Chapter 84 – Ellis

Many of the details included in this chapter are taken from The Uncensored Dardanelles , by Ellis Ashmead-Bartlett. The referenced events of August and early September 1915 are covered on pages 180-244. Some of the key details included from Ashmead-Bartlett’s perspective, from this source include:

p. 206 – 21 August – An assessment that further frontal attacks were “sheer madness”.

p. 208 – 21 August – The attack planned for Hill 60 was “truly ambitious” against an entrenched enemy.

p. 218 – Ashmead-Bartlett’s provides a damning assessment of the planning of the August Offensive by the Commander-in-Chief Ian Hamilton and his General Staff, as an “over-complicated, faulty and almost fantastic scheme of operations” in which “Success was made to depend upon the troops performing impossible feats, in murderous frontal attacks, and, even if there had been no mistakes in execution, the plan could never have succeeded.”

pp. 220-221 – An assessment of the poor Anzac prospects of success, not given “even a gambling chance”, despite having highly capable, seasoned troops, due to the difficulty of the tasks asked of them.

pp. 228-230 – An assessment of the landing of the troops of the British New Army at Suvla as requiring surprise and speed, with speed depending on experience, but having none of these. He expresses a view that “it would have been mere child’s play” for the Dominion troops to occupy the Anafarta Hills.

pp. 233-234 – Doubts as to the strategic benefit of holding the Anafarta Hills, even if they had been seized.

p. 231 – An assessment that the frontal assault made against the Anafarta Hills and Hill 60 on 21 August was “cruel and useless”.

p.239 – He writes that Keith Murdoch: “…begs me to write a letter which he will carry through uncensored, telling the plain truth, which he can hand over to the Government.”

pp. 240-243 – The full text of Ashmead-Bartlett’s letter to British Prime Minster Asquith is provided. The first portion of this letter is included as quoted.

p. 239, 240, 244 – Ashmead-Bartlett recorded on a number of occasions that he had written to the Newspaper Proprietors’ Association (N.P.A – ref p. 25), asking for permission to be allowed to return home. However, he felt obliged to stay.

p. 244 – Wind was blowing a howling gale from the north on 8 September, with the weather having turned much colder. This evening, Ashmead-Bartlett received a message that Ina Hamilton wanted to see him. Next day, Hamilton advised that photography had been banned by the War Office, but he considered this to be absurd and would continue to allow it.

In Gallipoli , Les Carlyon notes that there are differing accounts of how Keith Murdoch came into possession of the letter from Ashmead-Bartlett, and that contrary to Ashmead-Bartlett’s account, one of Murdoch’s biographers Desmond Zwar says Ashmead-Bartlett came to Murdoch and asked him to carry the letter to Asquith, and that Murdoch did not ask what was in the letter.