INTO THE JUDEAN HILLS
When the 52nd Division were moving out of Ludd on the 19th November
the 75th Division were fighting hard about Latron, where the Turks
held the monastery and its beautiful gardens and the hill about Amwas
until late in the morning. Having driven them out, the 75th pushed
on to gain the pass into the hills and to begin two days of fighting
which earned the unstinted praise of General Bulfin who witnessed it.
For nearly three miles from Latron the road passes through a flat
valley flanked by hills till it reaches a guardhouse and khan at the
foot of the pass which then rises rapidly to Saris, the difference
in elevation in less than four miles being 1400 feet. Close to the
guardhouse begin the hills which tower above the road. The Turks had
constructed defences on these hills and held them with riflemen and
machine guns, so that these positions dominated all approaches. Our
guns had few positions from which to assist the infantry, but they did
sterling service wherever possible. In General Palin the Division
had a commander with wide experience of hill fighting on the Indian
frontier, and he brought that experience to bear in a way which must
have dumb-founded the enemy. Frontal attacks were impossible and
suicidal, and each position had to be turned by a wide movement
started a long way in rear. All units in the Division did well, the
Gurkhas particularly well, and by a continual encircling of their
flanks the Turks were compelled to leave their fastnesses and fall
back to new hill crests. Thus outwitted and outmatched the enemy
retreated to Saris, a high hill with a commanding view of the pass for
half a mile. The hill is covered with olive trees and has a village on
its eastern slope, and as the road winds at its foot and then takes
a left-handed turn to Kuryet el Enab its value for defence was
considerable.
The Turks had taken advantage of the cover to place a large body of
defenders with machine guns on the hill, but with every condition
unfavourable to us the 75th Division had routed out the enemy before
three o'clock and were ready to move forward as soon as the guns
could get up the pass. Rain was falling heavily, the road surface was
clinging and treacherous, and, worse still, the road had been blown up
in several places. The guns could not advance to be of service that
day, and the infantry had, therefore, to remain where they were for
the night. There was a good deal of sniping, but Nature was more
unkind than the enemy, who received more than he gave. The troops were
wearing light summer clothing, drill shorts and tunics, and the sudden
change from the heat and dryness of the plain to bitter cold and wet
was a desperate trial, especially to the Indian units, who had little
sleep that night. They needed rest to prepare them for the rigour of
the succeeding day. A drenching rain turned the whole face of the
mountains, where earth covered rock, into a sea of mud. On the
positions about Saris being searched a number of prisoners were taken,
among them a battalion commander. Men captured in the morning told us
there were six Turkish battalions holding Enab, which is something
under two miles from Saris.
The road proceeds up a rise from Saris, then falling slightly it
passes below the crest of a ridge and again climbs to the foot of a
hill on which a red-roofed convent church and buildings stand as a
landmark that can be seen from Jaffa. On the opposite side of the road
is a substantial house, the summer retreat of the German Consul in
Jerusalem, whose staff traded in Jordan Holy Water; and this house,
now empty, sheltered a divisional general from the bad weather while
the operations for the capture of the Holy City were in preparation. I
have a grateful recollection of this building, for in it the military
attachés and I stayed before the Official Entry into Jerusalem, and
its roof saved us from one inclement night on the bleak hills. On the
20th November the Turks did their best to keep the place under German
ownership. The hill on which it stands was well occupied by men under
cover of thick stone walls, the convent gardens on the opposite side
of the highway was packed with Turkish infantry, and across the deep
valley to the west were guns and riflemen on another hill, all of them
holding the road under the best possible observation. The enemy's
howitzers put down a heavy barrage on all approaches, and on the
reverse of the hill covering the village lying in the hollow
there were machine guns and many men. Reconnaissances showed the
difficulties attending an attack, and it was not until the afternoon
that a plan was ready to be put into execution. No weak points in the
defences could be discovered, and just as it seemed possible that a
daylight attack would be held up, a thick mist rolled up the valley
and settled down over Enab. The 2/3rd Gurkhas seized a welcomed
opportunity, and as the light was failing the shrill, sharp notes
of these gallant hillmen and the deep-throated roar of the 1/5th
Somersets told that a weighty bayonet charge had got home, and that
the keys of the enemy position had been won. The men of the bold 75th
went beyond Enab in the dark, and also out along the old Roman road
towards Biddu to deny the Turks a point from which they could see the
road as it fell away from the Enab ridge towards the wadi Ikbala. That
night many men sought the doubtful shelter of olive groves, and built
stone sangars to break the force of a biting wind. A few, as many as
could be accommodated, were welcomed by the monks in a monastery in
a fold in the hills, whilst some rested and were thankful in a crypt
beneath the monks' church, the oldest part of the building, believed
to be the work of sixth-century masons. The monks had a tale of woe to
tell. They had been proud to have as their guest the Latin Patriarch
in Jerusalem, who was a French protégé, and this high ecclesiastic
remained at the monastery till November 17, when Turkish gendarmerie
carried him away. The Spanish Consul in Jerusalem lodged a vigorous
protest, and, so the monks were told, he was supported by the German
Commandant. But to no purpose, for when General Allenby entered
Jerusalem he learned that the Latin Patriarch had been removed to
Damascus. For quite a long time the monks did many kindly things for
our troops. They gave up the greater part of the monastery and church
for use as a hospital, and many a sick man was brought back to health
by rest within those ancient walls. Some, alas, there were whose
wounds were mortal, and a number lie in the monks' secluded garden.
They have set up wooden crosses over them, and we may be certain that
in that quiet sequestered spot their remains will rest in peace and
will have the protection of the monks as surely as it has been given
to the grave of the Roman centurion which faces those of our brave
boys who fell on the same soil fighting the same good fight.
While the 75th Division were making their magnificent effort at Enab
the Lowlanders had breasted other and equally difficult hills to the
north. General Hill had posted a strong force at Beit Likia, and then
moved south-east along the route prepared by Cestius Gallus nearly
1900 years ago to the height of Beit Anan, and thence east again
to Beit Dukku. On the 21st the road and ground near it were in
exceedingly bad condition, and the difficulty of moving anything on
wheels along it could hardly have been greater. Already the 52nd
Division had realised it was hopeless to get all their divisional
artillery into action, and only three sections of artillery were
brought up, the horses of the guns sent back to Ramleh being used to
double the teams in the three advanced sections. It was heavy work,
too, for infantry who not only had to carry the weight of mud-caked
boots, but were handicapped by continual slipping upon the rocky
ground. The 75th advancing along the road from Enab to Kustul got an
idea of the Turkish lack of attention to the highway, the main road
being deep in mud and full of dangerous ruts. They won Kustul about
midday, and officers who climbed to the top got their first glimpse
of the outskirts of Jerusalem from the ruined walls of a Roman castle
that gives its name to the little village perched on the height. They
did not, however, see much beyond the Syrian colony behind the main
Turkish defences, and the first view of Jerusalem by the troops of
the British Army was obtained by General Maclean's brigade when they
advanced from Biddu to Nebi Samwil, that crowning height on which many
centuries before Richard the Lion Heart buried his face in his casque
and exclaimed: 'Lord God, I pray that I may never see Thy Holy City,
if so be that I may not rescue it from the hands of Thine enemies.'
What a fight it was for Nebi Samwil! The Turk had made it his advanced
work for his main line running from El Jib through Bir Nabala, Beit
Iksa to Lifta, as strong a chain of entrenched mountains as any
commander could desire. General Maclean's brigade advanced from Biddu
along the side of a ridge and up the exposed steep slope of Nebi
Samwil, not all of which, in the only direction he could select for an
advance, was terraced, as it was on the Turks' side. He was all
the time confronted by heavy artillery and rifle fire, and, though
supported by guns firing at long range from the neighbourhood of Enab,
he could not make Nebi Samwil in daylight. Round the top of the hill
the Turk had dug deeply into the stony earth. He knew the value
of that hill. From its crest good observation was obtained in all
directions, and if, when we had to attack the main Jerusalem defences
on December 8, the summit of Nebi Samwil had still been in Turkish
hands, not a movement of troops as they issued from the bed of the
wadi Surar and climbed the rough face of the western buttresses of
Jerusalem would have escaped notice. The brigade won the hill and held
it just before midnight, but the battle for the crest ebbed and flowed
for days with terrific violence, we never giving up possession of it,
though it was stormed again and again by an enemy who, it is fair to
admit, displayed fine courage and not a little skill. That hill-top at
this period had to submit to a thunderous bombardment, and the Mosque
of Nebi Samwil became a battered shell. Here are supposed to lie the
remains of the Prophet Samuel. The tradition may or may not be well
founded, but at any rate Mahomedans and Christians alike have held
the place in veneration for centuries. The Turk paid no regard to the
sanctity of the Mosque, and, as it was of military importance to him
that we should not hold it, he shelled it daily with all his available
guns, utterly destroying it. There may be cases where the Turks will
deny that they damaged a Holy Place. They could not hide their guilt
on Nebi Samwil. I was at pains to examine the Mosque and the immediate
surroundings, and the photographs I took are proof that the wreckage
of this church came from artillery fired from the east and north, the
direction of the Turkish gun-pits. It is possible we are apt to be
a little too sentimental about the destruction in war of a place of
worship. If a general has reason to think that a tower or minaret
is being used as an observation post, or that a church or mosque is
sheltering a body of troops, there are those who hold that he is
justified in deliberately planning its destruction, but here was a
sacred building with associations held in reverence by all classes and
creeds in a land where these things are counted high, and to have set
about wrecking it was a crime. The German influence over the Turk
asserted itself, as it did in the heavy fighting after we had taken
Jerusalem. We had batteries on the Mount of Olives and the Turk
searched for them, but they never fired one round at the Kaiserin
Augusta Victoria Hospice near by. That had been used as Falkenhayn's
headquarters. General Chetwode occupied it as his Corps Headquarters
soon after he entered Jerusalem. There was a wireless installation and
the Turks could see the coming and going of the Corps' motor cars. I
have watched operations from a summer-house in the gardens, and no
enemy plane could pass over the building without discovering the
purpose to which it was put. And there were spies. But not one shell
fell within the precincts of the hospice because it was a German
building, containing the statues of the Kaiser and Kaiserin, and (oh,
the taste of the Hun!) with effigies of the Kaiser and his consort
painted in the roof of the chapel not far from a picture of the
Saviour. Britain is rebuilding what the Turks destroyed, and there
will soon arise on Nebi Samwil a new mosque to show Mahomedans that
tolerance and freedom abide under our flag.
When the 75th Division were making the attack on Nebi Samwil the 52nd
Division put all the men they could spare on to the task of making
roads. To be out of the firing line did not mean rest. In fact, as
far as physical exertion went, it was easier to be fighting than in
reserve. From sunrise till dark and often later the roadmakers were at
work with pick, shovel, and crowbar, and the tools were not too many
for the job. The gunners joined in the work and managed to take their
batteries over the roads long before they were considered suitable
for other wheels. The battery commanders sometimes selected firing
positions which appeared quite inaccessible to any one save a mountain
climber, but the guns got there and earned much credit for their
teams.
On the 22nd Nebi Samwil was thrice attacked. British and Indian troops
were holding the hill, but the Turks were on the northern slopes. They
were, in fact, on strong positions on three sides, and from El Burj,
a prominent hill 1200 yards to the south-east, and from the wooded
valley of the wadi Hannina, they could advance with plenty of cover.
There was much dead ground, stone walls enclosed small patches of
cultivation, and when troops halted under the terraces on the slopes
no gun or rifle fire could reach them. The enemy could thus get quite
close to our positions before we could deal with them, and their
attacks were also favoured by an intense volume of artillery fire from
5.9's placed about the Jerusalem-Nablus road and, as some people in
Jerusalem afterwards told me, from the Mount of Olives. The attackers
possessed the advantage that our guns could not concentrate on them
while the attack was preparing, and could only put in a torrent of
fire when the enemy infantry were getting near their goal. These three
attacks were delivered with the utmost ferocity, and were pressed home
each time with determination. But the 75th Division held on with a
stubbornness which was beyond praise, and the harder the Turk tried
to reach the summit the tighter became the defence. Each attack was
repulsed with very heavy losses, and after his third failure the enemy
did not put in his infantry again that day.
The 75th Division endeavoured to reach El Jib, a village on the hill a
mile and a half to the north of Nebi Samwil. The possession of El Jib
by us would have attracted some of the enemy opposing the advance
of the Yeomanry Mounted Division on the left, but not only was the
position strongly defended in the village and on the high ground on
the north and north-west, but our infantry could not break down the
opposition behind the sangars and boulders on the northern side of
Nebi Samwil. The attack had to be given up, but we made some progress
in this mountainous sector, as the 52nd Division had pushed out from
Dukku to Beit Izza, between 3000 and 4000 yards from El Jib, and
by driving the enemy from this strong village they made it more
comfortable for the troops in Biddu and protected the Nebi Samwil
flank, the securing of which in those days of bitter fighting was
an important factor. It was evident from what was happening on this
front, not only where two divisions of infantry had to strain every
nerve to hold on to what they had got but where the Yeomanry Mounted
Division were battling against enormous odds in the worse country to
the north-west, that the Turks were not going to allow us to get
to the Nablus road without making a direct attack on the Jerusalem
defences. They outnumbered us, had a large preponderance in guns, were
near their base, and enjoyed the advantage of prepared positions and a
comparatively easy access to supplies and ammunition. Everything was
in their favour down to the very state of the weather. But our army
struggled on against all the big obstacles. On the 23rd the 75th
Division renewed their attack on El Jib, but although the men showed
the dash which throughout characterised the Division, it had to be
stopped. The garrison of El Jib had been reinforced, and the enemy
held the woods, wadi banks, and sangars in greater strength than
before, while the artillery fire was extremely heavy. Not only was the
75th Division tired with ceaseless fighting, but the losses they had
sustained since they left the Plain of Ajalon had been substantial,
and the 52nd Division took over from them that night to prepare
for another effort on the following day. The Scots were no more
successful. They made simultaneous attacks on the northern and
southern ends of Nebi Samwil, and a brigade worked up from Beit Izza
to a ridge north-west of El Jib. Two magnificent attempts were made
to get into the enemy's positions, but they failed. The officer
casualties were heavy; some companies had no officers, and the troops
were worn out by great exertions and privations in the bleak hills.
The two divisions had been fighting hard for over three weeks, they
had marched long distances on hard food, which at the finish was not
too plentiful, and the sudden violent change in the weather conditions
made it desirable that the men should get to an issue of warmer
clothing. General Bulfin realised it would be risking heavy losses to
ask his troops to make another immediate effort against a numerically
stronger enemy in positions of his own choice, and he therefore
applied to General Allenby that the XXth Corps--the 60th Division was
already at Latron attached to the XXIst Corps--might take over the
line. The Commander-in-Chief that evening ordered the attack on the
enemy's positions to be discontinued until the arrival of fresh
troops. During the next day or two the enemy's artillery was as active
as hitherto, but the punishment he had received in his attacks made
him pause, and there were only small half-hearted attempts to reach
our line. They were all beaten off by infantry fire, and the reliefs
of the various brigades of the XXIst Corps were complete by November
28. It had not been given to the XXIst Corps to obtain the distinction
of driving the Turks for ever from Jerusalem, but the work of
the Corps in the third and fourth weeks of November had laid the
foundation on which victory finally rested. The grand efforts of the
52nd and 75th Divisions in rushing over the foothills of the Shephelah
on to the Judean heights, in getting a footing on some of the most
prominent hills within three days of leaving the plain, and in
holding on with grim tenacity to what they had gained, enabled the
Commander-in-Chief to start on a new plan by which to take the Holy
City in one stride, so to speak. The 52nd and 75th Divisions and, as
will be seen, the Yeomanry Mounted Division as well, share the glory
of the capture of Jerusalem with the 53rd, 60th, and 74th Divisions
who were in at the finish.
The fighting of the Yeomanry Mounted Division on the left of the 52nd
was part and parcel of the XXIst Corps' effort to get to the Nablus
road. It was epic fighting, and I have not described it when narrating
the infantry's daily work because it is best told in a connected
story. If the foot sloggers had a bad time, the conditions were
infinitely worse for mounted troops. The ground was as steep, but the
hillsides were rougher, the wadis narrower, the patches of open flat
fewer than in the districts where infantry operated. So bad indeed was
the country that horses were an encumbrance, and most of them were
returned to the plain. After a time horse artillery could proceed no
farther, and the only guns the yeomanry had with them were those of
a section of the Hong Kong and Singapore mountain battery, manned by
Sikhs, superb fellows whose service in the Egyptian deserts and in
Palestine was worthy of a martial race. But their little guns were
outranged by the Turkish artillery, and though they were often right
up with the mounted men they could not get near the enemy batteries.
The supply of the division in the nooks and crannies where there was
not so much as a goat-path was a desperate problem, and could not have
been solved without the aid of many hundreds of pack-donkeys which
dumped their loads of supplies and ammunition on the hillsides,
leaving it to be carried forward by hand. The division were fighting
almost continually for a fortnight. They got farther forward than
the infantry and met the full force of an opposition which, if not
stronger than that about Nebi Samwil, was extremely violent, and they
came back to a line which could be supplied with less difficulty
when it was apparent that the Turks were not going to accept the
opportunity General Allenby gave them to withdraw their army from
Jerusalem. The Division's most bitter struggle was about the
Beth-horons, on the very scene where Joshua, on a lengthened day,
threw the Canaanites off the Shephelah.
The Yeomanry Mounted Division received orders on the afternoon of
November 17 to move across Ajalon into the foothills and to press
forward straight on Bireh as rapidly as possible. Their trials they
began immediately. One regiment of the 8th Brigade occupied Annabeh,
and a regiment of the 22nd Brigade got within a couple of miles of
Nalin, where a well-concealed body of the enemy held it up. Soon the
report came in that the country was impassable for wheels. By
the afternoon of the next day the 8th Brigade were at Beit ur el
Foka--Beth-horon the Upper--a height where fig trees and pomegranates
flourish. Eastwards the country falls away and there are several
ragged narrow valleys between some tree-topped ridges till the eye
meets a sheikh's tomb on the Zeitun ridge, standing midway between
Foka and Beitunia, which rears a proud and picturesque head to bar the
way to Bireh. The wadis cross the valleys wherever torrent water can
tear up rock, but the yeomanry found their beds smoother going, filled
though they were with boulders, than the hill slopes, which generally
rose in steep gradients from the sides of watercourses. During every
step of the way across this saw-toothed country one appreciated to
the full the defenders' advantage. If dead ground hid you from one
hill-top enemy marks-men could get you from another, and it was
impossible for the division to proceed unless it got the enemy out of
all the hills on its line of advance. The infantry on the right were
very helpful, but the brigade on the left flank had many difficulties,
which were not lessened when, on the second day of the movement, all
Royal Horse Artillery guns and all wheels had to be sent back owing to
the bad country. Up to this point the fight against Nature was more
arduous than against the enemy. Thenceforward the enemy became more
vigilant and active, and the hills and stony hollows more trying. All
available men were set to work to make a road for the Hong Kong and
Singapore gunners, a battery which would always get as far into the
mountains as any in the King's Army. The road parties laboured night
and day, but it was only by the greatest exertions that the battery
could be got through. The heavy rain of the 19th added to the
troubles. The 8th Brigade, having occupied Beit ur et Tahta
(Beth-horon the Lower) early on the morning of the 19th, proceeded
along the wadi Sunt until a force on the heights held them up, and
they had to remain in the wadi while the 6th Mounted Brigade turned
the enemy's flank at Foka. The 22nd Mounted Brigade on the north met
with the same trouble--every hill had to be won and picqueted--and
they could not make Ain Arik that day. As soon as it was light on the
following morning the 6th Mounted Brigade brushed away opposition in
Foka and entered the village, pushing on thence towards Beitunia. The
advance was slow and hazardous; every hill had to be searched, a task
difficult of accomplishment by reason of the innumerable caves and
boulders capable of sheltering snipers. The Turk had become an adept
at sniping, and left parties in the hills to carry on by themselves.
When the 6th Brigade got within two miles of the south-west of
Beitunia they were opposed by 5000 Turks well screened by woods on the
slopes and the wadi. Both sides strove all day without gaining ground.
Divisional headquarters were only a short distance behind the 6th, and
the 8th Brigade was moved up into the same area to be ready to assist.
By two o'clock in the afternoon the 22nd Brigade got into Ain Arik and
found a strong force of the enemy holding Beitunia and the hill of
Muntar, a few hundred yards to the north of it, thus barring the way
to Ramallah and Bireh. Rain fell copiously and the wind was chilly.
After a miserable night in bivouac, the 6th Brigade was astir before
daylight on the 21st. They were fighting at dawn, and in the half
light compelled the enemy to retire to within half a mile of Beitunia.
A few prisoners were rounded up, and these told the brigadier that
3000 Turks were holding Beitunia with four batteries of field guns and
four heavy camel guns. That estimate was found to be approximately
accurate. A regiment of the 8th Brigade sent to reinforce the 6th
Brigade on their left got within 800 yards of the hill, when the guns
about Bireh and Ramallah opened on them and they were compelled to
withdraw, and a Turkish counter-attack forced our forward line back
slightly in the afternoon. The enemy had a plentiful supply of
ammunition and made a prodigal use of it. While continuing to shell
fiercely he put more infantry into his fighting line, and as we had
only 1200 rifles and four mountain guns, which the enemy's artillery
outranged, it was clear we could not dislodge him from the Beitunia
crest. The 22nd Mounted Brigade had made an attempt to get to Ramallah
from Ain Arik, but the opposition from Muntar and the high ground
to the east was much too severe. Our casualties had not been
inconsiderable, and in face of the enemy's superiority in numbers and
guns and the strength of his position it would have been dangerous and
useless to make a further attack. General Barrow therefore decided to
withdraw to Foka during the night. All horses had been sent back in
the course of the afternoon, and when the light failed the retirement
began. The wounded were first evacuated, and they, poor fellows, had
a bad time of it getting back to Foka in the dark over four miles of
rock-strewn country. It was not till two o'clock on the following
morning that all the convoys of wounded passed through Foka, but by
that time the track to Tahta had been made into passable order, and
some of these helpless men were out of the hills soon after daylight,
journeying in comparative ease in light motor ambulances over the
Plain of Ajalon.
The arrangements for the withdrawal worked admirably. The 8th Mounted
Brigade, covering the retirement so successfully that the enemy knew
nothing about it, held on in front of Beitunia till three o'clock,
reaching Foka before dawn, while the 22nd Brigade remained covering
the northern flank till almost midnight, when it fell back to Tahta.
The Division's casualties during the day were 300 killed and wounded.
We still held the Zeitun ridge, observation was kept on Ain Arik from
El Hafy by one regiment, and troops were out on many parts north and
east of Tahta and Foka.
On the next two days there was nothing beyond enemy shelling and
patrol encounters. On the 24th demonstrations were made against
Beitunia to support the left of the 52nd Division's attack on El Jib,
but the enemy was too strong to permit of the yeomanry proceeding
more than two miles east of Foka. The roadmakers had done an enormous
amount of navvy work on the track between Foka and Tahta. They had
laboured without cessation, breaking up rock, levering out boulders
with crowbars, and doing a sort of rough-and-ready levelling, and by
the night of the 24th the track was reported passable for guns.
The Leicester battery R.H.A. came along it next morning without
difficulty. I did not see the road till some time later and its
surface had then been considerably improved, but even then one felt
the drivers of those gun teams had achieved the almost impossible. The
Leicester battery arrived at Foka just in time to unlimber and get
into action behind a fig orchard in order to disperse a couple of
companies of enemy infantry which were working round the left flank of
the Staffordshire Yeomanry at Khurbet Meita, below the Zeitun height.
The enemy brought up reinforcements and made an attack in the late
afternoon, but this was also broken up. The Berkshire battery reached
Tahta the following day and, with the Leicester gunners, answered the
Turks' long-range shelling throughout the day and night. On the 27th
the enemy made a determined attempt to compel us to withdraw from the
Zeitun ridge, which is an isolated hill commanding the valleys on both
sides. The 6th Mounted Brigade furnished the garrison of 3 officers
and 60 men, who occupied a stone building on the summit. Against them
the enemy put 600 infantry with machine guns, and they also brought a
heavy artillery fire to bear on the building from Beitunia, 4000 yards
away. The garrison put up a most gallant defence. They were compelled
to leave the building because the enemy practically destroyed it by
gunfire and the infantry almost surrounded the hill, but they
obtained cover on the boulder-strewn sides of the hill and held their
assailants at bay. At dusk, although the garrison was reduced to 2
officers and 26 men, they refused to give ground. They were instructed
to hold on as long as possible, and a reinforcement of 50 men was sent
up after dark--all that could be spared, as the division was holding a
series of hills ten miles long and every rifle was in the line. This
front was being threatened at several points, and the activity of
patrols at Deir Ibzia and north of it suggested that the enemy was
trying to get into the gap of five miles between the yeomanry and the
right of the 54th Division which was now at Shilta. It was an anxious
night, and No. 2 Light Armoured Car battery was kept west of Tahta
to enfilade the enemy with machine guns should he appear in the
neighbourhood of Suffa. The 7th Mounted Brigade was ordered up to
reinforce. The fresh troops arrived at dawn on the 28th, and had no
sooner got into position at Hellabi, half a mile north-west of Tahta,
than their left flank was attacked by 1000 Turks with machine guns.
The 155th Brigade of the 52nd Division was on its way through Beit
Likia to rest after its hard work in the neighbourhood of Nebi Samwil
and El Jib, and it was ordered up to assist. At midday the brigade
attacked Suffa but could not take it. The Scots, however, prevented
the Turks breaking round the left flank of the yeomanry. The post
which had held Zeitun so bravely was brought into Foka under cover of
the Leicester and Berkshire batteries' fire, and very heavy fighting
continued all day long on the Foka-Tahta-Suffa line, but though the
enemy employed 3000 infantry in his attack, and had four batteries
of 77's and four heavy camel guns, he was unsuccessful. At dusk the
attack on Tahta, which had been under shell-fire all day, was beaten
off and the enemy was compelled to withdraw one mile. Suffa was still
his, but his advanced troops on the cairn south of that place had
suffered heavily during the day at the hands of the 7th Mounted
Brigade, who several times drove them off. Some howitzers of the 52nd
Division were hauled over the hills in the afternoon and shelled
the cairn so heavily that the post sought shelter in Suffa. To the
south-east of the line of attack the Turks were doing their utmost to
secure Foka. They came again and again, and their attacks were always
met and broken with the bayonet by yeomen who were becoming fatigued
by continuous fighting, and advancing and retiring in this terrible
country. They could have held the place that night, but there was no
possibility of sending them reinforcements, and as the enemy had been
seen working round to the south of the village with machine guns it
might have been impossible to get them out in the morning. General
Barrow accordingly withdrew the Foka garrison to a new position on a
wooded ridge half-way between that place and Tahta, and the enemy made
no attempt to get beyond Foka. Late at night he got so close to Tahta
from the north that he threw bombs at our sangars, but he was driven
off.
During the evening the Yeomanry Mounted Division received welcome
reinforcements. The 4th Australian Light Horse Brigade were placed
in support of the 6th Mounted Brigade and a battalion of the 156th
Infantry Brigade assisted the 7th Mounted Brigade.
On the 29th the Turks made their biggest effort to break through the
important line we held, and all day they persisted with the greatest
determination in an attack on our left. At midnight they had again
occupied the cairn south of Suffa, and remained there till 8 A.M.,
when the 268th Brigade Royal Field Artillery crowned the hill with a
tremendous burst of fire and drove them off. The machine-gunners
of the 7th Mounted Brigade caught the force as it was retiring and
inflicted many casualties. The Turks came back again and again, and
the cairn repeatedly changed hands, until at last it was unoccupied by
either side. Towards dusk the Turks' attacks petered out, though the
guns and snipers continued busy, and the Yeomanry Mounted Division was
relieved by the 231st Infantry Brigade of the 74th Division and the
157th Infantry Brigade of the 52nd Division, the Australian Mounted
Division ultimately taking over the left of the line which XXth Corps
troops occupied.
The Yeomanry Mounted Division had made a grand fight against a vastly
superior force of the enemy in a country absolutely unfavourable to
the movement of mounted troops. They never had more than 1200 rifles
holding a far-flung barren and bleak line, and the fine qualities
of vigorous and swift attack, unfaltering discipline and heroic
stubbornness in defence under all conditions, get their proof in
the 499 casualties incurred by the Division in the hill fighting,
exclusive of those sustained by the 7th Mounted Brigade which
reinforced them. The Division was made up entirely of first-line
yeomanry regiments whose members had become efficient soldiers in
their spare time, when politicians were prattling about peace and
deluding parties into the belief that there was little necessity to
prepare for war. Their patriotism and example gave a tone to the
drafts sent out to replace casualties and the wastage of war, and were
a credit to the stock from which they sprang.
While the Yeomanry Mounted Division had been fighting a great battle
alongside the infantry of the XXIst Corps in the hills, the remainder
of the troops of the Desert Mounted Corps were employed on the plain
and in the coastal sector, hammering the enemy hard and establishing
a line from the mouth of the river Auja through some rising ground
across the plain. They were busily engaged clearing the enemy out of
some of the well-ordered villages east of the sandy belt, several of
them German colonies showing signs of prosperity and more regard
for cleanliness and sanitation than other of the small centres of
population hereabouts. The village of Sarona, north of Jaffa, an
almost exclusively German settlement, was better arranged than any
others, but Wilhelma was a good second.
The most important move was on November 24, when, with a view to
making the enemy believe an attack was intended against his right
flank, the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade was sent across the
river Auja to seize the villages of Sheikh Muannis near the sea, and
Hadrah farther inland, two companies of infantry holding each of the
two crossings. The enemy became alarmed and attacked the cavalry in
force early next morning, 1000 infantry marching on Muannis. The
Hadrah force was driven back across the Auja and the two companies of
infantry covering the crossing suffered heavily, having no support
from artillery, which had been sent into bivouac. Some of the men had
to swim the river. A bridge of boats had been built at Jerisheh mill
during the night, and by this means men crossed until Muannis was
occupied by the enemy later in the morning. The cavalry crossed the
ford at the mouth of the Auja at the gallop. The 1/4th Essex held on
to Hadrah until five out of six officers and about fifty per cent. of
the men became casualties. There was a good deal of minor fighting on
this section of the front, and in a number of patrol encounters the
resource of the Australian Light Horse added to their bag of prisoners
and to the Army's store of information. Nothing further of importance
occurred in this neighbourhood until we seized the crossings of the
Auja and the high ground north of the river a week before the end of
the year.