Correspondence between Field Marshal Lord William Birdwood and Lady Janetta Birdwood, 1916 and 1918 - Part 3

• {*Give Helles*}
• [*please return  it*]

Headquarters,

Dardanelles Army, M E. F.

7th January, 1916.

[*to his wife*]

I am beginning a letter to you just before the

final evacuation of the Gallipoli Peninsula.  I wrote and

told you what a very trying time of it I had over "Anzac" and 

Suvla, and I am now again in the throes of the whole thing

over Helles, which I am sincerely hoping to see through

successfully tomorrow night.  It is of course a very different

proposition, as the Turks are naturally thoroughly awake to 

what may happen, and the latest prisoners tell us that German

officers are constantly going round their trenches at night, 

so they evidently mean to have at us if they can.  They keep

aeroplanes flying over our position day and night, while they

have lately been keeping up a continuous bombardment through-

out the twentyfour hours on our beaches, mostly with big shells

 - 4.2", 8" etc., which makes work extremely difficult and 

dangerous.  Two nights ago, a note was thrown across into one

of our trenches in German - "When are you finally leaving here?

"We shall all meet again on the Suez Canal!" so they have

evidently made more than an intelligent anticipation of their

own and our intentions.  In spite of this, I am full of

confidence and hope of being able to withdraw successfully,

provided always (as before) that the weather is kind to us, and 

I have every faith that this will be the case.

I am arranging at Helles to withdraw 17,000 men in 

one night.  We have 20,000 men there at present, of whom we 

get off 3,000 tonight, and leave the balance for another

twentyfour hours, but it is of course quite possible that heavy 

weather may spring up at any moment, in which case we are strong 

enough there to hold our own for a week, and all arrangements

are made, if heavy weather should come on, to stand fast until 

the/

 

-2-

the first fine night, when all will be withdrawn.  We have

still got about 50 guns ashore - French and English, and I 

am afraid that I must make up my mind to sacrifice between

twenty and thirty of these, but they will of course all be 

blown up at the last moment.  Though these may sound a 

largish number, yet they really are negligible.  Among the

British guns that we are abandoning, only one is what you

might call a modern weapon, viz., a 6" gun.  Of the remaining 

English guns, we have got off all modern weapons, viz., 18 pr.,

6" and 4.5" howitzers, leaving behind only the old 15 pr. and

5" howitzers, which have been brought out here by Territorials,

and for which I understand no more ammunition is being

manufactured.  With the French guns I am getting away all their

beloved 75's, and leaving behind only four 9.2" and two Naval 

guns.  They tell me that all of these have fired about 5,000

rounds each, and are really of little value to them, so I think

we can blow them up without regret.

I am sorry to say that we will have to destroy a

goodish number of transport animals before going, which may 

possibly amount to eight or nine hundred.  We have had real

bad luck regarding them which has been unavoidable.  The first

night when we started evacuation, I sent over a horse ship,

which would have brought away 500, when the French Flagship

proceeded - apparently without much reason, to ram and sink

her as she left the harbour here, defeating me for that night.

The following night a high wind got up, making work practically

impossible, and a whole lighter load of mules, that was on the

point of being shipped, got driven out to see and was lost.

If we could only rely upon fine weather, we would 

of course be able to get off all our animals, but I dare not 

gamble with them against men's lives, and I feel I must take

advantage of the first fine night to get away, and just destroy

the remaining animals; but I mean to get off all I possibly 

can between now and the actual time of going.  It will be a 

real load taken off my shoulders, and, if we succeed, Government 

should

 

-3-

should indeed be grateful for the efforts made by this force

to see them through a very uncomfortable position.

I am delighted to say that I have found my

relations with the French, since I have been in command here,

have been excellent, and I am most grateful to little

General Brulard for the way he has met me in every detail.

Some little time ago, by the wish of the French Government,

we evacuated their Senegalese (24 companies) and 1,500 Creoles,

so as to get them out of the cold.  As soon as I get definite

orders for evacuation here, I at once withdrew the whole of the

remaining French Infantry - about 5,000 men, so as not to have 

any possibility of divided command in the final rearguard, but

General Brulard at once agreed to leave me the whole of his

artillery, to be withdrawn entirely at my discretion, gun by

gun pari passu with the British guns - their C.R.A. taking his 

orders direct from mine, and giving me an entirely free hand

about abandoning any of his guns.  I have or course explained

to him that every possible French gun we can get away will be 

withdrawn, while he agreed it would be out of the question to

get away his six big guns, which he assured me were of very 

little value to them.  The little man has played the game most

thoroughly, and I am extremely grateful to him.  I will of course

bring his name to notice when I send in my report on the 

evacuation, and I sincerely trust it may be found possible to

give him a "K.C.B.," which I know he and the French troops 

would sincerely appreciate.  He has been kind enough to send

me a telegram yesterday, telling me that his Government have

approved of my becoming a Grand Officier de Legion d'Honneur,

while they have also conferred upon me the "Croix de Guerre

avec palme," though I am at a loss to think why they should 

have thought fit to honour me in this way.

The Germans are evidently very keen upon getting 

at my Headquarters, and we almost daily have a visit from 

"Fritz."  He came along over here yesterday, and got in two

good sized bombs just either side of my tiny wooden hut, and

then/

 

-4-

then proceeded to fly over our transport lines, where I am 

sorry to say he sent showers of hand grenades, causing

casualties to 130 mules and about 30 men in our camp, so I 

fear it was for him a successful raid.  All our anti-aircraft 

guns on the ships and on shore were firing away at him for all

they knew, but I am sorry to say with no success.  We sent up

our machines over to their aerodromes at once in retaliation,

and I am glad to say they seem to think they did some good. 

I am delighted to have Admiral de Robeck back here,

and he has kindly come up here and made his headquarters 

alongside of me;  we see each other daily to arrange about all

details, as was the case with Wemyas before the other withdrawals.

Admiral Fremantle is also here with tow of the ships of his

lately arrived squadron, "Hibernia" and Russell," both of which

are delighted I think to be here in time to join in, and we 

have been having some very successful shooting recently by them

on the Turkish batteries on the Asiatic coast with I hope good

results.

Monro and his staff went down to Egypt ten days ago, 

and I presume I shall follow on down there, as soon as I have 

cleared Helles - but exactly in what capacity, and what force I

shall have under me when I get there, I do not yet know.  de

Robeck is very anxious that I should go over to Salonika with

him to look round there before I go to Egypt, and I hope

perhaps I may be able to manage this for a couple of days.

 

(Later - 9/1/16.)

Not having been able to get this off before, I have

kept it until our evacuation was over, which I am thankful to 

say was the case at 4 a.m. today, and I now again feel a free

man with no anxieties - but just a little done up, though only

for a day or so.  After a lot of bad weather the sky suddenly

cleared, and we had two days which were lovely, so I decided to

take advantage of this, and put forward final evacuation by 24

hours, viz., the night of 8/9th. 

On the afternoon of the 7th, the Turks suddenly

developed/

   - 5 -

developed a big attack on our right. They started with a very

heavy bombardment with I fancy all their guns, and real

intensive fire for four or five hours, knocking our trenches

about a good deal, and I am sorry to say causing a certain 

amount of casualties in the 13th Division.  Then we saw whole 

trenches fill up with men with fixed bayonets, and officers

going along them evidently trying to induce them to charge.

The men, however, appeared reluctant to do this except in one

or two places where small bodies of them left their trenches 

to come at us; but these were all either killed or wounded,

and no other attack matured.  In the meantime our guns had of 

course opene d on them, while the "Edgar" and "Wolverin" - a

cruiser and a destroyer, who always keep off our left flank,

got into them really well, the latter in fact using up the

whole of her ammunition. The effect of this in crowded 

trenches, of which the ships knew the exact range (for they 

have been on those particular targets for several months) must, 

I think we may take it, have created very considerable losses

to the Turks, and possibly this had the best of results for

us - also, I think it is possible they may have got through

a good deal of any spare ammunition they happened to have in

hand.  At all events, the results were excellent, for on our 

evacuation taking place the following night, they seemed to 

have little or no ammunition to spare, for our beaches were

practically left unshelled all night - thank goodness, as it 

was from this shelling that I had most anticipated considerable 

losses.  Our causalities during this attack were about 5 

officers and 160 men killed and wounded, which is much more

than one likes to think of, though I hope we gave back as good

as, if not better than we got.

Everything being settled for last night, the wind

rather to our dismay began to rise at about 7 o'clock.  I went

on board the flagship "Lord Nelson" to join de Robeck, and we

then went off on "Chatham" to cruise up and down the position

all/

 

-6-

all night.  I had been over to Helles during the day just to

see that all final arrangements there were all fixed up, and

that everybody was quite happy.

The Admiral was the opinion that the wind would 

probably go down, and that in any case it was not sufficiently

strong to warrant our putting off operations, which of 

course we would not have done except if unless it looked really very

bad.  Several times during the night when heavy squalls came

on, our hearts rather jumped into our mouths, but, as when we 

vacated "Anzac" and Suvla, Providence again stood by us, an d 

saw us thought all our difficulties.  The work of the Navy was

quite beyond praise, and for them the anxieties were

tremendous, as the rising wind of course made all their

evacuations extremely difficult, and it only wanted to have

been a little stronger to have probably made them impossible. 

To add to our anxieties, at about 10 p.m. we got

a message from the right flank to say that a submarine was

apparently coming down the Straits on the surface.  The Admiral

was doubtful whether this was really the case, when half an 

hour later, the "Prince George" ( an old man o'war now being 

temporarily used as a trooper) sent up two rockets, and 

signalled that she thought a torpedo had been fired at her, and

that she had been hit, but not damaged.  We at once started

off full steam in pursuit, and cruised all about the place for

an hour, but saw nothing, and you can imagine our relief in

consequence, as the "Prince George" had at the time 8,600

troops on board - but it made our anxieties none the less

as "Mars" with an equal number of men, and of course a large

number of other ships were about.  

In spite of the weather, the Navy were able to

stick to their original programme, and the actual  evacuation

of the position was carried out in very much the same way as

was done at "Anzac" and Suvla.  The troops all got off on time,

even though we had to abandon the use of one beach owing to the 

heavy/

 

-7-

heavy swell running into it, and the men ready there had to 

be marched round about three miles to one of the other 

beaches - fortunately, only a few men had to go from that spot .

I am glad to say that we were able to get off 

more  guns than I had at one time hoped for.  We had to leave

the good 6" gun, as it was essential to keep one long range

gun up to the very last, and it was then impossible to move 

a big one like that.  We however got away the whole of the 

howitzers, and only left ten of the old 15 pr., which may

really be regarded as obsolescent guns and of no value.

The French guns were got away as in the intended programme

leaving six only, and of course all abandoned guns were 

thoroughly blown up. The French are I think most awfully 

pleased not having had to sacrifice a single '75" and not to

have suffered a single casualty.

Our own casualties were one man wounded only, and

and he only slightly! By getting a real good hustle on about

the animals during the last 24 hours, I am glad to say we were 

able to do much better than I had dared to hope for, and at

the last we only had to leave x behind 400 animals altogether,

[* x This meant we got away about 3300.]

though even those I abandoned with the very greatest regret,

and of course they were destroyed before the troops embarked - 

a horrible thing to think of, but a far better fate for them

than falling into the hands of the Turks, to whom they would

of course have been of the greatest value.

We got off practically the whole of our ammunition,

and though it was impossible to get all the transport carts

away, yet we got off about half of them.  and got away the 

wheels of the greater part of the remaining half, while naturally 

all those left behind were broken up.  A considerable quantity

of supplies naturally had to be  left and all our hospitals that

were left standing in the open, but after all these (except 

perhaps the tents) cannot be of any great value to them for any 

length of time, while for the next few days the Navy will be 

bombarding them hard, and getting into the Turks wherever they

see/

 

-8-

see a chance.

As the troops left, all the dumps of supplies 

were set on fire, and formed a huge bonfires which went on for

hours with occasional  tremendous explosions, so I do not think

our friends, the enemy, will have profited very much, though I 

am sure they heartily glad to be rid of us.  Indeed, a

deserter, who came in two days ago, told us they were quite

convinced we were going, and they therefore did not see much 

object in attacking us and getting killed before we went, and

I dare say this had something to do with their unwillingness

to come on and close in a big attack on the 7th.

As I have said, we really have to give our whole

thanks for our complete success in both these withdrawals to

Providence, but as far as the work goes, the wonderful way 

in which we got off last night was due to the real good work 

put in by de Robeck and the Navy (with a wind at times of 42

miles an hour), and that of Davies and the 8th Corps Staff,

who ran their show excellently, leaving precious little for us to do.

Now that it is all over, I am glad to think that

I am probably one of the few remaining here, who actually 

landed on the peninsula on our first day - the 25th April, and 

were was still on it on the last - 8th January, having had the 

good fortune to keep my health, and not having had to go away

for a day - a few individuals of the 29th Division are I think

are the only other ones who can have done the same, as they are

the only troops left here now who landed on the 25th April.

The Naval Division have had a long spell of it too, and have

improved very much.  When we all go down to Egypt, they remain 

behind to garrison these islands, and I fancy will not be

sorry for a long well-earned rest, with a chance of pulling

themselves together and doing some excellent training, which

is quite possible here.  They will have to look out for

German aeroplanes,  which will I dare say be fairly busy, but 

I hope our anti-aircraft guns will improve in their practice 

on them.

Now/

 

-9-

Now I fancy I shall be off to Egypt almost

immediately, and am quite looking forward to getting my boys

together again - especially the Australians, from whom I hate

being separated, and if as I believe they are still sending 

out a good many/more troops, there will be a chance of doing a

good deal of organization with them, while training in Egypt

for these next few months can be done with such tremendous

advantage.  I fear though that in the sand there, my boys will

not have the chance of shewing that wonderful expert skill and

ingenuity which they have shewn here in the trench digging

line, as in the deep sand probably nothing but the ordinary, 

stereotyped trencht enwill be possible - but these we must

and will make as good as they possibly can be made, and I dare

say some of my officers and men will devise something cunning

regarding them.