Prisoners of the Turks (First World War)

Officers who were captured were generally treated better than “other ranks”, who almost always experienced terrible conditions, often leading to death.

Of approximately 2,962 white British officers and other ranks captured at Kut, 1,782 would go on to die in Ottoman captivity. Indian prisoners along with their white comrades, experienced a horrific death march from Kut-al-Amara to the northern railhead at Ras-el-Ain (in modern day Syria).

There were camps in Kastamonu, Eskisehir, Capadoccia, Cankiri, Afion, Sivas, Yozgat, Hacikiri, Belemedik. Some of these were work camps, such as Hacikiri and Belemedik in the Taurus Mountains.

Bagtsche, Airan and Entelli were railway work camps, under control of the German construction company, in the Amanus Mountains, (now Nur Mountains). The section between Bagtsche and Airan –Entilli was at kilometres “485,800-502,800”. William Fratel of the Indian Subordinate Medical Department, who had been captured at Kut, was court-martialled in England in 1919 for his actions at Bagtsche.

In 1917 Angora (Ankara) became the centre of the working groups engaged in laying the narrow-gauge line towards Yozgad.

Gedos was a parole camp on the shore of the Black Sea established late in 1917, where officers who gave their word that they would not escape were well treated. Eskichehir and Konia were camps for Indian officers only.

Transfers between different camps were common.

A POW Museum has now been established at Afionkarahissar in the main (namazgah-chapel) section of the Madrasa

Spelling variants

• Afyonkarahisar (modern name), Afyon Karahisar, Afyon Kara Hisar, Afyon, Afion, Afionkarahissar, Afion-Kara-Hissar, Afion Karahissar, Afioun Karahissar, Afium-Kara-hissar.
• Ankara, Angora
• Bagtche, Bagche (Amanus Mountains)
• Belemedik, Bedernadik (Taurus Mountains)
• Bor, Bora, Bore (north of the Taurus Mountains)
• Bozanti, Pozanti (Taurus Mountains)
• Kiangri, Changri, Çankırı, Cankiri, Cangara
• Entelli, Entilli, Intilli, Intille, Intaley. A work camp in the Amanus Mountains.
• Hacikiri, Hadschkiri, (the latter may be the German name), Hacýkýrý . A work camp in the Taurus Mountains.
• Ngde, Nigdeh (north of the Taurus Mountains)

Mesopotamia

For many accounts of members of the allied forces taken prisoner in Mesopotamia, especially after the fall of Kut, see Mesopotamia Campaign-External links and Historical books online

Additional information

External links

• British Prisoners Of War House of Commons 12 October 1916. Lists the location of where British prisoners are detained in Turley. hansard.millbanksystems.com
• Imperial War Museums Catalogue entry: Private Papers of Colonel W C Spackman: Ts memoir (331pp) covering his service as Regimental Medical Officer to the 48th Pioneers, 6th Indian Division in Mesopotamia, 1914 - 1915, at Kut during the siege, December 1915 - April 1916, and as a prisoner of war in Anatolia, 1916 – 1918. An edited version has been published.
• The Liddle Collection at the University of Leeds has a number of books, manuscripts and tapes, including transcripts in its collection, relating to Prisoners of War in Turkey. For catalogue references, use terms such as prisoner, Turkey in the Search. Includes a photocopy of the book The Sufferings of the Kut Garrison during their March into Turkey as Prisoners of War, 1916-1917 by F A Harvey, Lt & Q-Mr, published 1922. (The author was in the 2nd Battalion, Dorsetshire Regiment, and this book was privately printed after his death in 1921, as a memorial). Note, the actual items do not appear to be available online.
• Finding Aid: Foreign Office Files (FO 383) at the National Archives: Regarding Military & Civilian Prisoners of War: List of Files and Contents: 1915-1919. Compiled September 2014 by seaforths. Contains a FIND (Search) function. onedrive.live.com. Contains references such as "FO 383/090 1915 Description: Turkey: Prisoners, including…"
  • Catalogue entry FO 383/231 Turkey. Prisoners... includes mention of camps at Magnesia, Smyrna, Tchoroum, and transfer of British and French prisoners from camps at Kiangri and Afion Kara Hissar to Bosanti for employment on railway construction.
  • Other records from FO 383 include FO 383/456 File 117571 (03/09/1918) Various lists: Nominal role of British Officers, Warrant Officers, Non-Commissioned Officers, Men and Indian military personnel held at Afrion Kara Hissar, Kedos, Konia, and Magnesia in Turkey providing rank, name and unit/ship… 2. List of Assistant Surgeons of the Indian Medical Service: PoWs in Turkey. 3. List of Sub Assistant Surgeons of the Indian Medical Service; PoWs inTurkey…

Note: findmypast has a dataset of records "Prisoners Of War 1715-1945" (located in Armed forces & conflict/Regimental & service records) which appears to contain some records from FO 383, including some for Indian Army soldiers. Includes FO 383/336, POWs in Turkey, 1917, Death date of prisoners who have died in camps in Turkey, Cause of death, Burial place; FO 383/456, POWs in Turkey, 1918, British prisoner of war deaths in Turkey, including name, rank, date of death and cause.

• "Prisoners of War (Ottoman Empire/Middle East)" by Yücel Yanıkdağ . Scroll down to the section "Entente Prisoners of War in the Ottoman Empire" encyclopedia.1914-1918-online.net. The mortality rate of the British and Dominion prisoners in Ottoman captivity was very high.
• "Prisoners of War" by Heather Jones. encyclopedia.1914-1918-online.net. "Section 6: Mistreatment" contains information about prisoners in Turkey.
• Pursuit of an 'Unparalleled Opportunity': The American YMCA and Prisoner of War Diplomacy among the Central Power Nations during World War I 1914-1923 by Kenneth Steuer, written as a dissertation in 2008. Website of Gutenberg-e, a program of the American Historical Association and Columbia University Press.
  • Turkish Prison Camps. Click on the map for a list of the camps in Turkey.

"Appendix A: Prison Camps: Turkey". This alphabetical list, which contains information about location, appears to be from an earlier/different version of the above book, and does not appear to be included in the current version.

"First World War Central Power Prison Camps" by Kenneth Steuer 1-1-2013 History Faculty Publications, Western Michigan University . Includes Turkish Prison Camps

• "Precious and Honoured Guests of the Ottoman Government" by Panayiotis Diamadis, pages 162-179 Genocide Perspectives II, 2002. The author is a lecturer at the University of Technology, Sydney.
• “Australian Prisoners of the Turks: Negotiating Culture Clash in Captivity” by Kate Ariotti, pages 146-166 ‪Other Fronts, Other Wars?: First World War Studies on the Eve of the Centennial‬. 2014 Google Books
• The Cilician gates trainsofturkey.com. The Baghdad Railway and construction of the tunnels through the Taurus Mountains. The location of the work camps at Belemedik and Hacikiri.
  • German photos of the Baghdad Railway, including a category titled "Bagdadbahn, Taurusgebirge, Belemedik, Adana". Bildarchiv der Philipp Holzmann AG.
• Photographs: Historical : Baghdad Railway including
  • Belemedik c 1915-18 which includes text about Allied POWs, British and Indian, working along the railway. Working meant tunnel works, laying tracks but often loading and de-loading wagons. Others had to join road-construction teams. Gunter Hartnagel Collection on flickr.com. There are also associated photograph collections titled "Baghdad Railway: Now and then", and "Baghdad Railway: Taurus/Toros section"
• "Scene From "Inferno." Prisoners In Turkey. British Soldiers Ill-Treated" Mount Ida Chronicle, [New Zealand] Volume XLV, 10 May 1918, Page 1 paperspast.natlib.govt.nz
• "The forgotten Anzacs: ‘honoured guests’ of the Sultan" 24 April 2014 theconversation.com. This article also mentions Indian POWs.
• Narrative of John Wheat c 1914-1918, who was a torpedoman on the Australian submarine A.E.2 which was sunk 30 April 1915 in the Sea of Marmora (Gallipoli), taken prisoner by the Germans, and subsequently became a prisoner of war in Turkey, working on the construction of the Baghdad Railway. Transcribed by, and from the collection of the Mitchell Library, State Library of NSW. Photographs and postcards from his album Click on the tab “Online” to display 8 items.
• From the Sea of Marmara to the North Gate of Baghdad: The Story of Four HMAS AE2 Crew Members Elsewhere, the author is stated to be Colonel Marcus Fielding, Australian Army. The crew was taken into captivity by the Turks. With quotes from the diary of AE2 crew member Able Seaman Albert Knaggs. mhhv.org.au
  • Jeff Knaggs - the Autobiography - my Grandfather. Albert Edward Knaggs Able Seaman; RN/RAN 7893 of HMAS AE2 left an important diary of events up until his death at Belemedik where he died in the makeshift camp hospital on 22 October 1916.
• Sergeant Maurice George Delpratt, 5th Light Horse Regiment, A I F
  • The Delpratt war helenhambling.com
  • Maurice George Delpratt Correspondence, A Turkish Prisoner Of War State Library of Queensland, with Correspondence Includes digital images.
  • Afyonkarahisar… Curiously, it all turns out well in the end July 24, 2013. A Mevlevi (Dervish) Museum has information relating to Afyon’s key role in WWI for both the Turkish military, and for Allied POWs. helenhambling.com
  • A goat track to the Holy Grail… July 31, 2013. A journey to Belemedik and Hacikiri, in the Taurus Mountains, sites of the camps where POWs worked on the railway tunnels for the Berlin to Baghdad Railway. helenhambling.com
    • Photographs: Prison of War camp WW1, Belemedik Turkey, Prisoners of War Camp along the Berlin-Baghdad Railway flickr.com
• "Homesick Anzac POW offered full-time job by Turkish captors after WWI" by Mazoe Ford. 25 April 2015. abc.net.au. Australian soldier George Kerr, ((AIF) 14th Battalion), wounded and captured at Gallipoli, became the paymaster at Belemedik POW camp.
• RAMC profile of: Valentine Michael Flood [Service No: 46780] He was moved in early 1916 to the camp at Bilemedik-Pouzantri where he'd have been put to work on the Berlin - Baghdad railway. He appears to have died in the POW Hospital at Angora (Ankara) and was buried in the hospital cemetery.
• New Zealand’s Gallipoli Prisoners of War. Scroll down for an account by Private William Robert Surgenor (10/724 Wellington Infantry Battalion) who was wounded and captured on Chunuk Bair on 8 August 1915 and was in various prisoner of war camps in Turkey. His account appears as an Appendix in the book Gallipoli: The New Zealand Story by Chris Pugsley.The original account is held at Archives, New Zealand (R24428210). January 17, 2013. garriehutchinson.com
• A man named Troy Private Martin John Troy 16th Battalion AIF. January 12, 2013 garriehutchinson.com. Mentions the conditions of the prisoners, some of whom were better off than others. The prisoners taken at Kut seemed to suffer the most.
• Bugler Frederick Ashton 11th Battalion AIF. He was at the German railway camp at Belemedlk, and unsuccessfully tried to escape. January 9, 2013. garriehutchinson.com.
• Listen to the 1985 inteview with Joseph William Lennox Napier, British officer served with the 4th Bn South Wales Borderers in Gallipoli and Mesopotamia, 1914-1917; POW in Turkey, 1917-1918. Reel 2. iwm.org.uk
• Prisoners of the Turks: the fate of Frederick William Davey and Frank Turner following the surrender of Kut winkleighheroes.co.uk
• Scroll to: "A Prisoner of the Turks" by Brian and Mari Walker, Winter 2012 Newsletter The War Graves Photographic Project. twgpp.org. Herbert George May 9th Light Horse Regiment 5th Reinforcement, died of disease at Ngde (north of the Taurus Mountains) 26 September 1917. Private Colin Spencer Campbell, 2nd Light Horse Field Ambulance was captured in Palestine 26-3-17, and was sent to Bagtche (Amanus Mountains) to work on the railway line, where discipline was harsh. He subsequently went to Jarbaschi, another working camp , and when sick with malaria, to Bore camp (north of the Taurus Mountains).

Historical books online

• Rapport de MM. Alfred Boissier et Dr Adolphe Vischer sur leur inspection des camps de prisonniers en Turquie International Committee of the Red Cross report on inspection of prisoners camps in Turkey, October 1916 to January 1917. French language. Scribd.com. Also available through grandeguerre.icrc.org
• Miscellaneous No. 24 (1918): Report on the Treatment of British Prisoners of War in Turkey. Presented to Parliament November 1918. HMSO 1918 IOR/L/MIL/7/18737 British Library
• From Kastamuni to Kedos: Being a Record of Experiences of Prisoners of War in Turkey, 1916-1918 by C L Woolley, Capt. RFA 1921. Archive.org
• Prisoners of the red desert, being a full and true history of the men of the "Tara" by Captain Rupert Stanley Gwatkin-Williams RN 1919 Archive.org. HMS Tara was sunk by a German submarine near Sollum, Egypt in 1915. The surviving crew were handed over to the Senussi, allies of the Turks and were held prisoners at Bir Hakkim (Bir el Hakim) in Libya until rescued in 1916 in dramatic circumstances by British Armoured Cars under the command of the Duke of Westminster. HMS Tara was formerly the London and North Western Railway (LNWR) ship Hibernia, with more details in Prisoners of the Red Desert: Wartime Adventures of LNWR railwaymen National Railway Museum.
• A Prisoner in Turkey by John Still 1920 Archive.org. The title page contains a handwritten note “Ceylon Civil Service (Forests)”

Poems in Captivity by John Still 1919 Archive.org

• Eastern Nights--and Flights; a Record of Oriental Adventure by Alan Bott 1920 Archive.org The author was a scout pilot in Palestine, who became, after his plane crashed in 1918 a prisoner of the Turks, eventually in Afion-Kara-Hissar in Turkey. Alan Bott Wikipedia.
• The Escaping Club: "Part II" [page 241] by A. J. Evans 1922 Hathi Trust Digital Library. As a POW the author had escaped from Germany in June 1917. In March 1918, while on a bombing raid in Palestine his plane came down. He was captured by Arabs, along with two others, and subsequently became prisoners of the Turks.
• Adventures in Turkey and Russia by E H Keeling, London 1924 is available to read online on the Digital Library of India website. He was captured at Kut, and the initial chapter details the the very poor medical condition of many of those captured. Edward Keeling Wikipedia. He was in the Indian Army Reserve of Officers
• Four-Fifty Miles to Freedom by Captain M A B Johnston, RGA and Captain K D Yearsley RE 1919 Archive.org. The cover title is 450 Miles to Freedom. The authors were at Kastamoni, Changri and Yozgad
• In Brigands' Hands and Turkish Prisons, 1914-1918 by A Forder 1920 Archive.org The author was an American missionary who was taken prisoner in Jerusalem in November 1914 and jailed by the military. He was a prisoner in Damascus for four years until the British occupation.
• Agreement between the British and Ottoman governments respecting prisoners of war and civilians Presented to Parliament April 1918 HMSO. Archive.org
• National Archives of Australia files, mainly consisting of copies of files from the British Foreign Office. Search the NAA collection
  • 1916 Correspondence File S9/364 (4 pages)
  • Prisoners of War Camps in Turkey File 1917/69/526 (8 pages)
  • File 1917/89/397 (185 pages)
  • Australians captured in Turkey (40 pages) Alphabetical list with details. This is an Australian file.
  • Mortality among Prisoners of War in Turkey :1918 correspondence File 1918/89/724 (20 pages)
  • Agreements with Turkey (67) pages ((Australian) Prime Minister’s Department file) Includes treatment of the British Prisoners of War working for the Baghdad Railway Construction Company in Belemedik in the Taurus Mountains. Also prisoners from Kut who suffered terrible conditions.
  • Prisoners of War in Turkey Includes a copy of Reports on Conditions in Turkish Prisons, HMSO, presented to the British Parliament 1919. File 1919/89/298 (37 pages)
  • Narrative: Two and a half Years a prisoner of war in Turkey Related by Trooper GW Handsley, [2nd Light Horse] Written by Serj. JH Foster 1919. 39 pages. The narrative is pages 7-39. This is an Australian file. [Subsequently published, see following entry].
• Two-and-a-Half Years a Prisoner of War in Turkey Related by Trooper G.W. Handsley, Second Light Horse Regiment ; written by Sergeant J.R. Foster, 2nd edition c 1920. nla.gov.au
• Sample chapters from Other Ranks of Kut by P. W. Long, M.M. Flight Sergeant R.A.F, 1938. Transcription of the Preface, Author’s Note, Chapter One and Chapter Six only, with details of the titles of the remaining chapters. saradistribution.com. The author was at the time Driver Percy Walter Long, 67528, 63rd Battery, R.F.A. Long’s account starts on 30th April 1916, the day after the surrender of Kut. From the preface by Sir Arnold Wilson, M.P. “Of 2,592 British rank and file taken prisoner at Kut, 70 per cent died in captivity”. More about the book
• An American Physician in Turkey : a narrative of adventures in peace and in war by Clarence D Ussher and Grace H Knapp 1917 Archive.org. The author was a medical missionary. The chapters from page 213 cover the war period.
• Baghdad Railway
  • C 1916 Map showing Route of the Baghdad Railway showing yet to be constructed tunnels. globalsecurity.org.
  • The Short Cut to India, the record of a journey along the route of the Baghdad Railway by David Fraser 1909 Archive.org. Includes a description of the areas where the railway had not then been constructed such as the Taurus and Amanus Mountains.
  • The Baghdad Railway by Captain S. F. Newcombe, R E and Lieut, J. P. S. Greig R E The Geographical Journal Volume 44, No. 6 (Dec., 1914), pp. 577-580. jstor.org . Describes a journey in May 1914. Includes photographs. Available to read online for free, but first you must register with JSTOR, see Miscellaneous tips.
  • "Germany’s Railway Problems in Asiatic Turkey" by R J Bjurstedt page 647 Popular Mechanics May 1916. Google Books. Includes a map of the route of the Baghdad Railway.
  • The War and the Bagdad Railway; the story of Asia Minor and its relation to the present conflict by Morris Jastrow 3rd edition 1918 (first published 1917) with a Map showing the route of the railway