22nd April 1915

[michaeldr]

“Thursday, April 22. – Presumably the expedition starts to-day, about four o’clock I understand, if the weather has moderated enough. [The weather did not moderate, and the landing was delayed until the 25th.] I shall see the transports pass and we will follow later. It seems a perfectly desperate undertaking. I can hardly expect to see many of my men alive again. My present feeling is that the whole thing has been bungled. The Navy should never have started the bombardment without the Army. Now there has been no bombardment for some weeks. Meanwhile the Turks, under German direction, have perfected their defences. The aerial reconnaissance reports acres of barbed wire, labyrinths of trenches, concealed guns, maxims and howitzers everywhere. The ground is mined. In fact, everything conceivable has been done. Our men have to be towed in little open boats to land in the face of all this. Of course their landing will be covered by the Navy. But I simply dread the first few days. I felt so miserable saying good-bye. However, I don’t suppose it can be much worse than what has been going on in France. Slaughter seems to be inevitable. We had a printed message form Hunter-Weston, our Divisional General yesterday. He said the eyes of the world are on us, and we must be prepared to face heavy losses by bullets, shells, mines, and drowning. Cheery, isn’t it? People’s eyes seem perfectly open. My brigade is to land first. At least three-quarters, it seems to me, will probably be casualties the first day. They are quite prepared for it. I feel very gloomy about it all at the present moment. One thing I feel certain of, and this is that the men will do their duty and cover themselves with glory, even if they are to be exterminated; and even if they had gone to France it would have been the same. Extermination is going on everywhere, and nothing can stop it now.

I held a service in the saloon in the evening, and a number of men and officers came.”

from ‘With the Twenty-Ninth Division in Gallipoli’ by Rev. O. Creighton

[PhilB]

Who would have been responsible for the timing of the naval bombardment, Michael? Army or Navy? Phil B

[michaeldr]

“The Navy should never have started the bombardment without the Army. Now there has been no bombardment for some weeks. Meanwhile the Turks, under German direction, have perfected their defences.”

Phil,

The short answer is the Navy. For here I take it that the good Reverend is referring to the Navy’s bombardment of the forts which, they started at the turn of the year under the mistaken impression that they could handle everything by themselves, with the army only necessary for the occupation of territory already gained by their intimidation of the Ottoman Turks. The Navy’s first set back was the enemy’s use of mobile batteries on land, quickly followed by his expert mine-laying in the Straits. Only then did they call in the Army to do the job for them, by tackling the forts from the landward side.

The British O.H. [vol I, p.160] makes a similar point to the chaplain's, by quoting the Germans, Liman von Sanders and his orderly officer Major Prigge;

“The English”, wrote Liman, “allowed us four good weeks of respite for all this work before their great disembarkation…………This respite just sufficed for the most indispensable measures to be taken.”

“A month earlier”, wrote his German orderly officer “might have been fatal to the defenders.”

Regards

Michael D.R.