From Gaza to Jerusalem

by Stuart Hadaway

  We were all glad when daylight came and the storm slackened a little. This was Christmas morning. Now the question arose what we were going to do for rations. Owing to the bad weather transport had been held up. For breakfast we had only four small tins of bully beef a few biscuits and tea without sugar and milk to divide between 25 of us, and we did not know when we would get the next [issue]. However later in the day we managed to get some more.409

  Some units were slightly luckier; those that were positioned in or near villages often managed to buy extra food to ease through the shortages, and to celebrate Christmas.410

  Christmas in the mountains was even more miserable for those clinging in isolated pockets to jagged mountainsides, although the scattered rocks provided an element of shelter. Private Henry Pope of the 2/15th London Regiment (2nd Civil Service Rifles) recorded in his diary:

  Christmas Eve!! Raining hard. Pack up and marched to hills in support as attack by Turks expected. Awful night, perishing cold and soaked through once more. Spent half the night carrying Lewis gun equipment from one place to another. Christmas Day – spent day in ‘prehistoric stone cabin’ or rather an alcove in some rocks with bivouac sheet for roof. Stay all day propped up on a stone because floor was a lake. Pouring with rain all day. Rations – 3oz of bully and about two biscuits. What a Christmas dinner! Half starved and shivering with cold.411

  However, Christmas could have been worse. It had been Allenby’s intention to restart the advance in the mountains on Christmas Eve, after carrying out a series of preliminary attacks on 23 December. As it was, although various small actions were fought in the week before Christmas, by 24 December the weather had deteriorated to such a point that the fighting had to be postponed. In fact, this postponement was not only fortunate for the troops. Intelligence now began to report, based on interviews with prisoners and deserters and on intercepted wireless messages, that von Falkenhayn was planning his own attack to attempt to retake Jerusalem with the 7th (OT) Army.412 This was a fairly hopeless gesture; even with the arrival of the fresh 1st (OT) Infantry Division, von Falkenhayn could only muster at most 20,000 men to attack the 33,000 of Allenby’s XX Corps, while the terrain where the main attack would fall was, in the words of the 60th Division’s historian, ‘the most difficult yet encountered’.413 A series of steep ridges divided by deep, almost vertical ravines ran east–west across the area separating the northern British positions and the Ottoman attacking forces. Chetwode, with Allenby’s support, decided to use the Ottomans’ own plan against them. It seemed fairly certain that the main attacks would fall on the 60th Division, north of Jerusalem astride the road to Nablus, and on the 53rd Division to the east. Once the enemy attack against these points, expected around 27 December, were fully committed, the 74th and 10th Divisions to the left of the 60th would swing out and round, advancing east into the flank of the Ottoman attack. In one sweep, the army could roll up most of the remaining units in the 7th (OT) Army.

  The expected attack came in the early hours of 27 December. To the east of Jerusalem the 53rd (OT) Infantry Division attacked the bulk of the 53rd (Welsh) Division, while the 26th (OT) Infantry Division attacked the right of the Welsh. To the north, the 19th (OT) Division came straight down the Nablus road against the 60th Division. Although the outposts of the 53rd (Welsh) Division were driven in, and hard fighting flared along their main line, the British positions east of Jerusalem did not face any serious danger throughout the day; indeed, some areas were barely engaged by the Ottoman attacks. The 60th Division, on the other hand, also had their piquets and outposts driven in, but then faced some serious and determined attacks along their whole front. Ottoman troops managed to penetrate into the British lines even if they failed to break through, and some vicious fighting occurred as counter-attacks were mounted to throw them back. The 2/16th London Regiment found itself in particular difficulties, and two platoons of the 2/15th mounted a local counter-attack to push the Ottomans back. Instead, they were themselves cut off, and faced a desperate fight for their own survival. Bernard Flynn recalled:

  The call in the morning for everybody out. The first enthusiastic close-quarters encounter with the Turks; my chagrin at missing a retreating Turk at 25 yards when firing from the standing position, surrounded and exposed to enemy fire with men being killed and wounded around us. Barely adequate cover behind an outcropping of rock … [Corporal James] ‘Tiny’ Warren … being killed instantaneously on raising his head to get a better sight to fire a rifle grenade. [Second Lieutenant Roland] ‘Bulldog’ Harris a little to the left behind some rocks, exuding confidence. A fatuous signal to retreat from a runner up the hill – how the hell could we? The Turks coming on again and a last desperate bayonet charge led by ‘Bulldog’ and Charlie Jones. That was the last I saw of Harris.414

  The two platoons were almost wiped out, and the popular Second Lieutenant Harris was killed. Flynn himself was wounded, but had to wait for several days before he was found and taken for treatment.

  In other areas the line held firm, and some troops even found time for their first proper meal in days as a ration convoy made it through. Sergeant William Mole was with the Machine Gun Corps:

  On Boxing night, the expected attack commenced; shells and bullets were flying in all directions, and still it rained, and this time, we had hail also, making things worse than ever. Once the gun and myself were almost buried by the explosion of a large shell which fell uncomfortably near us. All next day we were worried by shells and bullets again flying in all directions. After a time, we packed up and moved further away. The place we came to next was a bit better, on account of being out of range of most of the shells. On our arrival, we were greeted by the arrival of the rations, including a bit of boxwood (dry). The rain had stopped now and I managed to make some porridge out of crushed biscuits and jam, and wonder of wonders, we managed to make some hot cocoa (our first hot drink for three days) and we fried some real good bacon.415

  By 6 p.m. the attacks had ended, and the British line was still intact. The Ottoman position, however, was far from secure. At 5 a.m., once it was clear that the main Ottoman offensive had begun, the British had begun their own counter-stroke. To the left of the 60th Division, the other two divisions of XX Corps (the 74th Division on the right and the 10th Division on the left) had swung out of their positions and begun to advance into the open Ottoman flank. They had pivoted around to face east, moving along the tops of the precipitous ridgelines rather than having to struggle across them. With heavy artillery support, they made good progress even though they almost immediately ran into the 1st and 24th (OT) Infantry Divisions, which had been moving up to make their own attack, and the right flank of the 3rd (OT) Cavalry Division, which was holding the line to the west.

  Through the day the two divisions made steady progress. By going with the grain of the landscape they had an easier route to follow, but the open ridgelines presented their own problems. Even as the bulk of the Ottoman forces fell back in confusion, small rearguards in isolated farms, villages or woods, or even just hidden among the jumbled piles of rocks, all took their toll. It took time to find sheltered paths to outflank and then attack each position, and in the meantime troops were often pinned down in the open. In one such ambush, Private James Duffy, a stretcher-bearer of the 6th Inniskilling Fusiliers received the Victoria Cross for repeatedly rescuing the wounded under heavy fire.416 By dusk, all of the attacking division’s objectives had been taken.

  The following morning, 60th Division joined in the advance, and all three divisions turned north while the 53rd Division extended its left flank to maintain contact. With the grain of the landscape now against them, progress was slower, and although Herculean efforts had brought some artillery forward, the attackers were not nearly as well supported as the day before. Even so, progress continued to be made. On 29 December the 10th Division, slightly to the north of the others, halted while they caught up to the east. By 30 December the 74th was in line with the 10th, and they both held while
the 60th Division made a small advance to come into line with them. With this achieved, Chetwode called a halt to all further operations.417

  The counter-attack had worked. The Ottoman attack had been interrupted and thrown back on the western flank before it had had a chance to properly develop. The attacking divisions, including the newly arrived 1st (OT) Infantry Division, had all received bloody repulses, and been chased back beyond their original lines. The British had advanced across a 19km front, moving 4.8km (3 miles) north on the left and 9.5km (6 miles) north on the right, further securing Jerusalem. With the end of the operation, so ended the campaigns of 1917.

  The Egyptian Expeditionary Force could look back at a job well done. The year had begun badly for the British, with the two defeats at Gaza, but had ended with a spectacular success. The Ottomans had held the Gaza–Beersheba line with 45,000–50,000 front-line troops, well dug-in (a skill the Ottomans excelled at) in most places, having had the best part of a year to create and reinforce their positions. Against them, the EEF had pitched around 75,000–80,000 infantry and 18,000 cavalry, falling well short of the usual military rule-of-thumb that an attacking force should outnumber the defender by three to one. During the following campaign, both sides had fought with determination and valour in the most difficult of conditions. The cost had been high for both sides; 28,000 Ottoman casualties and 21,000 British. Long marches, bad weather and huge supply problems had plagued both sides, but in the end the superior numbers, logistics and, it is probably fair to say, command of the British had won out. Not only had Allenby proven to be a steady commander supported by solid corps commanders, but the German/Ottoman command structure had proven to be disjointed, confused and at times unrealistic.

  Now the armies both settled down to reorganise themselves and recoup their strength. British reinforcements began to arrive, and work continued apace on the inevitable restoration and expansion of the road and rail network. The Ottomans had fewer opportunities to either regain their strength or improve their communications and logistics. The only road worth the name between the 7th and 8th (OT) Armies was now over 48km (30 miles) to the north, at Nablus. Stark evidence of how bad the Ottoman supply situation had become for the average Mehmetçik was discovered by the 60th Division during their advance on 28 December. On retaking some of their outposts that had been overrun the day before, the bodies of the British dead were found to have been stripped. Later, Ottoman bodies were discovered wearing items of captured British uniform, having no chance of receiving new or warm clothing through their own supply system.418 Given the conditions the Ottoman troops had faced, their level of resistance and resilience throughout the campaign had been extraordinary.

  Notes

  * Captain R. Armitage, commanding ‘A’ Battery of the 303rd Brigade RFA. Actually, both officers also had their orderlies with them to hold their horses.

  * For this, Anderson received a bar for his Distinguished Service Order, and Hills the Military Cross.

  390 TNA WO95/4472 Report of Operations of two cars of No. 7 Light Car Patrol under the command of Lieutenant McKenzie on 30 November and 1 & 2 December

  391 Millis IWM 1292

  392 Dudley Ward 53rd Division pp. 141–51

  393 See, for example, 5th HLI p. 186

  394 Falls Vol. 2 pp. 244–5; Dalbiac pp. 156–8

  395 Gliddon pp. 170–6; Dalbiac p. 157

  396 Falls Vol. 2 p. 247; Dalbiac pp. 158–60

  397 Falls Vol. 2 p. 248; Dudley Ward 74th Division pp. 130–2

  398 Falls Vol. 2 p. 250; Dudley Ward 53rd Division p. 157

  399 Falls Vol. 2 pp. 243–4

  400 TNA WO95/4663

  401 Quoted in Kedar p. 140

  402 Falls Vol. 2 pp. 256–8; Dalbiac pp. 161–2; Dudley Ward 74th Division pp. 134–6

  403 Falls Vol. 2 pp. 258–9

  404 Clunie p. 176

  405 Gliddon pp. 177–80

  406 Falls Vol. 2 pp 265–9; Thompson pp. 482–500

  407 5th HLI p. 194

  408 Clunie p. 178

  409 Scott IWM 5743

  410 Gibbons pp. 119–20

  411 Quoted in Knight p. 194

  412 Sheffy British Military Intelligence pp. 242–3

  413 Falls Vol. 2 pp. 277-8 & 291; Dalbiac p. 186

  414 Quoted in Knight p. 195

  415 Mole IWM 15153

  416 Gliddon pp. 181–5

  417 Falls Vol. 2 pp. 279–89; Dalbiac pp. 182–8; Dudley Ward 53rd Division pp. 141–51

  418 Dalbiac p. 180

  EPILOGUE

  BY NEW YEAR’S Day, 1918, the Egyptian Expeditionary Force was exhausted. Men and equipment were worn out, units far below strength, and logistics increasingly tenuous. Allenby had been warned that he might lose some of his forces to France in the spring of 1918, and to limit his operations accordingly, but even without that restriction his forces were in dire need of time to rest, refit and reorganise. Even so, the rest did not last long. In February 60th (London) and the AN&Z Mounted Division struck north-east into the Jordan Valley, taking Jericho and securing the northern end of the Dead Sea. Other smaller operations pushed the line north of Jerusalem into a more favourable position. In late March, a large-scale raid was mounted across the Jordan with the aim of capturing Amman, but unexpected Ottoman resistance by the 4th (OT) Army foiled the attack and forced a quick withdrawal. A second attempt was rapidly planned, although at this point the vague warning about needing troops in France resurged in spectacular style.

  On 21 March 1918, as XX Corps had attacked across the Jordan, the Germans had launched their Spring Offensive on the Western Front, achieving dramatic and deep advances and pushing the British back in near disarray. Within weeks, the 52nd (Lowland) and 74th Divisions, with nine yeomanry regiments and nine infantry battalions, plus artillery and machine gun units, had been despatched to France. They were slowly replaced by Indian Army troops, but it was a lengthy process and most of the new units needed extensive training. Infantry and cavalry brigades across the army were mixed to include fresh Indian units alongside veteran British ones, but it still took many months to bring the army back up to full strength and fighting efficiency. Meanwhile, a second raid across the Jordan was launched in early April, with much the same results. After this failure, the army settled down to the defensive, training and reorganising. For large parts of the army this meant spending parts of the summer in the Jordan Valley, of which, the Army Handbook on Palestine declared: ‘Nothing is known of the climate in summer time, since no civilised human being has yet been found to spend summer there.’

  What the troops in the Jordan found was suffocating heat and lethal wildlife. Snakes and scorpions aside, the mosquitos that abounded in the valley (whose one redeeming feature was the plentiful supply of water) spread malaria that wreaked havoc among the ranks and created serious problems for the medical services. Skirmishing between patrols and piquets also created a smaller but steady trickle of casualties. Units had to be regularly rotated into the cooler hills or coastal plain to rest and recuperate from the climate alone. It was as unpleasant a situation for a soldier to find themselves in as any billet during the First World War, but for six months the army could do nothing but stand firm and endure it.

  Opposite them the Yildirim made ineffectual attempts to heal its own wounds. In February 1918 von Falkenhayn was replaced by Liman von Sanders, who at least had more experience and understanding when it came to dealing with the Ottoman forces under his command. A few new formations arrived, but even when combined with the trickle of new conscripts sent as replacements, they came nowhere near to bringing the Ottoman forces back up to strength. After all, the Yildirim had been the Ottomans’ last pool of reserve units, the results of scraping together every spare unit left in the empire, and they had been at least partially destroyed by Allenby. Morale among the 7th and 8th (OT) Armies remained low and the desertion rate high, although across the Jordan the 4th (OT) Army was buoyed by its successes against the British raids. By August, von S
anders had just twelve divisions to defend a 90km (56-mile) front, and most of them were at 15–20 per cent of their intended strength. Their own experiences in the Jordan Valley had been equally draining, or perhaps even more so as their own hopelessly inadequate medical services failed to cope.

  After some hard times, 1918 would eventually see the ultimate and dramatic fruition of the Arab Revolt. Even after the fall of Aqaba and the establishment of direct contact with the British forces in Palestine, the campaign had remained highly peripheral, even if it did keep tens of thousands of Ottoman soldiers away from the main fighting fronts. The Arab contribution to the 3rd Battle of Gaza had not extended much beyond that achievement, despite Allenby and Lawrence agreeing on a more concrete contribution. They had agreed that the Arabs would blow up a railway bridge in the Yarmuk valley, to the east of the Sea of Galilee and far north of the main fighting fronts. This should not only add to the Ottomans’ supply and communications problems, but also keep Ottoman troops tied down guarding such places rather than being redeployed to face the British. However, problems dogged this plan from the start. A cholera outbreak in Aqaba had severely limited communications and the flow of supplies into the port, and Lawrence was forced to make the raid with inadequate equipment, especially detonators and control cables. In the end, he left Aqaba with a fairly small force of tribesmen (including one strongly suspected of being, and later confirmed as, a traitor) and Indian machine-gunners on 24 October 1917. Efforts to raise much support from the tribes that they passed on the way north failed, and a week later, after establishing a base camp at Azraq, Lawrence led his small force after dark into the Yarmuk valley. However, as they approached the bridge, someone dropped his rifle and the clattering noise alerted the guards, who opened fire. The covering force of Indian machine-gunners returned fire, and in the confusion most of the explosives were dropped into the ravine under the bridge. Lawrence had no choice but to withdraw his men.