The Desert Mounted Corps

low ebb. The evacuation of Gallipoli in December 1915, followed by the fall of Kut el Amara four months later, and by our two unsuccessful attacks on Ga

amboul, the followers of Islam had triumphed over the Infidel; Allah was

was a mere incident in the world war, which would be more than made good in the final, and glorious, peace terms. Nevertheless, the Turks insisted on making an effort to recapture the place, and for this purpose a special, picked force, known as the Yi

nce in the Turkish press, chronicling the doings of the 'Lightning' armies. They were to recapture Baghdad, drive the British into the Persian Gulf, and then march to the 'relief' of India. Afterwards the presumptuous little fo

nd it is probable that one more British reverse in the East would have been sufficient to set all these countries in a blaze. The least imaginative can form some idea of the tremendous consequences that such an upheaval would have had upon the war in general. Yet the newspapers of tha

g

at a signal defeat should be inflicted on the Turks as soon as possible. The capture of Jerusalem, which city ranks only after Mecca and Stamboul among

ctive of the new British Commander-in-Chief. Th

entrenched and wired, and offering every facility for protracted defence. The remainder of the enemy's line consisted of a series of strong localities, viz.: the Sihan group of works, the Atawineh group, the Abu el Hareira-Abu el Teaha trench system (near Sharia), and, finally, the works covering Beersheba. These groups of works were generally from 1500 to 2000 ya

but a well-graded, metalled road, which they had made just behind their line, connecting these two places, a

nes of railway from the so-called Junction Station on the Jerusalem-Jaffa line, one to Deir Sineid, just north of Gaza, and the other to Beersheba, and beyond it to the village of El Auja,[3] on the Turko-Egyptian frontier,

to Damascus, Aleppo, and the Baghdad Railway. With the junction in our hands, any enemy force in the Jud?an hills, protecting Jerusalem, would be cut off from all railway communication to the north, and would be compelled to rely f

f Beersheba. The opposing lines thus formed a rough 'V,' with its apex at Gaza, where the lines were, in some places, only a couple of hundred yards apart. Fr

hose with passes from the Intelligence Staff, were forbidden to approach our lines, but it was impossible to control all the natives in such a scattered area, and much can be seen, with the aid of a pair of field-glasses, from the top of a hill a mile away. There were also at l

on. An enemy staff document, subsequently captured by us, and dated just prior to the commencement of the operations, stated that: 'An[Pg 6] outflanking attack on Beersheba with about one infantry and one cavalry division is indicated, but the main attack

tely. Hitherto the German Flying Corps had done what it liked in the air over our lines. For several months on end our troops had been bombed, almost with impunity, every day. Our own pilots, starved alike of aeroplanes and of materials for repairs

erms, and quickly began to obtain supremacy in the air. By the end of October this supremacy was definitely established, and

Eastwards again, towards Beersheba, the country changed to a wilderness of bare, rocky hills, intersected by innumerable wadis (dry river beds). These wadis were, for the most part, enclosed between limestone cliffs, sometimes 100 feet or more in height, and impassable except where the few native

, stretched the great plain of Philistia, a strip of rolling down-land fiftee

uch larger scale than had hitherto been attempted. From his first study of the problem before him, the new Commander-in-Chief realised the predominant

rce, which was known as the Desert Column, consisted of the Australian and New Zealand Mounted Division (which then included the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd

g

two divisions of four brigades each, including a new brigade of Australian Light Horse (the 4th) which had been formed, partly out of Light Horsemen who had returned from Gallipoli, and partly out of reinforcements from Australia. General Allen by now remounted the remainder of the Yeomanry in Egypt, and formed out of them two new brigades. The ten brigades thus available were organised as a corps of three divisions: the Australian and New Zealand (1st and 2nd A.L.H. Brigades and the New Zealand

who was appointed to command it, asked that the name of the Desert Column might be perpetu

p Chetwode, and the 21st commanded by Lieutenant-General Bulfin, with one other infantry division. The 20th Corps (10th, 53rd, and 74th Divisions, with th

t yet seen any serious service, and its fighting qualities were rather an unknown factor. Later on in the camp

he VIIth and VIIIth, and one cavalry division, a total of about 49,000 fighting men, 3000 of whom were mounted, with 360 guns.[7] Our superiority in numbers, though considerable, thus fell short o

TNO

's despatch, dated

cavalry in May 1917, and about thirty miles of the track destroyed, in ord

ed by some of the rul

Append

Append

rmations was in the hands of the Germans. All ranks of the flying corps, heavy artillery and motor transport corps, and the officers of the enginee