Armoured Trains

[centurion]

My information came from an Australian's diary in which he mentioned a Turkish armoured train exchanging fire with the Royal Navy. Could there have been a railway in the early part of the campaign but destroyed by naval gunfire and not reinstated?

[Rockdoc]

This Austro-Hungarian map appears to show a railway line along the peninsula from Gallipoli town to the tip at Seddul Bahr. The information at the bottom of the index page says that the map was last revised in 1916.

Keith

[bob lembke]

My information came from an Australian's diary in which he mentioned a Turkish armoured train exchanging fire with the Royal Navy. Could there have been a railway in the early part of the campaign but destroyed by naval gunfire and not reinstated?

On the European side, which is what people usually think of when thinking of Gallipoli, there was no railroad for 100 km or more. It makes sense, as there was little population in the area, and that mostly ethnic Greeks, who seem to have been sent away. But I have read the accounts of many approach marches and re-supply efforts, and there is no mention of a railroad in the area, but many accounts of de-training many km away and approaching by marches. (Also have never read mention of a Turkish armored train anywhere, but admittedly they can be fabricated. The entire Turkish rail situation was dismal and was a big problem to their war effort.) There were long columns of camels, and of ox-carts. Sometimes re-supply or reenforcements were brought by steamer, but these were sometimes sunk by Allied (mostly British) subs that were able to get thru the Narrows. The Goeben dismounted two of its 15 cm guns of its secondary battery and 15 cm ammunition for same from its magazines, only to have them sunk by a British sub as a steamer was taking them to Gallipoli. A rail line from the east would have been a great help. I have read an account of the father of an Istanbul middle-class family being drafted to fight at Gallipoli, being issued very ill-fitting boots, and then literally being marched to death on the approach march of his unit to Gallipoli, his feet broke down so badly that he died of his foot injuries. My father told me that the water they had at Gallipoli had been carried for days in goat-skins on camel-back in the summer sun; it was black and vile, and Europeans could only drink it if it was heavily laced with oil of peppermint, which the Germans brought with them.

My wife has read one or more memoires by Australian soldiers at Gallipoli (she mentioned one just a day ago), and she sometimes chuckles about them. She has mentioned that they mentioned that Allied soldiers bathing at the Gallipoli beaches were sometimes eaten by sea monsters, and also that the Egyptian pyramids were built with the aid of trained dinasours. So an armored train in an area where there is no rail for 100 km would fit right in. More seriously, as I know a fair amount about the Turkish/Hunnish side, as I have read everything that I can find on that side, mostly in German, a bit in French, and for three painful days attempting the Turkish; as I read the Allied memoires I see many things that I know not to be not true; one common thing was their being shelled by large-caliber guns that the Turks/Germans did not possess.

But this stuff about armored trains and armored rail batteries, and the photos, is fascinating.

Bob

[centurion]

(Also have never read mention of a Turkish armored train anywhere, but admittedly they can be fabricated.

They certainly existed elsewhere

[centurion]

Bob there is both cartographical and photographic evidence of a railway on the Gallopoli Peninsula prior to the landings. Not made up by fanciful or ignorant Aussis as your post suggests. Apart from Rocdoc's map I have found a British map of 1910 showing it. The enclosed link

http://www.anzacs.net/Turkish/Gallipoli-March18.jpg goes to a Turkish photo of Gallipoli taken a month before the landings and the lines are perfectly visible. There is also a photo of the same time showing Turkish soldiers sitting on the lines at a station further down the peninsula.

The line was coastal and would have been easily interdicted by the RN's guns.

[centurion]

Further to the last photo this link http://www.anzacs.net/Turkish/Gallipoli-Rail-tracks.jpg goes to a photo supplied by Evren Isikozlu from Istanbul to an Australian site Anzac Link. The notes on the photo are not mine. The caption was "About 6 miles along the coast from Gallipoli is Kilid Bahir. Obviously, the rail tracks continued along the coast."

The railway must have been relatively new as there were agitations circa 1900 for the building of one to link Gallipoli town to the main Turkish network

[bob lembke]

Bob there is both cartographical and photographic evidence of a railway on the Gallopoli Peninsula prior to the landings. Not made up by fanciful or ignorant Aussis as your post suggests. Apart from Rocdoc's map I have found a British map of 1910 showing it. The enclosed link

http://www.anzacs.net/Turkish/Gallipoli-March18.jpg goes to a Turkish photo of Gallipoli taken a month before the landings and the lines are perfectly visible. There is also a photo of the same time showing Turkish soldiers sitting on the lines at a station further down the peninsula.

The line was coastal and would have been easily interdicted by the RN's guns.

First of all, please specify if the shore/line you mention was along the shore leading to the Sea of Marble or along the Med coast, as per past ANZAC. But I am 95% sure that you mean along the coast leading to Mamara and Istanbul. A line running roughly north to Sulva would be running nowhere.

However, what you picture is some sort of a field railway, perhaps 60 cm, possibly even a smaller gauge. the rail looks like 20 or 25 lb rail. I don't think I even saw any sleepers. (I looked at the pic about three times, but for some reason when I go to the pic I get thrown out of the forum, and I will lose my text if I go there again.) That is not a "railway" or "railroad" in any normal sense of the word. You can not run an armored train, or any sort of real full-gauge train, down that. I think that there may have been a bit of mining on the Penninsula. Whatever ran on that narrow-gauge track most likely was pulled by oxen or other animal power, not by a donkey engine. It may have been put down to facilitate construction of fortifications at the Narrows, running to the several small ports at the north end of the Narrows. In that case the line would have been about five miles long.

Over the last 11 years I have read many books on Gallipoli, mostly on the Turkish side, mostly memoires and other primary sources. They have included several first-person accounts of the approach march, always on foot, and many lengthy discussions of the supply problems, and the available modes of transportation.

"The line was coastal and could have been easily interdicted by the RN's guns." Hardly. Allied ships only once got into the Narrows, and it cost them four battleships. Unless you mean firing from the Med over the Penninsula, with either no or aerial spotting, which was done several times (and also by a Turkish battleship the other way), but against area targets, unlikely to hit a 60 cm target at say 10 miles from seaborne artillery with no or indifferent spotting.

There is a photo of a "station" on that line? Can that be posted? Why would someone build a "station" on such a line? Or, perhaps, there was a standard gauge line at that place. Then there is a chance that an armored train might reach the area. But an armored train at that spot would have nothing to fire on or defend against. The RN never made it to that spot of coast, except for a few submarines.

Also, how would an Australian see what was going on along that stretch of coast? They (nor any other Allied personel, except a few Brit and French submariners, ever got there, or even had line of sight view of it, even from 10 miles away.

Can you give a citation for the Australian's diary? My "Super Librarian" wife (yes, some of her colligues (sp?) wear "Super Librarian" tee-shirts) sits in a library of 8 million books, and has 2-3 day's access to 75-100 million books at about 10-12 major research libraries in the US's north-east, thru a wonderful system called "BorrowDirect". Always on the lookout for another source on Gallipoli, although I am working elsewhere for the moment.

Bob

[bob lembke]

Centurion;

You are a mind-reader, while I was writing my typical overly-long post you posted the other photo.

That is a 60 cm track way, or even possibly smaller. You can not possibly run any sort of real train down that, or any car weighing more than a few thousand lbs, and that only at a few miles an hour. (I am a mechanical engineer, and worked for a freight railroad {Conrail} for 7 1/2 years.) Whatever it was, it much more likely had animal power than mechanical traction. But that could not have run very far. If the Turks had a standard rail line running east (or north) towards Istanbul, they would have used it.

Bob

[centurion]

Since both Rocdoc and I have mentioned the line being at Gallipoli town I don't need to answer the which coast bit. Sleepers would be difficult to spot. Although rare narrow gauge armoured trains have existed (assuming that that is narrow gauge). I've already posted a link to the station photo. The RN did sometimes shell things on the other side of the peninsula (they had an observation balloon). If the line could be shelled it would be unwise to bring troops up on it (assuming that the navy hadn't obliterated it anyway). Turkish railways in general had severe shortages of rolling stock and no easy way of of shifting it to where it was needed so even with an operating railway most troops and supplies might have to go by road anyway.

[centurion]

Centurion;

You are a mind-reader, while I was writing my typical overly-long post you posted the other photo.

That is a 60 cm track way, or even possibly smaller.

Using the stride of the man striding along it I'd say wider than 60 cm. Given that Kilid Bahir was a major Turkish fortification the line may have been intended to act as a supply route to it.

[bob lembke]

Rocdoc and Centurion;

Rocdoc's map shows some sort of linear symbol, sort of what looks like their symbol for what must be a rough track, which is all over the map, but fainter, that does not seem to be elsewhere on the map, running from Maidos to Seddul Bahr at the tip. So this quite likely is a symbol for the field railroad that is seen in the two photos. It makes sense that a light field railroad be put down starting at Maidos, an equipped port, along the coast to the tip, in order to move building supplies for the further construction of the fortifications, brought to Maidos by sea.

So supposedly a minature armored train ran along this bit of exceedingly miserable track (I do not accept that it is any wider than 60 cm), dueling with the RN? A few questions.

How did this minature armored train get there? I found about eight maps of the 1912 - 1914 - 1916 Turkish rail system (e.g., see " trainsofturkey.com ", I believe), and as I suspected, the closest railhead was the mid-point of the Constananople-Adrianople rail line, about 90 miles away, which matches the several narratives I have read of troops or equipment de-training at such a point, negotiating with the Turks for teams of horses or oxen, and then proceeding toward Gallipoli. Also, to the north, inside Greece, there was another rail line also about 90 miles as the crow flies from Gallipoli, but much further overland. Some maps show a rail line on the Asiatic side, but a map from 1916 with a complex key shows that the line was "planned" by a French rail company, as opposed to "completed" or "under construction".

Assuming our minature armored train appeared at Gallipoli (disassembled and carried their on camels?) Unfair, it could have been taken on ships. What sort of gun could be fired from our Lilliputian armored train at the RN? A two-pounder? Anything larger would hurle our tiny armored train off the rails. (The stability of such a train, firing, is probably roughly related to the track width, to the third power, and the weight of the train, to the second power.) This area of coast was covered by Krupp 35.5 cm (about 14") cannon (the last of them sits before the Askeri Mueze in Istanbul today), plus other artillery, including several mobile 15 cm howitzer batteries commanded by German artillery officers, each with multiple pre-prepared firing positions; I don't think that one or two two-pounders would add to the mix, or even be able to reach RN warships intruding into the waterway between the coasts.

Many German field rail engines on the Western Front were armored, for the simple survival of the crews. Anyone know of actual 60 cm armored trains, mounting cannon? Speaking as one who has left the office and gone out to rail lines and walked them inspecting the track, the rail in those photos is some of the most miserable rail I have ever seen. I doubt that it carried motorized traction.

I have read every memoire from the German, Turkish, and Austrian officers involved that I could find, in German, French, and English (a few), including Liman von Sanders and several of his staff officers, plus officers (like Kannengeisser) commanding Turkish units, plus the vital source of Pomiankowski, the long-term Turkish-speaking A-H miltary polipotentiary in Turkey, and a few German secondary sources on Gallipoli, written by former officers, and I have never encountered any mention of any rail activity in the area, and certainly not of an armored train; I maintain a sub-timeline on WW I armored trains, and generally have interest in rail matters, and I would have been surprised, and noted it down and remembered it.

Let's have the citation for the Australian diary.

Bob

PS: The Turks and Germans had about 100 cannon covering this waterway, going down from 35.5 cm to 75 mm, with some guns of calibers about 8". (This text strayed away from the above text.)

[Rockdoc]

Bob, I have no knowledge of the Gallipoli peninsular and I'm just tossing ideas in where I hope I can help. The solid, black line shown on the map running from Gallipoli to Seddul Bahr is used on others of this series for a standard-gauge line. If you look at map 41-41 (covering the area between Salonika and the Gulf of Orfano) and find Skala Stavros, you'll see that the symbol for a narrow-gauge line is quite different. I know that the short line running north from Stavros was built from Decauville components so there's no confusion. The fact that the Gallipoli line is standard gauge doesn't necessarily mean that it was built to main-line standards, of course, and it could have been built for horse or light-engine haulage. Whether it was ever capable of taking an armoured train remains to be answered.

Keith

[bob lembke]

Keith;

I am sure that you are trying to, and succeeding to, contribute constructively. In the Salonika map there are two lines running "north" out of the town you cite, there is a short one running NNW, and that symbol seems to match or be close to the line from Maidos to the tip of the penninsula. The second runs more NNE, a more complex symbol, which a bit north branches up the coast to the NE, while the other branch heads west. The short symbol (without putting them side by side), seems to be the one running from Maidos to the tip. We already know that there is some narrow-gauge rail of sorts, from the photos; I see no sign of ballast, no sign of sleepers, even, and it runs just feet from a major body of water. I would think that if you ran anything resembling a train down that track, it probably would go 100 yards before it toppled off the track. But there clearly is no connection between Maidos by rail to the interior of Turkey, based on about eight maps, and innumerable books by staff and commanding officers who were there, and many discussions of the supply problems, and many photos of the supplies being brought up, by oxen and by camel train.

Plus, one cannot conceive of a piece of rolling goods that could travel down that miserable track, and actually fire a gun bigger than a two pounder, without toppling off the track, for sure.

I am repeating myself.

But the subject of armored trains is fascinating. Earlier in the war I don't think that the Turks had any rail line that ran close to a fighting front, except for the Russian line running from (now) Armenia to Van, in eastern Anatolia, and the Russians controlled the line and the rolling stock. But I'm sure that they did when the Allies pushed into Palestine. They made a lot of sense in the broad expanses of the Eastern Front.

Bob

[Rockdoc]

I think we're seeing different things on the same map, Bob. There may have been some standard-gauge track in the port area at Skala Stavros because there was an intent to lay it along the same routes but components were unavailable and the available but less useful Decauville equipment was used instead. As you say, there's a junction not far from Skala Stavros and the track divides, one supplying the Birdcage line along Lake Beshik and the other ran to Tar Kasli Derbend, where there was a dump to supply troops in the southern end of the Struma Valley. The symbol that's been used for that 60cm track is an alternating light and dark infill. Moving back to map 44-40, I disagree that the solid black line, indicating standard-gauge track, does not go above Maidos. My reading is that the line runs alongside the road (two parallel lines) to Kilia Dere and then runs at more or less beach level past Galata to Gallipoli. From Gallipoli there appear to be two lines: a branch to Jenikoj and another running NE that goes off the map. Unfortunately, there is no map to the east of this one in the same series so there's no way to know where that one terminated.

If I'm right, that's a significant distance so it would be unlikely that the line was incapable of handling locomotives, though I wouldn't be surprised if the line towards Maidos and Seddul Bahr from Gallipoli could only handle small tank-engines running slowly. The track might easily be all over the place but, comparing it with other lines in remote areas of, say, South America today, I could imagine that every train carried equipment to rerail the loco and rolling stock and probably used it frequently. I think that it matters less what the track could sustain when an armoured train fired than you suggest. The important thing would be how well the troops could prepare the ground for the stabilising jacks. The less weight being carried by the rails the more rounds that could be fired before damage was caused. The other point, though, is whether the track, especially if it could only be traversed at low speeds, could be allowed to move laterally before becoming unusable by the normal traffic on the line. I could easily imagine Turkish sappers moving in to restore the track after an exchange of fire. As you say, it appears to have been laid on beaten earth rather than a conventional railway foundation so the chances are it wasn't kept straight and level at the best of times so rough and ready repairs would probably do fine.

Keith

[bob lembke]

Kieth;

So, on the Salonika map, the alternating light and dark linear symbol, flanked by fine black lines, is the field rail line. I don't think that there is such a symbol anywhere on the Gallipoli map. None of those maps seems to have any key to anything. We cannot be sure that they have common symbols.

Well, on the map of the Gallipoli penninsula, there is a (this is from memory) faint, grey line running from Maidos down to the tip of the penninsula, which I am guessing is the very light 60 cm (or less to my old eyeballs) line that is apparent in the two photos. I do not see that symbol anywhere else on that map. The heavy dark lines that you seem to feel are rail lines must be, IMHO, a better grade of road. They run all over the place, from memory.

The problem with your very well thought out discussion of the Gallipoli rail, which demonstrates that you are expert on rail matters, is that I am 110% sure that there was no standard gauge anywhere near the penninsula (and I generally do not believe in certainty or 100% of anything). As my father fought at Gallipoli, and I am working, haltingly, on a military biography of him and his father, I have read dozens and dozens of books about Gallipoli, mostly on the Turkish/German side, including any primary source that I (or my "Super Librarian" wife) can find, by Liman von Sanders, one or more of his staff officers, and many other German and Austrian officers who served there. I have also been working on assisting a friend, a German General Staff officer, who spent four years in the Turkish Army, has good Modern Turkish, and is a Gallipoli enthusiast, who has written a book on Gallipoli, and published it in German and Turkish, helping him move to two more editions, one in English, plus an upgrade of his successful German edition. (This work has unfortunately been put aside for the present, due to a demanding posting of my friend.)

In all of this, I have never read a word on railroads at Gallipoli, or anywhere nearby. I have repeatedly read of formations traveling by rail to a mid-point on the Constantinople-Adrainople line, de-training, haggling with the local Turkish authorities for draft horses or teams of oxen, and then setting off on a foot march for Gallipoli. This de-training location is about 90 miles from Maidos, as the crow flies. In the course of this discussion I have rustled up about eight maps of the Turkish rail system for the period 1912 to 1918,about four detailed maps from the period (one or two had detailed keys for at least 18 different classes of existing or proposed rail lines), and another four present-day maps of the rail situation in that period, and none of those maps showed a scrap of rail line within 90 miles of Gallipoli. I have read many accounts of the supply problems at Gallipoli, and problems moving troops to there, written in part by the German staff officers who struggled with these problems, and there are lengthy discussions of camel trains, ox carts, and troops marching on foot, and never a whisper about a rail line or rail traffic. As I worked at a railroad for 7 1/2 years, I would have been very interested in any mention of rail.

The WW II Admiral Doenitz was a young naval officer on the Breslau at Constantinople, and in his book on Gallipoli and the rest of the Turkish adventure he described in detail the formation of the naval MG landing formation hastily assembled, armed with Maxims from the armories of the Goeben and Breslau, and rushed to Gallipoli to meet the just-landed Allies, they were critically needed, and they walked to Gallipoli. My father described to me in detail his arrival at Constantinople by rail, the scene in the station, I think I know the station (last time I was in Istanbul I arrived at the same station), no mention of taking a train to the front.

Also, I have read German, French, and British descriptions of the naval/shore battles inside the Straits, no mention of an armored train firing on the RN and French. Also, Ambassador Morgenthau's detailed description of his visit to and description of the defenses of the Straits, artillery preparations, decoy batteries, etc.; again, no train.

I am utterly convinced that there was no working (or any other) rail line to the Penninsula.

Bob

[centurion]

Eye witness account of an Australian Corporal wounded at Gaba Tepeh, reported in The Sydney Mail

"One of the sights of the day was to witness the Queen Elizabeth plant one of her ton shells from her 15 inch guns right under the enemy's armoured train and lift it bodily into the air like a huge snake."

BTW proper armoured trains on narrow gauge are certainly possible as witness this preserved interwar Yugoslavian one

http://ccgi.ajg41.plus.com/wp-content/uploads/ba-sarajevo-armoured-train-20070725-3a-web.jpg

[Rockdoc]

Bob, The maps I'm pointing to in this thread were produced by the Austro-Hungarian Army, initially before WW1 and updated as necessary throughout the war, as a complete series that covered a great deal of Europe, as you can see from the index page. The legend for the maps of the Salonika area that I'm familiar with and others I've checked at random appear to be identical to those on the Gallipoli map, as you'd expect from a series from one source. Main roads are shown as two parallel lines and would be those that are wide and made by civil engineers. Some routes are shown as chain-dotted lines and those are the glorified mule tracks that run along the contours and have developed by use rather than design. On 44-40 there is another route indicator of one solid line and a parallel chain-dotted one, which I'd interpret as being a narrower road rather than a track and on other maps there are single solid lines than appear to be country roads (for the want of a better term).. A bold, single, solid line is a standard-gauge (let's just say >60cm) railway and there's one running on the southern side of the peninsular.

The presence of a railway line of any gauge does not indicate its suitability for a given level of traffic, of course. The line between Salonika and Constantinople was used by the British and French armies in 1915 to take men to and from Serbia. It was standard gauge and had not been damaged at that point yet it was incapable of running sufficient trains to move a few Divisions of troops in either direction. The fact that the German and Turkish commanders make no mention of the coastal line may only mean it was unsuitable and, therefore, irrelevant, not inoperable.

Keith

[centurion]

Was this line at ANZAC captured or built?

[centurion]

The presence of a railway line of any gauge does not indicate its suitability for a given level of traffic, of course. The line between Salonika and Constantinople was used by the British and French armies in 1915 to take men to and from Serbia. It was standard gauge and had not been damaged at that point yet it was incapable of running sufficient trains to move a few Divisions of troops in either direction. The fact that the German and Turkish commanders make no mention of the coastal line may only mean it was unsuitable and, therefore, irrelevant, not inoperable.

Or the necessary rolling stock was not available. Not a problem confined to WW1 - back in the ACW a good deal of the Confederate network was effectively abandoned not because of Union damage to the tracks but because of a lack of rolling stock, locos and men with the knowledge and experience to run them (Davis was constantly asking the generals to release enough railwaymen from fighting in the front line so they could supply the front lines.) The Turks certainly had all these problems in other theatres.

[centurion]

Sapper J.H. Hague 1st Field Company of Australian Engineers in a letter to his father from Cairo (where he had been evacuated wounded) describing the landings

"An armoured train was destroyed by the Queen Elizabeth by means of a single shell"

[michaeldr]

The nearest Turkish railway lines to Gallipoli were quite some distance away from the peninsula.

On the Asiatic side there was a line which ran from Smyrna to Panderma on the Marmara

On the European side there was the line north-west from Constantinople, running via Tschataldja, Lule Burgas and Adrianople

with a line branching off from this to the west via Dedeagatsch

see the map with Liman v. Sanders' book Five Years in Turkey

Was this line at ANZAC captured or built?

Built!

Sapper J.H. Hague must have been mistaken or, more likely, he was just repeating a story (like the tales of the woman sniper?)

regards

Michael

[Rockdoc]

There's no reason why there couldn't be an isolated line on the peninsular, built for a particular purpose. That would certainly explain Bob's records of men having to detrain on the main line and walk for miles to get anywhere.

Keith

[James A Pratt III]

Osprey has two books by steve Zaloga which deal with armoured units in the RCW which include armoured trains. There are one or two books that do deal with german armoured trains. Also the US AEF did use Rail road artillery in France in 1918. Just thought you'd like to know.

[centurion]

Sapper J.H. Hague must have been mistaken or, more likely, he was just repeating a story (like the tales of the woman sniper?)

Funny that three seperate eyewitnesses should mention it in their letters home! Not passing on a tale but something they actually saw

[centurion]

There are many references to mobile batteries on both side of the Dardenelles (including the peninsula). Granville Fortescue ( a Daily Telegraph reporter who had visited the Peninsula in 1914 just before the outbreak of war) gives details "In addition to the defences enumerated the Straits are protected by howitzer batteries mounted on short sections of railway track." There are other references to mobile batteries on rails but not connected to any larger network. These batteries had the task of protecting the minefields and fire was exchanged between these and the minesweeping trawlers and their escorts. Because they could easily retreat into cover it was very difficult for the escorting destroyers to hit them. They even did damage to the Queen Elizabeth's superstructure. It's quite possible that such a battery was incorporated into the defences at Gaba Tepeh.