On 3 December 1915, the submarine HMS E11 sank the Turkish cruiser Yar Hissar in the Sea of Marmara.
When relating the history of the Gallipoli campaign historians tend to focus on the slaughter on the beaches or the failure of the Allied navies to force a passage through the Dardanelles Strait. However, often overlooked is the outstanding submarine campaign that very nearly ended the campaign in the Allies’ favour.
The Dardanelles Strait is forty miles in length and a maximum of four miles in width and this narrows to one mile. The waters are too shallow for a submarine to penetrate these narrows dived. Moreover, the Turks had laid at least ten barriers of anti-submarine nets and mines just in case any submariner was foolhardy enough to attempt passing through the Strait into the inland Sea of Marmara. For good measure, they lined the shore on both sides with searchlights and artillery forts. Yet amazingly, several Royal Navy submarines (and one Australian) did penetrate the Strait and wrought complete havoc in the Sea of Marmara on which the Turkish Army depended for the supply of troops and ammunition to reinforce its positions on the Gallipoli peninsular. So successful were the submarines in sinking Turkish shipping by torpedo, gunfire and burning, that they brought all shipping and even the coastal railway to a total standstill. The Turkish soldiers were forced to march on foot to Gallipoli and transport their ammunition on mules and camels. Unbeknown to Allied Intelligence, when the Allied troops finally withdrew from the beaches, the Turks were down to their last seven days of ammunition and might have been forced themselves to withdraw from the peninsular.
Books on the history of the submarine campaign in the Dardanelles read like an action novel and this inspired me to relate the true events in a fictional form. My novel, The Custom of the Trade, is based on the story of Lieutenant Commander Martin Nasmith in HMS E11. Nasmith was one of four submariners to earn the VC for exploits in the Dardanelles. It has received nearly 800 mainly 5* ratings worldwide and was once Amazon’s #1 bestseller globally. My talks to local groups on the campaign have proved popular, too.
Comments