Express & Star

1915. Sitting Ducks At Gallipoli.

By February 1915 the Western Front was in a deadlock.

Published

The Allies were considering trying to go through the Balkans or even attempt an attack on the German Baltic coast.

With the Russians under threat from attacks by the Turks in the Caucasus, the British sent a naval expedition to the Gallipoli Peninsula on the western shore of the Dardanelles in north western Turkey.

The plan was to capture Constantinople (today called Istanbul), re-group with the Russians, defeat Turkey and perhaps even convince the Balkan states to join the Allies.

The naval bombardment started on February 19. It was abandoned after three battleships were sunk and three others were damaged. By the time military back-up arrived and troops began to land on April 25, the Turks were ready.

Their armies were six times the size they had been when the campaign began.

Although the Australian and New Zealand forces won the bridgehead of Anzac Cove, the British managed to establish themselves at only three of the five points they needed around Cape Helles and did not get much further.

Winston Churchill was the First Lord of the Admiralty and had been the minister championing the operation.

Lord Fisher, the First Sea Lord, wanted it scrapped and resigned when he was overruled.

Troops were eventually evacuated in December 1915 and January 1916. The Allies had lost 214,000 men, the Turks 300,000.

The outcry over the failure of Gallipoli played its part in Herbert Asquith eventually resigning as Prime Minister to be replaced by David Lloyd George.

One of the British troops who fought on the front line takes up the tale.

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