A good and scarce First World War Mesopotamian Campaign grouping relating to Captain (then 2nd Lt) Samuel Charles Robert Lane Clarke of the Wiltshire Regiment with the 13th (Western) Division.

Five maps: The first of 'East Turkey in Asia, Kifri', Sheet 37, Intelligence Division War Office revised edition 1914, scale 1:250,000; the others noted as Degree Sheets No. 2G, 2P and DO, covering the Dawairij River, Puli-Madian Rud, Khankin and Mandali, 4 miles to 1 inch, some marked Official Use Only / Provisional.

'Some Notes on the Country above Baghdad (Provisional Edition)' General Staff, India, 1917, published by Simla Government Central Press in 1917, waxed cotton covering, 29pp (annotated in pencil 'C L Clarke')

Officer's khaki map case with a large pocket, six pencil holders and original brown leather suspension harness and clip

An early Magnapole Compass marked 'Patent Applied For', with the original leather case

Ephemera including Christmas Greetings Card from Mesopotamia, dated 1918, blank and unused, featuring black and white photographs of Baghdad; three postcards home from Clarke to his mother including one with Passed by Censor marking, three telegraphs informing that Clarke has been wounded (gunshot wound to the back), dated 1917, and a scan of a group portrait showing Clarke seated, holding a dog.

Two field message pocket notebooks, including one used by 2nd Lt Clarke when serving in Operations in attempted relief of General Townsend during the Siege of Kut-Al-Amara in April 1916.

Provenance: Direct family descent. See footnote for further details.

Sold together with a type-written oral history of Major Clarke’s military career as dictated to family.

Relevant entries include

‘The Wiltshire embarked on the S.S. Oriana on the 13^th March and arrived to Basra on the 26^th March 1916. After waiting there about a month for river transport we went up river on the old Blosse Lynch to the Mesopotamian front line at Sheik Saad. A week later we took over trenches opposite the Turks front line in the HANNAH position. On the 5^th April 1916 we attacked this position and overran a number of lines trenches which had been evacuated by the enemy the night before.

We continued to advance and came under very heavy rifle, machine gun and artillery fire from the strongly held Falyhia defences some two miles from Hannah. The ground was so flat it gave no cover and our casualties steadily mounted … By midday our numbers were depleted it was decided to make the assault under cover of darkness with fresh troops. We were relieved by the 7^th Division. We did not get a rest for long as we were ordered to the right bank of the Tigris in support of the 3^rd Division and continued fighting there until General Townsend was forced to surrender on the 29^th April 1916. The siege lasted 143 days. Townsend surrendered with 9000 troops, 6000 of them Indian.

The relief force casualties amounted to 20,000 in all ranks. The 5^th Wiltshire’s lost some 23 Officers and 600 other ranks. On the 18^th April 1916 at the Battle of Beit Eassia on the right bank of the Tigris I was wounded. A shrapnel bullet penetrated by right chest wall just missing the lung. There were no ambulances and Army Transport mule carts were used to transport wounded to the River steamers. These carts were an open metal framework without springs on an axel, and two large wheels, not intended for personnel carrying…

… we reached the vicinity of Kult el Amara still held by the Turks. Kut had to be captured before an advance could be made further North. The 40^th Brigade took up position in the Hai salient. This salient was made where the river Hai flowers into the river Tigris, just south of Kut. Here we proceeded to dig ourselves in and then ‘Mole’ ourselves forward. In a series of trench lines to within assaulting distance of the Turk trench lines south of Kut. It was a slow means of approaching an enemy position and often a costly one in casualties as this proved. You mole out a number of sap heads in right angles at the trench you are in and in the direction of the enemy position; that night under cover of the dark you work in the open to join up these sap heads and form another line of trench.

It was in this kind of operation I was wounded a second time. Before this happened, I with the 40^th Brigade took part in an attempt to cross the Tigris above Kut. The place chosen for the attempted crossing was about ten miles distant at the junction of a very deep crossing and wide ditch with the Tigris close to the Shumeran Bend. We did a forced march to get in this depression under cover of dark. We took with us a complete Bridging Unit drawn by mules, a pair of mules to each section, of which there were many.

The whole force got into the depression without incident. When we started to emerge from our place of cover to launch bridging boats to cross the river we came under such heavy rifle and machine gun fire that no one could survive to reach the opposite bank and the boats just drifted off down the river with their dead and wounded occupants. General Crocker of the Cavalry Division was in command and I think wisely decided to withdraw and return to the river Hai. Our Brigadier Lewin was very annoyed at this and said ‘He could have crossed the damn river sliding on his arse’. As it was the whole operation was a most exhausting one, had we preserved with the crossing I do not think we would have had a sufficiently strong enough force left to hold a bridge on the opposite bank. So we returned to the Hai salient to continue our moleing operations towards the Turkish front line. In this the most nerve-wracking job was doing covering force to those who were digging the trenches; for this, you lay out in the open ahead of those digging. It was freezing cold, you had to keep still, any movement brought a burst of machine gun fire or a sniper’s bullet. The night I was wounded I was leaning over one of the sap heads asking someone below for a stretcher. A sniper about fifty yards away got me. As the bullet hit me it turned on end and tore a large lump of flesh out of my back fortunately stopping short of my spine. I was put on the stretcher I had ordered as the man for whom I wanted it was dead. This was on 17^th Jan 1917….”

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