Battle of Imbros
Battle of Imbros | |||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Part of the Mediterranean Theatre of World War I | |||||||
Yavûz Sultân Selîm beached in the Dardanelles | |||||||
| |||||||
Belligerents | |||||||
United Kingdom Greece[1] |
Ottoman Empire Germany | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Henry F. Kitchener[2] | Hubert Paschwitz | ||||||
Strength | |||||||
2 monitors 2 destroyers 12 aircraft |
1 battlecruiser 2 light cruisers 4 destroyers 10 aircraft | ||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
139 killed 2 monitors sunk 1 aircraft destroyed 1 aircraft damaged |
330 killed 172 captured 1 light cruiser sunk 1 battlecruiser disabled 1 destroyer damaged 3 aircraft destroyed |
The Battle of Imbros was a naval action that took place during the First World War. The battle occurred on 20 January 1918 when an Ottoman
Although the Ottoman forces managed to complete their objective of destroying the monitors located at Imbros, the battle turned sour for them as they sailed through a minefield while withdrawing. Midilli was sunk and Yavûz Sultân Selîm heavily damaged. Although Yavûz Sultân Selîm managed to beach herself within the Dardanelles, she was subjected to days of air attacks until she was towed to safety. With the most modern cruiser of the Ottoman Navy sunk, and its only battlecruiser out of action, the battle effectively curtailed the Ottoman Navy's offensive capability until the end of the war.
Prelude
By January 1918, the situation for the Ottoman Army in
Without Agamemnon and Lord Nelson the British were severely outgunned in comparison to the Ottoman ships. Tigress and Lizard both were armed with two
Battle
Setting out towards Imbros, Yavûz Sultân Selîm struck a mine on transit to the island, but the damage was insignificant and the two Ottoman vessels were able to continue their mission. Yavûz Sultân Selîm then proceeded to bombard the British signal station at Kephalo Point while Midilli was sent ahead to guard the entrance of Kusu Bay. As Yavûz Sultân Selîm and Midilli approached Kusu Bay, they were sighted by the destroyer HMS Lizard at 5:30 am.[9] Lizard attempted to engage the Ottoman ships, but could not close to torpedo range due to heavy fire from her opponents. Yavûz Sultân Selîm soon sighted the two British monitors taking refuge in the bay, and broke off from Lizard to engage them. As Yavûz Sultân Selîm attacked the monitors, Midilli continued to duel with Lizard who was then joined by the destroyer HMS Tigress.[9] Lizard and Tigress attempted to shield the monitors from Yavûz Sultân Selîm by laying a smoke screen, but this was ineffective. The monitors were both much too slow to evade Yavûz Sultân Selîm and she was able to score numerous hits on Raglan, hitting her foretop and killing her gunnery and direction officers. Raglan attempted to return fire with its 6- and 14-inch guns, but scored no hits on the German vessels before her main armament was knocked out when a shell pierced its casemate and ignited the ammunition within it. Shortly after she was disarmed, Raglan was hit in her magazine by one of Yavûz Sultân Selîm's 11-inch shells, causing the monitor to sink. After Raglan was sunk, the Ottoman battlecruiser began turned her attention to HMS M28, striking her amidships and setting her alight before she was sunk when her magazine exploded at 6:00 am. With the two monitors sunk, the Ottomans decided to break off the engagement and head south in an attempt to raid the allied naval base at Mudros.[9]
Upon withdrawing from Kusu Bay, the Ottoman force accidentally sailed into a
In addition to Lizard and Tigress, a dozen British seaplanes from
Aftermath
With no way to free herself, Yavûz Sultân Selîm remained stranded on the sandbar until 26 January when the Ottoman battleship Turgut Reis finally arrived and towed her back into the Black Sea. In one last effort to destroy the battlecruiser, the British sent the submarine HMS E14 into the Dardanelles on 27 January. Yavûz Sultân Selîm had already left the area, and so E14 began sailing back to Allied waters after discovering the battlecruiser's absence. Sighting an Ottoman freighter, the British submarine attempted to torpedo her. The second torpedo fired exploded prematurely.[12] The resulting explosion damaged the submarine, forcing her to try to flee the straits. She came under heavy fire from nearby Ottoman shore batteries and was eventually beached with her commander, Geoffrey Saxton White, and another sailor killed and seven captured.[5] White was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross for his efforts to beach the submarine and save her crew.[13]
Although the Ottoman force destroyed the two monitors as planned, their losses traversing the minefield after the engagement in Kusu Bay offset these successes considerably. With Midilli sunk and Yavûz Sultân Selîm severely damaged, the threat of the Ottoman Navy to the Allies was greatly reduced for the remainder of the war. Despite the removal of these two vessels from the Ottoman
Notes
- ^ a b Jon Guttman (23 September 1998). "Air Attack Over the Dardanelles – Sidebar: September '98 Aviation History Feature". historynet.com. Archived from the original on 4 January 2012. Retrieved 4 May 2010.
- ^ Woodhouse 1920, p. 160.
- ^ a b Halpern 1994, p. 255.
- ^ a b c d Jameson 2004, p. 89.
- ^ a b c d Chisholm 1922, p. 1082.
- ^ Sieche 1985, p. 44.
- ^ Gröner 1990, p. 107.
- ^ Gröner 1990, p. 54.
- ^ a b c d e Littlefield 1918, p. 414.
- ^ Buchan 1922, p. 241.
- ^ "220 Lost on the Raglan" (PDF). The New York Times. 25 January 1918. p. 4. Archived (PDF) from the original on 25 November 2021. Retrieved 30 November 2009.
- ^ Jameson 2004, pp. 95, 96.
- ^ "No. 31354". The London Gazette (Supplement). 23 May 1919. p. 6445.
References
- Buchan, John (1922). A History of the Great War Volume VII. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. Archived from the original on 2 May 2021. Retrieved 14 October 2020.
- Chisholm, Hugh (1922). The Encyclopædia Britannica, The Twelfth Edition, Volume 2. New York: The Encyclopædia Britannica Company, LTD. Archived from the original on 2 May 2021. Retrieved 14 October 2020.
- ISBN 0-87021-790-9.
- ISBN 0-87021-266-4. Archivedfrom the original on 2 May 2021. Retrieved 17 October 2016.
- Jameson, William (2004). Submariners VC. Penzance, Cornwall: Periscope Publishing. ISBN 978-1-904381-24-2. Archivedfrom the original on 2 May 2021. Retrieved 14 October 2020.
- Littlefield, Walter (1918). The European War. The New York Times Current History. Vol. 14. New York: The New York Times Company. Archived from the original on 2 May 2021. Retrieved 14 October 2020.
- Sieche, Erwin (1980). "Germany". In Chesneau, Roger (ed.). Conway's All the World's Fighting Ships 1922–1946. London: Conway Maritime Press. ISBN 0-85177-146-7.
- Woodhouse, Henry (1920). Textbook of Aerial Laws. New York: Frederick A. Stokes Company. p. 160.
hms raglan m28.