Introduction
The Dardanelles Campaign of April-December 1915, during the Great War, is remembered especially for the Anzac and Indian troops who gave their lives on the Gallipoli Peninsula in western Turkey. Then as now it was regarded as a failure by many, but John Masefield took quite another view — of the campaign, and of failure itself.
A LITTLE while ago, during a short visit to America, I was often questioned about the Dardanelles Campaign.* People asked me why that attempt had been made, why it had been made in that particular manner, why other courses had not been taken, why this had been done and that either neglected or forgotten, and whether a little more persistence, here or there, would not have given us the victory. These questions were often followed by criticism of various kinds, some of it plainly suggested by our enemies, some of it shrewd, and some the honest opinion of men and women happily ignorant of modern war. I answered questions and criticism as best I could, but in the next town they were repeated to me, and in the town beyond reiterated, until I wished that I had a printed leaflet, giving my views of the matter, to distribute among my questioners.
See The Gallipoli Landings. The campaign was devised early in 1915 as a new front against the German Empire. The plan was to knock Turkey, or the Ottoman Empire as it then was, out of the Great War by sailing the Royal Navy’s Aegean fleet right up to her capital Constantinople (Istanbul) through the connecting Dardanelles Strait. This required the army to clear guns from the slim Gallipoli Peninsula that forms the northern shore. The campaign began on April 25th, 1915; by December little progress had been made, despite the loss of some 44,000 Allied lives. The ships never sailed through the Strait; Winston Churchill was dismissed as First Lord of the Admiralty; Herbert Asquith’s reputation as a weak wartime leader became more widespread, and he was ousted by David Lloyd George in December 1916.
If you like what I’m doing here on Clay Lane, from time to time you could buy me a coffee.
Buy Me a Coffee is a crowdfunding website, used by over a million people. It is designed to help content creators like me make a living from their work. ‘Buy Me a Coffee’ prides itself on its security, and there is no need to register.
