CHAPTER XXII THE LAST PHASE

Arabian Syria extends northwards a little beyond Aleppo. A study of the place-names on the map will establish a fairly well-defined line, running from about Jerablus on the Euphrates to the sea near Antioch, north of which the Arabic names give place to Turkish. From the political point of view it was highly desirable that all the country south of this line should be in our hands before the Turks should have had enough, and ask for a cessation of hostilities. But Aleppo is a far cry from Damascus, 230 miles by the Rayak road, and it is doubtful whether the Commander-in-Chief had in his mind at this date so extended an enterprise as the capture of that city.

Strategically, however, an advance as far as Rayak and Beir?t offered several advantages. The possession of Beir?t would give us a good, if small, port, connected by rail and road with Damascus, thus greatly shortening our line of supply. And, with Rayak Junction in our hands, we should control the important broad-gauge line that runs northwards from this place, through Homs, Hama, and Aleppo, to join the Baghdad line at Muslimie.

The total destruction of the Turkish armies had ensured us freedom of movement at least as far as the line Rayak-Beir?t, and the only obstacle to an advance lay in the weak and reduced condition of the Corps.

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In the twelve days from the 19th to the 30th of September inclusive, the three cavalry divisions had marched over 200 miles, fought a number of minor actions, and captured more than 60,000 prisoners, 140 guns, and 500 machine guns.

Long marches, especially at night, and half rations during the whole period, had rendered the horses thin and tired, and they were in urgent need of a rest. The men were in considerably worse case. In the course of the operations, the Australian Mounted Division had lain one night beside the Jordan at Jisr Benat Yakub, and the 4th Cavalry Division had spent several nights in the neighbourhood of Beisan. In both places the men were exposed to the attacks of swarms of malaria-bearing mosquitoes. Though the outbreak of malignant malaria, which was the fruit of these nights, did not begin to make its appearance till about the 5th of October, the day on which the advance was resumed, there were many cases of influenza in the Corps, and the hospitals were full of sick men, especially Indians. The 5th Division, which had not been in the mosquito districts, suffered less severely from malaria, and was thus able to continue the advance later on, at a time when the other two divisions were so weakened by the disease as to be almost incapable of moving.

After weighing all the factors of the situation, however, the Commander-in-Chief decided that the advantages to be gained by securing the port of Beir?t and the railway to Damascus, justified a farther advance, and he determined to push on with his cavalry at least as far as the Rayak-Beir?t line.

The 4th and 5th Cavalry Divisions were detailed for this task, the Australian Division remaining in and around Damascus, to keep order in the city and throughout the surrounding country.

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The two divisions started on the morning of the 5th of October. At Khan Meizelun, eighteen miles from Damascus, their roads parted, the 4th Division moving on Zebdani, on the railway between Damascus and Rayak, the 5th making for Rayak by the main road through Shtora. Both objectives were reached without difficulty the following afternoon. In the course of the advance the 14th Brigade entered Zahle, capturing 177 prisoners and a few guns. Thirty burnt aeroplanes were found on the aerodrome at Rayak, and in the station a quantity of rolling stock and a number of engines of both the broad and the narrow gauge. Though damaged, most of these were subsequently repaired and put into use.

On the next day (the 7th) the armoured cars attached to the 5th Cavalry Division made a reconnaissance to Beir?t, which they entered without opposition about mid-day. The townspeople received them with acclamation, and showed with pride a party of about 600 Turkish soldiers whom they had collected and disarmed. The 7th Indian Infantry Division, which had left Haifa on October the 3rd, reached Beir?t on the 8th, and took over these prisoners.

On the 10th the cars reconnoitred northwards as far as Baalbek, without encountering any of the enemy, and the Commander-in-Chief thereupon decided to make a farther advance as far as Homs.

Unfortunately malaria had by now laid such a hold upon the men of the 4th Division, that the surviving hale scarce sufficed to carry on the ordinary duties of camp, and any further work by this division was out of the question. This left only the 5th Division, itself much reduced in numbers, to carry on the advance.

The 7th Infantry Division was directed to send a[Pg 285] brigade to Tripoli, where there was a small port, with jetties suitable for landing stores in fine weather, and a fairly good, metalled road running inland to Homs, which would facilitate the sending of supplies to the cavalry at the latter place. The 5th Division was then ordered to occupy Homs as soon as possible, the 4th remaining in the Zahle-Rayak-Baalbek area.

The 13th Brigade entered Baalbek on the 11th of October, and collected 500 Turks who had surrendered to the inhabitants, and who had been 'offered' to the armoured cars the previous day.

The railway from Aleppo to Rayak was in working order, and it was quite possible for the enemy to send troops south to delay our advance. It was very important, therefore, that any further move forward, once decided upon, should be carried out as rapidly as possible.

To this end General MacAndrew organised his division at Baalbek in two columns. Column 'A,' which was to lead the advance, consisted of the divisional headquarters, three batteries of armoured cars, and three light car patrols, supported by the 15th Brigade. This brigade had only two regiments, the Hyderabad Lancers being still on the line of communications. The remainder of the division formed Column 'B.' It will be apparent that Column 'A' was little more than a raiding force, but it was considered that the heavy volume of machine-gun fire provided by the twenty-four cars would be sufficient to disperse, or at least to break up and disorganise, any body of the enemy that might be encountered. The country was very suitable for the employment of armoured cars, being open and fairly flat, with a hard surface.

A wing of the Royal Air Force was attached to the[Pg 286] division for reconnaissance purposes. Throughout the campaign, the close co-operation between our aeroplanes and the cavalry had given most excellent results. During the advance on Damascus, Air Force motor cars had accompanied the advanced headquarters of the Corps, carrying a party who selected and marked landing grounds at each halting place. Lorries carrying petrol and stores followed a few miles in rear. These arrangements resulted in maintaining that close personal contact between the two forces without which satisfactory work is impossible. Moreover, the provision of a landing ground beside the advanced Corps headquarters meant that there was always an aeroplane ready at hand for instant use, if any special work was required.

Similar arrangements were now made with the 5th Division, and the subsequent assistance of the wing attached to the division was of the highest value.

At this time no orders had been received as to Aleppo, but it is evident that General MacAndrew had in his mind the probability of an advance to seize that city. At any rate, this organisation of his division enabled him to do so when the time came, and by a piece of sheer bluff.

The march proceeded without incident up the valley of the Orontes, and the armoured cars of Column 'A' entered Homs unopposed on the 15th, where they met a force of Sherifian troops, under Sherif Nasir, who had marched from Damascus by the direct north road. Two days previously the 20th Corps cavalry regiment had occupied Tripoli, where it was joined a few days later by part of the 7th Infantry Division, and arrangements were at once put in hand to land stores at the little port, and send them up by road to Homs. Column 'B' arrived on the 16th.

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The Commander-in-Chief now determined to complete the political part of the campaign by seizing Aleppo, and occupying all the Arab-speaking country from the sea to the Euphrates.

The only troops available for the enterprise were the 5th Cavalry Division and the armoured cars. The Australian Division was at Damascus, over 100 miles away, and could not be brought up in time. The 4th Division, reduced in strength and exhausted by disease, was incapable of any work till men and horses had been given a thorough rest and time to recover from sickness. This division and the Australian Division had suffered some 300 deaths from disease since reaching Damascus, a fortnight before. Even the 5th Division, which had suffered far less severely than the other two, was in a deplorable state. The whole division hardly mustered 1500 sabres. The two R.H.A. batteries with the division numbered between them but four officers and eighty men.

It was known that there were about 20,000 Turks and Germans at Aleppo, or south of that place, and it was believed that about half of these were combatants, though probably ill-armed and disorganised. Aleppo is over 100 miles from Homs, and 180 from Tripoli or Baalbek, the two nearest points from which any possible reinforcements could be sent.

In the face of these facts, the boldest of commanders might well have been excused for deciding to call a halt. But the political and moral advantages to be gained by a farther advance into the enemy's country appeared so great that General Allenby determined to accept the risk. On the 19th of October he directed General MacAndrew to advance to Aleppo.

The divisional field squadron Royal Engineers, covered by the 15th Brigade, at once moved out to[Pg 288] El Rastan, to repair the bridge over the Orontes at that place, which had been blown up by the Turks during their retreat. The following day the divisional headquarters and the cars joined the 15th Brigade at El Rastan, and, on the morning of the 21st, Column 'A' crossed the repaired bridge, and, making a long march, reached Zor Defai, five miles north of Hama, that evening. No opposition was encountered during the march.

Next morning the cars pushed off early on an extended reconnaissance. Reaching Ma'arit el Na'aman, thirty-five miles distant, about mid-day, without meeting any of the enemy, they made a short halt, and then started off again towards Aleppo. Seven miles farther north, near Khan Sebil, they sighted some enemy armoured cars and armed motor lorries. These at once turned and fled, pursued by our cars, and a nice little hunt ensued. Hounds were stopped after a fifteen mile point, as it was getting late, but not before a German armoured car, two armed lorries, and thirty-seven prisoners had been captured. Just as our cars drew off, two enemy aeroplanes appeared, and, evidently mistaking the German lorries for our troops, promptly dived, and machine-gunned them vigorously! The armoured cars had reached a point fifty-five miles from Zor Defai, and only twenty miles south of Aleppo, before they turned back. They withdrew to a point four miles north of Seraikin, where they bivouacked for the night, finding their own outposts. The 15th Brigade reached Khan Shaikhun late in the afternoon.

citadel

Aleppo. The old citadel.

soldiers

Bedouin and Sherifian soldiers. Near the Euphrates.

On the 23rd the cars pushed on again, and encountered some enemy cavalry at Khan Tuman, about ten miles south of Aleppo. These they brushed aside without much difficulty, and proceeded along[Pg 289] the road. Some miles farther on, however, they were held up by strong Turkish rearguards holding an entrenched position astride the road, through El Ansarie and Sheikh Said. A reconnaissance of this position, carried out by the cars and some aeroplanes, indicated that it was held by a force of 2000 to 3000 infantry. It was reported locally that there were six or seven thousand more in Aleppo.

General MacAndrew thereupon determined to try and bluff the enemy into surrendering, and, to this end, sent an officer with a flag of truce into Aleppo in a car, to demand the capitulation of the city. The Turks took this officer through their defences without blindfolding him, apparently in order to show him that the position was a strong one, which it was, and adequately held. Having done so, they entertained him most courteously with cigarettes, coffee, and small talk for half an hour or so, and then handed him a reply to take back to the British General. The officer got back to Divisional Headquarters about four in the afternoon, and delivered his letter, which proved brief and to the point. 'The Commander of the Turkish garrison of Aleppo,' it ran, 'does not find it necessary to answer your note.' Fortunately for us, however, the Turkish Commander, after making this bold reply, began to get uneasy, and, in the course of the next three days, evidently came to the conclusion that discretion was the better part of valour. During the night of the 25th he commenced to withdraw his forces to the north.

At seven o'clock the cars were withdrawn into bivouac on the open plain south of Khan Tuman, so as to give them freedom of movement if attacked during the night.

The 24th was occupied in further reconnaissance of the enemy positions. The Turks were found in[Pg 290] occupation of the same trenches, with cavalry outposts pushed forward on to the hills north of Khan Tuman. Some of the cars were sent off in a north-westerly direction, with the object of discovering a practicable way through the rocky hills south-west of Aleppo, to the Alexandretta road. They were unable, however, to find any track that was possible for cars.

Further reconnaissances on the 25th disclosed the enemy positions more fully, and drew considerable fire from guns, machine guns, and rifles all along the line. The 15th Brigade came up in the evening, and relieved the cars on outpost duty that night. Sherif Nasir's Arabs, who had been marching at a great pace along the railway, had arrived earlier in the day, and moved east towards Tel Hasil, to attack the city from that side.

Column 'B,' which had been steadily plodding along, a day's march in rear of Column 'A,' reached Seraikin the same evening.

With the arrival of the 15th Brigade and the Arabs, General MacAndrew deemed himself strong enough to take Aleppo. He ordered the 15th to advance early next morning, through the hills west of Aleppo, via Turmanin, and get astride the Aleppo-Alexandretta road, while the Arabs and the armoured cars attacked from the east and south respectively. During the night of the 25th, however, the Arabs, assisted by friends in Aleppo, succeeded in entering the city. They enjoyed a first-rate, old-fashioned, hand-to-hand fight with the Turks, and beat them decisively. By ten o'clock in the morning the city was in their hands, and General MacAndrew motored in with the armoured cars. Sherif Nasir had lost about sixty killed, but he had inflicted far heavier casualties on his enemies, and driven them out of Aleppo full speed.

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Meanwhile the 15th Brigade had started at seven in the morning, and reached the Alexandretta road, without opposition, about ten o'clock. The only definite information the brigade had received at this time, was that about 300 Turkish cavalry were on the road, eight miles north of Aleppo. Shortly afterwards a verbal message was brought in by a car, to the effect that about a thousand 'scallywags' of all descriptions, with two field guns, had left Aleppo, going north, about half-past seven in the morning.

The brigade proceeded along the road, and, about eleven o'clock, two squadrons of the Jodhpur Lancers, who were acting as advanced guard, topped the ridge overlooking the village of Haritan from the south-east, and about a mile and a half distant. They immediately came under heavy rifle fire from the village, and took up a dismounted position on the ridge.

Rightly deeming that instant action was all important, and relying on the information he had received as to the strength and composition of the enemy force in front of him, General Harbord decided to attack at once. He ordered the Mysore Lancers to move out to the east, and endeavour to charge the enemy on his left flank. Two squadrons of the Jodhpur Lancers were directed to move in support of the Mysores, as a 'mopping up' party, while the remainder of this regiment, with the machine gun squadron, held the Turks in front, with fire directed from the ridge on which the advance guard had first taken up its position.

Just after the Mysore Lancers commenced their move eastwards, General Harbord was reinforced by a battery of armoured cars, which had been sent out from Aleppo to join him. He directed these cars to approach the enemy positions along the road, and assist the attack with their machine-gun fire. Un[Pg 292]fortunately something went wrong with the battery leader's car, and it was withdrawn and driven back to Aleppo. The remaining three cars, through some misunderstanding, followed it, and the brigade was thus deprived of their support.

Meanwhile the Mysore Lancers, finding that the enemy's position extended farther than was expected, moved more to the east to gain the flank. At twelve o'clock, Major Lambert, finding himself in a favourable position, ordered a charge. The ground was rather rocky, and gave some trouble to the horses, but the charge was driven well home, and a considerable number of the enemy was killed. The Turks, however, were to be found in much greater strength than had been expected, and, after driving through their flank, the Lancers were heavily fired on by Turks farther west. Many of those who had been ridden over, and had thrown down their arms, now picked them up again, and continued the fight. Seeing that his regiment had not sufficient weight to charge through the large body of Turks farther west, Major Lambert rallied his squadrons behind the Turkish line, and took up a dismounted position on the left rear of the enemy, where the two squadrons of the Jodhpur Lancers joined him.

The charge had compelled the Turks to reveal their full strength, which turned out to be about 3000 infantry and 400 cavalry, with ten or twelve guns and about thirty-five machine guns. Seeing the smallness of the force opposed to them, they now advanced boldly to the attack, but, when about 800 yards away, thought better of it, and began to dig themselves in.

The 15th Brigade remained in observation of the Turks, and desultory firing continued till about nine o'clock at night, when the enemy faded gradually[Pg 293] and silently away. Two hours later the 14th Cavalry Brigade, which had reached Aleppo with Column 'B' late in the evening, arrived on the scene, and relieved the 15th Brigade. The casualties in the latter brigade totalled sixty-three killed, wounded, and missing, which comparatively light bill might have been very much heavier had the Turks showed any real disposition to fight. They outnumbered our men by at least seven to one, and were well supplied with artillery and machine guns, but their morale had sunk so low that it was only surprising that they did not all surrender, or break into helpless flight, when charged. We learnt afterwards that the Turkish Commander in Aleppo had been completely deceived by General MacAndrew, whose boldness in detaching the whole of his cavalry to cut the Alexandretta road led him to believe that we had a much larger force at our disposal than was actually the case.

On the 28th the Arab forces seized Muslimie Junction, on the Baghdad Railway twelve miles north of Aleppo, dislodging a small Turkish rearguard there, and this inglorious little action ended the war for Turkey. The few surviving Turks retired rapidly in the general direction of Constantinople, and that was the last seen of their army. The Armistice[27] came into operation at noon on the 31st of October.

In the thirty-eight days since the commencement of the operations, the 5th Cavalry Division had marched 567 miles, fought six actions, and taken over 11,000 prisoners and fifty-eight guns. The total captures of the Desert Mounted Corps in the same period were 83,700 prisoners and about 160 guns.

The Australian Mounted Division left Damascus[Pg 294] on October the 27th to march to Aleppo, a distance of rather over 200 miles. Marching by the direct road to Homs, which runs almost due north from Damascus, the division reached the small village of Jendar, eighteen miles south of Homs, at nine o'clock on the night of the 31st. Here the news of the Armistice was received by wireless, but, as there was no water available in the neighbourhood, the Australians continued the march the same night, and arrived at Homs at eight o'clock on the morning of the 1st of November. Three days later they moved down to Tripoli, on the coast, where they remained until sent to Egypt, en route for Australia, at the end of February 1919.

The Commander-in-Chief made his official entry into Aleppo on the 12th of December. As at Damascus, we had installed an Arab Governor here, but, in view of the disorders that had occurred at the former place, his powers were restricted to giving advice, and the whole of the policing of the city was in the hands of our troops. The 'Chief' took the occasion to give him some good advice, couched in the vigorous language for which he was famous.

One of the first things General Allenby did, when order had been restored in the country, was to direct that a day should be set aside to be observed throughout the force as one of thanksgiving for victory. Tuesday, December the 16th, was selected for the purpose, and was celebrated by the holding of religious services in the morning by all the many religions and denominations in the Corps. The afternoon was spent in such games and sports as could be organised.

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FOOTNOTES:

[27] See Appendix III. for terms of Armistice.