Date of Surrender of Constantinople 1918?

[Pete H]

All of the literature I have come across gives the first date for entry of British troops into Constantinople as November 13th 1918, with the French arriving a day earlier.

However, my attention was caught by an article here http://firstworldwar.com/source/constan ... dprice.htm that gives a date of November 10th, with the reporter being G Ward-Price, Official British Observer. To establish whether or not this was a typo, I followed up the reference for this claim on Records of the Great War Vol Vi, Ed Charles F Horne, National Alumni 1923, given below and there is no error, it is a verbatim account giving Nov 10th. I'm confused. Does this mean that a destroyer with an advance party 'Herald of the British fleet' arrived earlier to arrange for the official surrender to General Wilson on 13th?

https://archive.org/stream/sourcerecord ... tantinople

[Tosun Saral]

According to peace agrement of Mundros Entente forces entered into Dardanelle on Nov. 6-12 1918.

- On Nov. 7th four British officers arrived to Istanbul on turkish torpedoboad Basra. They were taken to Pera Palace Hotel and Tokatlıyan Hotel. Where 80 rooms were rented for coming Entente personal.

- On Nov. 8th four french officers arrived on the board of Arian. They walked to french embassy at Pera.

- On nov. 10th 2 british and 1 french genarals arrived together to İstanbul.

- On Nov. 12nd a french briagade entered to İstanbul.

- On Nov. 13rd a fleet of 61 ships consisting of 22 British, 12 French, 17 İtalian, 4 greek, and 6 sub anchored on Bosphorus. On Now. 15th the number of ships increased to 167

This was the unofficai occupation of İstanbul.

As the national movement under Mustafa Kemal Pasha developed in Anatolian part of Turkey Entente occupied İstanbul officially on March 20th 1920 killing many innocent unarmed Turkish soldiers while sleeping in their beds at the military barracks and arresting many turkish honourable officers and sivil officials. This is the darkest day in Turkish history that we never forget.

[Tosun Saral]

Number of soldiers killed by British at Şehsadebaşı army barracks are 61

[Pete H]

Hi Tosun,
That's a fascinating response, thank you very much.
My interest in this date, by the way, is not to celebrate in any way the occupation of Constantinople, but to establish the journey home made by my grandfather who was a PoW at Gelebek in 1918. You have generously helped me with this before.
There is an 'oral history' handed down through the family that having escaped* from Gelebek he got to Constantinople on trains, then met an English man who helped him. One day he sees some solidiers who look to be British at a waterfront. He approaches them, and on finding that they are British, sits at the side of the road and weeps, his ordeal nearly over. I was trying to establish where and when this could have happened. If he had met soldiers on emerging at Haydarpasha, there would be no need to be helped by an Englishman so that can't be the case. If he sees soldiers at a waterfront on Nov 13th, it can hardly be a surprise as the arrival is anticipated to the extent that the prisoners were organised into a 'guard of honour', so that can't be the incident either. These early arrivals you describe, on the 7th and 10th look to me to be far more likely candidates. He would know about the armistice, perhaps even the planned arrival on 13th, but finding some fellow British soldiers on one of these earlier dates fits well with the story described above, that these British soldiers are not anticipated at that time and place, hence the sudden emotion of finding freedom etc.
I've spent many an hour searching for the details you have provided and I failed, so thanks once again for providing them!

Pete

[Tosun Saral]

Hello Pete, The place where your late father was hold as POw must be Belemedik. There is no place called Gelebek as far as I know.. Belemedik is on the top of Taous Mountains. The railway ended at Pozanti and from Belemedik continued to Damascus. Between Pozanti and Belemedik turks and germans build rail road connecting two places together. It is known that British POWs of Irak and Palestine were forced to work on that rail road. Hard to escape. because ottoman railroads were under control of Germans who hate the British. I think that your father escaped to Mersin by the help of an armenian or a greek on the Med. sea shore a city full of christian citizens (armenians, greeks, christian araps and british tradesmen who settled ther since 1800s) of Ottoman Turkey. British occupied Mersin on No. 1918 and left the city under control of French on Dec. 17. 1918. He must met the british at Mersin.

[GregSingh]

Gelebek or Kelebek was/is the small train station.
Nearby village is called Durak in Google maps. There is a restaurant there called Kelebek Köyü.

Kelebek Tren İstasyonu (Durak)

[Tosun Saral]

Thank you for the information

[Pete H]

Hi Tosun

Thank you once again for your generous help.
I can confirm Gelebek existed, as one of the very few documents that I have from this period is 'Army Form B' sent to his family to tell them where he is imprisoned. You are right to point out that it doesn't exist as a place anymore. It was really just a labour camp and disappeared after construction was complete. My understanding is that it was a point at which the broad gauge railway became narrow gauge so the work involved unloading goods from one train then loading them on to the next. I think I am right in thinking that Kelebek is Turkish for butterfly, and have wondered (though with no evidence) whether that might refer to the layout of the track, perhaps some circular pattern to allow trains to turn around, who knows...
I have located one image of Gelebek / Kelebek, it is number 23 in this fascinating collection.
https://hiveminer.com/Tags/t%C3%BCrkiye%2Cww1/Recent
Belemedik was the regional centre for the Taurus area, but had a number of lesser camps like Gelebek associated with it. I do wish he had been at Belemedik by the way, a much nicer place!

When I started to research this story I followed the same logic as yourself, suspecting that Constantinople was too far away and too difficult to get to, and that he may have travelled south, or even south-east towards Aleppo - after all, he would know the way having walked from there to get to his PoW camp. However, there is evidence pointing the other way. I have a second army letter recording that he arrived in England on the Calais/Dover ferry December 8th 1918. That seems too early for him to have got home from the southern Turkish ports, but very neatly matches this possibility. When the British arrived in Constantinople, one of the ships was SS Katoomba, a troop carrier. It left on November 16th loaded with PoWs, sailed to Salonica then Taranto on the heel of Italy and the PoWs were then taken by train to Calais, crossing to Dover on December 8th. This persuades me to believe the Constantinople route home, and anyway, when he was alive he always described his escape as travelling on the roofs of trains to Constantinople, too spectacular a place to be confused with anywhere else. The railway had been incomplete for much of the war (which makes the ability of the Ottomans to wage a war in Palestine tremendously impressive) but the tunnels had been completed and all the track to Aleppo built just in time for the end of the war. I think a trial run on the route took place in August 1918. So it would have been possible, even if hard to believe.

I was particularly interested in your point about the travellers on the train being Germans. I have been curious about who would be on these trains. It is hard to imagine that too many civilians would need or wish to travel into this remote area, but the military would. My grandfathers own description of the journey states that he was thin and dirty and dressed in rags and so looked very similar to the other poor people who travelled on the roofs, so perhaps the Germans were seated inside while he was on the roof.

Yes the Germans, mostly, didn't like the British very much! The German doctor at Gelebek, a man called Wagner, would proudly boast that he had 'killed more Britishers than any German soldier'... Not what you want to hear when you are ill. Though to be fair to the Germans, the commandant at Belemedik seems to have been a very fair man. Its the luck of the draw I suppose.

Thanks once again,

Pete

[Pete H]

Hi Greg

Thanks for that. I didnt know the exact location of Gelebek so that's really interesting. Is this the little station you were referring to?

http://wowturkey.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=4895820



Cheers

Pete

[GregSingh]

Yes, it is. See also: Berlin–Baghdad railway. You have all stations listed there.

Nice photos from mapio.net:

92065052.jpg

24377600.jpg

24377531.jpg

[Pete H]

Thanks Greg, that link was reallyinteresting, not least because of the detail about the tunnels. I knew some existed but not to that extent. My grandfather is said to have travelled from gelebek to constantinople on the roofs of trains - as poor people did at the time. Makes me wonder what he did in the section with the tunnels! Perhaps there was enough space above the train to sit on top?

[Pete H]

I am trying to establish the location of the Gelebek / Kelebek POW camp on the attached map, drawn up at the time. I know, from Greg's help that it is a little north of Durak and south of Belemedik on this map, but any more precise location would be very welcome.

[GregSingh]

It's hard to do, because this map is incorrect in the area of Durak!

Basically, Gelebek camp was just north of Durak, where road departs from railroad.
Unfortunately railroad is marked incorrectly on this map. Actual point of "road departing from railroad" is further north than shown on this map (much closer to the river/stream).
Locations of some villages are also off the mark...

[Pete H]

Thanks Greg, that really makes sense. I did spend some time, before turning to you, trying to match up the locations, railway tracks and roads on this map with google maps satellite view of the area as it is now. I got frustrated as I couldn't get the two accounts to match up as well as expected. It also seemed to me that the approximate distance between Belemedik and Durak seemed further than expected on the old map, now I can see why!

Thanks for your help..

[Pete H]

You can't blame a bloke for trying! I wonder if this map is any more accurate? I am wondering whether Gelebek is indicated here as the unnamed station below the 300km mark about one third of the way up the image? Near the Altschak Gedik indicated.