The Battle of the Nek (Turkish: Kılıçbayır Muharebesi) was a minor battle that took place on 7 August 1915, during the Gallipoli campaign of World War I. "The Nek" was a narrow stretch of ridge on the Gallipoli Peninsula. The name derives from the Afrikaans word for 'mountain pass', but the terrain itself was a perfect bottleneck and easy to defend, as had been proven during an Ottoman attack in June. It connected Australian and New Zealand trenches on the ridge known as "Russell's Top" to the knoll called "Baby 700" on which the Ottoman defenders were entrenched.
The campaign on the Gallipoli Peninsula had begun in April 1915, but over the following months had developed into a stalemate. In an effort to break the deadlock, the British and their allies launched an offensive to capture the Sari Bair range. As part of this effort, a feint attack by Australian troops was planned at the Nek to support New Zealand troops assaulting Chunuk Bair.
Early on 7 August 1915, two regiments of the Australian 3rd Light Horse Brigade, one of the formations under the command of Major General Alexander Godley for the offensive, mounted a futile bayonet attack on the Ottoman trenches on Baby 700. Due to poor co-ordination and inflexible decision making, the Australians suffered heavy casualties for no gain. A total of 600 Australians took part in the assault, with four charges; 372 were killed or wounded. Ottoman casualties were negligible.
Prelude
Geography
A narrow saddle, the Nek connected the Australian and New Zealand trenches on Walker's Ridge at a plateau designated as "Russell's Top" (known as Yuksek Sirt to the Ottomans) to the knoll called "Baby 700" (Kilic Bayir), on which the Ottoman defenders were entrenched in what the historian Chris Coulthard-Clark describes as "the strongest position at Anzac". The immediate area was known to the British and Empire troops as the Anzac sector, and the allied landing site was dubbed Anzac Cove, after the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. The Nek was between 30–50 metres (98–164 ft) wide; on each side, the ground sloped steeply down to deep valleys 150 metres (490 ft) below. These valleys were Monash Valley to the south and Malone's Gulley to the north.
The name given to the feature by Australian troops – the Nek – derives from the Afrikaans word for "mountain pass" and according to Glenn Wahlert was "likely coined by veterans of the South African war". The Turkish name for the Nek was Cesarettepe. It was well suited to defence, with no vegetation, and providing the defenders good observation and fields of fire along a narrow frontage. The ground was bare and covered in pot-holes, and on a slight slope. The difficult nature of the terrain had been highlighted earlier in the campaign, initially when a battalion of the Turkish 57th Regiment had suffered heavy casualties during a failed counter-attack in April. After the 19 May Ottoman counter-attack, Major-General Alexander Godley had ordered an attack by the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade across the Nek, but Brigadier General Andrew Russell (after whom Russell's Top was named) had convinced him to abandon this over concerns of the commanders of both the Wellington and Auckland Mounted Rifles Regiments. Another unsuccessful attack resulting in heavy casualties had been made by the Turkish 18th Regiment across the Nek on the night of 30 June. Despite these incidents, the challenges of attacking the Nek were not fully appreciated by Allied commanders when formulating the plan for the August Offensive.
The Australian line at Russell's Top lay just below the Nek and extended 90 metres (300 ft). The right of the line lay opposite the Ottoman position across flat ground; it was described by Les Carlyon as a "conventional trench" and was deep enough that wooden hand and footholds had been attached to the wall of the trench to enable the assaulting troops to climb out. On the left of the Australian line, the line sloped away into dead ground where the Australians had established what Carlyon describes as a "ditch without a parapet" that was obscured from view with vegetation and earth.
The Ottoman front line at the Nek consisted of two lines of trenches, with machine guns positioned on the flanks on spur lines, which provided clear fields of fire into no man's land in front of the Ottoman position. Behind this another eight trenches existed, tiered along the slopes towards Baby 700. At least five groups of machine guns – approximately 30 altogether – were located in the area, providing direct fire support to the Ottoman troops holding the Nek. These positions were widely dispersed and positioned in depth, at least 200 yards (180 m) from the Ottoman front line. The commanders of the two Ottoman regiments occupying positions around the Nek had chosen not to cover their trenches, despite orders from their divisional headquarters, due to concerns that a bombardment would collapse the roofs and block communication through the trenches, similar to what had occurred at Lone Pine.
Strategic situation and planning
For the three months since the 25 April landings, the Anzac beachhead had been a stalemate. On 19 May, Ottoman troops had attempted to break the deadlock with a counter-attack on Anzac Cove, but had suffered heavy casualties. In August, an Allied offensive (which later became known as the Battle of Sari Bair) was intended to break the deadlock by capturing the high ground of the Sari Bair range, and linking the Anzac front with a new landing to the north at Suvla. Along with the main advance north out of the Anzac perimeter, supporting attacks were planned from the existing trench positions. Higher-level conceptual planning for the offensive was undertaken by the commander of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, Lieutenant General William Birdwood, and Colonel Andrew Skeen; more detailed tactical planning devolved to other staff. Tactical command of the offensive to secure Sari Bair was given to Godley, who was at the time in command of the New Zealand and Australian Division.
As part of the effort to secure Baby 700, Godley, assisted by Birdwood, planned a breakthrough from the Nek. The official Australian historian Charles Bean writes that concerns about "attacking unaided" meant that plans were made to co-ordinate the attack with other actions. The attack at the Nek was meant to coincide with an attack by New Zealand troops from Chunuk Bair, which was to be captured during the night. The light horsemen were to attack across the Nek to Baby 700 while the New Zealanders descended from the rear from Chunuk Bair onto Battleship Hill, the next knoll above Baby 700. Other attacks were to be made by the 1st Light Horse Brigade at Pope's Hill and the 2nd Light Horse Brigade at Quinn's Post.
The 3rd Light Horse Brigade was chosen for the attack at the Nek. This formation was commanded by Colonel Frederic Hughes, and consisted of the 8th, 9th and 10th Light Horse Regiments. For the attack, the 8th and 10th would provide the assault troops, while the 9th was placed in reserve. Some of its machine guns, positioned on Turk's Point, about 120 metres (390 ft) from the Nek, would provide direct fire support during the attack. Like the other Australian Light Horse and the New Zealand Mounted Rifles formations, the 3rd Light Horse Brigade had been dispatched to Gallipoli in May as infantry reinforcements, leaving their horses in Egypt. The area around the Nek was held by the 18th Regiment, under the command of Major Mustafa Bey. The regiment formed part of Mustafa Kemal's Ottoman 19th Division. The 27th Regiment, under Lieutenant Colonel Sefik Bey, also held part of the line south from the Nek to Quinn's Post (Bomba Sirt).
Godley's orders for the attack stipulated that the attack would be made with bayonets and grenades only; rifles would be unloaded. This was, according to Roland Perry, designed to "influence the troopers to keep running at the [Ottoman] trenches" and ultimately meant they could not stop and fire. Planners envisaged four waves of troops attacking from Russell's Top across the Nek. The first wave would use the cover of a naval bombardment to approach the trenches silently and quickly while the defenders were dazed, and would capture the trench with bayonets and grenades. The second wave would then pass through the first to capture trenches on the lower slopes of Baby 700. The third and fourth waves would exploit further and would dig-in, with ultimate goal of securing the heights 200 metres (660 ft) away on Baby 700. The British 8th Battalion, Cheshire Regiment, was to consolidate positions on the Nek afterwards, while two companies from the 8th Battalion, Royal Welch Fusiliers would advance up the western part of Monash Valley and carry out an attack around the "Chessboard" – to the south of the Nek – to cover the southern flank of the Australians on the Nek.
Preparations for the attack began several days earlier when the troopers were ordered to stow unnecessary clothing, including woollen tunics, and equipment. This resulted in the men living in the trenches for several cold nights in just shirts and short pants. Each man was authorised to carry 200 rounds of ammunition, as well as a small amount of personal rations. Assault equipment included wire cutters, empty sandbags, ladders, and periscopes; only the fourth and final assault line would carry entrenching tools. The light horsemen had not participated in a large-scale attack before; they had not been trained to fight like infantrymen, having been recruited to fight in a mounted role, but they were all keen and eager for the attack to commence. Encouraged by earlier efforts by compatriots at Lone Pine, the troops were spurred on by the brigade major, Lieutenant Colonel John Antill, a Boer War veteran who encouraged them with stories from that war. Many soldiers who had been injured or ill, and were in hospital, ensured they were released and returned to their units in time to take part. In this climate, nobody questioned the tactics of the plan, contingencies, or the efficacy of attacking without loaded weapons. Prior to the assault, each man was given a double issue of rum to warm up.
Battle
The attack was scheduled to commence at 04:30 on 7 August. It was to be preceded by a naval bombardment, supported by field guns from several shore based batteries. The 8th and 10th Light Horse Regiments assembled in a trench about 90 metres (300 ft) long, opposite the Ottoman line that was between 20–70 metres (66–230 ft) away. Coloured marker flags were carried, to be shown from the captured trenches to indicate success. To help the supporting artillery to identify the attacking Australian troops, the attackers attached white armbands and patches to their shirts.
On the morning of 7 August, it was clear that the prerequisites for the attack had not been met. The initial concept of operations for the August offensive required a simultaneous attack from the rear of Baby 700, thereby creating a hammer and anvil effect on the Ottoman trenches caught in between this pincer movement. Because the New Zealand advance on Chunuk Bair had been held up and failed to reach Chunuk Bair, the troops assaulting the Nek would have to do so alone if the attack was to continue. The New Zealanders had made some progress, though, having captured the lower part of Rhododendron Spur and it was hoped that Chunuk Bair could still be carried; as a result, Birdwood and Skeen decided it was important for the attack on the Nek to proceed as a feint – rather than a pincer – to assist the New Zealanders at Chunuk Bair, while the Australians and Indians from other formations also attacked Hill 971. British troops were also landing at Suvla Bay, having commenced their operation the night before (6 August).
A further part of the plan required an attack from Steele's Post through several tunnels against German Officers' Trench by the Lieutenant Colonel Gordon Bennett's 6th Battalion (2nd Infantry Brigade of the Australian 1st Division). The Ottoman machine guns sited there enfiladed the ground in front of Quinn's Post and the Nek and the 6th Battalion's attack was conceived as a preliminary supporting move to suppress Ottoman fire onto the Nek to assist the 3rd Light Horse Brigade's. Planners had requested that this attack be conducted simultaneously with the attack at the Nek, but Birdwood had decided it should be conducted prior. The failure of this attack meant that Ottoman machine guns supporting the 18th Regiment around the Nek remained intact. Nonetheless, Birdwood declared that the 3rd Light Horse Brigade's attack was to proceed, albeit with some modifications. This would see the Australian light horsemen become the right flank of the assault on Chunuk Bair, linking in with the New Zealand Infantry Brigade on Rhododendron Spur.