This was posted on Facebook – this event was world changing and worth celebrating. The Anniversary of the charge on the Wells of Beersheba by the Australian Light Horsemen – in two years will be 100 years. It’s disappointing that a significant event is all but forgotten, and overshadowed by another.
Extract from Col Stringer’s Book…. ‘800 Horsemen’ (Worth Reading);
“Early Crusaders. In 1099 Godfrey of Bouillon and his knights conquered Jerusalem, following a five week siege. There followed wholesale slaughter of the city’s inhabitants, including all of its Jewish citizens, many burned alive in their synagogues.
A terrible indictment on Christendom. In 1187 Saladin defeated the Crusaders, re-entered Jerusalem, stripped the cross from the Dome of the Rock, plundered churches and convents, restored all the buildings that had been mosques (notably the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa mosque), while turning other churches into stables or granaries. Thousands of following Crusaders paid the ultimate price with their bones bleaching the barren rocky hills but Jerusalem was to remain firmly in the hands of the Turks right up until this century when 800 Aussie Light Horsemen rode into history and opened the gateway to Jerusalem.
Beersheba – Well Of The Oath. The key to the battle were the Gaza-Beersheba fortifications. Beersheba, meaning “well of the oath”, so named by Abraham in the book of Genesis. The well had provided water not only to Abraham, but to Moses and David. Any army approaching its life-giving wells has to march for days through the waterless Sinai desert. All the Turks had to do was hold off an attack for one day and the merciless desert sun would do the rest. Despite constant assaults by the combined forces of the British and Australian armies, the place could not be taken. Then came the fateful day of October 31 1917. The generals were desperate, 50,000 British infantry with tank support had been driven back into the desert. With the sun about to set and with no water for many miles, disaster stared them squarely in the face.
The Australian Light Horse Commander Chauvel’s orders were to storm Beersheba, it had to be won before nightfall at all costs. The situation was becoming grave as they were in urgent need of 400,000 gallons of water for men and horses.
Chauvel concocted a crazy plan. Why not let his 800 horsemen charge the Turkish artillery? A cavalry charge across 6000 yards of open terrain straight into the face of the massed Turkish guns. It sounded like a recipe for disaster.
No wonder the German Officer commanding the Turkish defences described the Aussie Light Horsemen as “madmen!” For a start the Light Horse were not cavalry, they were mounted infantry. They had no swords or lancers but were equipped with rifles and bayonets designed for infantry warfare. But left with virtually no alternative the desperate General gave the order for the last great cavalry charge in history!
The 800 young men mounted their magnificent Walers (horses) and lined up to face the Turkish guns, their young faces bronzed and tanned from the desert sun, their emu plumes swaying in the breeze from their famous slouch hats, rifles swung across their backs and bayonets in hand. History was about to be written. These 800 young men were about to open the doorway to the liberation of Jerusalem!
The Light Horsemen charged magnificently across the dusty plains, so fast that the Turkish artillery could not keep pace with them and the “mad” horsemen were able to slip under their guns. As they leapt the trenches laced with machine gun bullets, a magnificent cheer went up from the British ranks, even some of the Turks stood and applauded, such was the magnificence of the feat.
Although hopelessly outnumbered and outgunned they charged on. Beersheba – the gateway to Jerusalem, fell that day, not to the Crusaders, not to the British, German or US Armies – but to the Australian Light Horsemen!
The rest is history. “Beersheba – well of the oath, was in Australian hands by the time the last rays of fading daylight had gone from the desert sky. This deed would live on as the proudest achievement in the colourful story of the legendary Light Horse, the force that was probably the most uniquely Australian fighting unit ever raised. The Light Horseman was the best mounted soldier in history, finer even than the Cossack or the American Plains Indian.”
In fact the British General Allenby rated the Cavalry charge as one of, if not the most magnificent in history.Eight hundred Aussie Light horsemen had achieved what 50,000 British troops with tanks could not do, what even the Crusaders or Napoleon could not do! They had opened the doorway to Jerusalem against seemingly insurmountable odds.”
Now that’s worth celebrating!