Rachel Sargeant's Blog - Posts Tagged "ww1"

Although naval forces had been engaged in the area for some time, 25th April 1915 marked the start of the land battle for the Dardanelles. During the subsequent eight and a half months of the campaign, the Allies lost at least 140,000 men, of whom more than 44,000 died and the rest became sick or wounded. The Turks probably lost double these numbers.
To mark this centenary, here are the words of Sister Muriel Wakeford, a nurse on board the hospital ship Gascon. Muriel was my husband’s grandmother. My new novel is based on her 1915 diary.

“Sun 25 Apr 1915
Bombardment of the Dardanelles commenced 5 am. Moved off at 1am. Reached Gaba Tepe at 5. Shells were bursting everywhere. At 9 the first lot of wounded came on board. At midday the place was a fiery inferno. The London was lying almost touching us. Shells from the enemy frequently burst quite close to us. The first landing party cut to pieces by the Turks who fired shrapnel before the lighters even touched the beach.
At 6.30 left for Lemnos with 600 on board. In the meantime the wounded had to be placed on the various transports pending arrival of another hospital ship. The boys are wonderfully plucky and everyone on our ship worked like fury – to help them.”

One thing that struck me when reading Muriel Wakeford’s diary was how well-informed she was about what was going on in the rest of the Gallipoli Campaign and how quickly she received news. Of course it’s possible she added the diary entries retrospectively but, given the way they are written, I doubt it.
Here are two examples:
"Thu 13 May
The Goliath was torpedoed last night. All the ships are in darkness tonight. We are getting wounded steadily on all the time. I have 50 so far in my ward. For the biggest part these are medical."
"Fri 13 Aug
7pm we sail for Malta. News received that a transport Royal Edward was torpedoed off Kos Island with 3000 troops on board."


I was able to find more information about these losses and discovered how accurate Muriel’s information was.
On the night of the 12th/13th May H.M.S. Goliath sank 100 yards off shore in Morto Bay. The captain challenged an unknown vessel but, when the reply came back in English, no alarm was sounded. Three torpedoes struck. The ship sank within two minutes. Five hundred and seventy of the seven hundred strong crew drowned.
On the morning of 13 August the Royal Edward was torpedoed with the loss of approximately 1000 men.