Phillip Schuler by Mark Baker

Author:Mark Baker
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: ebook
Publisher: Allen & Unwin
Published: 2016-06-15T04:00:00+00:00

Two days later the Murdoch letter was debated at a meeting of the Dardanelles Committee. Chairman Sir Edward Carson began the meeting by accusing Kitchener of failing to fully brief them about the Suvla debacle. Kitchener’s response was to offer his own sacrifical lamb—Hamilton. He told the committee that he had ordered a number of generals to brief him on the conduct of the operations at Suvla and they had come back to him with ‘considerable criticism of Hamilton’s leadership’.11 In fact, the only general openly attacking Hamilton’s leadership was Sir Frederick Stopford, the man who was deservedly sacked by Hamilton for his incompetence at Suvla and who was now back in London and bent on settling the score. Stopford was a totally discredited witness for the prosecution, as Kitchener well knew. Lloyd George was quick to reinforce the Kitchener line, telling the committee he also had heard criticisms of Hamilton’s leadership. When the meeting turned to the first agenda item—the Murdoch letter—Asquith criticised it as ‘rather a bitter document’ and pointed out that it was ‘conspicuous for the omission of any praise for anyone and anything at the Dardanelles’. The prime minister also reinforced Colonel Hankey’s assessment that the letter was full of errors and accusations that Murdoch was unable to substantiate. But the anti-Dardanelles faction was unwavering. Both Lloyd George and Andrew Bonar Law, the colonial secretary, argued strongly that stripped of its journalese and any inaccuracies, the letter was a credible account of how the Dardanelles campaign had failed. The committee did not take a formal decision on the future of the operation and the commander-in-chief, but the momentum was heading inexorably in that direction.

It was not until 12 October that Hamilton finally received a copy of Murdoch’s letter—a document that, by then, had been seen by dozens of his supposed friends, as well as those out for his scalp, and had been debated at the highest levels of the government. It was sent by the War Office’s director of military operations and intelligence, Major General Sir Charles Callwell. A covering note from Callwell claimed improbably that Kitchener ‘has not had time to read it yet’ but thought Hamilton should have a chance of defending himself against the allegations. The offer, like Kitchener’s supposed friendship, was hollow; the time for explanations and self-defence had long passed. Four days later Hamilton was awoken late at night in his tent to receive a cable marked ‘Secret and Personal’ from Kitchener, telling him that he must personally decipher the next message that arrived. When a staff member brought him the second cable and the code book the next morning, Hamilton had already ‘got K’s message pat in my dreams’. His command was over.

The War Council held last night decided that though the Government fully appreciate your work and the gallant manner in which you personally have struggled to make the enterprise a success in the face of the terrible difficulties you have had to contend against, they, all the same, wish to make a change in command which will give them an opportunity of seeing you.

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