The Battle of Tikrit was the last victory won by British troops in Mesopotamia under the command of General Frederick Stanley Maude. General Alexander Cobbe’s British-Indian I Corps, which had spent the summer at Samarra, moved up the Tigris at the beginning of November 1917 against the Turkish XVIII Corps. After a preliminary fight at Daur on 2 November, on 5 November the 7th Division stormed a strongly fortified position at Tikrit. The Turks defended themselves stubbornly all day, but withdrew north during the night, and on 6 November the British occupied the town. They had no intention of holding it, however. After destroying the Turkish base they returned to Samarra.

Name and dates

The British chronology of the war (Principal Events) records an “Action of Tikrit” under 5 November 1917 and the occupation of the town by British troops under 6 November. The British official history of the campaign (F.J. Moberly, The Campaign in Mesopotamia, vol. IV) describes both days in a single subsection and treats the fight at Daur on 2 November as a separate action. We do the same on this page: the battle covers the assault of 5 November and the occupation of Tikrit on 6 November, while the fighting of 2 and 3 November is described as its background. Sources also use the old spelling of the town’s name, Tekrit. The news of the town’s capture on 6 November is also confirmed by contemporary press reports and by the memoirs of the German general Otto Liman von Sanders.

Background

After the capture of Samarra in April 1917 the summer heat halted operations on the Tigris. The Turkish XVIII Corps, part of Halil Pasha’s Sixth Army, took up position at Tikrit, with its advanced guard about 20 kilometres above Samarra. In the autumn Maude first cut the Turks’ route along the Euphrates by taking Ramadi at the end of September, and in the second half of October his III Corps occupied the Jebel Hamrin hills on the Diyala. The Turks replied with a sortie on the Tigris: on 22 and 23 October between 4,000 and 6,000 men of XVIII Corps approached Samarra, but as Cobbe prepared to attack they withdrew during the night to their former positions. According to a Turkish account the sortie was ordered by Field Marshal Erich von Falkenhayn, commander of the “Yıldırım” army group, to relieve the front on the Diyala.

Maude decided to strike while the Turks on the Tigris were isolated. Intelligence reports agreed that the enemy’s main effort was now directed towards Palestine rather than Mesopotamia. By an order of 28 October he instructed Cobbe to attack the position at Daur, about 30 kilometres above Samarra, and to destroy the Turkish 51st Division defending it before reinforcements arrived. British intelligence estimated that the Turks had about 4,000 rifles, 20 guns and 36 machine guns opposite Daur, 1,300 rifles and 19 guns at Tikrit, and a further 5,000 rifles about 50 kilometres further north, at Al-Fatha. It was expected that if attacked they would fall back to a prepared position at Al-Fatha.

The force committed comprised General Vere Fane’s 7th Division, reinforced by the 8th Infantry Brigade from the 3rd Division, General Jones’s Cavalry Division, ten armoured cars and part of No. 63 Squadron of the Royal Flying Corps. Five hundred Ford vans were allotted to carry supplies. After a night march, on the morning of 2 November, the infantry of the 7th Division took both lines of trenches at Daur. The heaviest losses fell on the 28th Brigade, in which the 56th Rifles, the 51st Sikhs and the 2nd Battalion of the Leicestershire Regiment attacked. The cavalry lost its way in the night and failed to cut off the Turks’ retreat. The British lost 224 men; Turkish losses were estimated at about 260, including 82 prisoners. The next day the 19th Brigade occupied Al-Auja, but airmen and cavalrymen found that Tikrit was strongly held. In accordance with Maude’s orders the troops fell back to bivouac at Daur, losing a further 94 men that day.

Cobbe was already intending to return to Samarra, but on the morning of 4 November Maude stopped the withdrawal. The British official history notes that there is no trace in the records of what “changes on the whole front” he had in mind. Maude had, however, just learned of Allenby’s capture of Beersheba. At noon he informed Cobbe that the Turks might abandon Tikrit and were removing stores from it, and proposed attacking as early as the next day. Cobbe replied that the Turks were holding the whole line of trenches, about 13 kilometres long, probably with the 51st and 52nd Divisions, so a determined assault would be necessary. He brought up the 9th Infantry Brigade and two batteries from Samarra and Istabulat. Maude answered that he did not wish to hurry anything more than necessary and agreed to postponing the attack by a day, but left the decision to Cobbe. Cobbe decided to strike at once.

The Tikrit position

The walled town stood on the right bank of the Tigris, on a cliff that dropped to the river in a sheer face more than 25 metres high. From the highest houses, about 45 metres above the river, Daur could be seen. The line of Turkish trenches ran about one and a half kilometres south of the town: from the river bank westwards, then curving north-west and north for a further eight kilometres. The first line was almost continuous, in many places the second and third lines were joined to it, and machine-gun posts were closely spaced. The Turkish left flank, in front of which the ground was cut by ravines, was particularly strongly fortified. In front of the right stretched a flat plain, giving the defenders an excellent field of fire.

Cobbe chose the left part of the centre of the Turkish line as the point of attack. There the infantry could approach by night across the open, undulating plain and find cover in the broken ground in front of the trenches. The Cavalry Division was to pin down the Turks on the long right flank and cover the infantry’s left, while the 21st Brigade, marching along the left bank of the Tigris, was to shell the positions and the roads behind the town.

Course of the battle

5 November

Before dawn on 5 November both divisions were in their assigned positions, and the guns of the 21st Brigade were placed on the left bank east of Tikrit. At 5.30 a.m. the advanced guard, the 8th Infantry Brigade with the 4th Field Artillery Brigade, moved towards the dry bed of the Wadi Jibin. When the Turkish artillery opened fire at 5.45 a.m., the 47th Sikhs drove the Turkish outposts out of the wadi and before nine had reconnoitred the position so well that General Fane was able to draw up a plan of attack. By 9.30 a.m. the Sikhs and the 59th Rifles had dug in in a ravine about 700 metres from the Turkish trenches.

Fane decided that the 8th Brigade would attack on a front about 550 metres wide, under cover of an artillery barrage and the fire of the 19th Brigade, which was to pass through it further north once the trenches had been taken. The Turks evidently meant to hold their ground. Their artillery fired accurately and continuously, repeatedly cutting the British telephone lines, so preparing the artillery support took until 11.30 a.m. The British official history considers that this delay shortened the day’s fighting and meant that less infantry went into action than had been planned.

At 11.30 a.m. the artillery bombardment began, made accurate by good co-operation between aircraft and batteries. A minute later the 59th Rifles and the 47th Sikhs, with the 2/124th Infantry close behind them, advanced. Without stopping they took the trenches and established themselves in the unfinished Turkish third line on a front of about 700 metres. They took about 85 prisoners, but lost nearly a third of their strength, mainly to artillery fire and to enfilading rifle fire, especially from a high strongpoint to the left of the point of attack. Heavy losses were also suffered by the 28th Punjabis and the 1st Battalion of the Seaforth Highlanders, which covered the attack with fire from both sides. At 12.45 p.m. the 1st Battalion of the Manchester Regiment was sent up to the line and arrived in time to help repel a Turkish counter-attack. A second counter-attack was repulsed at about 3 p.m.

Throughout the day the British command had little idea of what was happening in the front line. The cables were cut by Turkish fire, and the infantry did not light the agreed signal flares for the airmen, believing that they would thereby betray their positions to the enemy. Fane did not learn for a long time that the trenches had been taken, and since three battalions of the 19th Brigade were still fighting on the flanks, the idea of passing it through the 8th Brigade was abandoned.

At 4.20 p.m., after a fifteen-minute barrage, the Seaforth Highlanders and the 125th Rifles attacked the strongpoint that had been enfilading the 8th Brigade. At about 4.45 p.m. they took the trenches and captured more prisoners. The commander of the 7th Cavalry Brigade then judged that the cavalry could support the infantry. The 13th Hussars and a squadron of the 13th Lancers went into a mounted attack. Under cover of the smoke and dust of the bombardment, “B” and “C” Squadrons of the Hussars reached the infantry. Their commander, Captain Robinson, saw 300–400 Turks gathering for a counter-attack about 1,000 metres further on. He wheeled both squadrons to the left and, to the cheers of the infantry, charged, riding right through the Turkish ranks. He himself was killed in the hand-to-hand fighting. The Hussars turned, rode through the Turks a second time and halted beside the infantry. Thanks to the falling dusk and inaccurate fire, only about 28 of the roughly hundred horsemen were lost. According to the British official history they inflicted at least twice as many casualties on the enemy.

The sun set just after 5 p.m. The Seaforths and the 125th Rifles advanced a further distance of just under a kilometre and dug in on the ground they had won. The Cavalry Division had pinned down the Turks on its sector all day, and the guns of the 21st Brigade kept the roads north of the town under fire. At 6 p.m. Cobbe ordered the cavalry to withdraw to Al-Auja, and the 7th Division to hold the line it had won and push out patrols boldly.

6 November

At one in the morning strong patrols of the 7th Division set out to occupy a line north of Tikrit, running west from the Tigris. They met very weak resistance. In the morning it turned out that the Turks had withdrawn far to the north. The British occupied the town and the base left by the enemy. The Turks had burned or destroyed a large part of the stores before retreating. Among other things the steamer Julnar burned, the vessel in which, in April 1916, an attempt had been made to bring food to besieged Kut al-Amara. Even so, a good deal of abandoned equipment fell into the victors’ hands.

Casualties

According to the British official history, British casualties on 5 November amounted to 1,801 men, including 161 killed. The Indian battalions suffered most: the 47th Sikhs 326 men, the 2/124th 307, the 59th Rifles 251, the 28th Punjabis 245. The Seaforth Highlanders lost 187 men and the Cavalry Division 74. Together with the fighting at Daur on 2 and 3 November, the whole operation thus cost the British more than 2,100 men. They took 137 prisoners. Moberly estimates Turkish losses at about 1,500 men, including 300 killed. He gives no Turkish figures.

Significance

The British had no intention of going further. Their supply lines ended at Samarra, and the Turks stood in a strong position at Al-Fatha, where the Tigris breaks through a range of hills. On 7 November the Cavalry Division set off south, and on 10 November the rest of the force began withdrawing to Samarra. The whole Turkish XVIII Corps, including the divisions beaten at Tikrit, was by then at Al-Fatha or further north. The British occupied Tikrit permanently only on 12 July 1918, while extending the railway from Samarra.

The operation nevertheless achieved its purpose. On 22 November the Chief of the Imperial General Staff wrote to the command in Mesopotamia that the destruction of the enemy’s forward bases at Ramadi and Tikrit, together with the successes in Palestine, would prevent the Turks from assembling forces capable of threatening Baghdad that year, and perhaps also before the onset of the hot weather of 1918. It was the first time the possibility of reducing the British forces in Mesopotamia was mentioned.

Maude’s biographer, General Charles Callwell, stressed the tragic dimension of this victory. Tikrit was the last triumph of the army which, under his command, had grown out of the former Indian Expeditionary Force “D”. Less than two weeks later, on 18 November, Maude died of cholera in Baghdad, and command passed to General William Marshall.

Battle of Tikrit