HOW THE TURKS CAME.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVI, Issue 63, 15 March 1915, Page 11 (Supplement)

HOW THE TURKS CAME.

THE ATTACKS OX KANTARA. Cairo, February I(s.—There remains'to be told the earlier operations opposite the northern section at Kantara, and the two attacks on Kantara and Ismailia respectively, which were made for the purpose of holding our attention on the

""" """<= ■=""=• 6-" ""■■■ ■» =*—=j» g"»» amongst the hills at Moiva Harab; and several thousands were at the foot of the mountains opposite Suez, at a well called Bir Ma-beiuk. FIRST BRUSH AT KANTARA. I described in a previous article the three stretches of land along which tbe course of the Suez Canal has to be defended. It was at the northernmost of these three stretches and with the northern end at the very important post of El Kantara that the first contact with the oncoming Turks appeared. On January 26, very shortly after they first appeared, they opened fire with mountain guns on one -of our patrols at \oog range, and caused a few casualties. The contact with the enemy at Kantara lasted for ten days. The Turks seem to have counted on the chance that our Indian Mohammedans would desert us, for ome day at the beginning of affairs four of them walked calmly in with their to one of our outposts. However, so far, they failed in persuading the/ Mohammedans to help them that there was some difficulty in preventing the native troops from shooting them. It was on Tuesday, January 20, that this flrat brush occurred. The post was twice afterwards attacked. The first time was on the following Thursday. Tire attack began about 4 o'clock iii the morning. At that hour one of the line of British outposts some miles out along tire telegraph line on the road Ito Syria was attacked. There was a 'bright moon, but the Turks; did not manage to drive the outposts in. The casualties on both sides werp small. The second I attack was on the following Wednesday, February 3. During all the intervening days the enemy had been arriving in j smaller or larger bodies concentrating either behinfl the distant i-andhills or at a point in the desert opposite Ismailia. 'On Sunday, the last day of January, strings of camels and columns of men were seen going southward's continuously I opposite the British front at Ismailia. I The British, from first to last, remained entirely on the defensive. Only once an en- , counter occurred, in which some of our troops moved out, and it appeared possible that the enemy's guns or some of , them might be captured. .But this movement was brought to a sudden end by a sandstorm, which came down so quickly aa to. «tog the fighting. ... 1 ;. r

PREPARATIONS FOR THE ATTACK. These movements must, of course, have been in preparation for the main attack —the only real attack—upon tbe Canal, which was eventually made on Wednesday. February .1. The main Turkish force consisted of the 25th Division, and apparently some other troops who had come through the centre of the Isthmus, had been camped for some time in a valley in the hills 40 miles east of the Canal, and was at this time moving down towards tbe plain in a depression which brought it out amongst the sandhills about 12 miles east of Ismailia ferry. This point is known as Katib El Kheil. During Monday the movement of troops opposite Ismailia continued. Whether these included Turkish troops sent back from direction of Kantara, or whether they were part of the force which had just come out of the nil Is and were debouching from behind the foothills and turning southwards, I do not know. But troops, J guns, and camels could be seen almost continuously crossing parts of the desert |in our front, apparently moving from a northerly direction towards the low desert, east of Lake Timsah. I On Tuesday, February* 2, there was some rather half-hearted' fighting in the I neighbourhood of all this movement. | Whether the Turks wanted to establish themselves in trenches close to Ismailia i ferry, or whether they were merely out , to gain information is not clear. 'They brought their batteries into action and loosed off a good deal of ammunition, ' both large and small. The fighting was put an end to by an exceptionally thick sandstorm. It was during the night that followed in the exceptional darkness of that sandstorm thnt the Turks made their attempt, six miles farther south, to cross the Canal. THE ATTACK ON ISMAILL4. It was iv connection with this main attempt to cross the Canal at Toussoum that two subsidiary attacks against the Ismailia ferry and against Kantara were made. When dawn broke, about three hours after the attack on Toussoum had begun, the observers at Ismailia ferry made out, about 700 yards across the desert, a line of men entrenching themselves. There seems to have been two battalions of reservists engaged at this point, and they were working remarkably swift. The Turks generally made their advances by night. They advanced by short rushes in open order. The British artillery, which was shelling them, naturally had comparatively slight effect on the open formations; only

so little trouble was experienced in beating them off that it was almost impossible to believe there was not a more serious attack 'behind. Although the posts which faced the main attack must -have been outnumbered very many times over, and the Turks had the greatest possible help from the condition of the weather, our lines were never once in any place seriously tried. It was difficult at first to believe that the whole affair was not merely a reconnaissance: that we might expect a far more serious onslaught just behind it. And that fact possibly did as much as anything else towards preserving the remainder of the Turkish army, which eventually made its way back into the mountains. THE TURKISH LOSSES. The Turkish losses at Toussoum were about 400 killed, and 400 prisoners. Ours seem to have been two officers and 13 men killed and about seventy wounded. One officer of the Egyptian field artillery and two Egyptian gunners were killed, the Egyptian artillery being under a heavy .fire most of the time. At Kantara we lost four killed and 22 wounded. The enemy'sllo s here was iat least 20 killed and GO prisoners. The Turks helped away all the wounded that they could. Possibly they had been told | that we should maltreat all who fell into our hands. Some of their dead have since been found in the desert buried 'by I the Turks themselves under a shallow 'heap of sand. These are still being discovered, as well as others drowned in the canal, and prisoners are .still coming in occasionally, in the whole operations the enemy's known loss is at least 500 dead and COO to 700 prisoners. Allowing four men wounded for each man killed, the loss would be between 3,000 arid 4,000. Our tota] losses seem to be well under 150 all told.

of cm!"—when he himself was hit by a sniper. I believe that the Turks on their side never got a shot from one of their guns into Kantara. The outposts managed to hold them up several miles away. So fixed was everyone's attention on the play of our gnus that by one of those curious mental occurrences which are often recorded in battles no one in the camp appeared to have noticed another line of the enemy spreading out fast along their south-east front. By the time attention was called to them, the Turks were deploying far out in the direction of the Canal on this side also. They -could be seen creeping through the line of scrub, and were within about 151)0 yards of the outermost trenches of Kantara. This attack was the only one against Kantara, but it was easily checked. The Turks never crossed the strip of grey plain. They were held up at 1200 yards from our trenches. THE TURKS' RETREAT. With the failure of these three attacks on February 3 there ended the first attack ever made on the Suez Canal. The Turkish retreat began at once. The ■force which had been camped at Kantara hastened off into the sandhills and mountains to the south-east. The troops intended for supporting the attack on Toussoum and IsnmiUia scuttled off in the same direction. Guns, wagons, and camels disappeared into the hills along the central road. Our cavalry patrols found the pumps which the Turks had put down in the wells lying 'broken at the wellside; and occasionally the hide of a dead camel, which had apparently been used for food. Within a week there was not a Turk left within 00 miles of the Canal— is stated in the local Press to be the range of our aeroplanes. There is now no question that the Turks intended this to be a serious attack on the Canal. The number of troops within the area of operations, including a force which made one feeble display near Suez and against the little port of Tor. on the coast of the Red Sea, some way down the peninsula of Sinai, amounted to between 30,000 and 40,000 all told. The Turkish losses at ifhe most cautious estimate must have been over 3,000, iwijaroJfcfclE reaped. feQW^jßta^