Christmas Hols and time for another 'If the Lord Spares Us' (Too Fat Lardies) get together, paying another visit to Great War Palestine to re-fight Umbrella Hill at the Third Battle of Gaza on 1st November 1917.
General Allenby is conducting his offensive to open the gate to Southern Palestine. British XXI Corps has been bombarding the Gaza defences for five days. XX Corps and the Desert Mounted Corps has captured Beersheba the day before and in order to pin Turkish XXII Corps to their Gaza defences, XXI Corps will now make a night assault on the town. As a preliminary operation, elements of 156th (Scottish Rifles) Brigade will capture and hold the redoubt on Umbrella Hill, southwest of Gaza, which flanks the main axis of attack.
British frontline reconnaissance from the southwest shows the objective (Photos 1&2) to be well wired. However, the wire to its immediate front has been damaged by the bombardment and is assessed as crossable.
To be continued.

Aerial reconnaissance shows Umbrella Hill from the west (Photo 3) and southeast (Photo 4) indicating the communication trenches to the rear of the hill, the extent of the sand dunes to the west, Fisher's Orchard to the south and the Cairo Road and the start of the cactus hedges running along the hill's lower eastern slope.
To be continued.

Wow, great looking table.

 

Looking forward to seeing how this goes

We've done first Gazza need to find time to do both 2^nd and 3^rd

looks like a tough assignment for the laddies from 156th Brigade....

Nice looking table Martin...can you tell me what you made the barbed wire out of? it looks very realistic. Need some beach wire defences for a Cape Helles game I would like to run one day next year.

Look forward to the game report.

And we will need some wire for 2^nd and 3^rd Gazza, it does look very effective

Great stuff !

Cheers - Phil

Paul, Pierre
Good morning (or good evening?)
The barbed wire sections are homemade; plastic card base, miliput timber posts and commercially available model wire. A 'little' time consuming assembling each section with having to cut wire between the posts individually and attach with super glue. All sprayed brown, wire painted metallic and rust, timbers highlighted brown, sand glued to base. Done. A bit over scale and not as big in area as the rules suggest, but I think it works.

I'd better finish writing the report.

Regards

Mart

That's a cracking looking table .

Looks fantastic, but I could not get my head round those rules at all.

Its evening/night over here now....

Thanks for the reply Mart, very useful.

Will any Sections of E Company, Heavy Branch Machine Gun Corps be making an appearance in your scenario or are they all in the main attack? They would take care of the wire.....

My troops have stormed a few Turkish trenches in ITLSU games over the years and would love support from a Heavy Section to help them out occasionally      

Great idea but they remain allocated to the main attack. Tanks are currently further down the metal acquisition plan. I keep telling myself to just finish painting what I've got!

156th Brigade comprised 1/7th Cameronians and an attached company from the 1/8th Cameronians, part of 156th Machine Gun Company under the Brigade MG Officer and part of 156th Trench Mortar Battery. Off-table artillery support came from A Bty, 262nd Brigade RFA with 6 x 18pdrs (All Jolly Good Fellows – SR0).
The defending Turks had the 2nd Bn, 138th Regiment (Pasha Bashers – SR3) with an MG company (Johnny Turks – SR2) and off-table support from a 4-gun 77mm battery from 5th Field Artillery (Pasha Bashers – SR3).
(Photo 5) Major Karparc Bey (Young Turk) the CO of the 138th, sensed an attack was imminent for he had seen that the British had cut two gaps in their wire. He deployed his force under Blinds. 2nd Battalion HQ and its 3rd Company with attached MG held the redoubt on Ahmettepe itself. To avoid further shell fire and in anticipation for the need for counter-attack, the 1st Company with attached MG were held back in reserve nearest the road and the 2nd Company was further back near Karparc Bey's HQ. A small patrol (Dummy Blind) was positioned in the orchard to give early warning of an enemy advance through this covered approach. All units were on Hold orders.
Brigadier General Leggett (Harrow) also had his Brigade HQ well forward in order to interpret and exert more control over the night's action in the dark. Being informed he had a battery of field guns at his disposal for 20 minutes (4 turns of fire) he opted for a timed fireplan of 'barrage' fire. For 3 turns the guns (12x4" zone) would hammer the forward trench on the hill, hopefully destroying the wire also, and then lift to hit the communication trenches to the rear to disrupt any enemy reinforcement during the infantry assault. The trench mortars were also to target the wire in front of the hill once the bombardment had started, and the machine guns had orders to wait an be prepared to engage any Turks seen on the hill. Now, the Brigade MG Officer could only see the dim outline of the hill in the dark, but he knew the infantry had been told to go in with the bayonet. Any muzzle flashes, particularly MG fire, would be Johnny Turk.
Leggett had ordered two gaps to be cut in the British wire. He believed the approach through Fisher's Orchard to be too obvious and would be expected. None the less, he ordered the 1/8th company on a diversionary attack through the right-hand gap and into the orchard, heading for a known gap in the Turkish wire. The main assault, despite the difficulty of traversing the deep 'loose sand' of the dunes, would go through the left-hand gap. The 1/7th Cameronians were ordered to advance out into No Man's Land and form up ready to move to their right and storm the hill through what was left of the wire. H Hour was fast approaching and it was now down to the arty to do their bit.

As this was a night action the lights were off and I bounced the light of an angle-poise off the wall. It was actually darker than the photos suggest. The net result with the flash off was atmosphere, but poorer quality photos. Hope you can see in the dark.

The laddies of the 1/8th sensed they had drawn the short straw. They felt they were being used as a forlorn hope with the trepidation of advancing uphill through the orchard and undergrowth in the dark, where any number of Johnny Turks were bound to be hiding (Photo 6).
To be continued.

Ohh good luck

(Photo 7) H Hour and the British artillery opened up on time. Through his trench periscope Leggett could see the forward observers had done a perfect job registering the guns. Their fire was bang on the redoubt and also hitting the wire. "Bloody marvellous!" 3rd Company was taking suppression, but the MG crew was unscathed.

My house rule is that off-table barrage fire can inflict damage to troops under Blinds.

Despite his satisfaction with the arty, Leggett began to feel some frustration. There was no movement from his infantry and the trench mortars were not firing as yet. He was anxious that the Cameronians didn't lose the benefit of this covering fire. "Come on, come on!"

(Photo8) On its second turn the barrage slipped slightly northwards but was still inflicting heavy suppression to all the redoubt's defenders and causing damage to the wire, but not where it was most required. At last, the trench mortars got going and concentrating their fire, blew a hole in the wire on the front of the hill. Leggett was relieved to hear that his infantry to both his left and right had moved out of the trenches. His plan of attack might yet work.
The third turn of barrage fire slipped even further north, missing any defenders. The lift of fire onto the communication trenches proved ineffective against Turkish troops, but unknown to the British, had another decisive effect. A shell hit Karparc Bey's HQ dugout. A roof beam collapsed, hitting him on the head. Karparc Bey was knocked out cold!
To be continued.