A History of the British Cavalry 1816 to 1919 by The Marquess of Anglesey

Author:The Marquess of Anglesey
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781473815025
Publisher: Leo Cooper

Pursuit continues – Huleikat taken – enemy panics at Et Tine – action at Balin

The Plain of the Philistines was now full of hopelessly confused and despairing Turkish infantrymen, perhaps 15,000 of them, streaming northwards. On the spot to get at them and force them to surrender there were, in the centre, virtually only the rest of the yeomanry from 5 Brigade and the three regiments of 3 Brigade. Neither, though, was sufficiently strong or fresh to brush aside the unwavering staunchness of the German machine gunners. A few successes in the way of captures were made but, as Major L.C. Timperley of 10 Regiment wrote, the enemy ‘hung on to their guns and waggons and brought the machine guns into action whenever we threatened them.’2 Contributing during this afternoon to the demoralization of the Turks were twenty-eight bombers which machine-gunned as well as bombed them. Large numbers of German aeroplanes had just been diverted from Mesopotamia, but they did not arrive in time and most of them were still in their cases. Those which were not bombed on the ground were destroyed by the retreating enemy. After 3I October few German planes were seen in the air. No I Australian Flying Squadron did splendid photographic work at this time. They obtained detailed pictures of the enemy’s formations and each evening formation headquarters received up-to-date maps based on them.

During the night of 7 November Chauvel had begged Allenby to return to him if not all of Barrow’s detachment from the east, at least Yeodiv. To this plea the Commander-in-Chief yielded, but the orders were not sent till the afternoon of 8 November. Since, when they were received, Barrow was still dealing with the Turks near Hebron, it was not until two days later that the division, after an exhausting march, short of water and in a raging khamsin, could take over Descorps’s right flank.

An intercepted wireless message received on the morning of 9 November indicated that a counter-attack had been ordered from the Hebron direction, but Allenby, rightly, believed that the enemy troops there were too disorganized to make it. His only action in consequence was to move the Camel Corps to a position from which it could be on the flank of any attack which might develop.

Meldrum’s New Zealand Brigade was not ordered to rejoin Descorps till later. Consequently it did not leave Beersheba till 4.30 p.m. on 11 November. With an overnight watering stop it reached Hamame at 11 a.m. next morning. It had covered fifty-two miles in eighteen-and-a-half hours, the Auckland Regiment marching an extra eight miles because it was near Khuweifle when the order was received. The Camel Brigade had rejoined Descorps at Julis in the afternoon of the 11th.

The capture of Huj on 8 November yielded hardly any water supplies. The enemy had destroyed all but two of the wells and these were very deep. The winding gear had been destroyed. For this canvas buckets attached to telephone wire were a poor substitute.* Of Ausdiv,

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