The National Army Museum Book of the Turkish Front, 1914-1918: The Campaigns at Gallipoli, in Mesopotamia, and in Palestine (review)

The British National Army Museum exists to "tell the story of the army as a whole." In keeping with this mission, the museum has recently published a series of general interest books about the Boer War, the Zulu War, and (most recently) the Crimean War, as well as the book under review. The Turkish Front, 1914-1918, was the last book written by the late Field Marshal Lord Carver in 2001 (the Field Marshal previously wrote the National Army Museum Book of the Boer War in 1999).

Lord Carver's book is organized broadly into three segments that address the three major campaigns which the British Empire fought against the Ottoman Turks during the First World War: Gallipoli, Mesopotamia, and Palestine. In his own words, the "main aim is not to provide any new historical evidence or aspect, but to portray what it was like to serve in those campaigns." The book was designed to be read by a general readership and to acquaint them with the first person experiences of the soldiers themselves.

To accomplish this, Lord Carver used the papers and letters of forty-five participants to illustrate vividly key points in the book. These personal narratives form the centerpiece of the work, and to some extent, drive the direction of the narrative itself. In this regard, The Turkish Front, 1914-1918, reflects our contemporary historical popularization of the drama of war as captured by the words of the participants themselves.

For those familiar with the campaigns against the Turks there is no new information here, although there are many previously unpublished photographs. Lord Carver's narration is taken mainly from the official histories (Aspinall-Oglander, Falls, and Moberly) and the standard secondary writers (including Barker, Hickey, James, Moorehead, Steel & Hart, and Wavell, among others). As such, the book is a very conventional view of the war against the Turks. The narratives of the participants themselves illuminate the difficulty and hardship of campaigning in the stultifying conditions of such places as the Sinai and Palestine, the Tigris-Euphrates Valley, and the Gallipoli Peninsula. Since many of the forces engaging the Turks were from the Indian Army, about a third of the participant narratives are from men of the Indian Army. In his epilogue, Lord Carver wrapped up the entire British experience as a waste of effort and manpower that cost the empire a quarter million casualties without achieving the strategic objective of knocking Turkey out of the war.

The Turkish Front, 1914-1918, is a good general overview of Britain's war against the Turks, but it is not a book for the specialist. It is not footnoted and it is based entirely on secondary works in English. However, this is by design and not neglect. The specialist will also note that, at times, the relationship of the participant narratives to the main topic at hand is somewhat obscure and strained. The participant narratives came entirely from the archives of the National Army Museum and the reviewer was surprised that Lord Carver did not mention Peter Liddle, the Liddle Collection at Leeds, or Liddle's work. Finally, it must be noted that Lord Carver did not use the most recent scholarship available in 2001 (particularly the work of Tim Travers and the present reviewer).

All in all, for what it was written to be—a book about what it was like to fight the Turks in hellish climates—The Turkish Front, 1914-1918, is a good read, engaging, and serves its stated purpose well. I bought my copy full price at the museum itself and it will stay in my library.