shredward

from the FirstWorldWar.com, History Channel: April 30, 1917 Battle of the Boot On this day in 1917, the Battle of the Boot marks the end of the British army’s Samarrah Offensive, launched the previous month by Anglo-Indian forces under the regional Commander-in-Chief, Sir Frederick Stanley Maude, against the important Turkish railroad at Samarrah, some 130 kilometers north of Baghdad, in Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq). Fresh from the triumphant capture of Baghdad, Maude decided not to hesitate before moving to consolidate the Allied positions to the north, where Turkish commander Khalil Pasha’s forces had retreated from Baghdad to await reinforcements sent from Persia. In the Samarrah Offensive, begun on March 13, 1917, some 45,000 Anglo-Indian frontline troops were sent up the Tigris River towards the railway at Samarrah; on March 19, Maude’s forces seized Fallujah, preventing the Turks from flooding the Euphrates River onto the plains and hampering the British advance. Though an attempt on March 25 to intercept the Turkish reinforcements, Ali Ishan Bey's XIII Corps, met with failure, the British were able to capture another city, Dogameh, by the end of March. Ishan's force then sought temporary refuge in the Jebel Hamlin mountains in mid-April 1917. As the Samarrah Offensive continued into April, the Turks had backed up to positions between the Tigris and the Al Jali Canal; the Samarrah railway itself lay in between. Heavy fighting beginning on April 21 resulted in a Turkish defeat two days later and they were forced to cede Samarrah to the British. Less than a week later, Ishan suddenly reappeared with the majority of his troops at Dahubu in an attempt to surprise the British forces; they were aware of his movements, however, and the Turks were met by several infantry brigades, commanded by General William Marshall. Aware of the impending arrival of the British - and with the element of surprise lost - Ishan promptly withdrew to pre-prepared positions in the foothills spanning the river at Band-i-Adhaim. The subsequent action that took place, beginning early the morning of April 30, became known as the Battle of the Boot, for the boot-shaped peninsula of high ground on which it was fought. Marshall began his infantry attack early in the morning of April 30; his forces advanced quickly, taking 300 Turkish prisoners and two lines of trenches within a short time. A sandstorm subsequently halted British operations, and the Turks were able to call on reserve forces for a successful counter-attack. By the time the sandstorm cleared, in the late afternoon, Isha and his men had taken 350 British prisoners and begun a retreat into the mountains; blistering temperatures ensured that Marshall could not pursue Ishan's retreating troops into the mountains. The Battle of the Boot effectively ended the Samarrah Offensive, as Maude decided to pause in order to regroup and give his forces the chance to recover their strength. Casualties in the offensive numbered some 18,000, with losses due to illness running more than twice that number. Ishan and his Turkish forces remained in the mountains, preparing for the renewal of hostilities on the Mesopotamian front that would begin that fall.

As high as 20,000. Will Barker was stalking a Rumpler crew (who were on O2) at over 20,000 when he was hit from below by a prop-hanging DVII, at the start of his epic VC winning fight against odds on Oct 27 1918. He was no doubt suffering from hypoxia, reducing his awareness of what was going on down below. Cheers, shredward

Cosmos, No, you cannot be invited to join a squadron, nor can you request a transfer. There is no mechanism in the manager to do this. The only way that it might be possible would be to edit the files, and that is not advisable - you could screw up your installation. Much better to simply start a new career in the squadron of your choice. Cheers, shredward

from the History Channel: April 29, 1916 British Army Surrenders at Kut In the single largest surrender of troops in British history to that time, some 13,000 soldiers under the command of Sir Charles Townshend give in on April 29, 1916, after withstanding nearly five months under siege by Turkish and German forces at the town of Kut-al-Amara, on the Tigris River in the Basra province of Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq). Under the command of Sir John Nixon, British troops had enjoyed early success in their invasion of Mesopotamia. Forces led by Nixon’s forward divisional commander, Sir Charles Townshend, reached and occupied the Mesopotamian province of Basra, including the town of Kut al-Amara, by late September 1915. From there, they attempted to move up the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers toward Baghdad, but were rebuffed by Turkish troops at Ctesiphon (or Selman Pak) in late November. Despite outnumbering the Turks two-to-one, Townshend’s troops, made up partially of soldiers dispatched from India, were forced to retreat to Kut, where on December 5 Turkish and German troops began to lay siege to the city. Problems with illness plagued Townshend’s forces, as morale sank precipitously along with dwindling supplies and a lack of relief due to the heavy winter rains, which had swollen the Tigris River and made it difficult to maneuver troops along its banks. The British attempted four times over the course of the winter to confront and surround their Turkish opponents only to suffer 23,000 casualties, almost twice the strength of the entire remaining Kut regiment, without success. Kut finally fell on April 29, 1916, and Townshend and his 13,000 men were taken prisoner.

No

All a/c are flyable - you will find the units and types they flew in the manager, and the list of types is on the website. No Noop 28 yet. However, only 3 American units flew it, and for a short time before they re-equipped with Spuds. All the American pursuit squadrons are there, so lots of other choices. Cheers, shredward

Marine-Feldjagdstaffel I-V - Naval fighter units operating in Belgium Seefrontstaffel I-II - charged with protection of seaplanes operating on the coast Cheers, shredward

Hi Tony, Actually, you will be surprised at what is left at some dromes - much of rural France is much as it was 90 years ago. Of course, the tent and Bessonneau hangars are gone, but on some former dromes, other buildings are much as they were, and it's eerie how you can let yourself be transported back. Vert-Galant and Bertangles are two of the obvious ones, but there are many others where stepping back in time is very easy...I would highly recommend Mike O'Connors Battleground Europe - Airfields and Airmen series. Cheers, shredward

Hi Kerry, Australian battleground - sounds like your dig may be tied to the Battle of Messines? Is the group you are heading out with the one known as 'The Diggers'? Please keep us posted shredward

Halberstadt Fighters, rockets, and misadventures From the Halberstadt Fighters Datafile, Peter Grosz: With the exception of the engine and machine gun installation, there was little difference between the Halb DI, DII, and DIII. DI 100hp Mercedes DI - one or two built and tested DII 120hp Mercedes DII - 96 production a/c DIII 120hp Argus ASII - 50 production a/c Of the 57 DV fighters built, 31 were sent to Turkey, including all of the last production batch D3500-3024/17...Halberstadt fighters served in Palestine well into 1918. Leutnant Rudolf Nebel of Ja 5, the noted German rocket pioneer, recorded how he wanted to increase the distance at which HA could be attacked. He mounted two stovepipes under each wing, installed four signal rockets and attached ignition cables connected to a firing button. As Ja5 took off to intercept, Nebel recalled: Twenty-five HA closing from the west. I no longer paid any attention to my squadron mates, who could climb faster than my a/c with its four stovepipes. There was no time to reflect. I flew directly at the enemy squadron and automatically pressed the small button on the steering column. The distance about 100m was an enormous one compared to the accepted machine-gun range. Under my wings a woosh of fireworks, then a giant smoke trail shot through the English squadron. Was I successful? As a matter of fact, yes! An English pilot put his biplane into a dive and landed on the nearest field. Throttling down, I dived after him, landing some 20m away. The Tommy did not try the trick of surrendering and then at the last minute taking-off to escape. The new weapon had frightened him to such an extent that he surrendered without a fight. Eight days later I was to discover that the stovepipes had more than a mere morale effect. During this mission I shot the airscrew off an enemy machine. It crashed on the ground. A week later, the fiery exhaust of the rockets, now mounted on an Alb DIII, ignited the wings, but fortunately the slipstream extinguished the flames. Nebel was lucky to escape serious injury when his a/c crash-landed. A second Halberstadt fighter-rocket combination was less successful. On October 16, 1916, a Raketentrupp equipped with one Halb DII armed with four stick-stabilised rockets mounted on the outer wing struts for attacking balloons (an idea that had been copied from the French) left Berlin for the First Armée on the Western Front. Two weeks later the Raketentrupp was back in Berlin due to 'difficulty with the rocket system.' ...In any event, rocket attacks on balloons appear to have been a totally useless exercise, spectacular to be sure but incendiary bullets proved far more accurate. Cheers, shredward

And yes, we use the same model for the Halb DII and DIII - the differences being cosmetic, we felt it better to invest the time in something else. Same for the Alb DI and DII - yes, there was a difference in the pilot's view of the world outside, but our time is precious, and better spent elsewhere. Cheers, shredward.

From the Halberstadt Fighters Datafile, Peter Grosz: With the exception of the engine and machine gun installation, there was little difference between the Halb DI, DII, and DIII. DI 100hp Mercedes DI - one or two built and tested DII 120hp Mercedes DII - 96 production a/c DIII 120hp Argus ASII - 50 production a/c Of the 57 DV fighters built, 31 were sent to Turkey, including all of the last production batch D3500-3024/17...Halberstadt fighters served in Palestine well into 1918. Leutnant Rudolf Nebel of Ja 5, the noted German rocket pioneer, recorded how he wanted to increase the distance at which HA could be attacked. He mounted two stovepipes under each wing, installed four signal rockets and attached ignition cables connected to a firing button. As Ja5 took off to intercept, Nebel recalled: Twenty-five HA closing from the west. I no longer paid any attention to my squadron mates, who could climb faster than my a/c with its four stovepipes. There was no time to reflect. I flew directly at the enemy squadron and automatically pressed the small button on the steering column. The distance about 100m was an enormous one compared to the accepted machine-gun range. Under my wings a woosh of fireworks, then a giant smoke trail shot through the English squadron. Was I successful? As a matter of fact, yes! An English pilot put his biplane into a dive and landed on the nearest field. Throttling down, I dived after him, landing some 20m away. The Tommy did not try the trick of surrendering and then at the last minute taking-off to escape. The new weapon had frightened him to such an extent that he surrendered without a fight. Eight days later I was to discover that the stovepipes had more than a mere morale effect. During this mission I shot the airscrew off an enemy machine. It crashed on the ground. A week later, the fiery exhaust of the rockets, now mounted on an Alb DIII, ignited the wings, but fortunately the slipstream extinguished the flames. Nebel was lucky to escape serious injury when his a/c crash-landed. A second Halberstadt fighter-rocket combination was less successful. On October 16, 1916, a Raketentrupp equipped with one Halb DII armed with four stick-stabilised rockets mounted on the outer wing struts for attacking balloons (an idea that had been copied from the French) left Berlin for the First Armée on the Western Front. Two weeks later the Raketentrupp was back in Berlin due to 'difficulty with the rocket system.' ...In any event, rocket attacks on balloons appear to have been a totally useless exercise, spectacular to be sure but incendiary bullets proved far more accurate. Cheers, shredward

And some think us superficial because we play games...

A golden opportunity to throw back the shroud of time! Where will the dig be - what are they hoping to find? Is this the Diggers, or another group? Tell us more! shredward

from the History Channel: April 27, 1916 Siege of Kut On this day in 1916, three British officers, including Captain T.E. Lawrence (later known as “Lawrence of Arabia”), attempt to engineer the escape of thousands of British troops under siege at the city of Kut-al-Amara in Mesopotamia through a secret negotiation with the Turkish command. Since December 1915, British forces under the command of Sir Charles Townshend had been under siege from Turkish and German forces in Kut, on the Tigris River in the Basra province of Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq). Four attempts to push the enemy troops back had resulted only in some 23,000 casualties—nearly twice the strength of the remaining regiment. Exhausted, undersupplied and plagued with illness, Townshend’s men were on the brink of surrender when the British regional command decided to try one last diplomatic maneuver. Then working in military intelligence in Cairo, Egypt, the recently promoted Captain Thomas Edward Lawrence found office work dull, and thus was excited to be sent, along with two other officers, on a secret mission to negotiate the escape of Townshend and his troops with their Turkish counterparts. On April 27, they made their offer: if the Turks allowed the men in Kut to leave the city and rejoin Allied regional forces located to the south of Kut, they would be rewarded with £1 million in gold. Turkish officers, confident of their imminent victory at Kut, refused the offer, and all Lawrence and his comrades were able to secure was the release of some of the wounded. Kut fell on April 29, as Townshend and his remaining 13,000 men were taken prisoner, in the largest single surrender of troops in British history to that point. Lawrence’s well-written reports to British military command, both about Kut and Arab nationalism, won him high favor among his superiors. He was soon sent on another important mission, to help engineer an Arab revolt against the Turks led by Feisal Hussein.

from the W.B. Rhodes-Moorhouse Trust April 26, 1915 First Air VC William Barnard Rhodes-Moorhouse, born in England but of Maori descent, was the first airman to be awarded the Victoria Cross Will Rhodes-Moorhouse was the eldest son of Edward Moorhouse and Mary Ann, the part Maori daughter of William Barnard Rhodes, an early settler in New Zealand. Will's parents settled in England in 1884 and he was brought up mainly in Northamptonshire. The family was rich, comfortable and happy living off the considerable fortune in property and rents from New Zealand. Will was a mischievous child and quite a handful for the nursery maids. He had auburn hair, green eyes and was not very tall but very well built. He was a natural mechanic but never shone at school; he left Harrow needing to attend a crammer before going up to Cambridge University where he never quite fitted in. He was soon involved in aviation, learning to fly at Huntingdon where he teamed up with James Radley, another pioneer aviator. Together they built the Radley-Moorhouse monoplane which resembled the familiar Bleriot type. In this aircraft Will gained considerable experience and became one of the top cross-country pilots of his time. In 1910 he and Radley took a Gnome-engined Bleriot "barnstorming" across the USA to compete for money and fame in the newly popular aero-meetings. They ended up in San Francisco winning the £1,000 Harbour Prize and where Will became the first to fly through the Golden Gate. Because of his flying accidents Will had a complete set of false teeth and there was an absurd rule that no one could fly in the RFC so "handicapped". He therefore went as officer in charge of a section at the Farnborough factory which accepted and tested Renault engines for the BE series of aircraft. However, on the quiet, Will got himself flying again by Christmas 1914, initially at Brooklands but then in BE machines at Farnborough. In February 1915 he delivered a Parasol Bleriot No 576 to St Omer and in March such was the need for pilots that he flew out BE2c No 1657 and joined No 2 Squadron RFC at Merville. Will started operational flying immediately usually flying BE2a No 492 and spending the rest of March and most of April doing recce patrols, artillery spotting and photography, frequently recording in his log the incidence of "Archie". On several sorties later in April his observer was Sholto Douglas, later Air Vice-Marshal in WW2, who was becoming an expert on mounting aerial cameras. After a month in action the Wing Commander, Lt Col Trenchard, recommended Will for promotion. The Second Battle of Ypres had now started and German reinforcements were routed through the railway junction at Kortrijk 35 miles beyond the front line. When Trenchard assigned this target to be bombed by No 2 squadron Will took on the task. In his last letter to Linda, only to be read on his death, he described how he would have to carry out the attack very low to ensure hitting the target. "...I am off on a trip from which I don't expect to return but which I hope will shorten the war a bit. I shall probably be blown up by my own bomb or, if not, killed by rifle fire." He also left a letter addressed to his only son, "Sonny", full of good advice to read on his 21st birthday. The raid on Kortrijk BE2a No 492 was being repaired from shrapnel damage so he selected BE2b No 687, "a good climber", and he took off solo at 3.05pm April 26th carrying a 100lb bomb. On reaching Kortrijk he ignored Maurice Blake's advice to bomb from altitude and flew down to below 300ft through a hail of machine gunfire from a church tower and from hundreds of rifles. A shell drove the seat into his left thigh also tearing part of it away. At the same time a piece of shrapnel took off three fingers from his right hand: so to release the bomb he had to let go of the stick and lean right over to activate the mechanism with his left hand. The explosion of his bomb then very nearly sent the aeroplane out of control. His left leg was now useless so he only had his left hand and right leg to fly the machine, added to which the seat was so shattered that it sagged forward into the controls. At this point he could have landed immediately and saved his life but he judged it more important to return and report the success of his mission and in any case was determined not to let the Germans have his machine. He was so faint now that he decided to fly very low to keep up speed to re-cross the lines as quickly as possible. Probably while he was crossing the Ypres battlefield he was hit by a bullet which ripped through his abdomen and came to rest just under the skin over the ribs of his left side: this proved to be the fatal wound. In his diary Maurice Blake described Will's arrival at Merville. "...About 4.12pm saw an aeroplane flying very low on other side of river, when it turned to land machine was only 30ft high. It was Moorhouse and he switched on engine and cleared hedge on other bank and made perfect landing on top ground. Webb-Bowen and I went to machine and we found poor old Moorhouse was badly hit. Sent for stretcher and cut anti-drift wires. He said he felt as if his stomach was shot out of him". Before he died the next afternoon he said to Blake: "It's strange dying Blake old boy - unlike anything one has ever done before, like one's first solo flight". First VC won in the air After hearing he had earned an immediate DSO, he was awarded posthumously the first Victoria Cross ever won in the air. This was Gazetted on May 23, 1915. In making the award the authorities had no knowledge of his letter foretelling so exactly what he was to face, had little idea of the professionalism and great experience he drew upon, and no inkling that the nation had lost a pilot and engineer who could have in years to come contributed so much more to aviation than this suicidal exploit. Exceptionally and at his own request, his body was allowed back to England and he was buried in specially consecrated ground on top of a hill overlooking Parnham House were he and Linda had planned to build a cottage. Will's only son, Flight Lieutenant Willie Rhodes-Moorhouse DFC, gained his pilot's licence aged only 16 having to bicycle from Eton College to Heston Aerodrome to fly as often as he could. In November 1939 he took part in the first fighter-bomber attack of the war flying a Blenheim on the Borkum Raid. In January 1940, 601 converted to Hurricanes and during the German advance to Dunkirk was briefly based at Merville, where his father had been. Flying from Tangmere he was a Hurricane "ace" by the time he was awarded the DFC in August. Flying from Hornchurch on September 6, he was shot down and killed over Kent along with his wingman Carl Davis, another pre-war 601 pilot. They were probably "bounced" by Me109s. The very next day the exhausted and much depleted Squadron moved from 11 Group and the front line to Exeter. The Merlin engine and other remains of his Hurricane are displayed at the Battle of Britain Museum, Hawkinge. His ashes were scattered over the grave of his father.

from the History Channel: April 26, 1915 Italy Joins Entente On April 26, 1915, after receiving the promise of significant territorial gains, Italy signs the Treaty of London, committing itself to enter the Great War on the side of the Entente. With the threat of imminent war looming in July 1914, the Italian army under Chief of Staff Luigi Cadorna had begun preparing for war against France, according to Italy's membership in the Triple Alliance with Germany and Austria-Hungary. Under the terms of that agreement, however, Italy was only bound to defend its allies if one of them was attacked first. Italian Prime Minister Antonio Salandra deemed the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum to Serbia late that month an act of aggression, declaring that Italy was free of its alliance obligations, and was officially neutral. In the first year of war, both sides—the Central Powers and the Entente, as the British-French-Russian axis was known—attempted to recruit neutral countries including Italy, Bulgaria, Romania and Greece, to join the war on their side. Italy, more than any other country, was clear about its aims for joining the war effort: to gain the most possible territory for itself and raise its status from a minor to a great power. In reality, Italy's geographical position—bounded on all sides by the sea, and thus subject to pressure from Britain's great navy—inclined it to favor the Entente. Moreover, past interactions between Italy and Austria-Hungary had been driven more by mutual animosity than alliance, as the Italians had been forced to push the Austrians out of their peninsula in order to achieve unification in 1860. In making a bid for Italy's allegiance in the Great War, the Central Powers clashed over Germany's desire to promise the Italians the Trentino region (now occupied by Austria) in return for their entrance into the war. Though Austria-Hungary agreed to cede the Trentino in March 1915, their army's sorry performance against Russia gave the Italians more bargaining power and led them to demand even more territory. The Entente, for its part, offered much more substantial gains of territory—most of which currently fell within the Austro-Hungarian Empire—and it was under these terms that Italy signed the Treaty of London on April 26, 1915. Italy was promised the fulfillment of its national dream: control over territory on its border with Austria-Hungary stretching from Trentino through the South Tyrol to Trieste. In the treaty, the Allies gave them that and more, including parts of Dalmatia and numerous islands along Austria-Hungary's Adriatic coast; the Albanian port city of Vlore (Italian: Valona) and a central protectorate in Albania; and territory from the Ottoman Empire. Carrying out its part of the bargain, Italy declared war on Austria-Hungary (but not on Germany) on May 23. The Allies seemingly faced a more difficult task in the fulfillment of their own obligations: another secret treaty, signed March 20, had promised Russia control of Constantinople and the Dardanelles. Both treaties depended on an Allied victory at the Gallipoli Peninsula for their promised gains, which at this point seemed in no way secure. A naval attack against the Dardanelles on March 18 had failed miserably; a massive Anglo-French land invasion, begun the day before the Treaty of London was signed, would soon be stymied by a stiff Turkish resistance.

from Digger History, Wikipedia, Gallipoli Association: April 25, 1915 Landing at Gallipoli In January 1915, Russia appealed to Britain to draw off attacks by the Ottoman army in the Caucasus. Lord Kitchener told Winston Churchill, First Lord of the Admiralty, that no troops were available to directly help the Russians, but they could launch a diversionary attack at the Dardanelles, to prevent Ottoman troops from moving east to the Caucasus. First Sea Lord John Fisher advocated a joint Army-Naval campaign. The land campaign was launched on 25 April 1915 with two landings; one at Helles, and the other at a place now known as Anzac Cove. One was a 35,000-strong British main force led by Lieutenant General Hunter Weston and the other a 17,000-strong support force from the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) under General William Birdwood. Helles, at the foot of the peninsula, was the main landing area. With the support of the guns of the Royal Navy, a British division was to advance 6 miles along the peninsula on the first day and seize the heights of Achi Baba. From there they would go on to capture the forts that guarded the straits of the Dardanelles. General Sir Ian Hamilton, commander of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force, chose to land at Helles because it allowed the Navy to provide support from three sides. The disadvantage was that Helles was a long way from the forts that needed to be captured. The Helles forts made up the outer defences of the straits and had already been neutralised by naval gunfire and raids by Royal Marines. Between Helles and the forts were two naturally strong defensive positions; the hill of Achi Baba (today called Alçitepe) and the Kilitbahir plateau. As there was not room for ANZAC to land at Helles, the Australians and New Zealanders made a separate landing to the north, closer to the forts, but facing more difficult terrain. The intention was that if this secondary landing was unsuccessful, the Anzacs would be re-embarked and would be landed at Helles. The French were to make a diversionary landing on the Asian shore opposite Helles at Kum Kale. They would then cross the straits and join the British at Helles. The Helles landing would be made after dawn and following a preliminary naval bombardment, starting at 5 am and lasting one hour. This differed from the ANZAC landing which was a surprise assault, with the covering force going ashore before dawn without any supporting bombardment. The Helles landing was mismanaged by the British commander, Major General Aylmer Hunter-Weston. While the Anzacs were battling their way up the Sari Bair ridge the landings at Helles were under way. Beaches selected had been named as 'X', 'Y', 'V', 'W' and 'S'. Whilst 'S' and 'Y' on the right and left flanks respectively were only lightly garrisoned and quickly taken, lack of initiative and the failure of the 29th Division's commander Major General Hunter-Weston to exploit success resulted in tactical stagnation. At 'V' and 'W' beaches the picture was very different. Each was held by little more than a platoon of Turkish infantry but they exacted a terrible toll on the attackers. At 'W' the Lancashire Fusiliers were able to fight their way off the heavily wired beach, gaining six VCs in the process, but at 'V', where the Royal Dublin Fusiliers in ships' boats and the Munsters and Hampshires aboard the River Clyde were to land, there was slaughter; a Naval pilot flying overhead thirty minutes into the assault was horrified to see that the sea was red with blood up to fifty yards from the shore. For the rest of that day the attacking troops were pinned down on the shoreline, unable to move. The ANZAC landing area was a broad, four mile stretch of beach from about a mile north of Gaba Tepe to a point near Fisherman's Hut, north of Anzac Cove. It was officially designated "Z Beach". To attain surprise the landing would commence following moonset, about one hour before dawn. The landing scheme was a simple one, in outline at least. The 3rd Brigade's 4000 men would land as a covering force to secure a beachhead for two Australasian divisions made up of six brigades. Those 4000 would go in two waves. The first, consisting of 1500 men, were to start from three three Formidable-class battleships; HMS Queen, HMS London and HMS Prince of Wales– then be distributed between twelve tows, each made up of a steamboat, a cutter (30 men), a lifeboat (28 men) and either a launch (98 men) or a pinnace (60 men). The remaining 2500, the second wave, were to land from seven destroyers shortly afterwards. Those destroyers would wait near the island of Imbros and join the battleships, one and a half miles from the mainland, at 04:15. The first wave was scheduled to land a few minutes earlier, and the destroyers would then sail in, full speed ahead, adding a number of lifeboats borrowed from transport vessels to the tows that had been used by the first wave. Once the whole 3rd Brigade was ashore, the rest of the 1st Division would arrive on transports, grouped in fours and coming in at regular intervals. In reality, the landing was very confused and set in train a sequence of events that were never to be overcome. Not only did the boats of the first wave contract into a much reduced line significantly to the north of the expected beach, they also became intermingled before the troops could disembark. As a result the men went ashore in considerable disarray. The second wave then followed in order, ironically compounding the original errors. Throughout the day the main body of the 1st Australian Division continued to land and move into this uncertain position. On the Turkish side, the defence was in the hands of the 19th Division, commanded by Mustafa Kemal (Atatürk). Without reference to his superiors he rode at once to the summit of Chunuk Bair from where he could see the situation at a glance. He immediately launched one of his three regiments, the 57th, which was deployed close at hand to charge the oncoming Anzacs who had almost gained the summit but were blown and hopelessly intermixed . His orders to the 57th regiment were nothing if not direct: 'I am ordering you not to attack but to die' – which they duly did, saving the situation and buying time for further reinforcements to join the counter attack. The Anzacs were hurled back off the summit but held on sufficiently to establish a precarious front line which endured until the end of the campaign. This is where the Anzac legend was born, in places like Quinn's Post, 'Johnson's Jolly', 'Courtney's', and The Nek. Night fell on scenes of despair and confusion at Helles and Anzac, where General Birdwood had been summoned ashore by his senior officers for what amounted to a council of war. The narrow beach at Ari Burnu – ever thereafter immortalised as Anzac Cove, was choked with personnel and equipment as streams os casualties were carried back off the slopes above. . The spectacular charge up onto the heights of Sari Bair earlier in the day had so nearly taken the Anzacs to the vital summits; but Mustafa Kemal's rapid appreciation and firm direction of the defence had frustrated the attackers. Men were pouring back to the beach in search of their units and officers, discarded packs, food, water and ammunition. Major General Bridges, commanding the 1st Australian Division, favoured immediate re-embarkation as did several others, and a signal to that effect was sent to Hamilton on board the battleship HMS Queen Elizabeth. Woken at midnight with this unwelcome news he sought the advice of the naval commander who told him that it could take three days to get the troops off Anzac and would invite disaster. Hamilton therefore signalled Birdwood to dig in. During the night of 25-26 April the attackers were faced with almost unimaginable scenes of confusion and apparent disaster. At Anzac, where rain had set in, the beach was filling up with hundreds of wounded, brought down from the summits, and stragglers seeking to regain their original units. Stores of every type were piling up on the narrow strip of beach, and Turkish artillery was now bringing down accurate shrapnel fire to inflict further casualties on the beach parties and incoming boats. Despite this, however, the engineers were accomplishing wonders; within 48 hours their bore-holes just above the beach were producing tens of thousands of gallons of drinkable water and condensers were being brought ashore to augment the supply. On the ridge barely a thousand yards above the beach the infantry were digging frantically to establish some sort of front line against mounting Turkish counter attacks. Innumerable deeds of heroism took place, notably involving the evacuation of wounded to the beach; within days one medical orderly in particular had secured his place in Australian mythology:Private John Simpson Kirkpatrick, serving as Simpson, commandeered a donkey with which he conveyed wounded men down to the beach until killed himself. At Helles, as night fell on 25 April, it was possible to succour the surviving wounded on the shoreline and the troops who had been cooped up aboard the River Clyde were able to get ashore, to be greeted by the appalling sight of the Dublins and Munsters lying dead on the sand and in the shallows. Steve58 sent along this link to an amazing Australian Broadcasting Corporation site: http://www.abc.net.au/innovation/gallipoli/gallipoli2.htm shredward

from the History Channel: April 24, 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin Around noon on Easter Monday of 1916, some 1,600 Irish nationalists--members of the Irish Volunteers--launch the so-called Easter Rising in Dublin, seizing a number of official buildings and calling on all Irish patriots to resist the bonds of British control. Since the outbreak of World War I, the leading Irish nationalist, Sir Roger Casement, had pressed the German government to see the potential benefit of an Irish rebellion against British rule. Consequently, on April 2, the German merchant ship Aud was sent to the Atlantic coast of Ireland, loaded with some 20,000 rifles and 1 million rounds of ammunition bound for the hands of the Easter rebels. Before the Aud reached its destination, however, a British ship intercepted it, and the crew members of the Aud scuttled the ship with all its cargo. When Casement himself traveled from Germany to Tralee Bay, also on the Atlantic coast, three weeks later, he was put ashore by the Germans on an inflatable raft. He was subsequently arrested, tried and executed for treason by the British authorities. Meanwhile, plans for the Easter Rising had gone ahead without Casement or German help. Due to last-minute uncertainty, however, one of its leaders canceled the orders for mobilization on the Saturday before the planned uprising—because of this only 1,600 of an expected 5,000 participants gathered at Liberty Hall on April 24 to march towards the center of Dublin. There, they seized the post office, several court buildings, St. Stephen’s Green and several other locations. From the steps of the post office, the rebels declared Ireland an independent republic, stating that “We declare the right of the people of Ireland to the ownership of Ireland, and to the unfettered control of Irish destinies, to be sovereign and indefeasible.” Despite the rebels’ hopes, the public did not rise to support them, and they were quickly crushed by the police and government forces sent against them, among them some newly recruited troops bound for service in World War I. Sixty-four rebels were killed during the struggle, along with 134 troops and policeman, and at least 200 civilians were injured in the crossfire. Fifteen of the uprising’s leaders were eventually executed; a sixteenth, Eamon de Valera, was saved from a death sentence because he was an American citizen. Even in its failure, the Easter Rising and the continued volatility of the so-called “Irish question” demonstrated the thwarted desires for self-determination that still bubbled beneath the surface in Great Britain, as in many countries in Europe, even as the larger matter of international warfare superseded them for the moment.

from Eric Brenchley(Veterans Affairs), Calgary Military Historical Society April 22, 1915 Second Ypres - Gas!!! The Second Battle of Ypres was the only major attack launched by the German Army on the Western Front in 1915; most of their attention being focused on the Eastern Front against the Russians. The Second Battle of Ypres is known for the first use of gas warfare on the Western Front. Gas had been introduced on the Eastern Front earlier in the war, but with little effect. At 17:00 on April 22, a German spotter plane dropped three red flares. Big Bertha began firing at Ypres, and German Pioneers opened the valves on 5,700 canisters releasing 168 tons of chlorine gas. A veil of greenish-yellow mist could clearly be seen rolling across from the German front lines to the Allied positions held by French Algerian and Territorial Division troops. Covering six kilometres of Allied trenches, the gas affected some 10,000 soldiers, half of whom died within ten minutes of the gas reaching the front line. Death was caused by suffocation. Those who survived were temporarily blinded and left gasping for air, stumbling sightless to the rear. As a weapon, gas was particularly advantageous when used against soldiers in defensive positions. Being heavier than air, chlorine followed the ground's contours and sank into the trenches and shell holes soldiers used as protection against shrapnel and bullet. This forced them to abandon their defences in favour of higher ground. Those who did stay found it extremely difficult to fight with watery eyes, heaving stomachs and burning lungs. It could thus be more effective than artillery, which had to be very accurate to do any damage to a defensive position, or rifle fire, which required the enemy to expose himself.The effectiveness of the gas stunned the German troops carrying out the attack; the German command considered it inconceivable that a major breakthrough could be achieved. Therefore, during the planning of the attack, reserves were thought unnecessary. As a consequence the actual breakthrough was not exploited to its full potential. The two advancing Germans corps wearing primitive respirators walked warily through a clear seven kilometre gap in the Allied lines, then advanced three kilometres where they were halted by their equipment and the fire from the scrambled counter-offensive. The French colonials, whose soldiers received full doses of the vapour, gave way before the gas attack, leaving a breach in the Allied lines of over four miles wide, which the Germans were quick to exploit. The Canadian Division, which held the line to the right of the French positions, were asked to try and seal off the gap and hold the line which now was coming under attack not only from additional gas and artillery, but also direct assaults by German infantry. In this the Canadians were largely successful. In particular, that first night, the 10th and 16th Canadian Infantry Battalions were ordered to recapture Kitchener's Wood, a large copse of trees in which the Germans had set up new defences. Their attack was a typical example of the tactics of the day. The men formed up in a nearby field under cover of darkness to avoid the German shelling. When the time came to attack, the 1500 troops stood up in eight ranks at intervals of about thirty yards. There was just enough light for these soldiers to see the woods they were to capture, 500-600 yards away. A house off to one side, suspected (accurately) of harbouring machine-guns, they left alone, because officers determined, to their grief, it was not their job to take it. At 11:45 the attack began. At this point the two battalions were on their own, since they had no way to communicate with headquarters or supporting artillery, except through runners. Artillery support having ceased, the Canadians had to rely on their rifles, bayonets and bombs to carry out the assault, which took place just three minutes after setting out. There was a momentary pause at an unexpected hedge which brought down a hail of bullets, due to the noise of breaking through. Those unhit burst through the hedge at a fast run and struck the foremost enemy trench, where work with bayonet and butt soon cleared the position. The whole body then swept forward and, after heavy and close fighting, cleared the wood. In spite of heavy German rifle and machine-gun fire and the absence of Canadian artillery support, the assault was a success. Casualties were high however and holding the newly-won line was to be more difficult than taking it had been. The Germans, as was common in 1915, organized their defences in depth, even if they had just recently captured the ground they were defending. The Canadians, as it turned out, had managed to cave in the first line, but there were others from which the German commanders could launch their men into counterattacks. Ultimately under a series of strong counterattacks and rising casualties, the two battalions had to retire. Other similar Canadian counterattacks throughout the night and in brigade strength at least twice in daylight the next day were carried out. Casualties were very heavy and little ground was gained, but these further delayed German attempts at exploitation and gave other reinforcing troops — Canadian, British and French — sufficient time to close most of the gap. The result is that throughout the 23rd, the Canadians still held their positions more or less. As mentioned some retreat had occurred in order to consolidate forces, but the line was held. On April 24 , the enemy struck again. A great bombardment and another cloud of gas repeated the pattern of the first attack. This time a light breeze carried gas onto the Canadian positions, resulting in the full effects of the vapour settling upon the troops. The Canadians, without protection other than wet cloths over their faces, could do little but withdraw. Evacuating the first line of trenches, the men moved back a bit to lie on their stomachs and wait. Meanwhile, Canadian artillery, firing shrapnel over open sights, kept the Germans from taking the Canadian positions, until reoccupied once the gas dissipated. The gas, which had come as a complete surprise to the Algerians, now began to lose some of its novelty. The Canadians, initially held in reserve, realized the only place with fresh air would be near the German lines. The Canadians fought through using urine-soaked handkerchiefs as primitive gas masks, (for the ammonia in the urine would react with the chlorine, neutralizing it and the water would dissolve the chlorine allowing the soldiers to breathe.) It was found the urine and soil-impregnated cloths tended to absorb most of the vapour and allowed the troops to function to some extent. The result was that relatively few were totally overcome (the Canadian Division lost only 228 men to gas; however, many had lasting effects of varying degrees that would plague them the rest of their lives). Many casualties, though, were probably caused due to a gas-induced diminished capacity to defend themselves. Most found breathing to be very difficult and it was hard to resist the temptation to tear away the damp cloths and gulp air, but the worst effects lasted only a few minutes. Also because the fumes made it difficult or impossible for German observers to call the fall of shot, the German infantry was forced to advance without artillery support. The Canadians waited until they came upon their empty trenches and then opened fire from ranges less than 100 yards. As a result they were able to beat off most of the repeated attacks, and caused heavy German casualties. Notwithstanding this general state of affairs, there were set backs. From the northern fringe of St. Julien, the 15th Battalion was forced back with enormous losses to a line south of the village. To the right, on the forward slope of Gravenstafel Ridge, the 8th Battalion stood firm. However, Brigadier Arthur Currie, commanding the 2nd Brigade, managed to fill the former gap at St. Julien with fresh troops, and fresh British troops supported on the right. So even under the horrible surprise of gas the Canadians in their first major battle held the line against many times their numbers. The Canadians were withdrawn from the battle on May 3, being relieved by the British. Losses had been heavy. Of a maximum divisional strength of 18,000 that had started the battle, 5975 had become casualties, of whom over 1000 were fatal. Most of these casualties were infantrymen. The fighting of the first few days, as the Canadians counterattacked to recapture lost ground, had been heavy, but the worst day for the division was April 24, when it had to defend its own trenches against determined attacks by gas, shelling and infantry. 3058 of the casualties occurred on this day alone. What of the aftermath of the battle? Firstly, the Germans did not follow up their advantage. The attack was essentially a testing ground for the new weapon and not a major offensive. As a result, the Germans, dubious of any major success, had failed to provide sufficient reserves with which to exploit the initial resulting gap. Had the Germans broken through to Ypres and continued southward along the Yser Canal, they would have cut off 50,000 British and Canadian troops and removed the salient. By the end of the war, Ypres had been largely reduced to piles of rubble. The Second Battle of Ypres was the first battle to attempt the use of gas to clear the battlefield. Although it was condemned by the Allies as barbaric and it violated the Hague Convention, the Allies quickly developed their own form of gas warfare. All the Allied armies were to make extensive use of poison gas over the next three and a half years.

April 21, 1918 Dear Reader, I'm sure you know what happened on this day in the Great War. Perhaps you could tell us. Cheers, shredward

from the History Channel & FirstWorldWar.com April 20, 1917 Nivelle Offensive a Disaster On this day in 1917, a major French offensive along an 80 km front from Soissons to Reims ends in dismal failure. French Commander in Chief, Robert Nivelle, who had replaced Joseph Joffre in December 1915, had tenaciously argued for a major Allied spring offensive in spite of powerful opposition in the French Government, at one point threatening to resign if the offensive did not go ahead. Nivelle was convinced that the same tactics he had used at Verdun during the French counter-attacks in the fall of 1916, could achieve a breakthrough. Devised upon his appointment as Commander-in-Chief, Nivelle's plan, which he confidently assured the French Government would bring about an end to the war within two days, was beset by delays and leaks. By the time of its main launch on 16 April 1917, the plans were well-known to the German Army, who accordingly took appropriate defensive steps. The Second Battle of Arras (9 April-16 May 1917) was the British contribution to the Allied offensive. In preparation for the planned offensive at the Aisne River, the British Army began an attack on April 9 around Arras, with the limited objective of pulling German reserve troops away from the Aisne, where the French would launch the central thrust of the offensive. The British attack would involve troops from three armies. In the north the Canadian Corps would attack Vimy Ridge. In the centre of the line the Third Army (General Allenby) would attack from Arras. Finally, the British Fifth Army (General Gough) would attack on the right of the line. The attack on Vimy Ridge was one of the best planned offensives of the war. Of the nearly 1,000 heavy guns used in the attacks, 377 were aimed at a six-kilometer stretch of front facing Vimy Ridge, a high point overlooking the Douai Plain to the east. Twelve tunnels, one 2.5km long, were built leading up to the front line to protect the troops during their approach to the lines. On 9 April the Canadians stormed out of their tunnels and captured the ridge on the first day of the battle. By 13 April the Germans had accepted the loss of the ridge and pulled back to their third line of defences, the III Stellung (the Oppy-Mericourt Line), four miles further east. The entire British attack was supported by 2,879 guns each of which had close to 1,000 shells. When VI Corps of Third Army launched its attack on 9 April they were able to overwhelm the German front line, and in some places advanced more than three miles. Only to the south was progress limited. The capture of Vimy Ridge was a national triumph for Canada and a successful outcome for the initial phase of the Nivelle Offensive, as the Germans were forced to double their strength in the Arras region and thus draw forces away from the area further south, where Nivelle was preparing to launch his attacks. On April 16, 19 divisions of the French Fifth and Sixth Armies - under Mazel and Mangin, began their assault along an 80-kilometer front stretching from Soissons to Reims along the Aisne River. Opposite the French on high ground, heavily defended and fortified, was von Boehm's German Seventh Army, who conducted an efficient defence. The Germans had ample warning of French intentions from their intelligence systems; this, combined with the depth of their positions, meant that the French were literally outgunned from the beginning of the battle. The overconfident Nivelle had ordered a rate of advance of up to two kilometers per hour, which proved exceedingly difficult with the steep grade of the land, horrible weather and the strength of enemy fire. For this attack, known as the Second Battle of the Aisne, the French used tanks in great numbers for the first time; by the end of the first day, however, 57 of 132 tanks had been destroyed and 64 more had become bogged down in the mud. All in all, the French suffered 40,000 casualties on April 16 alone, a loss comparable to that suffered by the British on the first day of the Somme a year earlier. On the second day the French Fourth Army under Anthoine launched a subsidiary attack east of Reims towards Moronvilliers. However von Below's German First Army readily repelled the assault. It was clear from the start that the attack had failed to achieve the decisive breakthrough Nivelle had planned: over the next three days, the French made only modest gains, advancing up to seven kilometers on the west of the front and taking 20,000 German prisoners. On the rest of the front, progress was significantly slower, and Nivelle was forced to call off the attacks on April 20. Some gains had been made, by Mangin west of Soissons, but progress was slow. The offensive was scaled back over the next two weeks, although by 5 May a 4 km stretch of the Chemin-des-Dames - part of the Hindenburg Line - had been captured. The offensive was finally abandoned in disarray on 9 May following a final ineffective four day assault. French losses were significant, with 187,000 casualties. The Germans suffered an estimated 168,000 casualties. The high casualty rate among French forces during the ill-fated Nivelle Offensive, combined with the continuing effects of exhausting battles at Verdun and the Somme, led to sharply increased discontent among the soldiers on the Western Front. Mutinies began in late April 1917, and by June had affected 68 divisions, or about 40,000 troops. The army's response to this was quick: on April 25, Nivelle was dismissed as commander in chief. He was replaced by the more cautious Philippe Petain, the hero of the Verdun resistance, on May 8. Petain immediately responded to the soldiers' complaints, knowing that mutinies must be quelled in order to have a hope of success on the battlefield. Where Nivelle had cut soldiers' leave in March 1917, releasing only 5 percent of the army at a time, Petain increased it, establishing a standard of 13 percent, or ten days' leave for each soldier every four months. More importantly, Petain was only able to restore order within the French Army by refraining to commit his forces to any further offensive operations.

Heil dir im Siegerkranz http://rathay.de/Lieder/LiedTexte/heil_dir...siegeskranz.htm -Thanks to FliegerJG1 at The Aerodrome Forum

from the History Channel: April 18, 1915 Roland Garros Downed On this day in 1915, a member of the German Bahnschutzwache, or Railway Protection Guard, shoots down the well-known French airman Roland Garros in his flight over German positions in Flanders, France, on a bombing raid. Garros, born in 1882, gained renown early in his career as an experienced practitioner of aerial acrobatics, the first French pilot to fly across the Mediterranean Sea and a two-time winner of both the Paris-Madrid and Paris-Rome flying races. In 1914, while working as a test pilot for Morane-Saulnier, an aircraft manufacturer, Garros set the then-world record for the highest flight: 4,250 meters. When war broke out in Europe that same year, he was sent to serve with the French air service, L’Aviation Militaire, on the Western Front. At the end of 1914, Garros took leave from his regiment and returned to the Morane-Saulnier factory to work with Raymond Saulnier to test a recently developed device that enabled a pilot to fire bullets from a machine-gun through the blades of the propeller of his plane. The device, employed successfully by Garros in the early spring of 1915, allowed him to approach his enemies head-on in the air, giving him a vast advantage. Garros shot down his first German victim, an Albatross reconnaissance aircraft, on April 1, 1915; in the next two weeks, he downed four more. Garros’ run ended on April 18, however, when he was flying his single-seater plane, a Morane-Saulnier Type L, low in the skies above the German positions in Flanders. A member of the German Bahnschutzwache described the events of that day: “At that moment we saw a southbound train approaching on the railway line Ingelmunster-Kortrijk. Suddenly the plane went into a steep dive…He flew over the train in a loop and as he rose up into the sky again with his wings almost vertical, he threw a bomb at the train. Fortunately it missed the target and there was no damage….As the plane had swooped down over the train the Bahnschutzwache troops had fired on it following my order to open fire. We shot at him from a distance of only 100 metres as he flew past. After he had thrown his bomb at the train he tried to escape, switching his engine on again and climbing to about 700 metres through the shots fired by our troops. But suddenly the plane began to sway about in the sky, the engine fell silent, and the pilot began to glide the plane down in the direction of Hulste.” A German bullet had apparently hit the gas pipe on Garros’ plane, forcing him to land. Although the daring airman attempted to set the plane on fire and escape on foot once he hit the ground, both he and the plane were captured by the Germans. Garros later managed to escape from captivity and rejoin L’Aviation Militaire. Killed in battle at Vouziers on October 5, 1918, he is remembered as one of France’s most celebrated war heroes; the famous tennis stadium in Paris bears his name. The propeller of Garros’ Morane-Saulnier plane and its innovative machine-gun firing device were sent immediately after his capture in April 1915 to the Fokker aircraft factory in Germany. A few weeks later, the first Fokker EI—a single-seater airplane fitted with machine guns, deflectors and interrupter gear that could synchronize the rate of fire of the gun with the speed of the propeller—was sent to German forces on the Western Front. From mid-1915 until mid-1916, the Fokker E-types of the German Air Force were the menace of the skies, shooting down a total of over 1,000 Allied aircraft.

Hi Lou, I've not seen that photo. Would you mind emailing it to me? Bagger is doing at least one SE for every pilot we have who flew one - many have two or more eg if he flew Hissos and Vipers, or switched units, or had an extended career. Cheers, shredward