Images from the First World War

In January 1915 Russia asked its Allies (France and Britain) for help to fight the Central Powers (Germany, Austro-Hungary and Turkey) who were attacking them on three Eastern fronts.

The Allies were reluctant to commit troops to the East as this would mean taking them away from the Western Front.

Lord Kitchener suggested a naval attack was the only solution and Winston Churchill, First Lord of the Admiralty, suggested the Dardanelles waterway next to the Gallipoli peninsula, at the entrance to the Black Sea, as a possible target.

British ships began shelling Turkish forts in February 1915.

Naval disaster at the Dardanelles

Albert Tidman of Eynesbury, who was serving with the Royal Navy at the Dardanelles, wrote home to say that he had helped to rescue sailors who had survived the torpedoing of HMS Goliath, when 570 of the 700 strong crew died. Goliath had been providing cover for the soldiers landing on the beaches at Gallipoli.

1/5th Beds at the Dardanelles

The failure of the naval bombing campaign at the Dardanelles led to the decision to send troops to the Gallipoli peninsula.

On the 10th September the St Neots Advertiser published a letter from Sergeant-Major Milton reporting the many challenges of the fighting at Gallipoli; the heat, the dust, the lack of water, the steep hilly terrain, the insects and the Turkish snipers – including women – who could look down on the approaching Allied soldiers and pick them off as they advanced. The death of well-known local man, Captain Rudolph Smythe at the Dardanelles was also announced.

The Gallipoli Peninsula and the Dardanelles

HMS Goliath, sunk on 13th May 1915

Letter from Albert Tidman, St Neots Advertiser, 28th May 1915

ANZAC Cove, Gallipoli, 1915 from the Imperial War Museum archive

Sergt-Major Milton describes life in the Dardanelles, St Neots Advertiser, 10th September 1915

Announcing the death of Captain R. M. Smythe, St Neots Advertiser, 13th August 1915

By late 1914 both sides had reached stalemate in trenches dug across northern France, but both the British and the German commanders continued to believe that they could achieve ‘breakthrough’ on the Western Front, and crush their enemies.

The British commander, Field Marshall Sir John French, and the French commander, General Joffre, agreed that they would attack the Germans at Neuve Chapelle, close to Lille in France, in March 1915.

The British were well prepared and had a large contingent of experienced Indian troops fighting with them. However, they achieved only limited success for four reasons:

New technologies such as the machine gun and gas killed thousands
Advancing too quickly cut the troops off from vital supplies
Once on the battlefield troops could not communicate with commanders
Reinforcements took too long to arrive

As fierce fighting continued men from St Neots and the surrounding villages wrote home with stories and poems, Private Charles Chapman wrote of his ‘extraordinary experiences’ being wounded in France. Private George Corbett of Eaton Ford was gassed at Hill 60, Private Page of Abbotsley had been injured at Neuve Chapelle and was reported to be in hospital in Boulogne and Major Grey William Duberly of Great Staughton was killed leading his men in the capture of a German trench at Neuve Chapelle.