Innholdsfortegnelse for No. 50 i History of War

“Those heroes that shed their blood and lost their lives… You are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace” – Attributed to Mustafa Kemal Atatürk Accounts of WWI campaigns often come laden with their own controversies and biases, mixing cold, hard facts with national remembrance, mythology and even ideology. Even the authenticity of Atatürk’s profound words of reconciliation, adorning numerous Anzac memorials, has been questioned by some historians. What cannot be questioned is the immense sacrifice of Anzac troops, who distinguished themselves in the trenches of the Western Front, as well as at Gallipoli and in Palestine. This issue explores how Australia’s Light Horse regiments left their own mark on these latter campaigns, particularly during two very different charges at the Nek and Beersheba.…

“ALTHOUGH HUNDREDS OF BOXERS AND CHINESE MUSLIM TROOPS WERE KILLED, THEIR FANATICISM WAS DISCONCERTING AND SEYMOUR ORDERED A GENERAL RETIREMENT TO TIENTSIN” On 10 June 1900, more than a week before the Boxers laid siege to the Legations in Beijing, British Admiral Edward Seymour departed the port of Tientsin with 2,000 troops, including contingents from Britain, Japan, Germany, Russia, Italy, France, Austria and the United States. Their mission was to protect Western diplomats in the capital city along with civilians and sympathetic Chinese, including hundreds who had converted to Christianity, from the wrath of the Boxers. Moving by rail, the expedition was attacked twice on 14 June but continued to advance slowly. Four days later at Langfang, south of Beijing, the Chinese attempted to trap the Western force. Although hundreds…

The opening shots of the Boxer Rebellion caused alarm within the Western diplomatic legations and among the Chinese Christian population in the north of China. Calls for their protection brought the multi-national forces of the Eight-Nation Alliance to raise the siege in Beijing and defeat the militant Boxers and elements of the Qing army. QING ARMY FOLLOWING A SHATTERING DEFEAT IN THE FIRST SINO-JAPANESE WAR, THE QING GOVERNMENT BEGAN A MODERNISATION OF ITS ARMY The defeat of the Qing army and emergence of Japan as the first global power in Asia raised concerns at the Qing court in Beijing and served as a catalyst to update and improve the Chinese land forces. While the first wave of violence of the Boxer Rebellion rippled, the Qing army was in the midst…

DURING THE BURMA CAMPAIGN ROBERT CALLOW HAD TO RELY ON UNUSUAL SOURCES OF FOOD TO STAY NOURISHED WHILE ON MISSIONS The Burma Campaign was noted for the development of frequent airdrops to supply Allied soldiers while on active service. Robert Callow’s men primarily received drops of rice, but cooking conditions were extremely primitive. “Our troops were Indian so we also cooked chapattis on our steel helmets. If you took the lining out of a steel helmet and put it over a wood fire you could fry a chapatti on top of it. But of course you couldn’t do that when there was any of the enemy there.” Callow also frequently had to find alternative sources of food behind enemy lines. “The Japanese ate the local food and lived off the…

TOM GARNER This month Tom was privileged to interview Dr Robert Callow about his experiences serving on sabotage missions in Burma during WWII (p. 46). You can read the conclusion of this incredible story in the next issue of History of War. MIGUEL MIRANDA In the third and final part of his history of the Bangladesh War of Independence, Miguel looks at how the brief but bloody conflict came to a dramatic end, leaving behind a new nation and a precarious balance of power in South Asia (p. 66). DAVID SMITH Shortly after the 1807 Slave Trade Act was passed, the Royal Navy was preparing to take the fight to slaver vessels still operating in the Atlantic Ocean. Over on page 60 David explores the incredible story of the West…

“TO THIS DAY THE DEBATE RAGES AS TO WHERE REAL CULPABILITY LIES” For more than 200 years the Qing dynasty had ruled China – a country that was to Westerners a vast, mysterious land that seemed to beckon the entrepreneurial, adventurous and ambitious from Europe and America to explore, discover and sometimes exploit. As early as 1793 Emperor Qianlong told Lord McCartney, a British envoy, that China possessed “all things” and neither needed nor desired trade with the industrialising West. Nevertheless, within half a century the Chinese had suffered defeat in the Opium Wars, utilised first by Britain and later Russia, France, and the United States to open China to trade. As Western influence grew, China’s natural resources were plundered while the people watched the steady imperialist encroachment, seemingly powerless…

In the early hours of 1 February 1829 the Spanish slaver El Almirante turned to face the Royal Navy ship that had been pursuing it doggedly for the past 31 hours. Bigger than its opponent and carrying 14 guns as opposed to the British ship’s single 18-pounder, the Spanish vessel had every chance of fighting its way to freedom. The fate of the 466 slaves on board El Almirante hung in the balance, as HMS Black Joke closed in under unusually calm weather conditions, resorting to oars to get within range of its prey. A short, fierce firefight broke out, and over the course of 80 minutes El Almirante suffered 28 casualties, including the death of its captain. The Spanish ship had become another victim of one of the West…

 Author: John Broich Publisher: Duckworth Overlook Price: £20 “THE WRITING IS AT TIMES POETIC WHILE THE ACTION SEQUENCES ARE AS ENGROSSING AS A NOVEL” HOW FOUR MEN WAGED A PERSONAL WAR ON THE EVILS OF SLAVERY Britain’s decision to abolish slavery in the early 19th century has drawn the attention of many historians, but not many have looked in depth at the issue of enforcing the ban. The famous West Africa Squadron, established in 1819, had its work cut out patrolling the slave routes that criss-crossed the Atlantic, and it was forced to get by with minimal investment in terms of men and ships. But the West Africa Squadron was lavishly equipped In comparison with the situation on Africa’s east coast. It is the trade emanating from the east coast…

Captain John T. Myers of the US Marines surveyed the situation along the Tartar Wall enclosing the Legations quarter of Beijing, where 2,800 international civilians, diplomats, Chinese Christian converts and Western soldiers had taken refuge from the estimated 80,000-strong force of Boxers and elements of the Chinese army that were bent on their destruction. “The men all feel they are in a trap and simply await the hour of execution,” wrote Myers. The situation did indeed appear bleak. Sporadic combat inflicted casualties and sapped the strength of the British, American, Japanese, French, German, Italian, Austrian and Russian defenders. An international relief force under British Vice Admiral Edward Seymour had already been thwarted by stiff Chinese resistance and had turned back to the port of Tientsin with heavy casualties. “THE BATTLE…

XU JINGCHENG 1845-1900 CHINA Xu Jingcheng was a major political figure and served as a diplomatic envoy to several European countries during a political career that spanned more than three decades. He was a key advocate of modernisation in China and supported the Hundred Days’ Reforms, which resulted in improvements in infrastructure such as railways and other public works. As a young diplomat Xu gained an understanding of European industrialisation during the late 19th century and authored an encyclopaedia of foreign ships and naval vessels, while advocating the modernisation of the Qing government’s navy. In 1890 he returned to Beijing and rose to a post among the top six ministers of the Chinese government. Sometime during his diplomatic sojourn, Xu converted to Roman Catholicism. As the Boxer Rebellion took shape…

“ALTHOUGH THEY RODE INTO ACTION, THEY WOULD DISMOUNT TO FIGHT ON FOOT, WITH ONE MAN IN FOUR HOLDING THE HORSES” In 1917 the EEF’s mounted troops consisted of 16 regiments of British Yeomanry, 12 of Australian Light Horse, three of New Zealand Mounted Riflemen and three of Indian Lancers. Only the Indians were actual cavalry, and the rest were in fact mounted riflemen. Mounted rifles were organised as cavalry but fought as infantry. Each regiment had three squadrons of around 150 men, broken into four troops, plus machine gun and signalling sections, to make a total of around 500 officers and men. However, although they rode into action, they would dismount to fight on foot, with one man in four holding the horses for the others. This gave the regiments…

It is dawn over a Burmese river in late 1943. Above the misty water an aircraft flies overhead containing six British commandos. Among their number is a young lieutenant who is about to go on his first mission to wreak destruction behind enemy lines. Although he is still in his teens, the officer is already a skilled professional, and he is strapped up with various demolition bombs. Nevertheless, when he jumps from the plane, events spiral out of control. The commandos have been spotted and enemy machine guns fire into the sky, creating deadly tracers that resemble hosepipe jets. The majority of the commandos are either killed or captured and the officer lands in the river. His only objective now is to survive. The officer in question is Second Lieutenant…

“DURING A CAREER SPANNING NEARLY 50 YEARS, HE BECAME ONE OF THE MOST CELEBRATED BRITISH GENERALS OF THE VICTORIAN PERIOD” A bearded sergeant lugged Captain Garnet Wolseley back from the front line to the surgeon’s tent. The 21-year-old captain looked more dead than alive, having been severely wounded when a Russian shell exploded in the British trenches at Sevastopol. Wolseley looked hideous: the skin on his left cheek hung down to his neck, his right eye bulged from its socket, and his face and legs had gashes and cuts from rock fragments that had struck him like projectiles. The surgeon managed to patch the officer up and sewed his left cheek back into place. When he heard the news that the final British assault would be launched on Sevastopol, Wolseley…

“PARTICULARLY EFFECTIVE PHOTOS INCLUDE THE FAÇADE OF THE STALINALLEE, INTENDED TO BE A LUXURIOUSLY WIDE SHOPPING BOULEVARD BUT IN REALITY BARELY MASKING THE DEVASTATION BEHIND IT” Author: Allan Hailstone Publisher: Amberley Price: £14.99 AN INTERESTING STROLL THROUGH THE STREETS OF BOTH WEST AND EAST BERLIN Books of photographs need to work hard to keep a reader’s attention. The danger is that you may find yourself dipping in repeatedly, opening the book at a random page to look at a few pictures and then putting it down again. Grabbing a reader and encouraging them to proceed through the book, as they would with a conventional narrative history, is something of a challenge. Allan Hailstone hasn’t quite pulled off this tricky feat, but he has still produced a book that has the…