‘We were fired at from all directions,’ Keyes says. ‘One saw stabs of light in the hills and in the direction of the 6-inch battery covering the minefields on both sides of the straits, followed by the whine of little shells, the bursting of shrapnel, and the scream of heavy projectiles which threw up fountains of water. It was a pretty sight. The fire was very wild, and the Canopus was not hit, but for all the good we did towards dowsing the searchlights we might just as well have been firing at the moon.’
It was too much for the minesweepers. Four of the six passed over the minefield below Chanak without getting their kites down, and one of the remaining pair soon struck a mine and blew up. For a time a tremendous fire poured down on the survivors, and it was an astonishing thing that, with so many mines cut loose and drifting about in the darkness, only two men were wounded before the flotilla got away.
Next night Keyes tried again without the assistance of the battleship, hoping to steal up on the Turks unawares. ‘The less said about that night the better,’ he wrote later. ‘To put it briefly, the sweepers turned tail and fled directly they were fired upon. I was furious and told the officers in charge that they had had their opportunity, there were many others only too keen to try. It did not matter if we lost all seven sweepers, there were twenty-eight more, and the mines had got to be swept up. How could they talk of being stopped by heavy fire if they were not hit? The Admiralty were prepared for losses, but we had chucked our hand in and started squealing before we had any.’
And so too it seemed to Churchill in London. On this same day, March 11, he sent the following telegram to Carden:
‘Your original instructions laid stress on caution and deliberate methods, and we approve highly the skill and patience with which you have advanced hitherto without loss. The results to be gained are, however, great enough to justify loss of ships and men if success cannot be obtained without. The turning of the corner at Chanak may decide the whole operation… We do not wish to hurry you or urge you beyond your judgment, but we recognize clearly that at a certain point in your operations you will have to press hard for a decision, and we desire to know whether you consider that point has now been reached.’
By March 13 new crews had been assembled for some of the minesweepers — just as Keyes had anticipated there had been an immediate response to the call for volunteers — and that night the attack was renewed with great resolution. The enemy gunners waited until the trawlers and the picket boats were in the middle of the minefield and then, turning on all their searchlights together, opened up with a concentrated fire. This time the trawlers stuck to it until all but three were put out of action, and the effect of this was seen on the following morning when many mines came floating down with the current and were exploded. From this time forward it was decided that the sweeping should be done by day, and it was hoped that sufficient progress would be made for the Fleet to close in for the full scale attack on the Narrows on March 17 or 18.
Carden meanwhile had still not replied to the Admiralty’s message, and on March 14 Churchill telegraphed again. ‘I do not understand,’ he said, ‘why minesweepers should be interfered with by firing which causes no casualties. Two or three hundred casualties would be a moderate price to pay for sweeping up as far as the Narrows. I highly approve your proposal to obtain volunteers from the Fleet for minesweeping. This work has to be done whatever the loss of life and small craft and the sooner it is done the better.
‘Secondly, we have information that the Turkish forts are short of ammunition, that the German officers have made despondent reports and have appealed to Germany for more. Every conceivable effort is being made to supply ammunition, it is being seriously considered to send a German or an Austrian submarine, but apparently they have not started yet. Above is absolutely secret. All this makes it clear that the operation should now be pressed forward methodically and resolutely at night and day. The unavoidable losses must be accepted. The enemy is harassed and anxious now. The time is precious as the interference of submarines is a very serious consideration.’
To these messages Carden now replied that he fully appreciated the situation, and that despite the difficulties he would launch his main attack as soon as he could: probably March 17.
Carden was ill. Under the increasing strain of the operations he was unable to eat and he slept very little at night. He was worried about the failure of the seaplanes, about the mines and about the weather. It had taken him two days to make up his mind as to how he was to reply to Churchill’s messages, and now that he had pledged himself to this drastic all-out attack his confidence began to ebb away. He did not explicitly lose faith in the adventure, but in his weakened condition he seems to have felt that he no longer had the personal power to command it.
In fairness to Carden it ought perhaps to be remembered that it was only by chance that he had ever come to the Dardanelles at all; this was a post that should have gone to Admiral Limpus, the head of the former British Naval Mission to Turkey, the man who knew all about the Dardanelles. But at the time when Limpus left Constantinople Turkey was still a neutral, and the British did not wish to irritate the Turks by deliberately sending the man who knew all their secrets to blockade the Dardanelles. So Carden had been lifted out of his post as Superintendent of Malta Dockyard, and he had already had a long winter at sea off the straits before this action had begun. The enterprise had not been exactly thrust upon him — indeed, he himself had suggested the method of attack — but in agreeing to it in the first place one can imagine that he was influenced by the knowledge that he was going the way the young First Lord wanted him to go. And now this highly dangerous operation had built itself up around him into a tremendous thing. It had gathered an impetus out of all proportion to its beginnings, and since as yet he had fought no major action, had lost no ship and scarcely any men, he felt bound to go on. But he dreaded it.
On March 15, after another bad night, Carden told Keyes he could continue no longer. This meant the end of his career, and both Vice-Admiral de Robeck and Keyes begged him to reconsider. However, on the following day a Harley Street specialist who was serving with the Fleet announced after an examination that Carden was on the edge of a nervous collapse; he must sail for home at once.
The attack was now due to be bunched within forty-eight hours, and a new Commander had to be found in haste. Admiral Wemyss, the commandant of the base on the island of Lemnos, was the senior officer on the station, but he at once offered to stand down in favour of de Robeck, who had been involved in the fighting from the beginning. On March 17 Churchill cabled his agreement to this arrangement, and sent de Robeck the following message:
‘Personal and Secret from First Lord. In entrusting to you with great confidence the command of the Mediterranean Detached Fleet I presume… that you consider, after separate and independent judgment, that the immediate operations proposed are wise and practicable. If not, do not hesitate to say so. If so, execute them without delay and without further reference at the first favourable opportunity… All good fortune attend you.’
De Robeck replied that weather permitting he would attack on the following day.
There is an excitement about the attack on the Narrows on March 18, 1915, a sense of natural adventure, which sets it apart from almost any other battle in the two world wars. Those who took part in it do not remember it with horror, as one might remember poison gas or the atomic bomb, or with the feeling of futility and waste that eventually surrounds most acts of war. Instead they look back on this battle as a great day in their lives: they are delighted that the risk was taken, delighted that they themselves were there, and the vision of the oncoming ships with great fountains of spray about them, and the gunfire echoing along the Dardanelles, is still an exhilaration in their memory.