'IRAQ AND THE PERSIAN GULF' [‎193v] (391/862)

HISTORY
By four p.m. the forward posts had all been taken and orders were
issued to assault the main position on i June. Early that morning,
however, the single Maurice Farman aircraft reported that the Turks
were retreating up the Tigris. Immediately the pursuit began.
It was a naval pursuit, led by the mine-sweeping launch Shaitan,
which was followed by the sloops Espiegle, Clio, and Odin, the yacht
Comet, and the launches Miner, Sumana, and Lewis Felly, mostly
armed with 12-pounder guns. This small flotilla soon came with
in sight of the Turkish river-boats, which at once slipped their
troop-carrying barges, so that some of the pursuing vessels dropped
behind to collect prisoners. White flags fluttered from villages on
both banks as the chase went on, but there was none to accept sur
render. By 10 a.m. on the 3rd the Shaitan, far ahead of the rest,
was within sight of Amara, and a single shot from her 12-pounder
completed the operation. Under the command of Lieut. Singleton,
R.N., and with a crew of eight ratings, she tied up alongside the bank
and accepted the surrender of hundreds of Turkish troops. Four
more small vessels, one with General Townshend on board, arrived
by 2.15 p.m. and completed the demoralization of the Turks, who
were now being plundered by Arabs. Two thousand Turks, retreating
on Amara from Arabistan, were scattered by a few rounds from the
Shaitan. It was not until evening of the following day that any
reinforcements arrived. For over thirty hours Amara, with a popu
lation of more than 10,000, was held by 10 naval and military officers,
25 naval ratings, 12 N.C.O.s and men, and 4 marines, who had about
1,000 prisoners to guard and order in the town to maintain. Some
of the prisoners were marched to the Turkish barracks, there to be
guarded by three privates; the rest were placed on lighters in mid
stream. Thus ended the operation which came to be known as
‘Townshend’s Regatta’, remarkable for the ingenuity of its planning
and execution, and far-reaching in its effects, for it undoubtedly led
to a fatal under-estimation of the fighting qualities of the Turk.
In order to secure Basra against attack from the Euphrates direction
it now became necessary to occupy Nasiriya, the chief town in the
Muntafiq area. This operation also was largely amphibious, for the
only method of supply was by water, because of the lack of land
transport. For this purpose the naval flotilla, now reinforced by
river steamers, crossed the Hammar lake on 27 June. Very little up-
to-date information about the various Euphrates channels was avail
able. The most important of these, the Akaika, had been dammed
for irrigation purposes before the war and the obstruction had to be