by turcoscot on 07 Jun 2009 02:40
Dear John,
Please find below my translation of the section of Sunata's memoir describing the events of August 21. I have tried to give a clean translation, while keeping the rather staccato tone of the original, which resembles rapid journal entries in places. The tenses alternate in the original as I have rendered them here. There are a couple of old Ottoman Turkish words I have guessed at, and I have translated "obus" as "howitzer", which may not be quite right, but on the whole I think it is OK. Please let me know if you are unclear or unsure. If you know Turkish, I can easily send you the original.
I would be very glad to see the map you mention; I have looked around but cannot obtain the Turkish Official Histories in our library system here in North Carolina. If the file is large, you might try saving it as PDF, and then running the "reduce file size" in Acrobat professional, if you have it available. If not, no worry.
Hope this helps, looking forward to hearing from you,
Reha
The Great British Assault (p.159-163)
On the morning of August 21, 1331 I made myself a nice can of soup and drank it. I decided to visit Rustem and congratulate him on his promotion. At that moment 2nd. Lt. (Mulazim) Zeybek Ismail Efendi came by and said he would be back in a moment. I couldn’t leave, and waited. By the time he came back it was noon.
I had tea and sugar. I brewed tea. We worried that the enemy would see the smoke from our fire. Ismail Efendi has been awarded a German War Medal and proudly shows it to me, and congratulates me on my promotion.
It was after one in the afternoon. Two howitzer (obus) shells whined over our heads. They fell on the 5th Company a little to our left. One shell fell in front of the trench, and another behind it. There was a tremendous explosion that filled the air with dust and smoke. Howitzers are different from other guns. We can’t hear the gun fire. It’s coming from somewhere on the right flank. The shells make a strange whistling noise as they pass over our heads. Then they land and explode with a great noise. They destroy where they land. May Allah help those who happen to be there. They are using Mentestepe as a sighting point (isaret noktasi). The trenches on the other side of it are under heavy artillery fire. This is turning into a major battle. The shelling goes on and on. Ismail Efendi says “Things are getting bad, I had better go”. He needs to be with his unit.
The howitzer shells are coming so fast they seem like a constant thunder. Fortunately very few are falling in my area. The closest is about 30 metres away, on the far end of my platoon. From there to the left is dust, smoke, noise, confusion and terror. Nothing can be seen for the dust and smoke. I cannot see how far the bombarded area extends.
A while later the 3rd Battalion companies who were in reserve began to arrive. They are sent to fill the gaps in the shelled trenches, but the shelling is still going on, so they pack into our trenches. There is hardly room to move. With great difficulty I was able to get some of them out and moving. Anyway, it is pointless to send more troops to be killed there. They can wait in readiness a little in the rear. It appears that the enemy will attack. When the shelling stops the reinforcements can immediately move up. It has been two hours since the shelling started. It is still going on. The 7th Company is to our right, and to their right the battalion commander and his command post. There is a lot of activity over there.
They keep passing the word by mouth “The commander of the 36th Regiment is asking for news”. What news? We don’t know anything. To our left those under the shelling are in a death struggle. How can they send news?
After a while a moaning sound began to be head from our right. At first I didn’t understand. When the men in our positions joined in I understood: “Allahu ekber, Allahu ekber, la ilahe Illallah”. They are reciting the Bayram paean.
Dear savior, this is not a disaster coming from Allah from which one can be saved by prayer or by taking refuge in Him. If Allah was on the Muslim’s side he would stuff the British guns with straw and their guns could not fire. He doesn’t stuff them, and they fire as they wish. We don’t have as many guns to fire as they do. With prayers and paeans the firing does not stop.
Well, prayers are from desperation, what can we say?
The guns, not only the howitzers shelling the trenches, but the big guns of the battleships, explode with great noise, shelling the roads and artillery emplacements in the rear. The small guns on the torpedo boats (probably means destroyers, but he says torpido) and the field guns on land, all roads are under fire with shrapnel.
The Attack Begins
Around five in the afternoon. Suddenly the howitzers shelling the trenches fell silent. The naval guns and shrapnel shelling the rear continue.
When the howitzer fire stopped the dust and smoke over the trenches slowly began to clear.
From the right the word was passed by mouth: “The enemy have risen to the attack, let the left flank take care!”. The news came from Kirectepe.
Indeed, behind the slowly clearing dust and smoke, from our position we began to see masses of British advancing. We immediately opened fire on them from the flank. The enemy is not attacking our front, but that of the units to our left. Our flanking fire is very effective. As the dust and smoke cleared from over them the units to our left also opened fire. Now it’s up to the infantry.
All the reserves and other idle forces began to move in that direction, towards the area under attack.
The infantry fire is getting stronger and stronger. At this time I heard that Rustem’s company commander had been seriously wounded. A howitzer shell landed next to a squad’s trench and exploded. All the soldiers in the trench were buried.
The excitement mounts, and we are consumed by anxiety and worry. I doubt the enemy can succeed when all is up to the infantry rifles. But I don’t know how much damage the artillery fire did. The British keep coming. We see this and fire incessantly. Now all the artillery sounds are dying away. It is getting dark. With the ceasing of the artillery fire some calm has descended on the scene. But the infantry fire continues.
The sound of the artillery has given way to other sounds. From our left come shouts, moans, groans and screams, and orders are given. The rear of the trenches is full of wounded and moaning men, there are dead also. In the twilight some are coming, some are going, total confusion. Nothing can be understood of what is happening. A medical orderly has been raked across the stomach at the level of his navel by a machine gun, his wounds are exposed. Sergeant Hakki, whom I first met in the 6th Company, is badly wounded. I went to him at once. “Hakki Efendi, don’t forget me, avenge me on the British, I am going. Give me your blessing”, he said. I immediately sent him with some soldiers from his company to the aid station. Will the poor fellow survive, I wonder? I doubt it. A clean, innocent, honourable soldier of this army. What a pity.
I could not go further to the left. I did not want to become completely separated from my unit. Finally, I sent a soldier to go find out what had happened.
The word came an hour later. The British had broken into the trenches of the 34th Regiment on the hill to our left. Our battalion’s 6th Company got there, joined by some forces from the 3rd Battalion. They drove the British back and retook the trench. Later the 64th Regiment came up as reinforcements. The commander of our 3rd Battalion’s 10th Company, Captain Ali Riza Bey, was badly wounded by a howitzer shell. There are many dead and wounded. The enemy wounded are also calling out in front. The enemy was completely repulsed. The night passed with carrying the wounded and burying the dead. We were all awake. The day’s events had made us so nervous we had forgotten even what sleep was.
Some prisoners had also been taken. These rumors went around by word of mouth. We had suffered heavy casualties for lack of defensive equipment. The enemy had heavy losses because they were attacking, and because of the incompetence of their attack.
From my platoon to the right we had escaped the bombardment. When the attack had began our flanking fire had badly mauled them. These were things for the enemy commander to think on. The enemy made several repeated attaches on Kirectepe. Before that on Yusufcuk Tepe and the Buyuk Anafarta area, and half-hearted attacks on Koca Cimen Tepe. They had lost their chance from the first day. They never made a daring attack. Today’s was their strongest attack. It had us pretty worried. Right across to the line of Buyuk Anafarta, our single division, the 12th Division, was defending the Suvla Bay and Kucuk Anafarta front.
