Persia (Iran) - Dunsterforce

Dunsterforce was not a place as such, though it was the address which Cyril Sladden gave for his mail from July 1918.

Amidst the turmoil of World War I and the breakup of the Russian Empire, Baku, the capital of the newly-declared Republic of Azerbaijan, became a battlefield as four factions sought for control of its oilfields.  Into the cauldron of Bolsheviks, Mensheviks, Armenians and Azeris, London sent a tiny imperial force on an impossible mission:  to prevent Baku falling into the hands of the Ottomans or the Germans, both desperate for Azerbaijan’s oil.  London also feared that Baku could be a staging post for an assault on Central Asia and, from there, on British India.  With control of the city changing almost weekly, the force of roughly 1000 men and a few armoured cars, led by Major-General Lionel Dunsterville, fought its way from Baghdad to Baku; this was “Dunsterforce”.

Baku, on the Caspian Sea, is situated some 1100 km (700 miles) from the British railhead in Mesopotamia.  Dunsterforce and a few armoured cars set off on the long journey early in 1918.  Cyril Sladden became a part of the mission at the end of July 1918 when reinforcements from the 9th Battalion Worcestershire Regiment were sent.

On the journey they passed through Pai Tak, then Kermanshah 359 km on (223 miles) on, Hamadan and then Kazvin 320 km (200 miles) further, to the Elburz mountains, over the 2300 m (7,400 ft) Bulagh Pass and into the jungle lowlands of Gilan Province, home of the Jungle Movement of Gilan (Jangali) led by Kuchik Khan, and thence to Bandar-e Anzali from where they went by sea to Baku.

The Turkish attack of Baku began on 26th August, but it was not until early September that Cyril Sladden arrived in the city.  Dunsterville tried to organise the local Baku force to help to defend the city, but they had left a critical section of the city’s defences unmanned.  Realising that the situation was hopeless, Dunsterville organised an evacuation by sea on 15th September and extracted all his men without further loss of life.  In all, the Turks lost 1130 men and the British 92.  Despite losing Baku, Dunsterville could claim some success.  He had held off the Turks long enough to stop them exporting significant quantities of Baku’s oil or threatening India before the war ended.

But, perhaps inevitably, Dunsterville took the blame for the debacle.  The force was reconstituted as Norperforce (North Persia Force) under the command of Major-General William Montgomery Thomson, and re-entered Baku on 16th November.