On 11 Nov. 1918 the appointments of Ad miral Calthorpe as High Commissioner at Con stantinople, and of Rear-Admiral Richard Webb as Assistant High Commissioner, were an nounced. On the same day the French de stroyer Mangini and the British destroyer Shark entered the Dardanelles, from which the mines had been swept, and proceeded to Constan tinople. Two days later, the Allied fleet, with Admiral Calthorpe's flag in the Superb, passed through and anchored in the Gulf of Ismid. On 18 November Admiral Amet, commanding the French squadron in the Bosporus, was ap pointed High Connnissioner of the French Re public to the Turkish government. By 5 December the Turkish vessels, including the Goeben, were interned.
Dardanelles Campaign.— The first Allied attacic on the Dardanelles took place on 19 Feb. 1915 by a joint squadron of British and French battleships. Among the reasons which dictated this enterprise was the belief that a forcing of the Dardanelles, leading to the capitulation of Constantinople, would bring about an inunediate collapse of the Turlcish power, or at any rate of the German regime in Turkey. There was, furthermore, the great advantage, given success, of reopening the ice free route to Russia through the Black Sea and of liberating the huge stock of grain that was lying idle in the ports of southern Russia. Briefly put, the enterprise undertaken by Great Britam and France was an attempt to find a short cut which would at the same time have afforded a spectacular triumph. It is the es sence of war to discover the weak point of the enemy and to attack that point in force. As it turned out, the Allies had chosen the strongest point in the Turkish defense, and the venture was in consequence a failure, for the project had not been carefully thought out and the preparations had been made in a hurry. After bombarding the fortifications protecting the straits for nearly two months it was de cided that a naval attack alone could not hope to force a passage, and that troops would be necessary to obtam military conunand of both shores. Once that lesson was learned, prepara tions were undertaken for a combined naval and military attack. As it happened, the Brit ish had carried out a long-range bombardment of the forts at the entrance to the straits so early as 3 Nov. 1914, which committed no ap preciable damage and only served to put the Turks on their guard. Between that day and 19 Feb. 1915 no further offensive operations were undertaken in this theatre of war beyond seizing the island of Tertedos. The Turks, therefore, had pknty of time with Gersnan aid to put the straits into a strong state of de fense, if, indeed, they were not already in that condition before the war broke out. Even so, the Allies did not know in April 1915 how near they were to success; that the Turks had only a few shells left and were getting ready to evac uate the peninsula. The abortive naval attack
is descri&d elsewhere in this section under NAVAL OPERATIONS.
Though the Allies made a secret of their in tentions to dispatch an army to Gallipoli, the enemy appeared to be well aware of the fact, for considerable efforts were made to intercept the troops during their transport. A Turkish torpedo-boat fired three torpedoes at the trans port Maniion, all of which missed; about 50 men from the transport were lost, owing to the capsizing of a boat m the water, but the British cruiser Minerva and some destroyers chased the Turkish vessel, ran her ashore and destroyed her on the coast of Chios. On the same day the British submarine E-15 ran ashore on Ke phez Point about 10 miles inside the strait and the crew were captured. To prevent the sub marine from being of service to the enemy,, two picket boats from H.M.S. Triumph and Majestic, manned by volunteer crews, ran the gauntlet of a very heavy fire and got near enough to the submarine to torpedo it and ren der it useless. The boat from the Majestic was sunk, but the crew were saved by the other boat, and the exploit ended with only one casualty. Gen. Sir Ian Hamilton was appointed to the command of the military part of the ex pedition. He left London with his staff on L3 March 1915; traveling in a special train via Marseilles he reached the base at Tenedos on the 17th, the day before a great naval attack try the entire fleet was to take place. Hamilton witnessed the bombardment and then cabled to London his °reluctant deduction)) that the whole of the troops under his command would be re quired to enable the fleet effectively to force the Dardanelles. The British Cabinet accepted this decision. Hamilton had arrived at the COO clusion, after sailing along the ounvard shores of the peninsula, that a landing was feasible at the extreme southern point. He ordered nearly all the transports to proceed to Egyptian ports, where he would be able to work out in detail their distribution for the projected landing. He was accompanied by General d'Amade, commander of the French expeditionary force. The generals were convinced that, while land ing-places were few and difficult, it was essen tial to land at several of these at once, and to threaten to land at others, to act by way of surpnse and to wait for favorable weather. The last ccinsideration involved delay until near the end of April. During the afternoon of the 24th the troops which had then arrived at Tene dos were transferred to the warships and fleet sweepers, on which they were to approach the shore; they started off about midnight, the landing being planned to take place at five dif ferent spots early in the morning after a half hour's bombardment by the warships.