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"At a mile distant their thousand hooves were stuttering thunder, coming at a rate that frightened a man - they were an awe inspiring sight, galloping through the red haze - knee to knee and horse to horse - the dying sun glinting on bayonet points..." Trooper Ion Idriess

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Saturday, 19 July 2008
9th LHR On Manoeuvres, The Alleged Elliott Photograph Examined, Part 1
Topic: BatzP - Beersheba

9th LHR On Manoeuvres

The Alleged Elliott Photograph Examined, Part 1

 

 9th Australian Light Horse Regiment "On Manoeuvres".

Schramm Photograph Album

[Click on photograph for a larger version.]

 

The above photograph is possibly the most controversial photograph of the Palestine campaign. There are many different beliefs from the reasonable to the outright bizarre. This particular photograph was in our family collection with the heading "On Manoeuvres". The person who wrote that description was a veteran of the Sinai and Palestine campaign and was on Tel el Saba when the charge began.

Later on, after the Great War, when the "Charge at Beersheba" had cache,Trooper E.G. Elliot of the 4th Light Horse Machine Gun Squadron claimed authorship of this particular photograph. This claim was examined by Ian Jones in and article called: Is This The Charge At Beersheba? It was published in the Journal of the Australian War Memorial, October 1983. A copy of this article is located on the web site of the Australian Light Horse Association at this address:

BEERSHEEBA... THE CONTROVERSIAL PHOTOGRAPH OF THE CHARGE 

Elliott claimed that the photograph portrays the historic charge of the 4th and 12th LHRs of the Australian 4th Light Horse Brigade at Beersheba, Palestine, 31 October 1917. His Statutory Declaration claims that he was in an advanced position performing range finding duties and was unaware that the charge was planned but fortunately had a small camera with him and so took a quick snap as the horses charged towards him. In his latest work, The legend of the Light Horse written by Ian Jones in 2007, the arguments are reiterated with a few modifications but essentially alleging the same conclusion as made in 1983.

Matthew Woodhead and and Jacqui Lobach, in The Australian Charge at Beersheba, 1917: Is the Photograph Genuine or Staged, Wartime, Issue 1 (November 1997) refutes the Jones' thesis and formulates the hypothesis that the photograph was produced by Frank Hurley, the Australian Official Photographer, on 7 February 1918. They claim it portrays a re-enactment of the charge. The location of this photograph was around the Deir el Belah township south of Gaza where the Australian Mounted Division was resting for three months.

The relationship between Hurley and Brigadier General LC Wilson of the 3rd Light Horse Brigade was very much in evidence when Wilson escorted Hurley around the front lines in late December 1917. The various diary entries are found on this site at this address:

Fleas on fleas -The results from careless work - a case study 

My personal research agrees with this conclusion by Woodhead and Lobach and indicates that it is more than probable that the regiment in the photograph is the 9th Australian Light Horse Regiment. There are two reasons for this.

The first relates to other photograph albums claiming that the photograph is of the 9th LHR. In addition, there is a letter from Major Jack Davies, the Officer Commanding "C" Squadron, 12th LHR to his wife detailing his purchase of this very photograph from Lieutenant Colonel Scott, the Commanding Officer of the 9th LHR on 26 March 1918. No mention in his letter that this was a photograph of the charge at Beersheba yet the officer in question was quite happy to let his wife know in great detail other events in which he participated during the campaign. His photographs were always well described. Elsie Ritchie compiled all his letters in 1998 in a self published volume called Crusaders of the Southern Cross at p. 218. 

In addition, it requires an examination of the Massie Map:

Hand drawn map of the 4th LHB prior to charging into Beersheba, 31 October 1917

Special attention should be paid to the third line in the picture compared to that shown in the Massie Map. The representation of the third line in the Massie map indicates that the troops are in line of column. The alleged Elliott photograph shows the third line as a single line, a totally different concept. It comes down to whose evidence is accepted in this case. Massie's map was fully authenticated by the men who took part in the action at Beersheba. He was a thorough man who knew his task and produced a map accordingly. In the alternative there is Elliott who claims he took the picture but never saw it until years later. There does not appear to be any contest on credibility with the evidence put in sharp relief. The Massie map is accurate. It is the third line of the photograph that undermines the claim of Elliott. 

Finally the topography of the picture needs to be qualified by that portrayed quite accurately in the Official Map: 

Official map of the Beersheba Charge 

One major item missing from this picture is Tel el Saba which should have been clearly seen in the photograph as it is in any other photograph of the point where the charge was formed. An examination of the alleged Elliott picture requires a comparison of the topography. This is clearly undertaken in an earlier post and presented at:

Pictures (taken 2006) of the route taken by the 4th LHB charge at Beersheba

 

The thing to keep in mind, if this was a photograph of the charge as alleged by Elliott, is the background.

In addition to topography, on the day of the charge, to the left of the horse lines the alleged Elliott picture, there should by signs of many thousands of men on horses as well as field guns in place. The below photograph illustrates this principle of visually picking up horsemen in the distance.

 

3rd LHB at Marakeb Beach, July 1917

 

Had the alleged Elliott photograph been taken at Beersheba, the presence of 12,000 cavalrymen would have left even the slightest trace in the picture. It is impossible to hide such a number of horses and men. These would be picked up as black dots over the picture. The alleged Elliott photograph shows none. In other words, either the two divisions of cavalry disappeared and the war stopped for the sake of the photograph, or the photograph does not describe the charge at Beersheba.

Vast quantities of evidence exists indicating that the Elliott claim to authorship of this photograph is very much in doubt. That is not to say that Elliott did not take a photograph on that day, only that he did not take this photograph. This evidence will progressively be added to the blog.

One of the most bizarre claims is that the photograph was taken by a Turkish soldier in the trenches facing the charge. He was subsequently killed. The film was removed from the camera and this was on that roll. Unless this valiant but unlucky Turk had a telephoto lens attached to his camera and took the charge at its formation, then this photograph is an impossibility. By the time the Turkish trenche shad been reached, the charging horses had broken up into smaller units. While these were coherent fighting units, it would have appeared to be a shambles in front of the trench with horses and men going every which way. 

 

Further Reading:

9th LHR On Manoeuvres, The Alleged Elliott Photograph Examined, Part 2

Fleas on fleas -The results from careless work - a case study 

Pictures (taken 2006) of the route taken by the 4th LHB charge at Beersheba

Hand drawn map of the 4th LHB prior to charging into Beersheba, 31 October 1917

Official map of the Beersheba Charge 

The Battle of Beersheba

Myths and Legends 



Citation: 9th LHR On Manoeuvres, The Alleged Elliott Photograph Examined, Part 1


Posted by Project Leader at 6:04 PM EADT
Updated: Wednesday, 29 July 2009 9:06 AM EADT
Official map of the Beersheba Charge
Topic: BatzP - Beersheba

Below is the Official Map detailing the organisation of the 4th Light Horse Brigade prior to making the famous charge. The map was produced by the cartographic section of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force in Cairo.

 

Official map of the Beersheba Charge

[Click on map for a larger version.]

The interesting item information in this map is the arrangements of the regiments in the charge formation. The 12th LHR is line abreast in the front line followed by the 4th LHR and then the Brigade support services of the Field Ambulance and Machine Gun Squadron. The good thing about this map is the display of topography which is accurate.

Students of history would know that the formation of the regiments is totally at odds with the post battle reports in the various formation War Diaries and more importantly, it bears little similarity to the Massie Map located at:

Hand draw map of the 4th LHB prior to charging into Beersheba, 31 October 1917

As with the Massie Map, the charge lines were formed in the shadows of Tel el Saba.


Citation: Official map of the Beersheba Charge

Posted by Project Leader at 5:29 PM EADT
Updated: Saturday, 19 July 2008 5:32 PM EADT
Hand drawn map of the 4th LHB prior to charging into Beersheba, 31 October 1917
Topic: BatzP - Beersheba

Below is part of a hand drawn map detailing the organisation of the 4th Light Horse Brigade prior to making the famous charge. The map was drawn by Lieutenant Frank Raymond Massie, adjutant of the 12th Light Horse Regiment. 

 

The Massie Map

[Click on map for a larger version.]

The map places in great detail the formation of the various regiments. It drills down to the location of each troop and its relationship to the charge. Apart from the incredible detail, it shows that the first two lines were abreast while on the last line, the two "C" Squadrons are in line of column rather than abreast. The two machine gun subsections are located behind the lines of light horsemen, an issue that is significant in dealing with some subsquent controversies over the charge.

The credibility of this map is high as it was drawn up within days after the charge by a person who participated in the charge. The work of Massie within the 12th LHR indicates that his recall of the events would be scrupulous and carefully applied to produce the most accurate map possible.


Citation: Hand drawn map of the 4th LHB prior to charging into Beersheba, 31 October 1917 


Posted by Project Leader at 4:58 PM EADT
Updated: Wednesday, 24 September 2008 9:49 AM EADT
Pictures (taken 2006) of the route taken by the 4th LHB charge at Beersheba
Topic: BatzP - Beersheba

In ascertaining the nature of the landscape traversed by the horses and men of the 4th Light Horse Brigade as they charged towards Beersheba, below are two reasonably contemporary photographs of the location. They were taken in 2006 and are published by courtesy of Gal Shane.

 

The 4th Light Horse Brigade formed up around this point prior to the charge
[Click on photograph for a larger version.]

This contemporary photograph clearly illustrates the terrain encountered by the men of the 4th Light Horse Brigade as they prepared for the famous charge. The important feature to note is the imposing hill in this photograph called Tel el Saba. Once seen in photographic form, it becomes self evident why the charge could not occur prior to the taking of Tel el Saba by the Auckland Mounted Rifles. The redoubt dominates the plain. While the Turks occupied Tel el Saba with about 300 men and 8 machine guns, any movement on this plain would have been subject to savage and devastating enfilading fire. However, once taken, the danger from the flanks was removed allowing Chauvel to order the charge. 

The path taken by the 4th Light Horse Brigade during the charge
[Click on photograph for a larger version.]

The camera has now been swivelled 90 degrees to face Beersheba. It was over this tract of land that the charge occurred. This is ideal cavalry terrain with soft slopes and open territory.

To contrast this with the scene at Beersheba in November 1917, a photograph taken by Brigadier General LC Wilson, GOC 3rd LHB, illustrates the view of the charge path.

Beersheba, November 1917

AWM Picture B02371
 

Citation: Pictures (taken 2006) of the route taken by the 4th LHB charge at Beersheba


Posted by Project Leader at 1:54 PM EADT
Updated: Saturday, 19 July 2008 4:01 PM EADT
Colonel Husnu, Yilderim, Page 12
Topic: Tk - Bks - Yildirim

Another entry from the book written by Lieutenant Colonel Hüseyin Hüsnü Emir, called Yilderim. Every day, one page of the book will be posted. This is Page 12.


Colonel Hüsnü, Yilderim, Page 12.

[Click on page for a larger print version.]


Citation: Colonel Hüsnü, Yilderim, Page 12


Posted by Project Leader at 11:51 AM EADT
Updated: Saturday, 19 July 2008 11:59 AM EADT

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