"تاريخ الحرب الكبرى استنادًا إلى وثائق رسمية. الحملة في بلاد الرافدين ١٩١٤-١٩١٨. المجلد IV". [و‎‎١‎٣‎٦] (٥٤٠/٢٧٦)

TURKS ADVANCE FROM TABRIZ
219
as the Armenian troops were unreliable and until they were
organised only a handful of British troops stood between Baku
and destruction. Everything pointed to an early Turkish
offensive and it was imperative that British reinforcements
should be despatched immediately.
In repeating this telegram to the War Office on the 22nd,
General Cobbe gave the 39th Infantry Brigade distribution on
that day. The 7th North Staffordshire were in Baku ; of the
9th Royal Warwickshire about one hundred were in Baku and
the remainder had either embarked from Enzeli or were on
their way there from Kazvin ; a company of the 9th Worcester
shire was at Kazvin and two companies on their way there from
Hamadan, where the fourth company was guarding the Jelu
refugees ;* and three companies of the 7th Gloucestershire
were due at Hamadan on the 25th, while the fourth company
was at railhead.
On the 20th August, General Dunsterville started for Derbend
in the President Kruger, accompanied by Commodore Norris,
to arrange for co-operation by Bicharakoff. But on approaching
that port next afternoon their ship, which was unarmed, was
fired on by a Bolshevik vessel and, not wishing to get shut up
in Derbend, they returned to Baku.
On the 20th, Major Wagstaff, who was in command of the
detachment about Mianeh watching the Turkish troops at
Tabriz, reported that Turks were coming down the Tabriz
road. His detachment, located north-westward of Zenjan,
consisted of a few Dunsterforce British officers and non-com
missioned officers with some 650 levies and a platoon l/4th
Hampshire, and its advanced patrols seem to have been about
five miles from Yusufabad, which was thirty miles south-east
of Tabriz ; while at Zenjan there were one squadron 14th
Hussars and fifty rifles l/2nd Gurkhas. The Turkish 11 th
Caucasus Division was beheved to have concentrated recently
at Tabriz, so that this movement might be the commencement
of an advance against our vulnerable line of communication
with the Caspian.
On the 21st and 22nd reinforcements consisting of a section
each 44th and C/69th Field, and 21st Mountain Batteries,
two armoured cars, one hundred rifles l/4th Hampshire and
* A good many Russian and Armenian bad characters had arrived with the
Jelus and it was thought that they and the armed Jelus might give trouble.
The formation of the Urmia Brigade had begun and General Cobbe had also
authorised the retention at Hamadan of one of the three Gloucestershire
companies due there on the 25th.