How Jerusalem Was Won Part 8

But there was no promise of an early peep at such historic sights, and the problem of getting at the nearer land was hard enough for present deliberation. It was at first proposed that the whole of the XXth Corps and a force of cavalry should carry out operations simultaneously on the north and east of the Corps front which should give us possession of the roads from Mar Saba and Muntar, and also from Taiyibeh and the old Roman road to Jericho, thus allowing two cavalry forces supported by infantry columns to converge on Jericho from the north and south. However, by the second week of February there had been bad weather, and the difficulties of supplying a line forty miles from the railway on roads which, notwithstanding a vast amount of labour, were still far from good, were practically insuperable, and it was apparent that a northerly and easterly advance at the same time would involve a delay of three weeks.

New circ.u.mstances came to light after the advance was first arranged, and these demanded that the enemy should be driven across the Jordan as soon as possible. General Allenby decided that the operations should be carried out in two phases. The first was an easterly advance to thrust the enemy from his position covering Jericho, to force him across the Jordan, and to obtain control of the country west of the river. The northerly advance to secure the line of the wadi Aujah was to follow. This river Aujah which flows into the Jordan must not be confused with the Auja on the coast already described.

The period of wet weather was prolonged, and the acc.u.mulation of supplies of rations and ammunition did not permit of operations commencing before February 19. That they started so early is an eloquent tribute to the hard work of the Army, for the weather by the date of the attack had improved but little, and the task of getting up stores could only be completed by extraordinary exertions. General Chetwode ordered a brigade of the 60th Division to capture Mukhmas as a preliminary to a concentration at that place. On the 19th the Division occupied a front of about fourteen miles from near Muntar, close to which the ancient road from Bethlehem to Jericho pa.s.ses, through Ras Umm Deisis, across the Jerusalem-Jericho road to Arak Ibrahim, over the great chasm of the wadi Farah which has cliff-like sides hundreds of feet deep, to the brown k.n.o.b of Ras et Tawil. The line was not gained without fighting. The Turks did not oppose us at Muntar--the spot where the Jews released the Scapegoat--but there was a short contest for Ibrahim, and a longer fight lasting till the afternoon for an entrenched position a mile north of it; Ras et Tawil was ours by nine in the morning. Tawil overlooks a track which has been trodden from time immemorial. It leads from the Jordan valley north-west of Jericho, and pa.s.ses beneath the frowning height of Jebel Kuruntul with its bare face relieved by a monastery built into the rock about half-way up, and a walled garden on top to mark the Mount of Temptation, as the pious monks believe it to be. The track then proceeds westwards, winding in and out of the tremendous slits in rock, to Mukhmas, and it was probably along this rough line that the Israelites marched from their camp at Gilgal to overthrow the Philistines. On the right of the Londoners were two brigades of the Anzac Mounted Division, working through the most desolate hills and wadis down to the Dead Sea with a view to pushing up by Nebi Musa, which tradition has ascribed as the burial place of Moses, and thence into the Jordan valley. Northward of the 60th Division the 53rd was extending its flank eastwards to command the Taiyibeh-Jericho road, and the Welsh troops occupied Rummon, a huge mount of chalk giving a good view of the Wilderness. This was the position on the night of 19th February.

At dawn on the 20th the Londoners were to attack the Turks in three columns. The right column was to march from El Muntar to Ekteif, the centre column to proceed along the Jerusalem-Jericho road between the highway and the wadi Farah, and the left column was to go forward by the Tawil-Jebel Kuruntul track. The 1st Australian Light Horse Brigade and the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade were, if possible, to make Nebi Musa.

The infantry attack was as fine as anything done in the campaign. I had the advantage of witnessing the centre column carry out the whole of its task and of seeing the right column complete as gallant an effort as any troops could make, and as one saw them scale frowning heights and clamber up and down the roughest of torrent beds, one realised that more than three months' fighting had not removed the 'bloom' from these c.o.c.kney warriors, and that their physique and courage were proof against long and heavy trials of campaigning. The chief objective of the centre column was Talat ed Dumm which, lying on the Jericho road just before the junction of the old and the new road to the Jordan valley, was the key to Jericho. It is hard to imagine a better defensive position. To the north of the road is the wadi Farah, a great crack in the rocks which can only be crossed in a few places, and which a few riflemen could cover. Likewise a platoon distributed behind rocks on the many hills could command the approaches from all directions, while the hill of Talat ed Dumm, by the Good Samaritan Inn, and the height whereon the Crusader ruins stand, dominated a broad flat across which our troops must move. This position the 180th Brigade attacked at dawn. The guns opened before the sun appeared above the black crest line of the mountains of Moab, and well before long shadows were cast across the Jordan valley the batteries were tearing to pieces the stone walls and rocky eyries sheltering machine-gunners and infantry. This preliminary bombardment, if short, was wonderfully effective. From where I stood I saw the heavies pouring an unerring fire on to the Crusader Castle, huge spurts of black smoke, and the dislocation of big stones which had withstood the disintegrating effect of many centuries of sun power, telling the Forward Observing Officer that his gunners were well on the target and that to live in that havoc the Turks must seek the shelter of vaults cut deep down in the rock by masons of old. No enemy could delay our progress from that sh.e.l.l-torn spot. Lighter guns searched other positions and whiffs of shrapnel kept Turks from their business. There are green patches on the western side of Talat ed Dumm in the early months of the year before the sun has burned up the country. Over these the infantry advanced as laid down in the book. The whirring rap-rap of machine guns at present unlocated did not stop them, and as our machine-gun sections, ever on the alert to keep down rival automatic guns, found out and sprayed the nests, the enemy was seen to be anxious about his line of retreat. One large party, harried by shrapnel and machine-gun fire, left its positions and rushed towards a defile, but rallied and came back, though when it reoccupied its former line the Londoners had reached a point to enfilade it, and it suffered heavily. We soon got this position, and then our troops, ascending some spurs, poured a destructive fire into the defile and so hara.s.sed the Turks re-forming for a counterattack as to render feeble their efforts to regain what they had lost.

By eight o'clock we had taken the whole of the Talat ed Dumm position, and long-range sniping throughout the day did not disturb our secure possession of it. Immediately the heights were occupied the guns went ahead to new points, and armoured cars left the road to try to find a way to the south-east to protect the flank of the right column. They had a troublesome journey. Some of the crews walked well ahead of the cars to reconnoitre the tracks, and it speaks well for the efficiency of the cars as well as for the pluck and cleverness of the drivers that in crossing a mile or two of that terribly broken mountainous country no car was overturned and all got back to the road without mishap.

Throughout the night and during the greater part of the day of February 20 the right column were fighting under many difficulties. In their march from the hill of Muntar they had to travel over ground so cracked and strewn with boulders that in many parts the brigade could only proceed in single file. In some places the track chosen had a huge cleft in the mountain on one side and a cliff face on the other.

It was a continual succession of watercourses and mountains, of uphill and downhill travel over the most uneven surface in the blackness of night, and it took nearly eight hours to march three miles. The nature of the country was a very serious obstacle and the column was late in deploying for attack. But bad as was the route the men had followed during the night, it was easy as compared with the position they had set out to carry. This was Jebel Ekteif, the southern end of the range of hills of which Talat ed Dumm was the northern. Ekteif presented to this column a face as precipitous as Gibraltar and perhaps half as high. There was a ledge running round it about three-quarters of the way from the top, and for hours one could see the Turks lying flat on this rude path trying to pick off the intrepid climbers attempting a precarious ascent. Some mountain guns suddenly ranged on the enemy on this ledge, and, picking up the range with remarkable rapidity, forced the Turks into more comfortable positions. The enemy, too, had some well-served guns, and they plastered the spurs leading to the crest from the west, but our infantry's audacity never faltered, and after we had got into the first lines on the hill our men proceeded methodically to rout out the machine guns from their nooks and crannies. This was a somewhat lengthy process, but small parties working in support of each other gradually crushed opposition, and the huge rocky rampart was ours by three o'clock in the afternoon.

Meanwhile two brigades of the Anzac Mounted Division were moving eastwards from Muntar over the hills and wadis down to the Dead Sea, whence turning northwards they marched towards Nebi Musa to try to get on to the Jordan valley flats to threaten the Turks in rear. The terrain was appallingly bad and horses had to be led, the troops frequently proceeding in Indian file. No guns could be got over the hills to support the Anzacs, and when they tried to pa.s.s through a narrow defile south of Nebi Musa it was found that the enemy covered the approach with machine guns, and progress was stopped dead until, during the early hours of the following morning, some of the Londoners' artillery managed by a superhuman effort to get a few guns over the mountains to support the cavalry. By this time the Turks had had enough of it, and while it was dark they were busy trekking through Jericho towards the Ghoraniyeh bridge over the river, covered by a force on the Jebel Kuruntul track which prevented the left column from reaching the cliffs overlooking the Jordan valley. By dawn on the 21st Nebi Musa was made good, the 1st Australian Light Horse Brigade and the New Zealand Brigade were in Jericho by eight o'clock and had cleared the Jordan valley as far north as the river Aujah, the Londoners holding the line of cliffs which absolutely prevented any possibility of the enemy ever again threatening Jerusalem or Bethlehem from the east. This successful operation also put an end to the Turks'

Dead Sea grain traffic. They had given up hope of keeping their landing place on the northern sh.o.r.es of the Dead Sea when we took Talat ed Dumm, and one hour after our infantry had planted themselves on the Hill of Blood we saw the enemy burning his boats, wharves, and storehouses at Rujm el Bahr, where he had expended a good deal of labour to put up buildings to store grain wanted for his army.

Subsequently we had some naval men operating motor boats from this point, and these sailors achieved a record on that melancholy waterway at a level far below that at which any submarine, British or German, ever rested.

CHAPTER XIX

THE TOUCH OF THE CIVILISING HAND

It is doubtful whether the population of any city within the zones of war profited so much at the hands of the conqueror as Jerusalem. In a little more than half a year a wondrous change was effected in the condition of the people, and if it had been possible to search the Oriental mind and to get a free and frank expression of opinion, one would probably have found a universal thankfulness for General Allenby's deliverance of the Holy City from the hands of the Turks.

And with good reason. The scourge of war so far as the British Army was concerned left Jerusalem the Golden untouched. For the 50,000 people in the City the skilfully applied military pressure which put an end to Turkish misgovernment was the beginning of an era of happiness and contentment of which they had hitherto had no conception. Justice was administered in accordance with British ideals, every man enjoyed the profits of his industry, traders no longer ran the gauntlet of extortionate officials, the old time corruption was a thing of the past, public health was organised as far as it could be on Western lines, and though in matters of sanitation and personal cleanliness the inhabitants still had much to learn, the appearance of the Holy City and its population vastly improved under the touch of a civilising hand. Sights that offended more than one of the senses on the day when General Allenby made his official entry had disappeared, and peace and order reigned where previously had been but misery, poverty, disease, and squalor.

One of the biggest blots upon the Turkish government of the City was the total failure to provide an adequate water supply. What they could not, or would not, do in their rule of four hundred years His Majesty's Royal Engineers accomplished in a little more than two months, and now for the first time in history every civilian in Jerusalem can obtain as much pure mountain spring water as he wishes, and for this water, as fresh and bright as any bubbling out of Welsh hills, not a penny is charged. The picturesque, though usually unclean, water carrier is pa.s.sing into the limbo of forgotten things, and his energies are being diverted into other channels. The germs that swarmed in his leathern water bags will no longer endanger the lives of the citizens, and the deadly perils of stagnant cistern water have been to a large extent removed.

For its water Jerusalem used to rely mainly upon the winter rainfall to fill its cisterns. Practically every house has its underground reservoir, and it is estimated that if all were full they would contain about 360,000,000 gallons. But many had fallen into disrepair and most, if not the whole of them, required thorough cleansing. One which was inspected by our sanitary department had not been emptied for nineteen years. To supplement the cistern supply the Mosque of Omar reservoir halved with Bethlehem the water which flowed from near Solomon's Pools down an aqueduct constructed by Roman engineers under Herod before the Saviour was born. This was not nearly sufficient, nor was it so constant a supply as that provided by our Army engineers.

They went farther afield. They found a group of spring-heads in an absolutely clean gathering ground on the hills yielding some 14,000 gallons an hour, and this water which was running to waste is lifted to the top of a hill from which it flows by gravity through a long pipe-line to Jerusalem, where a reservoir has been built on a high point on the outskirts of the city. Supplies of this beautiful water run direct to the hospitals, and at standpipes all over the city the inhabitants take as much as they desire. The water consumption of the people became ten times what it was in the previous year, and this fact alone told how the boon was appreciated.

The scheme did not stop at putting up standpipes for those who fetched the water. A portion of the contents of the cisterns was taken for watering troop horses in the spring--troops were not allowed to drink it. The water level of these cisterns became very low, and as they got emptied the authorities arranged for refilling them on the one condition that they were first thoroughly cleansed and put in order.

The British administration would not be parties to the perpetuation of a system which permitted the fouling of good crystal water. A householder had merely to apply to the Military Governor for water, and a sanitary officer inspected the cistern, ordered it to be cleansed, and saw that this was done; then the Department of Public Health gave its certificate, and the engineers ran a pipe to the cistern and filled it, no matter what its capacity. Two cisterns were replenished with between 60,000 and 70,000 gallons of sparkling water from the hills in place of water heavily charged with the acc.u.mulation of summer dust on roofs, and the dust of Jerusalem roads, as we had sampled it, is not as clean as desert sand.

The installation of the supply was a triumph for the Royal Engineers.

In peace times the work would have taken from one to two years to complete. A preliminary investigation and survey of the ground was made on February 14, and a scheme was submitted four days later. Owing to the shortage of transport and abnormally bad weather work could not be commenced till April 12. Many miles of pipe line had to be laid and a powerful pumping plant erected, but water was being delivered to the people of Jerusalem on the 18th of June. Other military works have done much for the common good in Palestine, but none of them were of greater utility than this. Mahomedans seeing bright water flow into Jerusalem regarded it as one of the wonders of all time. It is interesting to note that the American Red Cross Society, which sent a large and capable staff to the Holy Land after America came into the war, knew of the lack of an adequate water supply for Jerusalem, and with that foresight which Americans show, forwarded to Egypt for transportation to Jerusalem some thousand tons of water mains to provide a water service. When the American Red Cross workers reached the Holy City they found the Army's plans almost completed, and they were the first to pay a tribute to what they described as the 'civilising march of the British Army.'

Those who watched the ceaseless activities of the Public Health Administration were not surprised at the remarkable improvement in the sick and death rates, not only of Jerusalem but of all the towns and districts. The new water supply will unquestionably help to lower the figures still further. A medical authority recently told me that the health of the community was wonderfully good and there was no suspicion of cholera, outbreaks of which were frequent under the Turkish regime. Government hospitals were established in all large centres. In this country where small-pox takes a heavy toll the 'conscientious objector' was unknown, and many thousands of natives in a few months came forward of their own free will to be vaccinated.

Typhus and relapsing fever, both lice-borne diseases, used to claim many victims, but the figures fell very rapidly, due largely, no doubt, to the full use to which disinfecting plants were put in all areas of the occupied territory. The virtues of bodily cleanliness were taught, and the people were given that personal attention which was entirely lacking under Turkish rule. It is not easy to overcome the prejudices and cure the habits of thousands of years, but progress is being made surely if slowly, and already there is a gratifying improvement in the condition of the people which is patent to any observer.

In Jerusalem an infants' welfare bureau was inst.i.tuted, where mothers were seen before and after childbirth, infants' clinics were established, a body of health was formed, and a kitchen was opened to provide food for babies and the poor. The nurses were mainly local subjects who had to undergo an adequate training, and there was no one who did not confidently predict a rapid fall in the infant mortality rate which, to the shame of the Turkish administration, was fully a dozen times that of the highest of English towns. The spadework was all done by the medical staff of the Occupied Enemy Territory Administration. The call was urgent, and though labouring under war-time difficulties they got things going quickly and smoothly. Some voluntary societies were a.s.sisting, and the enthusiasm of the American Red Cross units enabled all to carry on a great and beneficent work.

CHAPTER XX

OUR CONQUERING AIRMEN

The airmen who were the eyes of the Army in Sinai and Palestine can look back on their record as a great achievement. Enormous difficulties were faced with stout hearts, and the Royal Flying Corps spirit surmounted them. It was one long test of courage, endurance, and efficiency, and so triumphantly did the airmen come through the ordeal that General Allenby's Army may truthfully be said to have secured as complete a mastery of the air as it did of the plains and hills of Southern Palestine. Those of us who watched the airmen 'carrying on,' from the time when their aeroplanes were inferior to those of the Germans in speed, climbing capacity, and other qualities which go to make up first-cla.s.s fighting machines, till the position during the great advance when few enemy aviators dared cross our lines, can well testify to the wonderful work our airmen performed.

With comparatively few opportunities for combat because the enemy knew his inferiority and declined to fight unless forced, the pilots and observers from the moment our attack was about to start were always aggressive, and though the number of their victims may seem small compared with aerial victories on the Western Front they were substantial and important. In the month of January 1917 the flying men accounted for eleven aeroplanes, five of these falling victims to one pilot. The last of these victories I myself witnessed. In a single-seater the pilot engaged two two-seater aeroplanes of a late type, driving down one machine within our line, the pilot killed by eleven bullets and the observer wounded. He then chased the other plane, whose pilot soon lost his taste for fighting, dropped into a heavy cloud bank, and got away. No odds were too great for our airmen.

I have seen one aeroplane swoop down out of the blue to attack a formation of six enemy machines, sending one crashing to earth and dispersing the remainder. In one brief fight another pilot drove down three German planes. The airman does not talk of his work, and we knew that what we saw and heard of were but fragments in the silent records of great things done. Much that was accomplished was far behind our visual range, high up over the bleak hills of Judea, above even the rain clouds driven across the heights by the fury of a winter gale, or skimming over the dull surface of the Dead Sea, flying some hundreds of feet below sea level to interrupt the pa.s.sage of foodstuffs of which the Turk stood in need.

All through the Army's rapid march northwards from the crushed Gaza-Beersheba line the airmen's untiring work was of infinite value.

When the Turkish retreat began the enemy was bombed and machine-gunned for a full week, the railway, aerodromes, troops on the march, artillery, and transport being hit time and again, and five smashed aeroplanes and a large quant.i.ty of aircraft stores of every description were found at Menshiye alone. The raid on that aerodrome was so successful that at night the Germans burnt the whole of the equipment not destroyed by bombs. Three machines were also destroyed by us at Et Tineh, five at Ramleh and one at Ludd, and the country was covered with the debris of a well-bombed and beaten army. After Jerusalem came under the safe protection of our arms airmen hara.s.sed the retiring enemy with bombs and machine guns. The wind was strong, but defying treacherous eddies, the pilots came through the valleys between steep-sloped hills and caught the Turks on the Nablus road, emptying their bomb racks at a height of a few hundred feet, and giving the scattered troops machine-gun fire on the return journey.

A glance at the list of honours bestowed on officers and other ranks of the R.F.C. serving with the Egyptian Expeditionary Force in 1917 is sufficient to give an idea of the efficiency of the service of our airmen. It must be remembered that the Palestine Wing was small, if thoroughly representative of the Flying Corps; its numbers were few but the quality was there. Indeed I heard the Australian squadron of flying men which formed part of the Wing described by the highest possible authority as probably the finest squadron in the whole of the British service. This following list of honours is, perhaps, the most eloquent testimony to the airmen's work in Palestine:

Victoria Cross . . . . . 1 Distinguished Service Order . . . 4 Military Cross . . . . . 34 Croix de Guerre . . . . 2 Military Medal . . . . . 1 Meritorious Service Medal . . . 14 Order of the Nile . . . . 2

The sum total of the R.F.C. work was not to be calculated merely from death and damage caused to the enemy from the air. Strategical and tactical reconnaissances formed a large part of the daily round, and the reports brought in always added to our Army's store of information. In Palestine, possibly to a greater extent than in any other theatre of war, our map-makers had to rely on aerial photographs to supply them with the details required for military maps. The best maps we had of Palestine were those prepared by Lieutenant H.H.

Kitchener, R.E., and Lieutenant Conder in 1881 for the Palestine Exploration Fund. They were still remarkably accurate so far as they went, but 'roads,' to give the tracks a description to which they were not ent.i.tled, had altered, and villages had disappeared, and newer and additional information had to be supplied. The Royal Flying Corps--it had not yet become the Royal Air Force--furnished it, and all important details of hundreds of square miles of country which survey parties could not reach were registered with wonderful accuracy by aerial photographers.

The work began for the battle of Rafa, and the enemy positions on the Magruntein hill were all set out before General Chetwode when the Desert Column attacked and scored an important victory. Then when 12,000 Turks were fortifying the Weli Sheikh Nuran country covering the wadi Ghuzze and the Sh.e.l.lal springs, not a redoubt or trench but was recorded with absolute fidelity on photographic prints, and long before the Turks abandoned the place and gave us a fine supply of water we had excellent maps of the position. In time the whole Gaza-Beersheba line was completely photographed and maps were continually revised, and if any portion of the Turkish system of defences was changed or added to the commander in the district concerned was notified at once. To such perfection did the R.F.C.

photographic branch attain, that maps showing full details of new or altered trenches were in the hands of generals within four hours of the taking of the photographs. Later on the work of the branch increased enormously, and the results fully repaid the infinite care and labour bestowed upon it.

The R.F.C. made long flights in this theatre of war, and some of them were exceptionally difficult and dangerous. A French battleship when bombarding a Turkish port of military importance had two of our machines to spot the effect of her gunfire. To be with the ship when the action opened the airmen had to fly in darkness for an hour and a half from a distant aerodrome, and they both reached the rendezvous within five minutes of the appointed time. The Turks on their lines of communication with the Hedjaz have an unpleasant recollection of being bombed at Maan. That was a noteworthy expedition. Three machines set out from an aerodrome over 150 miles away in a straight line, the pilots having to steer a course above country with no prominent landmarks. They went over a waterless desert so rough that it would have been impossible to come down without seriously damaging a plane, and if a pilot had been forced to land his chance of getting back to our country would have been almost nil. Water bottles and rations were carried in the machines, but they were not needed, for the three pilots came home together after hitting the station buildings at Maan and destroying considerable material and supplies.

The aeroplane has been put to many uses in war and, it may be, there are instances on other fronts of it being used, in emergencies, as an ambulance. When a little mobile force rounded up the Turkish post at Ha.s.sana, on the eastern side of the Sinai Peninsula, one of our men received so severe a wound that an immediate operation was necessary.

An airman at once volunteered to carry the wounded man to the nearest hospital, forty-four miles away across the desert, and by his action a life was saved.

APPENDICES

I

The following telegram was sent by Enver Pasha to Field-Marshal von Hindenburg, at Supreme Army Command Headquarters, from Constantinople on August 23, 1917:

The news of the despatch of strong enemy forces to Egypt, together with the nomination of General Allenby as Commander-in-Chief on our Syrian Front, indicates that the British contemplate an offensive on the Syrian Front, and very probably before the middle of November.

The preservation of the Sinai Front is a primary condition to the success of the Yilderim undertaking.

After a further conversation with the Commander of the IVth Army (Jemal Pasha) I consider it necessary to strengthen this front by one of the infantry divisions intended for Yilderim, and to despatch this division immediately from Aleppo.

With this reinforcement the defence of the Sinai Front by the IVth Army is a.s.sured.

General von Falkenhayn takes up the position that he does not consider the defence a.s.sured, and that the further reduction of Yilderim forces is to be deprecated under any circ.u.mstances.

He consequently recommends that we on our side should attack the British, and as far as possible surprise them, before they are strengthened. He wishes to carry out this attack with four infantry divisions, and the 'Asia' Corps.

Two of the four infantry divisions have still to be despatched to the front.

I cannot yet decide to support the proposal, nor need I do so, as the transport of an infantry division from Aleppo to Bayak requires twenty days. During this period the situation as regards the enemy will become clear, and one will become better able to estimate the chance of success of an attack.

I must, however, in any case be able to dispose of more forces than at present, either for the completion of Yilderim, or for the replacement of the very heavy losses which will certainly occur in the Syrian attack.