THE NAVY AT THE DARDANELLES.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 19 July 1924, Page 13

THE NAVY AT THE DARDANELLES.

EPISODES IX THE STRAITS. The early campaign of the Navy and its great exploits are recalled by a review of a recent work by Admiral Lord Wemyss, who, by the way, is suggested as a likely Governor-General of this Dominion. The writer gives a fine description of the many episodes ini the Straits. He says: It is not every r one who has read of the exploits of the gallant sub- j marine commanders and other naval officers who risked death so often in the Straits. A chapter on this phase of the campaign is partieularlv interesting. On April 17, 1915, Lieut.-Com-mander P. L. Brodie started in submarine El sin an attempt to pass through the Narrows into the Sea of Marmora. The submarine, however, ran aground close to Kephaz Light. Heroic efforts were made to destroy' the craft to prevent it from falling into the hands of the enemy'. Battleships failed to destroy it, and finally two picket boats from the Majestic and Triumph manned by volunteer crews crept up the European shore under cover of night until they' believed themselves opposite the spot where El 5 lay. It was pitch dark, and they had nothing to guide them except a boat's compass and their own judgment. As they hauled out from the European shore and steamed across the Straits they' were caught by the beams of a searchlight which until that moment had not been operating, and ran into heavy fire. However, the light which exposed their presence to the enemy also lighted up and showed them their target. Lieutenant Goodwin immediately 'fired his torpedo and had no sooner done so that his boat was hit by a shell and began to sink rapidly'. Lieut.-Commander Robinson, who also had fired his torpedo, in spite of the heavy' fire they were under, went alongside the sinking boat and succeeded in transferring her crew to his before she sank, and then steamed away at full speed without being hit: ‘ The next morning a reconnaissance by 7 aeroplane showed that the task so gallantly' undertaken had been succsesful, for El 5 ■was a complete wreck. This exploit, so worthy' of the very highest of the navy’s traditions, was carried out with the loss of but one man. Lieut.-Com-mander Robinson v'as rewarded with the Y.C., and Lieutenant Goodwin with the D. 5.0., and never were these decorations more worthily bestov'ed.

It was afterwards learned that Lieut.-Commander Brodie'and six of his crew had been ’ killed when the submarine ran aground and was fired on, and that the remainder had been taken prisoner. By a pathetic coincidence Lieut.-Coinmamler Brodie’s twin brother, who was also serving in the fleet, was an observer in the areoplane that reported the destruction of his brother’s vessel. Lieut.-Commander Nasmith’s record in the Straits is a remarkable one. “Rounding Kilid Bahr point on the early morning of May 19 he came across a Turkish battleship and several destroyers that immediately opened fire on his periscope and then fled northward. Two days later, having overhauled a small sailing ship, he lashed his vessel alongside of her and, thus disguised, cruised all day off Constantinople on the lookout for transports, without, however, obtaining any success. On the 23rd he torpedoed a Turkish gunboat lying at anchor off that city 7 , wlio, before sinking,' opened fire and hit his periscope, necessitating a retreat to unfrequented waters to repair the damage inflicted. Tv'o day's later he returned and diving into the very waters of Constantinople, torpedoed a large transport lying alongside the Arsenal. But Hn effecting his retreat he very nearly came to-grief

through the submarine grounding heavily, and experiencing considerable difficulty' in extricating herself from the cross currents of those narrow' w’aters. During this cruise of 19 day's’ duration three more transports, an ammunition ship, and a 4 small steamer were destroyed.”

On a later voyage Nasmith was to encounter a iiet. For 20 seconds the submarine, brought from a depth of 80ft to 40ft, laboured in its meshes and thou crashed through. Later Naisniith attacked troops marching along the road to Gallipoli from submarine Ell. The vessel torpedoed the battleship Harndin Barkaressa, wdiieh capsized half an hour after she had been hit*; she burnt six small sailing craft; -went to Constantinople, where she sank a transport alongside the Haidar Pacha railway' pier; bombarded a viaduct of the, Baghdad railway in the Gulf of Ismid; stopped and examined two hospital slaps, and w*as twice ineffectually attacked by aeroplanes, to one of which Nasmith derisively' waved, before diving to avoid its bombs.

During 12 day’s following nine sailing vessels were burnt, or otherwise destroyed, and four more large steamers sunk; Die latter all on the same dav and within the space of a few hours. Two of them w-ere sent to the bottom ’by torpedoes fired simultaneously' from the two bow' tubes, wdiilst the'fourth succumbed to Ell’s last missile. Nasmith s third and last cruise was commenced on November 7. The conditions prevailing in the Marmora had considerably altered since April. Some of the few surviving steamers were armed; those? lying at anchor were surrounded bv nets or screens of small craft, whilst at many of the anchorages guns had been mounted for their protection. Yet in spite of these precautions, of much bad -weather, and of the greatly' decreased amount of shipping, Ell during the 45 days that this, cruise lasted accounted for no less than 11 steamers, five large sailing vessels, and 35 smaller Again-did Nasmith attack the Ismid railway, setting fire to a waggon of a goods' train passing over the now familiar, line in the Gulf of Ismid; again did he dive into the W'aters of Constantinople and torpedo a steamer lying alongside the quay, where-to-this day the w-ondering inhabitants still point out to the pass” ing stranger the marks of the damage inflicted by the British submarine. Another destroyer" was sunk, off whose crew of. 85, t-wo officers and 40 men, five being Germans, u'ere rescued. Once more w’ere the bombs of an attacking aeroplane successfully avoided. A gun action with a despatch vessel was maintained for several hours, ending by the latter being set on fire, and Ell eventually returned to Mudros on December 23, two days after the evacuation of Suvla and Anzac had been effected.” Lord Wester-Wcmy'ss does not pretend to’write a history'. His book, he says, “is a record of some of the events forming but a part of the whole! and has been written in the hopes that it may help the historian of the future to clothe the dry bones of official documents with the cloak of reality.” - In giving a true impression of the atmosphere in which the army' and. navy' lived throughout that eventful ten months, he has certainly been successful.