British casualties Salonika 1915-18

[Nikolay]

Greetings from rainy Sofia,

Could anybody provide me the official statistics of the British servicemen, who were either killed, died of wounds, were wounded or went missing in action during Salonika campaign 1915-18. I would greatly appreciate also any info on casualties on the British site during both battles at Doiran. Thanks in advance!

Best wishes

Nikolay

[themonsstar]

Hi Nikolay

Macedonia 1915-18.

UK Killed Wounded POW

9,700 16,300 2,600.

France 30,500.

Serbia 19,400.

Greece 26,000.

Italy 8,400.

Russia 3,100.

All from the World War 1 Databook by John Ellis & Michael Cox.

[Malcolm]

Nicolay,

To add to the above.

More men died from disease than from battle. A lot died from Malaria contracted from the mosquitoes of the Vardar River marshes.

Aye

Malcolm

[awakefield]

Hi Nikolay

Here's a bit more infor regarding British Salonika Force casualties.

Non-battle casualties (illness, disease etc) = 481,262, of which 162,517 were victims of malaria. Obviously these are not all different individuals, many, especially the malaria victims, went through the hospital system a number of times and on each occasion were recorded as a 'new' casualty.

In total the non-battle casualties were approx 20 times the level of battle casualties.

For the 2 Battles of Doiran I have the following figures:

1st Doiran: British casualties = 5024, Bulgar casualties = 1344

2nd Doiran: British casualties = 3155 (Greek cas = 3948), Bulgar casualties = 2,726

The British totals combine to make 34.5% of total battle casualties suffered by the BSF during the campaign.

All figures from the two volumes of the British Official History.

Regards

ALAN

[PFF]

I think it was AJP Taylor WW I History about how half a million UK servicemen were staioned in Salonika to contain the Bulgarains (who wern't Moving anywhere)

The Germans Referered to Salonika as thir "biggest Concentration camp" of UK Servicemen (World War I usage)

THE CWGC Debt of Honour Register lists:

Salonika (Lambet Road) Military Cemetery Greece

1,648 buried/commerated + 45 Bulgarian + 1 Serbain war grave

1,680 ID

For reference only-copyrigthed

[aconnolly]

Nikolay

Figures from the Official British Medical Statistics volume.

Battle Casualties for UK & Dominions:

Officers killed 145, died of wounds 76, missing 74, POW 7 Wounded not dead 855

Other Ranks killed 2652, DOW 1223, missing 1510, POW 1187, Wounded 16033

I assume most of the missing were ultimately classified as dead

Non-Battle Casualties (ie illness & non-battle injury)

Officers dead 76, sick or injuried (not dead) 13,767

Other Ranks dead 3668, sick or injured (not dead) 463,751, total for all as given by Alan above

Ave Ration Strength UK & Dominions, Indian , Local labour:

1915: 60,889, Indian Troops Nil, Local Labour not recorded

1916: 123,394, Indian 2616 local labour not recorded

1917: 182,583, Indian 2108, local labour 17,574

1918: 128,747, Indian 3792 local labour 27,408

Total casualties all members of force:

Battle 23,787

Non-battle: 502,543

Regards

Andrew

[Nikolay]

I would like to thank all and everyone of you for the help I received!

As for Bulgarian casualties in total the most reliable numbers are

between 14 October 1915 and 30 September 1918

died (KIA, died of wounds and deceases)

101 253 all ranks

wounded

264 000

Unaccounted missing(probably KIA)

17 000

Taken prisoners until 30 September 1918:

around 20 000 men

According to the terms of Salonika armistice 86 475 men of all ranks were held by the Allies as "hostages" after the armistice, of which died of deseases in the POW camps in Serbia and Greece 1919-1920: 2 officers and 2 169 other ranks. All of them were fighting to the last day of war - 30 September 1918 and were not POW until Bulgaria signed the Armistice. No wonder they saw their sending to the Allies as hostages as a sort of betrayal on the part of Bulgarian government (frankly- the government had no choice...)

In total 1 030 000 Bulgarians served in the Army during the Great war.

Many thanks again and best regards