Part 1 (1/1)
Caught by the Turks.
by Francis Yeats-Brown.
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t.i.tle: Caught by the Turks
Author: Francis Yeats-Brown
Release Date: September 7, 2011 [EBook #37343]
Language: English
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CAUGHT BY THE TURKS ***
Produced by Barbara Watson, Ross Cooling, Mark Akrigg and the Online Distributed Proofreading Canada Team at munications west and north of Baghdad must be cut that day. Von der Goltz and a German battery of quick-firing guns were hasting down from Mosul to help their stricken ally, and reinforcements of the best Anatolian troops, magnificently equipped and organised by the Germans, were on their way from Gallipoli, whence they came flushed with the confidence of success.
Our attack on Ctesiphon was imminent. It was a matter of moments whether the Turkish reinforcements would arrive in time. Delay and confusion in the Turkish rear would have helped us greatly, and the moral and material advantage of cutting communications between Nur-ed-Din, the vacillating Commander-in-Chief defending Baghdad, and Von der Goltz, the veteran of victories, was obvious and unquestionable. But could we do it in an old Maurice Farman biplane?
Desperate needs need desperate measures. The attempt to take Baghdad was desperate--futile perhaps--and contrary to the advice of the great soldier who led the attack in the glorious but unsuccessful action of Ctesiphon. And so also, in a small way, ours was a desperate mission.
Our machine could carry neither oil nor petrol enough for the journey, and special arrangements had to be made for carrying spare tins of lubricant and fuel. With these we were to refill at our first halt.
While I was destroying the telegraph line, my pilot was to replenish the tanks of his machine. According to the map this should have been feasible, for the telegraph lines at the place we had selected for our demolition ran through a blank desert, two miles from the nearest track.