Battle of Scimitar Hill
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Battle of Scimitar Hill | |||||||
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Part of Gallipoli Campaign | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
British Empire | Ottoman Empire | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Beauvoir De Lisle | Mustafa Kemal Bey | ||||||
Strength | |||||||
11th and 29th divisions (14,300 men)[1] | |||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
5,300[1] | 2,600[3] |
The Battle of Scimitar Hill (
Prelude
Paralysis had set in to the British campaign in the
Scimitar Hill, so named because of its curved summit, and the neighbouring W Hills to the south were part of the Anafarta Spur that marked the southern edge of the Suvla sector. Their capture had originally been first-day (7 August) objectives but General Stopford was exceedingly hesitant about making any major advances without artillery support. Consequently, the troops of the British 11th (Northern) Division (which had made the initial landing on the night of 6 August) and the 10th (Irish) Division (which had landed the following morning) did not advance from the immediate environs of the beach until 8 August, by which time they were already exhausted from lack of water and being under constant shrapnel and sniper fire.
On the morning of 9 August, the British made their first effort to advance towards the high ground to the east, a ridge called Tekke Tepe. Scimitar Hill, which guarded the approach to this ridge from the southwest along the Anafarta Spur, had been captured unopposed by the 6th Battalion,
On 10 August the 53rd Division made another attack at Scimitar Hill, which was another massive failure for the British and effectively ruined the division as a fighting unit within two days of its landing.
Battle
On 15 August Stopford was sacked and
To make the attack from Suvla, De Lisle had the dismounted yeomanry of the 2nd Mounted Division and the 29th Division, which had moved from Helles where it had borne the brunt of the fighting since the landings of 25 April. The plan for 21 August was to attack Scimitar Hill with the 29th Division and the W Hills with the 11th Division, keeping the yeomanry in reserve near the beach. As was so often the case at Gallipoli, the preliminary artillery barrage looked impressive but achieved little. The British had no sight of their targets, which were obscured by mist and smoke, whereas the Ottoman artillery had a clear view of the entire Suvla battlefield and ample opportunity to register their targets.
The 11th Division attempt to capture the W Hills, collapsed in confusion when confronted by an Ottoman strong-point and artillery fire. As a consequence when the 1st Battalion of the Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers managed to capture the summit of Scimitar Hill, they found themselves under fire from the defenders higher up the Anafarta Spur to the east and from the W Hills to the south. The Irish retreated from the summit while the undergrowth around them was set ablaze by the shellfire, incinerating the wounded as they lay helpless.
Around 5:00 p.m. the troops of the 2nd Mounted Division were ordered forward from their reserve position on Lala Baba, near the beach. They advanced, marching in formation, across the bed of a dry
Aftermath
Casualties
In one day of fighting the British suffered 5,300 casualties out of the 14,300 soldiers who participated.[5]
Victoria Cross
The only two
Footnotes
- ^ a b c Aspinall-Oglander 1932, p. 354.
- ^ Aspinall-Oglander 1932, p. 355 & sketch 29.
- ^ a b Aspinall-Oglander 1932, p. 355.
- ^ Aspinall-Oglander 1932, p. 366.
- ^ Aspinall-Oglander 1932, pp. 354–355.
- ^ Aspinall-Oglander 1932, pp. 291–292.
References
- Aspinall-Oglander, C. F. (1932). Military Operations Gallipoli: May 1915 to the Evacuation. History of the Great War Based on Official Documents by Direction of the Historical Section of the Committee of Imperial Defence. Historical Section. Vol. II (IWM & Battery Press1992 ed.). London: Heinemann. ISBN 0-89839-175-X.