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Updated: May 5, 2025
Returned to Kirk Kilisse from the Bulgarian lines at Chatalja, I amused myself in an odd hour with burrowing among a great pile of newspapers in the Censor's office, and reading here and there the war news from English, French, and Belgian papers. Dazed, amazed, I recognised that I had seemingly mistaken the duties of a war correspondent.
By threats of invasion, Roumania has wrung from her a ransom for the Balkan victories, while in Macedonia her allies are preparing to dispute her lawful share and have massed against her their whole armies. So long as peace with Turkey is not signed she must remain immobilised in front of Chatalja and Bulair.
It gave a view of all the Chatalja position the range of hills stretching from the Black Sea to the Sea of Marmora, along which the Bulgarians were entrenched, and, beyond the invisible valley, the second range which held the Turkish defence. Over the Turkish lines, like a standard, shone in the clear sky a crescent moon, within its tip a bright star.
"Now big guns have been brought from Chatalja, Adrianople and elsewhere, roads have been made, heavy movable armaments provided, troops and machine guns have been poured into the Peninsula, several lines of trenches have been dug, every landing place has been trenched and mined, and all that clever German Officers under Von der Goltz can design, and hard working diggers like the Turks can carry out, has been done to make the Peninsula impregnable.
There was this check, mainly because, in an otherwise perfect system of training, sanitation had been overlooked. From a military point of view, of course, it was almost impossible in any case that the Bulgarian army should have forced the Chatalja lines without a railway line to bring up ammunition from their base. It was, however, an army which had been accustomed to do the impossible.
Against those lines a Bulgarian attack was finally launched, but too late. The entrenched Turks were strong enough to withstand the attack of the Bulgarian forces. My diary of these three critical days of the campaign reads: ERMENIKIOI The battle of Chatalja has been opened.
Now here, piping hot, were the stories of the war. There was the vivid story of the battle of Chatalja. This story was started seven days too soon; had the positions and the armies all wrong; the result all wrong; and the picturesque details were in harmony. But for the purposes of the public it was a very good story of a battle.
To remain within the Chatalja lines and, we are afraid, as a dependent of the Allies, is for the Sultan a humiliating position inconsistent with the Koranic injunctions. Such a restricted position of the Turks is virtually a success of the bag and baggage school. It is not yet known how the Supreme Council disposed of the rich and renowned lands of Asia Minor. If Mr.
Turkish suzerainty will be confined to the area within the Chatalja lines. With regard to Emir Foisul's position there is no news except that the Mandates of Britain and France transform his military title into a civil title. We have given above the terms of the Turkish treaty as indicated in Router's messages. These reports are incomplete and all of them are not equally authenticated.
I am sure they would not have done that if it had not been their wish to subdue Adrianople. The position of the Bulgarian army on the lines of Chatalja with Adrianople in the hands of the enemy was this, that it took practically their whole transport facilities to keep the army supplied with food, and there was no possibility of keeping the army properly supplied with ammunition.
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