phrase book and a
tourist’s guide for sightseers in Constantinople. As one writer comments:
‘He might have been forgiven for assuming that he was taking 70 000 troops
for a spring cruise in the Aegean followed by a pleasant summer holiday
overlooking the Golden Horn.’(3)
When Hamilton was given his command he was General Officer Commanding the
Central Force in England. Such was the confusion prevailing in the higher
command regarding the Dardanelles Campaign that, when Hamilton left Charing
Cross station on 13 March, he had one set of orders from Churchill (‘Land
with all available troops as soon as possible.’) and a completely
conflicting set of orders from Kitchener (‘Undertake military operations
only in the event of the fleet failing to get through after every effort has
been exhausted.’).
This confusion extended from the political establishment to infuse the
counsels of the military/naval commanders. At the root of this confusion was
the lack of a basic comprehension of combined operations. Hamilton and de
Robeck viewed combined operations from two totally different and
diametrically opposed viewpoints. De Robeck was under the impression that
the Army would first occupy the peninsula and thus allow his fleet to pass
through the Dardanelles and attack the defensive forts unhindered. Hamilton
conceived of a naval assault to first silence the shore batteries. Moreover,
there was no on-the-spot commander to brief them. Only Maurice Hankey,
Secretary to the War Council, appears to have entertained any sensible
doubts concerning the operation. As he pointed out, no one had yet even
considered whether there were sufficient troops available for a successful
invasion. The Greeks, when they had spoken of capturing the peninsula, had
submitted a plan involving an army of 150 000. Kitchener had derisively said
that half that number of British troops would be ample and had added that,
in any event, whether there were enough or not, there were no more
available. He had in fact emphasized that the 29th Division was only ‘on
loan’ and must be returned after use: ‘rather as if he saw it being shaken
out of a parcel, deployed in bloodless battle, then dusted off, repacked and
sent back again.’(4)
The War Council had ineptly decided that the Greek island of Lemnos should
be the military base, apparently because it had a natural harbour large
enough to accommodate a fleet of troopships. It had little else. There was a
pier that would have served as a landing stage for a pleasure launch and no
other facilities whatsoever for loading or unloading ships. The entire
population of the island was half that of the Army of 70 000 it was proposed
to base there; whilst the water supply was totally inadequate. Rear Admiral
Wemyss was placed in command of the forces on the island of which he was
made Governor. Impossible as it was to disembark and accommodate the forces
required for the operation, nobody in Whitehall had considered the need of a
depot ship or other means of supplying the needs of 70 000 men. As a result,
many were returned to Egypt or dispersed among the other Aegean islands.
Those that remained had to live aboard the troopships in the harbour.
However, it was gradually discovered that these troopships themselves were
in a state of chaos. They had been packed for hurried departures from Egypt
and Britain, with no thought of rational packing and loading. As a result,
it soon proved impossible to locate needed supplies, let alone organize the
Army for action. Many of the heavier weapons were hopelessly antiquated;
less than half the necessary artillery was present; ammunition was of the
wrong size; shells contained shrapnel instead of high explosive; the
redistribution of troopships around the Aegean and Mediterranean had
separated men, vehicles and animals that belonged together. In view of this
rampant chaos it is not surprising that Hamilton decided that he could only
reorganize his forces in the safety of Alexandria some 950 km distant.
Accordingly, Hamilton embarked his forces for Alexandria on 24 March 1915,
intending to return to Lemnos with his army and ready to launch the attack
on the peninsula on 14 April.
It was apparent that de Robeck and Hamilton were embarking upon an
enterprise in which none of the essential elements of success were present.
These elements were undivided command, thorough knowledge of the enemy
defences and order of battle, precise details of the terrain where troops
were to be landed, surprise, and a plan for the actual operation that was
firm yet flexible and understood by everybody. The absence of a supreme
commander is, in the circumstances, understandable, for the War Council had
never envisaged a combined operation as such. However, what is neither
understandable nor forgivable is lack of intelligence concerning the enemy.
For four years prior to Turkey’s entry into the war an unending stream of
continuously up-dated information had been communicated to the British War
Office from Constantinople. For the nine months preceding the war Lt Col
Cunliffe-Owen had held the post of military attaché in Constantinople and
had proved himself to be a particularly astute and conscientious officer. He
had not only sent back the routine reports that were required of him, but
had made a complete survey of the peninsula, reporting in full detail on gun
sites, mine-fields, torpedo tubes, and even the smoke canisters that were
later to cause such confusion during the naval battle of 18 March. This
information was ignored, as indeed was Cunliffe-Owen himself, and official
quarters remained totally indifferent to both throughout the campaign.
Neither he nor his files of detailed information were ever consulted. In a
similar manifestation of poor intelligence organization, the only British
admiral who had any local knowledge of Turkish waters, Admiral Limpus, Chief
of the pre-war British Naval Mission to Constantinople, had been withdrawn
from the Dardanelles in September 1914, and sent to manage the Malta
dockyard.
If lack of intelligence was a most serious deficiency in the Allied plan for
the invasion of the Gallipoli Peninsula, the lack of surprise was no less
so. The departure of the Allied fleet on 18 March convinced the Turkish
defenders under Gen L. von Sanders that the — to them — inexplicable
withdrawal of the British/French naval forces heralded a land invasion.
Sanders’ initial supposition was strengthened by the mass of intelligence he
received daily concerning British intentions, in the form of reports
filtered back from German agents in Alexandria, Greece and Syria. In
Alexandria itself the work of these German agents could not have been
simpler. Not only did the Egyptian newspapers report fully on the movements
of the British military commanders, but as the ships were repeatedly loaded
and unloaded in the harbour and troops drilled on the decks, every movement
was blatantly noted and photographed by reporters, fishermen and owners of
dhows who nightly sold their information in the alleys and brothels. On the
mainland of Greece and throughout the numerous islands German agents were
scattered in great profusion. The King of Greece, Constantine, who was
married to the Kaiser’s sister, Princess Sophia, had received his military
training in Germany and held the rank of Field Marshal in the German Army.
Constantine’s official policy of neutrality was opposed by Eleutherios
Venizelos, the Prime Minister, whose government favoured the Allies. It was
through Venizelos’ government that the island of Lemnos had been seized as a
naval base and Rear Admiral Wemyss made Governor; and when Venizelos
government fell on 6 March 1915 it was replaced by a strongly pro-German
ministry. Thus, it should have been no surprise to anybody that every move
taken by Wemyss, frantically preparing the harbour for the arrival of the
re-constituted Allied fleet, was known to Sanders almost before it was made.
Through his Intelligence Section Hamilton attempted to deceive the enemy by
leading them to think that the invasion would be made at Smyrna. However,
the enemy was not deceived in the slightest degree. Whilst there was no
activity to be discerned in the direction of Smyrna, there was considerable
activity in the vicinity of the Gallipoli Peninsula and in the Mudros
harbour at Lemnos. British reconnaissance aircraft flew over the peninsula
daily photographing the defences; a submarine attempting to scurry up the
Dardanelles (the B. 15) was detected, a lucky shot killing the captain (T.S.
Brodie) and six of her crew, the remainder being taken prisoner. There was
spasmodic shelling from British warships; landing stages were being built at
Mudros; on the island of Imbros, close by, there was a feverish assembling
of troops; British agents were known to be buying lighters and tugs whose
purpose could only be the transportation of the invading army. Sanders was
left in no doubt that the invasion would be on an extensive scale. Indeed,
he had even read a newspaper interview with the French general, d’Amade, in
which the various methods of invading the peninsula were freely discussed.
With regard to intelligence, all that the defenders lacked was a postcard
from Hamilton detailing the time, date and place of arrival. ‘Even that’,
one caustic historian subsequently commented, ‘would not have seemed outside
the realm of possibility.’
Not only did Sanders have every incentive to strengthen the defences of the
peninsula, but he was provided by the Allies with the time in which to do
so. This factor emanated from the appalling Allied logistics. Hamilton’s
arrival in Alexandria on 26 March had left him only three weeks in which to
meet his deadline of 14 April. He had only a few inexperienced general staff
officers to translate his plans into practical details. Moreover, he quickly
learnt that he was lacking sufficient engineers, artillery and landing craft
— three vital elements in his force. (It was the lack of landing craft which
forced Hamilton to resort to the amateurish practice of sending agents
shopping through the Middle East, buying up lighters and tugs.) Indeed, the
improvisations forced upon Sanders in preparing the defences (cf. below)
were as nothing compared with those to which Hamilton had to resort. As no
maps had been provided, cartographers were set to work tracing the one with
which Hamilton had been provided in London, and attempts were made to add to
it the new details of the defences revealed by aerial reconnaissance. An
English bookshop in Cairo was found to have a stock of Raedeker guides
described by the Egyptian sales assistant as ‘exactly the thing for the
soldiers visiting Turkey’. They were bought uninspected and found to be
guides of the Rhine Valley. At the last moment it was recalled that the
water supply on Lemnos was quite inadequate and the bazaars of Alexandria
had to be ransacked for skins, tins, bottles and any other containers that
could hold water — to the great profit and delight of the merchants.
Further, whoever had arranged for such transports as had been sent out from
England was clearly as ignorant as Hamilton of the terrain of the peninsula
and had provided lorries that would have been eminently suitable for
properly surfaced roads. With the knowledge that the majority of roads in
the peninsula were, in fact, little more than cart tracks came the necessity
to provide mules in abundance. These were eventually bought and formed into
the Zion Mule Corps.
Embarkation of the repacked and reorganized army at Alexandria had commenced
on 10 April, and it arrived uneventfully at Lemnos during the following
eight days. At this point in time, when the last shipping had returned to an
enormously overcrowded Mudros Harbour, the deadline of 14 April had, of
course, been abandoned. In addition to the problems involved in the
reorganization of the invasion force at Alexandria elucidated above, the
weather now occasioned further delays. The climate of the Aegean in spring
is unpredictable, and during most of March and April storms had been
capriciously alternating with fine days. On 21 April, when de Robeck
hesitantly gave the signal to prepare to leave harbour and set sail for the
beaches to launch the attack of 23 April, a gale descended upon the invasion
fleet. Doubtful of the weather-resistant qualities of the miscellany of
vessels involved (the fleet involved a motley collection of 200 warships,
tramp and pleasure steamers, caiques, trawlers, liners; in short, any vessel
that could be pressed into service as a troopship) de Robeck countermanded
the signal. The attack was to be launched on 24 April. Then he countermanded
that order too, the gale showing no signs of abating. Finally, but still
with hesitation and doubt, he ordered that the fleet should raise steam and
move out from the harbour on 23 April, and launch the attack on 25 April.
Liman von Sanders’ 5th Army of 80 000 men, formed in six divisions, was
concentrated in the places that Sanders thought most likely to bear the
brunt of the Allied invasion.(5) These were Kum Kale and Besika Bay on the
Asiatic shore and, on the peninsula itself, the southern tip extending up to
Chunuk Bair, the towns of Gallipoli and Bulair, and the Gulf of Saros. In
these areas he placed five of his six divisions; the sixth, under the
command of Lt Col Mustapha Kemal (the future Kemal Attaturk, the ruler of
Turkey) was placed inland around the village of Boghali (Map 1). Within
these areas the defenders were widely dispersed, some troops being posted
watchfully on the western and southern coastline of the peninsula and on the
eastern side of the Narrows at Chanak Kale; others, like Kemal’s, being held
inland in order to prevent any successful advance of the Allied forces
across the peninsula — which would, of course, have cut the 5th Army in two
— and to be available as reinforcements in any area as called upon. Having
effected these dispositions, Sanders embarked upon a programme of the
fortification and strengthening of these positions. When Enver Pasha could
not respond to his persistant demand for supplies, due to the requirements
of the Turkish armies on the Bulgarian, Syrian and Russian fronts, Sanders
resorted to improvisation. Under his supervision supply roads were built
across the hills of the peninsula, trenches dug with spades commandeered
from the villagers, landmines manufactured from torpedo heads, farmland
fences torn down and submerged in the shallows bordering the beaches.
Searchlights were trained on the straits by night, whilst sentries scanned
the Aegean by day. Continual movement of Allied ships could be seen. The
overcrowded harbour at Mudros was ablaze with the lights of the Allied fleet
by night, whilst by day there was a continual festivity of military
activity, bugle calls, troop exercises and briefings. When, on 21 April, a
squadron of British aircraft bombed Maidos in the Narrows setting it ablaze,
Sanders was left in no doubt that the invasion was nigh.
Planning
The Allied plan in its original conception was almost absurd in its boldness
and simplicity: ‘take a good run at the peninsula and jump on — both feet
together’.
The ANZACs, an untried force suspected of being little more than
enthusiastic amateurs, was to land at a kilometre-wide cove north of Gaba
Tepe, a supposedly heavily defended promontory 19 km up the west coast of
the peninsula. The ANZACs’ task was to fight their way eastwards across the
ridge of hills to Mal Tepe on the far side of the peninsula, thus cutting
the Turkish forces in two and preventing enemy reinforcements reaching the
south. It was the southern tip of the peninsula which was to receive the
brunt of Hamilton’s attack. Here 29th Division was to land at four ‘beaches’
spaced around Cape Helles. These beaches were designated V, W, Y and X; V
being the most easterly beach at Sedd-el-Bahr, W in the centre and X
approximately 1 371 m up the west coast from Tekke Burnu (Map 1). Whilst
these landings were taking place, the RND was to create a diversionary
operation by striking at Bulair in the extreme north of the peninsula. The
diversion was intended to keep the Turks fully engaged in this vicinity and
thus provide the ANZACs with time to establish themselves across the range
of hills and thereby dominate both the Narrows and lines of communication to
the south. This plan did not meet with the unanimous approval of Hamilton’s
subordinate commanders. Birdwood favoured a landing on the eastern shore of
the Dardanelles. (He had been C-in-C designate for the Dardanelles
Expeditionary Force before Kitchener had finally chosen Hamilton. He
accepted his new position, but not entirely without resentment).
Hunter-Weston gloomily forecast disaster wherever the attack was made. (One
historian(6) has written of Hunter-Weston that he ‘was blimpish and slow
thinking, and given to assuming that every battle he directed would progress
precisely according to his design, and that once he had set everything in
motion he could retire to his headquarters’.) Maj Gen Paris was extremely
cynical concerning the plan whilst Gen Sir John Maxwell, C-in-C of the
forces in Egypt, disapproved of the entire Gallipoli enterprise. The French
were to attack at Kum Kale, whilst a separate force (one battalion) was to
attack S Beach.
Execution
At dawn, on 25 April 1915, the invading force landed on the Gallipoli
Peninsula. The main forces to land at V Beach were conveyed in the River
Clyde, a converted steam collier, and a fleet sweeper. The River Clyde
transported 1 Munster Fusiliers; 2 Hampshire Regiment (less two companies);
1 Coy, 1 Royal Dublin Fusiliers; GHQ Signals Section; Field Coy Royal
Engineers; and one platoon of the Anson Battalion, Royal Naval Division. It
was planned to bridge the intervening water space with a motor hopper, the
Argyle, supported if necessary by dumb lighters. With regard to the
disembarkation of the troops, four sallyports had been cut in the River
Clyde, two on each side at lower deck level, where the men would be waiting.
The sallyports opened onto a gangway, three planks wide, which led forward
to the bows where there was a hinged extension onto the Argyle which, in
turn, had a brow, or gangway, of her own to connect with the shore. The
Argyle was to be towed from a gantry on the port side of the River Clyde
with a lighter inboard of the latter. A second lighter was to be towed from
the starboard side of the River Clyde and others, plus some boats, from aft.
A covering force was to be landed ahead of the River Clyde contingent from
two fast sweepers, the Clacton and Newmarket (railway packets, ex-Great
Eastern Railway). This covering force consisted of approximately 500 men,
comprising: 1 Royal Dublin Fusiliers, commanded by Lt Col R.A. Rooth; one
platoon of the Anson Battalion, RND; and a second platoon of the RND serving
as a naval beach party. The covering force was to be disembarked in six tows
of boats and were scheduled to land at 05h30, after half-an-hour’s
bombardment from Albion. The men from the River Clyde were to follow at
06h30. Along the 274 m of beach were well-sited entrenchments and dense
entanglements of barbed wire. The appreciation of the General Staffs stated
that these defences could be demolished by the same bombardment from Albion
that was to cope with the defences of W Beach (cf. below).
The covering force did not precede the main contingent, as was intended, but
landed almost simultaneously, due to the problems attached to navigating the
River Clyde whilst towing the motor hopper Argyle, in addition to the
various lighters and boats. From the outset, before the first troops could
disembark, the plan seriously miscarried. The Argyle sheered to port and
grounded broadside onto the beach. Thus, the distance between ship and shore
was left unbridged. At 06h00, after the cessation of the hour’s barrage that
was assumed would silence the Turkish defences of V and W Beaches, the River
Clyde, her 2 000 men ready to run down the gangways and across the bridge of
boats, was ordered forward. An officer aboard wrote confidently: ‘0622
hours. Ran smoothly ashore, no opposition. We shall land unopposed.’ Indeed,
the shelling had been followed by an uncanny silence. It was assumed that
all the Turks were dead, according to plan. The assumption was mistaken. As
was the case at W Beach, the Turks had retired during the barrage, and crept
back to their trenches when it had ceased. These trenches contained three
platoons (64 men) and one 37mm (pom pom) battery (the pom poms were to be
mistaken for the four machine guns, which only arrived later). As the River
Clyde’s causeway of boats was linked to the shore they held their fire and
waited for the troops to descend the gangway. As the first men descended
from the ramp, the frightful enfilading fire from 274 m distance commenced.
Alan Wykes(7) provides the following graphic account:
‘It was not only on the gangway that the men were mown down in dozens as
they emerged, until the narrow descent was piled with the wounded and dead;
those arriving in the cutters and row boats [i.e. those disembarked from the
fleet sweepers] were simply killed en masse, helplessly, as they stood
there. Their bodies tipped grotesquely over the sides, like mechanical
acrobats, their boats, unhelmed and powerless, drifted away from the shore
and sank as they became pierced with bullet holes.
The few who got away found shelter beneath a ridge of ground below the
castle walls; and in the madness of desperation the dead were flung from the
gangway of the River Clyde so that more men could be poured out to wade
ashore and be killed in their turn. It was if the men themselves had found
the whole situation unbelievable, as if by storming ashore hour after hour
they could change it, vanquish the defenders by sheer weight of numbers if
nothing else ... But the defences were apparently impregnable. The machine
guns mounted behind sandbangs in the bows of the River Clyde found no mark.
The entrenched Turks spat out their bullets at the faintest sign of
movement. By 0930 hours, of 1 500 men who had attempted to land only 200 had
reached cover. No spirit of conquest could overcome the fact that no more
could be done.’
A large proportion of the casualties was sustained whilst endeavouring to
position the River Clyde’s lighters together to form a causeway onto the
beach. (This objective was attained at 07h07.) Brig Gen H.E. Napier,
commanding the main force, had waited in the Clacton whilst the covering
force tried to land. He approached the River Clyde in a watertight boat
together with his staff and a number of soldiers. He leapt into the grounded
Argyle to lead the men ashore whom he observed choking the lighters, boats
and gangways, not realizing that they were all dead. He and his Brigade
Major (J.H.D. Costeker) were soon killed (as was Lt Col Rooth of the
covering force). On 26 April the survivors of the force from the River Clyde
stormed the village. The Turkish contingent defending V Beach, under Sgt
Yahja of Ezine, was annihilated.
Six Victoria Crosses were gained by members of the River Clyde’s forces,
viz. Cdr E. Unwin (commanding the ship); Midshipman G.L. Drewry (commanding
the motor hopper); Able Seaman C. Williams (who was killed and gained the
award posthumously); Able Seaman G.M. Samson (the first RNR rating to gain
the VC); Midshipman W. Malleson; and Sub Lt A.W. St Clair Tisdall (Officer
Commanding 1 Platoon, Anson Battalion, RND). The actions which were rewarded
with this decoration were involved either with the rescue of wounded troops
amidst the carnage or endeavours to secure the lighters between the River
Clyde and the shore. Tisdall was subsequently killed in the Second Battle of
Krithia on 6 May (cf. below) and his VC was gazetted posthumously.
On W Beach the brunt of the fighting was borne by the Lancashire Fusiliers
(who sustained 533 casualties, of whom six officers and 183 men were
killed). As was the case with V Beach, the heavy casualties inflicted
emanated from the Turkish forces whom, it was mistakenly assumed, had been
annihilated by the naval bombardment. The barbed wire, which had remained
intact despite the bombardment, compounded the problems besetting the
attackers. The Turkish defenders had been decimated but the survivors of the
bombardment remained in their trenches. Their orders were to allow the
invaders to land and advance within 41 m before opening fire. The Turks
realized with satisfaction that the thick wire entanglements at the edge of
the beach remained untouched by the barrage. As the first boatload of
Fusiliers scraped onto the beach the defenders opened fire. The men fell as
they sprang from the boats, rifles in hand. Their comrades who had
miraculously escaped the devastating fire attacked the wire with machetes
and cutters; but the wire would not yield. To quote the words of one
writer:(8)
‘Caught by hands and arms in the barbs they died spread-eagled on the
three-feet coils of rusty farm fencing, their screams heard above the
ceaseless fire, their blood pouring down the beach. At one point the wire
was breached and a dozen men broke through and tore for the cover of the
dunes; and while the Turkish defenders concentrated their incessant firing
on the fresh boatloads of men arriving — many of whom died in the packed
boats without ever setting foot to shore — there were a few other
breakthroughs by the Fusiliers. But they were mown down as they ran for
cover and failed to reach the summit of the beach.’
Reinforcements were off-loaded from the Euryalus and sent in cutters to the
beach. Brig Gen Hare, in command of the Helles covering force, managed to
lead the survivors of the carnage to a relatively sheltered position under
Tekke Burnu. From here they could return the Turks’ fire, which was
gradually subdued whilst the boatloads of reinforcements from Euryalus
accumulated and consolidated the landing. The Lancashire Fusiliers gained
eleven awards for gallantry; six Victoria Crosses, two Distinguished Service
Orders, two Military Crosses and one Distinguished Conduct Medal.
Y Beach, which, as was the case with S Beach, protected the flank of the
invading force, was captured on 25 April by a force consisting of 1 Kings
Own Scottish Borderers, one company of the South Wales Borderers and the
Plymouth (Marine) Battalion, RND. They were conveyed in the battleship
Goliath and the cruisers Sapphire and Amethyst. The landing was largely
unopposed. A golden opportunity was missed with regard to Y Beach. Cdre
Keyes realized that this unopposed landing promised success to Hamilton’s
plan to land 2 000 troops (the spearhead of 29th Division) in this position
for a thrust inland that would cut off the Cape Helles defenders in the
rear. Keyes begged de Robeck to persuade Hamilton to send at once for the
RND, which was committed to nothing more than a feint at Suvla Bay, and land
them at Y Beach, thus completely swamping the Turkish defenders. Hamilton,
however, resolutely refused to do so. Not only was he loath to commit his
only reserve, but would not countenance the ungentlemanly act of interfering
with his subordinate commander, Hunter-Weston. The invading force on this
beach did not remain unopposed, however. During the afternoon of 25 April
the Turkish sniping escalated into fierce attacks. The British casualties
(which included Lt Col A.S. Coe, OC of the force, who was mortally wounded)
became serious. The position became untenable and the force was evacuated
after nightfall. Despite the heroism displayed and the service rendered in
stalling a larger Turkish force for 24 hours, the effort at Y Beach proved a
failure.
The landings at X and S Beaches presented a marked contrast to those at V
and W Beaches. Two companies of the Royal Fusiliers had landed at X Beach
without a single casualty at 06h30 after an intense naval bombardment and
scaled the shallow cliff. From the summit they could see right across the
peninsula to S Beach at Morto Bay, where a covering force of South Wales
Borderers had easily overcome the slight opposition and was now digging in.
Thus, at this point in time (i.e. early in the morning of 25 April) the main
attacks at V and W Beaches on the tip of the peninsula had been halted and
could not recover their momentum, while on the flanks at X, S and Y three
smaller forces had been successfully landed. At Bulair, on 24—25 April the
RND executed its diversionary movement. Accompanied by the battleship
Canopus, the light cruisers Dartmouth and Doris, plus destroyers and
trawlers, the Division (minus Anson Battalion, detailed for V Beach and W
Beach, and the Plymouth (Marine) Battalion landed at Y Beach) had left
Trebuki Bay, Skyros, early on 24 April. They reached their rendevouz 8,5 km
WSW from Xeros Island under cover of darkness. During this manoeuvre a
singularly gallant action was executed by Lt Cdr Bernard Freyberg of Hood
Battalion. Painted brown and thickly oiled, he was lowered into the water
from a destroyer and swam ashore with a raft carrying flares. Landing on the
beach at midnight on 24 April, he crawled 365 m up to a trench and then
heard voices, thus proving that the trenches were occupied. Returning to the
beach unnoticed he lit three sets of flares 320 m apart along the shore in
the direction of Bulair. Two destroyers at once opened fire, which the Turks
returned. Freyberg then swam out and was picked up one hour later,
unscathed.(9)
The ANZAC landings were made shortly before dawn, and with surprisingly
little opposition. However, this initial light opposition mainly derived
from the fact that the landings had been made in the wrong place. It was
concentrated 3 km north of Gaba Tepe at An Burnu instead of being extended
along the cove dividing Gaba Tepe from Hell Spit. Many reasons for this
error have been suggested, e.g. northerly eddies that swept the boats off
course; misinterpreted signals; last minute alterations to the plan;
deliberate misplacement of a marker buoy by the Turks. Whilst it is
profitless to examine these factors in depth, it is apposite to comment that
upon this error pivoted one of the major disasters of the first landings. It
was Mustapha Kemal who was principally responsible for this Allied disaster.
To reiterate, he had his 19th Division in reserve at Boghali. Sanders
ordered him to repel the ANZAC attack with a single battalion; that was at
06h30 in the morning. Kemal realized at once the strategic error of trying
to beat off the enemy with one battalion; for once the ANZACs were
established in the hills they would be masters of the situation, since
domination of the heights was of the utmost importance. Kemal therefore
decided without hesitation — and without permission — to employ his entire
division for the task. A profound risk was involved, as Sanders had no other
reserves to call upon, but it ultimately proved to be justified. The day’s
fighting ended in confusion and withdrawal for the ANZACs. The narrow front
on which they had been mistakenly landed in the morning proved to be a
disastrous bottleneck, through which no troops or supplies could be landed
nor the wounded evacuated. Utter chaos prevailed at the beach at An Burnu;
and in the surrounding hills, where the fighting was fiercest, the isolated
detachments into which the ANZACs had dispersed could not be properly
rallied and controlled. Lt Gen Birdwood sent an immediate request to
Hamilton to be allowed to re-embark his demoralized forces. In reply to this
request Hamilton sent his famous message of encouragement, telling Birdwood
to appeal to his Australians and New Zealanders to ‘dig,dig,dig’. By the
time this message arrived it was midnight and Birdwood had already changed
his mind and ordered his men to dig themselves in and be prepared for a
counter-attack in the morning.
To reiterate, Y Beach was evacuated at nightfall on 25 April, the defenders
having suffered some 700 casualties. At Kum Kale a withdrawal was effected
during the day. Although hesitantly authorized by Hamilton, it was quite
unnecessary. The French landing had been made against inadequate resistance
and confused organization on the part of the Turks. The Turks had been
crushed by the French onslaught and were in total confusion. So, apparently,
was the mind of the French commander, Gen d’Amade. Surpremely ignorant of
the fact that the Turks in the vicinity of Kum Kale had suffered over 2 000
casualties and were surrendering in their hundreds, he persuaded Hamilton to
re-embark the French forces. By the time that Hamilton realized the true
state of affairs (on the evening of 26 April) the withdrawal was almost
complete and arrangements were being made to switch a French brigade to
enter on the right of 29th Division.
Aftermath of the Landings
The ensuing two days witnessed a grim striving for possession of the inland
hills, both at An Burnu and further down the cape. The ANZACs, halted in
their plea for re-embarkation by Birdwood’s change of heart and fortified by
Hamilton’s message of encouragement, had advanced slightly and recaptured
some of the ground that they had lost on 25 April. However, neither they nor
the Turks could wrest a decisive result from the desperate forays and
repulses that resulted only in heavier losses. In Cape Helles the village of
Sedd-el-Bahr was captured, but the advantage of the victory was lost because
no one on the British side realized the extreme weakness of the enemy forces
in this sector. Within this context it should be noted that a crucial factor
throughout the early stages of the Gallipoli Campaign was the total lack of
intelligence regarding the Turkish strength. Numerically large British
forces were being poured into breaches that were often held by isolated and
ill-disciplined Turkish platoons and companies. In point of fact an army of
75 000 was virtually held at bay by a tenth of that number of defenders.
Moreover, those defenders were poorly equipped and fighting in a terrain
that posed as many difficulties for them as for the invaders.
The ensuing two days also saw physical and moral exhaustion taking their
toll. Bureaucratic mismanagement and incredible stupidity had resulted in
utter chaos in the evacuation of the wounded — to the extent that fully
equipped hospital ships and hospitals in the peninsula remained unused
whilst the casualties were being shipped back to Alexandria in filthy
transports in which, lacking attention, many died. Those being fed into the
firing line were confronted with the sight of wounded lying in scores on the
beaches awaiting evacuation.
On the morning of 28 April the Allied forces in Cape Helles extended in a
straggling line across the peninsula from X to S Beach, a line which had
been achieved at the cost of 10 000 casualties. Hunter Weston gave the order
to advance forward to capture Krithia. A force of 14 000 men, inadequately
supported by artillery of which only 25 guns were ashore, pushed forward
into the hills. They were opposed by an increasingly tenacious resistance
that by the end of that day had inflicted upon the Allies 3 000 casualties.
Complete confusion now reigned due to hopeless planning and complete loss of
control by Hunter-Weston. Supplies were placed in jeopardy by a storm at sea
and because insufficient horses and mules were ashore to transport them to
the front. Liaison between the generals and admirals was ruined by
misinterpreted messages and poor communications. Moreover, a large-scale
Turkish counter-attack was hourly awaited on the Helles front where a
shortage of ammunition was already being felt. Kitchener had been misled by
Hamilton’s over-optimistic despatches. (These, indeed, were to remain a
consistent feature of Hamilton’s command throughout the Gallipoli Campaign.
His reports were of a consistently more confident tone than the facts
warranted; Hamilton reasoning that, if they were too depressing, they would
be seized upon by those in London who wished to see the entire Campaign
abandoned). Hamilton had sent a despatch to Kitchener in London on 26 April
which stated:
‘Thanks to God who calmed the seas and to the Royal Navy who rowed our
fellows ashore as cooly as if at a regatta; thanks also to the dauntless
spirit shown by all ranks of both services, we have landed 29 000 upon six
beaches in the face of desperate resistance.’
On 27 April his despatches were of a more cheerful hue, as is evidenced by
this following extract:
‘Thanks to the weather and the wonderfully fine spirit of our troops all
continues to go well.’
However, in the light of these over-optimistic despatches Kitchener was
undoubtedly bewildered to receive a hesitant request from Hamilton for
reinforcements ‘in case I should need them’. Surprisingly, in view of his
previous reluctance to weaken Gen Maxwell’s forces in Egypt, Kitchener
ordered Maxwell to despatch the 42nd (East Lancashire) Territorial Division
to Gallipoli.
The direct consequence of the strategic disasters of 25 April was the
painful and totally futile series of battles of attrition, which
characterized both the Helles and ANZAC fronts during the ensuing three
months. Between the initial landings and the end of July the Allied forces
in Gallipoli generated a sick, mirror image of the conflict on the Western
Front in Europe, manifested by futile attacks upon entrenched Turkish
positions followed by enemy counter-attacks. On the Helles front the Allies
concentrated their main efforts against the heights of Achi Baba on the
southern tip of the peninsula. The efforts to break through the Turkish
defences situated on the inland hills barring the objective expressed
themselves in the four battles of Krithia, viz.
1st Battle of Krithia — 28 April
2nd Battle of Krithia — 6/8 May
3rd Battle of Krithia — 4/6 June
4th Battle of Krithia — 12/13 July (officially known as the Battle of Achi
Baba Nullah)
The responsibility for the futile frontal assaults which characterized these
actions must lie with Hunter-Weston. Hamilton saw no future in such costly
attacks (in which the Allies were hampered by a most serious deficiency in
artillery), but failed to impress his views upon Hunter-Weston and his
staff.
Towards the end of July Hunter-Weston was sent home, suffering from
overstrain and sunstroke, leaving the army at Helles in a state of almost
complete exhaustion. Since the beginning of July the Allies had gained (very
approximately) 457 m of ground in return for 17 000 casualties. (The
ultimate casualties sustained by the Allies in the course of the entire
campaign may be approximately assessed at 265 000, of whom some 46 000 were
killed in action, in return for some 300 000 Turkish dead.) Turkish
casualties for the same period amounted to some 40 000, but reinforcements
were continually arriving, and within a week of Achi Baba Nullah they had
made good their losses and consolidated their positions. Sanders was adamant
that, despite the heavy Turkish losses, there should be no withdrawal, and
any officer suggesting such was liable to dismissal.
The ANZAC Front: May 1915
Throughout this period the Dominion forces clung tenaciously to the 400
acres of the parched, scrubby coast that was ANZAC. Their bridgehead was in
the shape of a narrow triangle, with its base, extending for approximately
three km resting on the sea, and its apex reaching to the slopes of Sari
Bair, some 914 m inland; a position later described in the Australian
official history as ‘theoretically untenable’. Kemal’s initial tactics —
bloody and unimaginative — were to hurl his infantry suicidally against the
ANZAC positions, where they were mown down by the Dominion troops, and by
the British Marine battalions who arrived at ANZAC on 28—29 April. Turkish
losses were, predictably, terrible. After six days and nights of continual
fighting the majority of Turkish battalions were below half-strength, losses
among officers and NCOs being particularly severe. Essad, therefore, forbade
any further frontal attacks for the immediate future. The battle developed
into a struggle for the head of the Monash Valley, where the ANZAC positions
at Pope’s Hill, and at Quinn’s, Courtney’s and Steele’s Posts faced the
Turks at distances, in some places, of no more than a few metres. In the
rear of Quinn’s, Courtenay’s and Steele’s Posts the ground dropped away
sharply, so that troops moving up to these posts could be exposed to the
Turkish fire from the enemy positions at
the Nek, Baby 700 and Pope’s Post,
known as the ‘Chessboard’ (Map 2). On the other hand the Australians
positioned at Pope’s Post could prevent an attack from the Nek or the
Chessboard, and were protected in turn by the troops on Russell’s Top and
Quinn’s Post.
New arrivals at ANZAC landed beneath a hail of shrapnel, amidst scenes of
indescribable confusion. Stores were heaped on the beaches; mules waited to
ferry them to the front line; casualties awaited embarkation; reinforcements
awaited direction to their sector of the line. Ashmead Bartlett, The Times
war correspondent, wrote: ‘The whole scene on ANZAC beach reminded one
irresistably of a gigantic shipwreck. It looked as if the whole force and
all the guns and material had not landed, but had been washed ashore.
Gradually, however, order emerged from this chaos as the organization at the
beacheads began to function more smoothly. Nevertheless, water was severely
rationed, every drop having to be carried to the front lines. (One officer
recorded having to use a pint a day for all washing purposes.) Food,
although plentiful, was as monotonous as on the Helles front, being equally
unsuitable for the climate. Sanitary conditions were literally appalling;
latrines consisting merely of holes in the ground, where the flies bred
ceaselessly. By the second week in May the ANZACs had lost 8 500 men, of
whom 2 300 had been killed. Many units urgently required rest and
re-organization, and the Dominion troops were compelled to revert to
defence, digging in and making their positions secure against attack. There
could be no question of an advance and, indeed, Hamilton asked Birdwood on 9
May to consider abandoning the bridgehead. Birdwood refused, and the ANZACs
clung to their precarious positions.
The Turks finally recognized not only that the ANZACs were not going to be
dislodged from their tenaciously held positions but also that their own
lines were impregnable. Accordingly, they reduced their forces in the area,
which thenceforth became characterized by shelling, sniping and fierce
skirmishes.
The ANZAC’s commander, Lt Gen Birdwood was, justly, described by Hamilton as
‘the soul of ANZAC’. His attention to detail and the example set by his own
personal courage deserves the highest praise, as does his acknowledgement
that ‘these colonials’ could not be treated in the same fashion as British
troops. The New Zealander, Col Malone, described them as‘masterless men
going their own ways’. They frequently disconcerted visiting Staff Officers
by their indifference to conventional military ritual, such as the salute.
Birdwood’s realization that the natural aggressiveness and fighting spirit
of the Dominion troops needed to be tempered by the caution and discipline
of British Army tradition if the narrow bridgehead were to be held also
merits the highest commendation. However, although he knew his men well,
with their abilities and limitations, his manner towards them remained
constrained and formal, with an obvious forced affability; he remained very
much the Englishman leading ‘colonials’.
Deepening despair
During June and July the heat became unbearable. The flies swarmed from the
corpses and latrines over the men's food. Not surprisingly, dysentry became
endemic throughout the Expeditionary Force in July, being particularly
serious at ANZAC, where at one point Birdwood was losing as many men in a
fortnight through disease as would be lost in a major attack. Sgn Gen
Birrell, in charge of medical services for the campaign, did nothing to
raise the low level of confidence in the staff when he suggested that the
remedy resided in the hanging of fly paper from bushes and incineration of
the breeding grounds of the flies. This impression that he did not fully
appreciate the situation was reinforced when he visited ANZAC for the first
time on 1 August and reported ‘a good deal of diarrhoea among the
Australians, possibly due to sea bathing’. Helles was, however, rather more
free of disease than ANZAC, since in the former sector the troops were not
living in such crowded conditions, and 29th Division was accompanied by its
own sanitary detachments and provided with fly proof latrine boxes. The
ubiquitous lice were yet another pest, tireless and ever-multiplying. In his
vivid diary of the campaign Cpl Riley wrote: ‘We itched and scratched until
we were tired with scratching, we turned our clothes inside out and ran the
burning ends of cigarettes up the seams. The crackle of frizzled louse was
one of the sweetest sounds we knew.’ Men lay their clothing out on anthills
so that the ants might eat the lice, shaking the clothes free afterwards;
but still the lice multiplied relentlessly.
In these circumstances it was not surprising that profound disillusion
spread throughout the Army. This despair was compounded by the enormous
casualties sustained on both Allied fronts. (Egerton, who commanded the 52nd
(Lowland) Division, which arrived in late June-early July, was appalled at
the losses among his men incurred during the Gully Ravine offensive, and
made known his views to both Hamilton and Hunter-Weston. He accompanied the
former on an inspection of his division, introducing each battalion as ‘the
remains of -th Battalion’, and earning a formal rebuke from Hamilton.) Both
officers and men looked upon themselves in the same light as did the 14th
Army in Burma prior to the arrival of Mountbatten, i.e. as the ‘forgotten
army’ betrayed by the politicians at home. Moreover, front-line criticism of
GHQ became widespread, with a great deal of justification; the standard of
senior officers was poor, many having to be sent home with shattered nerves
after only a few weeks. However, the most intense resentment of the troops
at Gallipoli was reserved for the lines-of-communication staff at Mudros
whose task, undertaken with lamentable inefficiency, was to supply the Army
with its daily needs. The lines-of-communication staff was inadequate in
terms of both numbers and quality; and a greater burden thus fell upon the
few efficient men. One officer, for example, was responsible for
administering the temporary hospital ships, the shore hospitals at Lemnos,
the ferry service from Mudros to the peninsula, the return of casualties to
their units, and the despatch of medical supplies. To execute these duties
he possessed a total complement of one staff sergeant. It is little wonder,
therefore, that the troops spoke scornfully of ‘Imbros, Mudros and Chaos.’
By the end of July the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force had been fought to
a standstill. The ANZACs had been unable to break out of their tiny
bridgehead; the French forces were effectively broken; the sole British
division remaining with anything resembling fighting strength was the 29th
Division. Cpl Riley wrote of Helles in terms that were equally applicable to
ANZAC: it ‘looked like a midden and smelled like an open cemetery’.
Only the failure of the Suvla Bay offensive of August 1915, and the
destruction of the artificial expectations which motivated it, separated the
Allied forces from the admission of defeat and final evacuation. (The
evacuation followed the dismissal of Hamilton in October 1915.)
Analysis of the Failure of the Gallipoli Campaign
Instrumental in the delays which weighted the odds against Hamilton’s force
(but not decisively so, cf. below) was the failure of the naval assaults
which occurred in February-March 1915. As intimated above, the root of this
failure was the clear lack of any real understanding of the concept of
combined operations by the higher command. The naval assaults of
February-March 1915 and the landings of April 1915 clearly reflected a
division of functions between Army and Navy. Had the two operations been
combined in a closely co-ordinated and precisely planned operation, the
opportunity provided to the Turks to strengthen their defences, during the
period 18 March — 25 April would not have existed. It should be noted that
it was only on 25 March that Enver Pasha at last decided to form a separate
army for the defence of the Dardanelles and place Sanders in command of it.
However, such a concept of combined operations — only falteringly and
indecisively approached during the naval assaults of February-March — was
clearly beyond the scope of the military technology of the period. As
discussed above, further disastrous delays were imposed by the Allied force
having to be concentrated in Egypt, due to disastrous failures in logistical
planning.
In view of these factors, can one state that the invasion of April 1915 was
doomed? The answer must be in the negative. It should be borne in mind that
the Turkish forces defending the Dardanelles only numbered five divisions in
the entire area. These forces, moreover, had no knowledge of the precise
location of the landing zones. As Sanders himself later wrote:
‘From the many pale faces of the officers reporting in the morning of 25
April it became apparent that, although a hostile landing had been expected
with certainty, a landing at so many points surprised and filled them with
apprehension because we could not discern at that moment where the enemy
were actually seeking the decision.’
These comments clearly illuminate the superior quality of Hamilton’s
strategic concept. By avoiding the anticipated approach and distracting the
enemy’s attention from the actual approach, Hamilton assured his own troops
of an immense superiority of force at the actual landing points, although
his overall force was smaller than that of the Turks.
Hamilton’s achievement in this respect is all the more noteworthy when one
considers that the Turks possessed the most detailed and extensive
intelligence of the Allied invasion, as has been discussed above. He so
fixed the Turkish Commander-in-Chief’s attention and person on the feint
assault at Bulair that the Turkish defenders at the main points of attack
were denied reinforcements for two days. The ANZAC landings, despite the
problems attached to them, placed 4 000 men by surprise, before 05h00, and a
further 4 000 before 08h00, on a shore defended by only one Turkish company.
The supporting Turkish company was more than a kilometre to the south,
whilst the two battalions and one battery in local reserve were located six
km inland, and the general reserve of eight battalions and three batteries
still further distant. At Y Beach 2 000 men of 29th Division had been safely
disembarked without any enemy opposition whatsoever. There they were left
entirely undisturbed by the Turks, whom they outnumbered by at least six to
one, for eleven hours. As one authority(10) states:
‘It is as certain as anything can be in war that a bold advance from Y on
the morning of the 25th must have freed the southern beaches that morning
and secured a decisive victory for the 29th Division,’
In his planning of the April offensive Hamilton revealed a clearer concept
of combined operations than any of his colleagues, in so far as the landings
centred upon a bare equality of force transformed into a potentially
decisive superiority with the assistance of sea power.
However, advantages which could well have proved decisive to the outcome of
the campaign were shattered by the tactical vices of Hamilton’s
subordinates. On 25 April the poor generalship of Hunter-Weston was mainly
responsible for precious strategic assets being totally wasted.
Hunter-Weston completely ignored the appeals of Col Matthews, the commander
of Y Beach force, for reinforcements and rejected Hamilton’s offers of
trawlers in which to land them. Thus, through inept generalship, the Y Beach
landing, which could have been the key to total success, was abandoned the
following morning after it had been held for twenty-nine hours; the force
re-embarked when the Turks had actually been evicted. The ANZAC opportunity
was also lost, as the country was so rough and the troops so inexperienced
that they were bewildered by the sporadic Turkish counter-attacks and were
only prevented from an ignominous evacuation by Hamilton’s famous
‘dig,dig,dig’ message. (However, the ANZAC failure may be attributed more to
lack of training than poor generalship; even the difficulties of ground
might have favoured more than handicapped such skilled skirmishers as the
Australians and New Zealanders were later to become.) This reluctance to
impose his authority — in this case upon Hunter-Weston — was the source of
the fatal and futile offensives in Helles during June and July.
The fundamental responsibility for the overall strategic failure must rest
with Hamilton’s lack of decisive leadership. One writer(11) projects the
following interesting analysis of the fundamental contrast between the
Turkish and Allied Commanders-in-Chief:
‘Liman von Sanders ... gave clear explicit orders to subordinates at crisis
moments in action. When his important lieutenants doubted or questioned the
possibility of success he summarily dismissed them from their commands. A
little iron in the soul of Sir Ian Hamilton might have been better for his
men than was gentlemanly conduct to his officers. Courtesy and decisiveness
need not be contradictory characteristics, but over-scrupulousness and
decisiveness are in opposition ... he must follow his own accurate surmise
that his forces would be lightly opposed in the area he had selected for his
main attack, and must bear it constantly in mind that this advantage would
diminish with the passage of every second of time. This must have been
obvious to a man of his intelligence. It was he who must ensure that this
transitory advantage must not be wasted. The first 24 hours would be
crucial.’
Thus, the deficiencies in Hamilton’s leadership fundamentally accrued from
personality; and it was this personality defect (a serious problem in a
military commander) which ensured that his subordinate commanders, when
placed in positions which enabled them to effect a decisive result, did not
have their natural indecisive and faulty leadership corrected. It is
certainly true that the April invasion of Gallipoli was conceived in advance
of its time, and that Hamilton’s strategic brilliance was most inadequately
supported by the military technology available to the commanders of World
War I. The appalling logistical mismanagement and maladministration —
applying to both supplies and the evacuation of the wounded — which has been
discussed in some detail above is clear evidence of this; as also is the
reliance upon the Western Front obsession with artillery barrages (in this
instance from ships) to support the invading forces upon an exposed beach,
which resulted in such heavy casualties on V and Y Beaches.(12)
Nevertheless, it is the writer’s contention that, despite the gross
disadvantages in terms of technological resources besetting the invaders
(manifested in the improvised landing craft, for example), Hamilton’s
strategic planning was such that victory could have still been assured on 25
April 1915.
Conclusion
The consequences of the ultimate failure of the Gallipoli offensive may be
justifiably described as monumental. Eventually, when Gallipoli was
abandoned, a total of 400 000 men was still diverted from France as a
defence against the new activities of lesser enemies, viz. in Palestine and
Mesopotamia against Turkey set free from Gallipoli involvement; and in
Salonika and Greece (‘the largest allied internment camp of the war’ was the
popular description applied to this theatre, in which the Allied forces were
dubbed ‘the gardeners of Salonika’) against Bulgaria. The Allies also
sacrificed a small ally — Serbia — and, of far greater consequence
ultimately, their largest ally, Russia. The failure to redress the strategic
isolation of Tsarist Russia by securing communication with her via the Sea
of Marmara and the Black Sea imposed intolerable strains upon the Russian
war machine (which depended upon a largely undeveloped agricultural
economy), ultimately resulting in the revolutions of 1917. What the success
of the campaign would have meant, at the most conservative appreciation, to
the Franco-British cause is best revealed in the words of the German
commander, Falkenhayn:
‘If the straits between the Mediterranean and the Black Sea were not
permanently closed to Entente traffic, all hopes of a successful issue to
the war would be very seriously diminished. Russia would have been freed
from her isolation which ... offered a safer guarantee than military success
... that the forces of this Titan would eventually and automatically be
crippled.’
Footnotes
1. Monick, S. ‘The Naval Struggle for the Dardanelles Straits’, Military
History Journal Vol 6 No 3 1984 pp. 73-77.
2. Ibid., pp. 73-85.
3. Wykes, A. First landings in Gallipoli in History of the First World War
(London, Purnell) Vol 2 p. 762.
4. Ibid., p. 765.
5. Sanders was offered, and accepted, command of the 5th Army on 24 March
1915.
6. Wykes, A. First landings in Gallipoli in History of the First World War
(London, Purnell) Vol 2 p. 767.
7. Ibid., p. 772.
8. Ibid., p. 771.
9. Bernard Cyril Freyberg, a New Zealander, was destined to have a most
distinguished career in World War 1. He was awarded the Distinguished
Service Order for his actions at Bulair. Between 1915 and 1917 he commanded
the Hood Battalion. As a Lieutenant Colonel in the Grenadier Guards he was
awarded the Victoria Cross for his actions on the Western Front (gazetted 16
December 1917). He subsequently commanded 173 Infantry Brigade in 58
Division in 1917 and 88 Infantry Brigade in 29 Division in 1918-1919. He was
awarded a Bar to his DSO for most conspicuous bravery and devotion to duty
in France. He was also made a Commander of the Order of St Michael and St
George (CMG), awarded the Croix de Guerre, and ended the war as a Brigadier
General. During World War II Freyberg commanded Allied forces in Crete and,
later, the New Zealand Corps in Tunisia and at Cassino.
10. Liddell Hart, B. ‘Gallipoli: judgement’, History of the First World War
(London, Purnell) Vol 3 p. 1139.
11. Schurman, D. Suvla Bay in History of the First World War (London,
Purnell) Vol 3, pp. 1050-1051.
12. It is a tragic irony that many of the lives lost on V Beach could have
been saved had the commanders employed the ‘Beetle’ for this purpose. This
armoured landing craft was ready for use by 1915. There were no exposed
gangways, as on the River Clyde. On the approach to the beach the mast could
be removed and stowed inside the hull; the landing tackle would only be put
up as the vessel approached the landing zone.
Bibliography
Bean, C.W. Official history of Australia in the war (London, Angus &
Robertson, 1921) Vols 1-2.
Masefield, J. Gallipoli (London, William Heinemann 1935).
Moorhead, A. Gallipoli (London, Hamish Hamilton 1956).
Rhodes, James R. Gallipoli (London, B.T. Batsford 1965).
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