100 Events of the Gallipoli Campaign
August 1915
3 August 1915
During the nights of 3–5 August, an extra 20,000 soldiers of the British 13th Division were secretly brought ashore at Anzac for the proposed August offensive.
5 August 1915
Death at Anzac of Commander Edward Cater, Royal Navy, the officer in charge of the Anzac landing site. Cater was much admired by the Anzacs for his bravery under fire and he was killed as he rushed along one of the landing piers to the assistance of men trying to land from a damaged steamboat.
6 August 1915
On this day began the August offensive at Anzac, aimed at capturing the heights of Chunuk Bair in the Sari Bair Range. A chronology of this offensive can be found in the ‘Australia and the Gallipoli Campaign’ timeline. Events recorded here reflect only the actions of British and Indian Army troops fighting at Anzac and Suvla between 6 August and 10 August.
At 2.30 pm at Helles elements of the British 29th Division attacked towards a feature known as the Vineyard. This attack, like that by the Australians at Lone Pine at Anzac, was aimed at holding down Turkish reinforcements from the main thrust of the August offensive — the night march up the Sari Bair range to take Chunuk Bair and Hill 971 and the British landings at Suvla Bay. Little progress was made in the Vineyard attack and the British 88th Brigade lost more than 2,000 men.
Along with Australian, New Zealand and British units, the 29th Indian Brigade — the 14th Sikhs, and 5th, 6th and 18th Gurkha Rifles — made their way from North Beach, Anzac, into the Sari Bair range and up towards Chunuk Bair and other peaks.
At 10.30 pm British troops began landing at Suvla Bay.
7 August 1915
British forces make little headway at Suvla while the forces in the Sari Bair range also failed to seize their objectives.
8 August 1915
On 8 August 1915, the New Zealanders, backed up by British units — 7th Battalion, Gloucester Regiment and 8th Battalion, Royal Welsh Fusiliers — captured Chunuk Bair. Fierce Turkish counter-attacks throughout 8 August failed to drive them off.
British forces made little progress at Suvla.
9 August 1915
A party of the 6th Gurkha Rifles, led by Major C J L Allanson, take Hill ’Q’ to the north of Chunuk Bair but are forced to retire when they are shelled by their own artillery. A supporting force under Brigadier-General A H Baldwin got held up in the battle confusion in the valleys below Chunuk Bair and ‘Q’ and failed to reach the Gurkhas.
British reconnaissance planes reported significant numbers of Turkish reinforcements massing behind Chunuk Bair.
General Sir Ian Hamilton personally visited Suvla in an attempt to get the stalled British advance moving forward. However, Turkish re-inforcements were now arriving in strength at Suvla and an attack beat the British back from the key position of Teke Tepe.
10 August 1915
Lieutenant-Colonel Mustafa Kemal led Turkish soldiers in a fierce counter-attack against British troops on the peak of Chunuk Bair. The Turks drove the British from their positions and then charged over the rim of the mountain towards the sea. Here they were cut down in great numbers by machine-gun fire and naval bombardment. Nevertheless, the British had lost the heights and the August offensive was a failure.
11 August 1915
After passing through the Dardanelles, the British submarine E11 began a 29-day cruise in the Sea of Marmara and up to Constantinople during which it accounted for, according to a naval report, a ‘battleship, a gunboat, six transports, and an armed steamer, as well as twenty-three sailing vessels’.
12 August 1915
A British advance at Suvla towards the Tekke Tepe Hills was repulsed by the Turks. The Reverend Charles Pierrepoint Edwardes was awarded the Military Cross (MC) for his bravery in bringing in wounded men under heavy fire during this attack.
13 August 1915
Flying a plane from the British seaplane carrier HMS Ben My Chee, Flight Commander C H K Edmonds torpedoed and sank a Turkish transport ship lying off Bulair to the north of Gallipoli.
The British submarine E2 got through the Dardanelles and between 13 August and 14 September conducted a successful campaign against Turkish shipping in the Sea of Marmara.
A German submarine sank the transport Prince Edward with the loss of 861 British soldiers.
15 August 1915
British units advanced at Suvla against the Turks on Kiretch Tepe Ridge. Little progress was made and the attackers suffered more than 2,000 casualties.