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25 April, 2026
GREAT GENERAL: Mastermind of the evacuation
THE evacuation at Gallipoli in late December 1915 has been called the masterpiece in the brilliant career of the general born in St Arnaud.
THE evacuation at Gallipoli in late December 1915 has been called the masterpiece in the brilliant career of the general born in St Arnaud.
Cyril Brudenell White forrged a well-respected career across three wars.
People like Charlton’s Bill Freeman are perhaps a “living legacy” of Brudenell White whose role in the evacuation meant the carnage of Australian and New Zealand on the peninsula came to an end although many were later sent to the bloody battles on the Somme.
The Department of Veterans’ Affairs continues to acknowledge the role of Brudendell White, born in St Arnaud 150 years ago this September.
“At Anzac and Suvla, an Australian staff officer, Lieutenant Colonel Cyril Brudenell White, devised a plan to gradually withdraw men and equipment while convincing the Turks that everything was normal.
“The troops carried out ‘silent stunts’ to trick the Turks. Nearly all firing from Anzac ceased to make the enemy think preparations for winter were underway.
“At the end of the stunt an irregular rifle and artillery fire of the sort to be expected by the Turks was kept up. Hopefully the enemy would not interpret these silences as a withdrawal; and aparently they did not.
“According to the evacuation schedule, the troops would leave Anzac in three stages; the preliminary stage, the removal of enough men and equipment to make it look like preparing for a defensive winter campaign; the intermediate stage, the removal of more men leaving sufficient to hold off a major Turkish attack for about a week; during these first two stages ,the Anzac garrison was reduced from 41,000 to 26,000 troops.
“The final stage from 17 to 20 December 1915 saw the remaining 26,000 troops withdrawn.”
Historians say that after the failure of the August Offensive, some senior officers began to question the value of remaining at Gallipoli.
“The British forces really needed reinforcements on the Western Front and at Salonika. In October, the British replaced General Sir Ian Hamilton with Lieutenant-General Sir Charles Munro. Munro immediately proposed evacuation,” they have written.
“On November 22, the British decided to evacuate Anzac and Suvla. Planning moved quickly and efficiently. The evacuation of Anzac started on December 15. Over five nights, 36,000 troops were withdrawn to the waiting transport ships. The last party left in the early hours of December 20 from North Beach at Anzac. British and French forces remained at Helles until January 9, 1916.
Gallipoli was a failure for the Allies, with some 44,000 soldiers killed in an attempt to take the peninsula from the Ottomans. Victory came at a high price for the Ottoman Empire, which lost at least 87,000 men during the campaign.”
The first steps to a formal decision to evacuated followed a visit on November 13, 1915 when a small boat arrived at North Beach.
From it stepped Field Marshal Lord Kitchener, Secretary of State for War. He had come to see the Anzac positions for himself.
As Kitchener walked up the pier with other generals, the men recognised him. They came running from all over and surrounded him on the pier. War correspondent Charles Bean watched Kitchener walk up from the pier:
“The tall red cap [Kitchener] was rapidly closed in among them-but they kept a path and as the red cheeks turned and spoke to one man or another, they cheered him-they, the soldiers-no officers leading off or anything of that sort. It was a purely soldiers’ welcome. He said to them, ‘The King has asked me to tell you how splendidly he thinks you have done-you have done splendidly, better, even, than I thought you would.”
Kitchener spent just over two hours at Anzac surveying the Turkish line from Australian trenches inland of the Sphinx and at Lone Pine. After another 2 days consulting with senior commanders, he recommended to the British War Cabinet to evacuate Gallipoli.
In Kitchener’s opinion, little progress could be made against the strengthening Turkish trenches without significant reinforcements and artillery resources. This was especially so at Anzac where another surprise attack, such as the August Offensive, was virtually impossible. Moreover, local commanders were extremely worried about the problems of supplying Gallipoli throughout the winter with its many severe storms.
By 4am on December 20, a handful of men were left at North Beach. Among these was the commander of the ‘Rear Party’, Colonel John Paton, from Waratah, Sydney. At 4:10am, Paton, having waited 10 minutes for any last Anzac straggler, declared the evacuation complete and the last steamboat sailed off. The Anzacs had successfully left Gallipoli with hardly a casualty. Anzac and Suvla were deserted.
And more than a century later, it is the boy from St Arnaud who historians say masterminded a brilliant evacuation.
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