suvla lake and plain

On Saturday (21st) I worked on board, and we went over in the Triad to watch a big attack on Suvla. Five thousand Yeomanry had arrived from Egypt, and the 29th Division from Helles. After half an hour's bombardment from the ships and artillery, the effect of which was impossible to follow -owing to the mist and smoke which overhung the plain- our whole line seemed to spring out of the ground and advance. The spectacle of the Yeomen of England and their fox-hunting leaders, striding in extended order across the Salt Lake and the open plane, unshaken by the gruelling they were getting from shrapnel -which caused many casualities- is a memory that will never fade.

“The Naval memoirs of admiral of the fleet, Sir Roger Keyes”, (London 1934), Roger Keyes, p. 421.

21 August : Lts Crocker & Marsden of the 3rd County of London Yeomanry under shell fire crossing the Salt Lake", picture reproduced from "Gallipoli, 1915-Pens, Pencils and cameras at war", (London 1985), Peter H. Liddle, p. 137

In the Royal Gloucestershire Hussars, a patrician yeomanry regiment, Private Lewis, in peacetime a small dairy farmer, was walking alongside his troop com-mander, Lieutenant the Viscount Quen-nington, arguing hotly with him about the sale of his milk, which he preferred to dispose of to a local dairy rather than the co-operative of which Quennington was a keep supporter. Still volubly debating milk marketing, they realized that they had arrived safely in the lee of Chocolate Hill.

"Gallipoli", (London-2000), Michael Hickey, p. 311

"The last great battles of the Gallipoli campaign were fought in the Suvla area. In the late afternoon of 21 August 1915, the men of the British 2nd Mounted Div.,"Peyton's Yeomanry", in failing light and with enemy shells bursting over them, advanced across the salt lake at Suvla.", period picture reproduced from "Gallipoli 1915”, (Sydney 2002), Richard Reid, p. 47.

From north to south, the main lines of hills are the Kiretch Tepe Ridge running along the north edge, The Tekke Tepe Ridge on the east, and the Sari Bair range on the south. Running from the Tekke Tepe Ridge due west is a spur, about 300 feet high and about a mile in length, culminating in a series of low but rugged eminences known to the Anzacs as the W Hills ( so- called because of the shape of a particular cluster of stunted trees) and Scimitar Hill, a low, rounded spur which juts into the Plain. Rising from the plain, midway between the W Hills and the low hump of Lala Baba, are two small isolated hillocks known as Chocolate Hill and Green Hill from their prevailing colours. To the north-east of the Salt Lake is another, lower, hillock known as Hill 10. The Plain is so flat that the importance of these small eminences is out of all proportion to their actual height. On the south of the plain another hillock, known as Hill 60, should also be noted. It is a kind of last gasp of the ridges plunging down from Sari Bair, yet it dominates the ground between the W Hills and Lala Baba.

“Gallipoli”, Robert Rhodes James, p. 238-9