Gallipoli Diary 1915


Book Description

“We had a look around, through periscopes, at the remains of recent fighting. The dead were on top, and we, the living, were below the general ground-level. The usual order of life and death were reversed.” So wrote Alec Riley in his account of an ordinary soldier in an extraordinary conflict, the Gallipoli campaign of 1915. A signaller with the 42nd (East Lancashire) Division, Riley was well placed to serve as an eyewitness to the sharp end of the campaign, being with the infantry but not of it. His task, and that of the small unit he served with and whose story he tells, was to maintain communications between the forward trenches and senior commanders in the rear, a conduit for at times unrealistic orders one way, and all-too-real situation reports the other. During his time on the peninsula, Riley kept meticulous notes, which form the basis of this account. He also took his camera to war, the resulting photos—some of which were used in the British official history of the campaign—flesh out his detailed story of life in and behind the lines. After four months on the peninsula, suffering from jaundice, septic sores and dysentery, Riley was evacuated sick, destined first for Mudros and then Blighty. He made sure to save his diary and camera. Although Gallipoli had done for Riley, Riley was not done with Gallipoli. Even while on the peninsula, he and his comrades had looked beyond the war. “We tried to imagine what the place would be like when the armies had gone. Achi Baba would be green again, the trenches would fall in and flatten; communication-trenches, through which thousands of men had passed, would be long and shallow depressions, and frogs and tortoises the only inhabitants of gully and nullah.” Remarkably, Alec Riley returned to find out, revisiting the peninsula at least twice. In 1930, he spent ten days wandering across the now overgrown fields of battle on a lone pilgrimage, revisiting places he knew intimately 15 years before. This pilgrimage, and a subsequent second visit, was intended to form the basis of a book, again illustrated with his trusty camera. Sadly, the original manuscript has been lost. But the editors have identified two extracts that appeared in print, which they present alongside a faithful transcript of Riley’s diary and notes. Also included is an unpublished introduction by General Sir Ian Hamilton, commander of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force of which Riley had been a small part, and with whom Riley had a decade-long correspondence. The editors of the diary, Michael Crane and Bernard de Broglio, have added copious footnotes and detailed biographical notes on the officers and men who come to life in Riley’s writings, as well as an order of battle and summary of arms for the 42nd Division at Gallipoli. Fourteen maps illustrate the actions, large and small, that Riley describes, alongside 47 black and white photographs, most showing the battlefield in 1915 and 1930. Gallipoli Diary 1915 will appeal to readers of WW1 and military history, but especially to those with an interest in the Gallipoli campaign. It will be bookended by two further diaries that record Alec Riley’s mobilisation and training in Egypt, and his time in the Royal Victoria Hospital, Netley. Collectively they offer a unique window into the experiences of a pre-war Territorial soldier, before, during and after Gallipoli.




Gallipoli Diary


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The Western Front Diaries


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"A Special 100th-anniversary edition"--Title-page. "Revised edition"--Verso.




Gallipoli


Book Description

The noted historian’s decisive and devastating history of the WWI Battle of Gallipoli “sets a new standard for assessing the Allied Dardanelles campaign" (Mustafa Aksakal, American Historical Review). The Gallipoli campaign of 1915–16 was an ill-fated Allied attempt to take control of the Dardanelles, secure a sea route to Russia, and create a Balkan alliance against the Central Powers. A failure in all respects, the operation ended in disaster, and the Allied forces suffered some 390,000 casualties. In this conclusive study, military historian Robin Prior assesses the many myths about Gallipoli and provides definitive answers to questions that have lingered about the operation. Prior proceeds step by step through the campaign, dealing with naval, military, and political matters and surveying the operations of all the armies involved: British, Anzac, French, Indian, and Turkish. Relying on primary documents, including war diaries and technical military sources, Prior evaluates the strategy, the commanders, and the performance of soldiers on the ground. His conclusions are powerful and unsettling: the naval campaign was not “almost” won, and the land action was not bedeviled by “minor misfortunes.” Instead, the badly conceived Gallipoli campaign was doomed from the start. And even had it been successful, the operation would not have shortened the war by a single day. Despite their bravery, the Allied troops who fell at Gallipoli died in vain. A Wall Street Journal Best Book of 2009




Gallipoli Diary


Book Description




Gallipoli


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In early August with the failure of the August Offensive at Gallipoli the senior commanders still believed that victory was possible. To help prepare for a new offensive sometime in the first half on 1916 the allied forces attempted to straighten out the line connecting Suvla and Anzac at a small hillock called Hill 60.




Gallipoli


Book Description

"First published in Great Britain in 2011 by Profile Books"--T.p. verso.




A Prayer for Gallipoli


Book Description

Many chaplains were not permitted to go near the Front in the First World War - others insisted on doing so, like Kenneth Best in the Gallipoli Campaign. Best had no military training before the war but he felt that he could only fulfil his pastoral role by getting close to the front line and working with the troops under fire. Best was attached to the 42nd East Lancastrians - the first Territorial Army Division to serve overseas in the conflict, so arguably the least experienced in the ways of war. In his diary we follow his progress through his initial training in Egypt and on to his arrival in Gallipoli in May 1915. Gallipoli has become notorious, even by the standards of the First World War. After a naval campaign to open up a supply route to Russia through Turkey failed, some 480,000 Allied troops were drawn into a land invasion in which hundreds of thousands were injured or killed. In his diary, Best records his efforts to encourage frightened men before they go over the top, to comfort the wounded and, when the fighting stops, to bury the dead. His empathy for the troops is matched by a forthright disgust for their leaders, few of whom share his insight into the horrific realities of trench warfare.




Hamilton & Gallipoli


Book Description

This is a study of Sir Ian Hamilton VCs command of the Gallipoli campaign. Appointed by Kitchener after the failure of the initial Allied naval offensive in the Dardanelles, Hamilton was to lead the ambitious amphibious landings that were intended to open the way to Constantinople. In the event, however, opportunities immediately after the landings were squandered and, in the face of unexpectedly effective Turkish resistance, soon stalled in attritional trench warfare like that on the Western Front. Hamilton has often been criticized for this failure and in many ways seen to typify the stereotype of a British general clinging to outdated Victorian thinking. Yet this fresh reappraisal, drawing on original archival research, shows that Hamilton did display some progressive ideas and a realization that warfare was rapidly changing. Like all generals of this period he faced the challenge of unprecedented technological and tactical revolution as well as the political and media battle. It is as a case study of command in these circumstances that Evan Mcgilvray's assessment of Hamilton will be most valued.