Battle of Agagia 26:2:1916

[asdarley]

Saw this in my local paper. Would anyone be able to flesh this out for me?

"The service at Thornford began at the war memorial in the churchyard which was attended by a large congregation and many representatives of current serving families. Wreaths were laid by Thornford veteran Philip Ellwood and a second wreath was laid on behalf of the Queen’s Own Dorset Yeomanry who also laid seven individual crosses in memory of the village’s First World War tragedy when five of the seven Yeomanry were lost on the same day, 26th February 1916 at the Battle of Agagia. The service was led by the Rev Andrew Evans."

The village of Thornford is very small even today. I suspect the loss of five villagers on the same day would have been quite traumatic for the whole community.

[stevenbecker]

Mate,

Is short this is a part of the operations against the Senussi Tribes then in Rebelion against the British in Western Eygpt.

The Yeomanry Regts in Egypt formed two Compostie Regts and the ALH formed a third for these operations.

The 2nd Composite Yeomanry Regt had the Dorset Sqn, Berks Sqn and Bucks Sqn as part of the Regt.

In short the actions happened as such;

A recon of the Agagiya found the enemy on the 26th Feb 1916 Gen Lukin moved his force of 2nd Comp Regt (one Sqn Bucks Yeo, one Sqn Dorset Yeo), the Notts Battery, 1st South African Bde (less 2 and 4Bn's), part of 1/6 Scots and two field Abalances and some Armoured Cars against the entreanched enemy.

It started with the Yeomanry seized a hill and the 3Bn SAIR attacked against stiff fighting and a counterattack by the enemy, they were in postion for the Yeomanry to charge after 1pm when the enemy started to brake and the horse were let loose,

This charge was under heavy fire from the enemy MG's and the Bucks and Dorset suffered during this charge who dispite their losses captured the enemy commander Gasfer pasha and his staff.

There should be more on this action on front of Chris (this) site.

Cheers

S.B

[asdarley]

Many thanks for that Steve. As always some one on the forum has the answer! So, going by what you say this was an old fashioned empire "bush" action. Would that mean it was not strictly speaking connected to the Great War? That being so should the casualties then have counted as Great War fallen?

[Dolphin]

Edorc

The Senussi action was one of the conflicts that made it a 'World' War. German and Ottoman agents were active in persuading Sheikh Sidi Ahmad esh Sherif, the leader of the Senussi to commence hostilities against the Allies, and provided some munitions and instructors. The Senussi warriors were led by Ja'afar al Askari, an Iraqi in Ottoman service, while another Turk, Nuri Pasha, was in overall command.

See Philip Haythornthwaite's The World War One Source Book for more information.

Regards

Gareth

[asdarley]

Edorc

The Senussi action was one of the conflicts that made it a 'World' War. German and Ottoman agents were active in persuading Sheikh Sidi Ahmad esh Sherif, the leader of the Senussi to commence hostilities against the Allies, and provided some munitions and instructors. The Senussi warriors were led by Ja'afar al Askari, an Iraqi in Ottoman service, while another Turk, Nuri Pasha, was in overall command.

See Philip Haythornthwaite's The World War One Source Book for more information.

Regards

Gareth

Thanks for that Gareth. Glad to be able now to know what the history of this is.

You can't help but think ( noting the Iraqi reference) that not a lot changes in this world!!

[Guest Bill Woerlee]

Garath

G'day mate

Just to add to your comments, the Turks provided in total about 108 men which included 47 officers, 47 NCOs and other ranks along with 14 military officials.

Below is a brief outline of the men who initially occupied the advisory positions in 1914/15:

Sultan Mehmet's personal representative: Gen Semseddin

General Commander of the Libyan theatre: Col Nuri

Commander of the Libyan theatre: Col Osman Fuat

Deputy Commander of the Libyan theatre: Maj Cafer Askeri

Chief of Staff: Maj Abdurrahman Nafiz

Operations officer: 2/Lt. Mehmet Veli

Commander of Trabkusgarb Front: Maj Ishak

General Commander of Trablusgarb: Lt. Col Abdulkadir

Regional Commander of Fizan: Maj Sakip

Regional Commander of Nalut: Lt Omer

Commander of Homs Front: Capt Seyit Hasan

Commander of Tacure Front: 2/Lt Salim

Signals: Lt Ihsan

Adjutant: Capt. Bilal

Guards Company Commander: Maj Halil

Numune Battalion Commander: Capt Emin

2nd Numune battalion Commander: Lt Muhtar

Bir el Var garrison Commander: Lt Nedim

1st Battalion Commander: Abdullah Timsik

2nd Battalion Commander: Capt Galip

Artillery commander: Capt Ziya

Logistic train: Capt Tarik

MG section commander: Lt Nihat

Adviser to Abidat and Avagir tribes: Lt Galip

Adviser to Hassa and Derwisch tribes: Lt Muhtar

Adviser to Evlade Ali Tribe: NCO Serg. Celal

Adviser to Birassu tribe: Lt. Abdullah

Adviser to Munif Tribe: Lt Tahsin

This above article was extracted from the Sydney Mail, 18 Novembe 1914 at p10.

As can be seen by the scale of organisation, this was no disorganised rabble but a sophisticated operation. The only reason why the Senussi Rebellion took off at all was the alliance of Britain with Italy - the Senussi did not mind the Brits but they hated the Italians - after all, it was an organisation set up to remove the Italians from Libya.

Cheers

Bill

[stevenbecker]

Mate,

Also the Germans supplied arms and muntions to these tribes during the war these were by U boat and two boats were used to move back and forth on these trips, the last was by U Boat in late 1918.

There is the story of the local leader near Tripoli after one arms shippment giving as a gift a Camel to the German Kaiser which the U Boat skipper had to take back to Pola, there base in Austria/Croatia.

His trying to get a camel in a sub and cross the Med under Allied control is a story in itself.

Cheers

S.B

[Dolphin]

Steve

Central Powers aid to the Senussi, and the carriage of the camel in a U-boat, forms part of the plot in the excellent Great War novel A Sailor of Austria by John Biggins.

Cheers

Gareth

[asdarley]

Steve

Central Powers aid to the Senussi, and the carriage of the camel in a U-boat, forms part of the plot in the excellent Great War novel A Sailor of Austria by John Biggins.

Cheers

Gareth

As ever the breadth on knowledge on this forum is jaw dropping! A camel in a U boat? I re watched Das Boot the other day and you wouldn't get one in a WW2 U boat so how on earth did they manage on a WW1 one?? The mind boggles!!

[stevenbecker]

Mate,

The story should be on this site some where but here is something i did for another site.

"Has any heard of the story of the underwater Camel?

This story is true and the names have not been changed.

During the War, Germany continued to supply Arms and Stores to the Senissi Tribes then in rebelion against the Egyptian and Allied Goverments.

To carry these stores two German U boats were converted from Mine Laying to cargo boats. These were UC 20 and UC 73.

They carried supplies threw out the war and the last run to Libyia was made in October 1918.

During a mission in June 1918, UC 20 under command of Oblt Heinrich Kukat delivered arms to the Arabs at Misrata East of Tripoli.

The Arab Sheik wanted to return the gift but what could he give them. His daughter? No he gave the Germans a greater prize, one of his best Camels.

Now the U Boat Captain was a Prussian Officer and a Gift to him was a Gift to the German Crown so he felt he had to take the camel. But how could he get this beast back to his home port of Pola in Austria.

The camel was to big to fit in a U Boat and he could n't carry it on the deck as he would need to submerge to excape allied patrols. Also there was no dock to get the animal on the boat.

The answer was to tie a rope around the Camels neck and pull the animal out into the water where the sub could submerge under the camel to get it on the deck.

This rope was as long as the U Boat at Periscope depth so if the U boat had to submerge and the camels head would be all that a plane or ship could see.

And this is how the U boat brought the camel to Pola by running on the surface at night while during the day underwater with the camel swimming along.

The U Boat could only move slowly but the camel was not use to swimming either."

and:

"This a true story.

If fact the Germans brought back three camels over their time carrying supplies to the Arabs.

Two were brought back by UC 20 and one by UC 73.

What happen to them in Germany is not told.

The story of this one, is in the book by Ernst Hashagen "U Boats Westwarts! Meine Fahrten um England" published in Germany 1931.

The rest is in the Patrol logs of the U boats who carried out the missions.

I should add that Australian and British Camel Corps Patrols, Based at Sollum and Matruth carried out long range patrols to Bardia and Tripoli during the war to stop these missions.

I am not aware of any that found or stopped any German arms shipment.

But the area covered by the North Africian Coast line is long and the troops involved in stopping them was very small".

Cheers

S.B

[Guest mick g]

edorc,

I was present at the ceremony. Inside the church is a folder left by A (Dorset Yeomanry) SQN Royal Wessex Yeomanry. the folder outlines the battle in diagramatic form and has a personal account written by a trooper who was in the charge. In addition it contains the photographs of those member of Thornford who were killed. The youngest of whom was Tpr Jack Biss 19.

After the war Gaffa Pasha retained links with the QODY even being Guest of honour at a reunion Weymouth in the 30s!

The QODY has a display in the Keep museum Dorchester. if you go to the Keep Museums website you will find more on the charge.

[stevenbecker]

Mate,

Is it possible to get a copy of this folder so we know what is recorded.

I am interested in this time and the Composite Regts.

Cheers

S.B

[solarbobky]

Philip Elwood (1926-2015) is a cousin of mine. He was born and died in Thornford.