Salonica and the Balkans (First World War)

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Alternative spelling

Salonica, Salonika

Official History

Military Operations Macedonia compiled by Captain Cyril Falls

Volume I: From the Outbreak of War to the Spring of 1917

Volume II: From the Spring of 1917 to the End of the War.

Part of the series: History of the Great War based on Official Documents. First published 1933-1935, London by HMSO, with later reprints, including a 1996 edition by the Imperial War Museum/Battery Press.

Some of the maps from these two volumes are available online. The French Official History is available online. Refer Historical books online, below.

Italy

The Apulia region of Italy was used as a rest area for British troops serving in the Salonika campaign. There were several rest camps there, as well as Base Hospitals and stores depot.

The British Salonika Force and the Army of the Black Sea

Immediately after the Armistice with Turkey orders had been issued for British troops to move to the Caucasus, due to the situation there. Troops were sent from the nearest British forces available, from the Salonika Force, and from North Persia [Mesopotamia Force]. Subsequently all troops came under control of the British Salonika Force, which later became known as the Army of the Black Sea, with Headquarters at Constantinople.

See Norperforce for these actions.

External links

• Details about Military Operations Macedonia, Volume II The Official British History. balkanalysis.com
• The British Army in Macedonia bulgarianartillery.it. Listing of regiments and some officers. Possibly sourced from the Official History volumes.
• "Macedonia 1916-1918: Indian Military Transport Units in Macedonia" by Harry Fecitt, Harry’s Sideshows kaiserscross.com
• "The 9th (Service) Battalion the Border Regiment (Pioneers) in Macedonia November 1915 - March 1919" by Harry Fecitt Harry’s Sideshows kaisercross.com
• "The 9th (Service) Battalion East Lancashire Regiment in Macedonia November 1915 - March 1919" by Harry Fecitt Harry’s Sideshows kaisercross.com
• 801 MT COY ASC 801st Mechanical Transport Company of the Army Service Corps [British Army]
• Great War Forum includes a category "Salonika & the Balkans"
• Salonika Campaign Society The Society's Journal is The New Mosquito, published from April 2000. An archived webpage shows the contents of some Journals to Issue 32, September 2015.
• IWM catalogue details of The Mosquito : The Official Organ Of The Salonika Reunion Association 1927-1964, and The Mosquito Index Also "Salonika Memories : the Mosquito, 1915-1919" Imperial War Museums. Note: the items themselves are not available online.
• Salonika: The Forgotten Front. Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC).
• "The Indian Cemetery In Salonica" by Helen Abadzi. For deaths 1916-1920. Website of the "Indo-Hellenic Society for Culture & Development", November 30th, 2006. This title is also available on academia.edu.
• "Military Cemeteries Of The First World War In Macedonia Region: Routes Of Reading History In Search The Common Cultural Heritage" by Eleni Gavra and Vlasis Vlasidis macedonian-heritage.gr. 1st Specialty International Conference on Monumental Cemeteries. Knowledge, Conservation, Restyling and Innovation, (Μodena, 3-5 May, 2006), Roma, 2007, ISBN 978 88 54801147-8, vol. 1, pp.179-189
• Soldiers’ Stories: [Diary extracts] Captain Noel Drury of 6th Battalion The Royal Dublin Fusiliers 1915-1916. National Army Museum.
• Memoir of Jane McLennan, Australian Army Nursing Service. Enlisted on 28 May 1917 for overseas service. Served No. 3 Unit, 60th General Hospital Salonika. In March 1918 she was invalided back to Australia with heart disease. Original diary with transcript. State Library of Queensland. From page 23 "The night staff had to take every precaution against mosquito bites and wore gloves, puttees, hat and a net veil on duty but many of the sisters went down with the disease [malaria] in spite of these precautions". Jane McLennan: Time Line “A State of War” State Library of Queensland.
• [1918 Balkans] "Diary of Lt Victor Edward Borgonon (1882-1966)"
• A Field Ambulance In Salonika, 1916-17 Health History @Huddersfield University
• Photograph: A convoy of lorries from 689 Motor Transport Company (ASC) halted on the Seres Road c 1917 iwm.org.uk
• Serbian Great War Digital Library National Library of Serbia. Includes images, maps, some books in English.
• Lost Bulgaria, photographs of Bulgarian history includes a category All photos of the First World War (1914-1918) lostbulgaria.com. Bulgarian website, but it is possible to select the English language option (or Google Chrome will translate automatically).

Prisoners of War

• 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.
  • Bulgarian Prison Camps. Click on the map for a list of the camps in Bulgaria.
  • "Appendix A: Prison Camps: Bulgaria". 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 Bulgarian Prison Camps

• Prisoners of War in Bulgaria during the First World War A dissertation submitted as part of the Tripos Examination in the Faculty of History, Cambridge University, April 2012. No author is given on the paper but elsewhere the author is given as Rumen Cholakov. This is a link to a pdf download. Once downloaded, depending on your browser, you may need to look in your download folder.The camp at Plovdiv [Philippopolis, Philippoupolis] housed all British and most French prisoners from 1916 onwards.
• Prisoners of War and Internees (South East Europe) by Bogdan Trifunović. encyclopedia.1914-1918. Briefly mentions British POWs in Bulgaria.
• Plovdiv Central Cemetery, Bulgaria. Contains Commonwealth War Graves from several sites. ww1cemeteries.com
• Also see Prisoners of the Turks (First World War) for an indication of the types of records which may be available, including the National Archives records FO 383. In particular FO383/370 contains an informative file 4 inches thick.

Historical books online

• The Balkans: A Laboratory of History by William M Sloane, Professor of History, Columbia University, 1914. Archive.org. Revised and Enlarged edition 1920 Archive.org
• Secrets of the Balkans: Seven Years of a Diplomatist’s Life in the Storm Centre of Europe by Charles J Vopicka, United States Envoy…to Roumania, Serbia and Bulgaria 1913-1920. 1920 Archive.org
• 14 Maps from Military Operations Macedonia of a total of approximately 23. Aikaterini Laskaridis Foundation.
• 1918 Map of Serbia showing the daily progress of the Allied and Serbian armies northwards, as they liberated the country from occupying Bulgarian, Austrian and German forces, from 15 September to 21 November 1918. [Imprimerie du Ministère de la Guerre de la Marine], 1918 nla.gov.au
• "Despatch from Lieutenant -General G.F. Milne dated 8th October 1916" The London Gazette. Publication date: 5 December 1916 Supplement: 29851 Page:11931

"Despatch from Lieutenant -General G.F. Milne dated 1st October 1917" The London Gazette. Publication date:13 November 1917 Supplement: 30380 Page: 11779

"Despatch from General Sir G.F. Milne dated 1st December 1918" The London Gazette. Publication date: 21 January 1919 Supplement: 31139 Page: 1169

Despatch from General Sir G.F. Milne, a one page supplement to the despatch dated 1st December 1918 The London Gazette. Publication date: 14 October 1919 Supplement: 31600 Page:12733

• French Official Histories: Les Armées françaises dans la Grande Guerre sga.defense.gouv.fr. French language. Includes: Tome VIII. La campagne d'Orient (Dardanelles et Salonique) in three volumes: Premier volume.La campagne d'Orient jusqu'à l'intervention de la Roumanie (février 1915 - août 1916); Deuxième volume. La campagne d'Orient depuis l'intervention de la Roumanie en août 1916 jusqu'en avril 1918; Troisième volume. La campagne d'Orient, d'avril 1918 à décembre 1918. There are maps (Cartes) and panoramic sketches (Croquis panoramiques).
• German semi Official History: Herbstschlacht in Macedonien, Cernabogen 1916 by Georg Strutz 1925. Band [Volume] 5 in the series Schlachten des Weltkrieges. Oö. Landesbibliothek, the Digital State Library of Upper Austria. German language. With maps and photographs which may be located by clicking on the Thumbnail gallery. Archive.org version 1921, where it is classified as Heft [Issue] 3.
• Official History of Austria-Hungary: Österreich-Ungarns Letzter Krieg, 1914-1918 Chief Editor Edmund Glaise-Horstenau. In seven volumes, each with a supplementary volume (Beilagen/Beil) of Maps, and a final volume of miscellaneous appendices (Registerband). Oö. Landesbibliothek, the Digital State Library of Upper Austria. German language.
  • Austria-Hungary's Last War, 1914-1918 In English, translated by Stan Hanna.
• History of the Great War: Medical Services: General History, Volume IV by G W Macpherson 1924. Includes Salonika. Archive.org

Also in this series: Medical Services: Diseases of the War Volume I, Includes Malaria. Archive.org.

Memoranda on some medical diseases in the Mediterranean war area, with some sanitary notes HMSO 1916. Archive.org

"Typhus Fever" page 133 History of the Great War: Medical Services: Diseases of the War Volume I Archive.org

Typhus Fever: with particular reference to the Serbian Epidemic by Richard P Strong, Director of the American Red Cross and International Sanitary Commissions to Serbia. 1920 Archive.org

Anti-malaria Work in Macedonia among British Troops by W G Willoughby 1918. Pdf download, Digital Library of India.

Salonika Diary 1915-1918. (Harold Arthur) Thomas Fairbank was an Officer in the Royal Army Medical Corps. His unit was moved to Macedonia to serve in Struma valley, and he was appointed consulting surgeon to the British Salonika Force. From the Fairbank Papers, University of Cambridge Digital Library. Typed manuscript, photographs etc.

• "Casualties in Months, Salonica" page 288 Statistics of the Military Effort of the British Empire during the Great War, 1914-1920. The War Office HMSO 1922 Archive.org
• The Royal Army Service Corps: A History of Transport and Supply in the British Army, Volume II by Colonel R H Beadon 1931. Link to an Adobe pdf download. Digital Library of India. Includes the First World War period, with a chapter on the Balkans.
• A History of the Army Ordnance Services, Volume III: The Great War by Major General Arthur Forbes 2nd edition 1932, first published 1929. Pdf download, Digital Library of India. Includes a chapter on Salonika.
• The Post Office of India in the Great War edited by H.A. Sams 1922 Archive.org. "The Dardanelles, Salonika and Constantinople 1915-1919" page 103.
• War in the Air: being the story of the part played in the Great War by the Royal Air Force Volume V by H A Jones 1935. Part of the series History of the Great War based on official documents. Includes Macedonia. Archive.org
• The War and the Balkans by Noel Buxton MP and Charles Roden Buxton 1915 Archive.org
• Russia, the Balkans and the Dardanelles by Granville Fortescue, Special Correspondent of The Daily Telegraph 1915 Archive.org
• The Intervention of Bulgaria : and the Central Macedonian question by Crawfurd Price 1915 Archive.org

The Balkan Cockpit, the political and military story of the Balkan Wars in Macedonia by W H Crawfurd Price 1915 Archive.org

Light on the Balkan Darkness by Crawfurd Price 1915 Archive.org

The Dawn of Armageddon or The provocation by Serbia, (vide German note to neutrals, Jan. 11, 1917) by Crawfurd Price 1917 Archive.org

The Role of Serbia. A brief account of Serbia's place in world politics and her services during the war by Crawfurd Price, formerly Correspondent of the Times with the Serbian Army. 1918 Archive.org

Serbia's Part in the War, Volume I: The Rampart against Pan-Germanism being the political and military story of the Austro-Serbian campaigns by Crawfurd Price 1918. Archive.org. This appears to have been the only volume published.

• Through the Serbian campaign : the Great Retreat of the Serbian Army by Gordon Gordon-Smith 1916 Archive.org. During the Word War, the author, a journalist from 1887, was war correspondent of the Daily Graphic of London, of the Manchester Guardian and of the New York Tribune.

From Serbia to Jugoslavia: Serbia's Victories, Reverses and Final Triumph, 1914-1918 by Gordon Gordon-Smith 1920 Archive.org.

• The Guardians of the Gate : Historical Lectures on the Serbs by the Rev R. G. D Laffan 1918. Archive.org. Based on a series of lectures on [then] modern Serbian history given to the scattered companies of the [British] ASC (MT) attached to the Serbian Army.
• My Balkan Log by J Johnston Abraham 1922 Archive.org

"With the First Red Cross Mission to Serbia". Extract from Chapter X , Surgeon's Journey by James Johnston Abraham, in charge of The First British Red Cross Serbian Mission in 1915. vlib.us

• The Story of a Red Cross Unit in Serbia by James Berry, F May Dickinson Berry, W Lyon Blease 1916 Archive.org. The Anglo-Serbian Hospital, or the Royal Free Hospital.

The Luck of Thirteen : Wanderings and Flight through Montenegro and Serbia by Mr and Mrs Jan Gordon 1916 Archive.org. Jan was acting as engineer to Dr Berry’s Serbian Mission from the Royal Free Hospital, and his wife Jo was a V A D. After six months they took a holiday, leaving with two knapsacks.

• The Flaming Sword in Serbia and Elsewhere by Mrs St. Clair Stobart 1916 Archive.org The author organized and directed a hospital for the Serbian Relief Fund

My diary in Serbia, April 1, 1915-Nov. 1, 1915 by Monica M Stanley, attached to the Stobart Field Hospital in Serbia. 1916 Archive.org

Letters from a Field Hospital by Mabel Dearmer 1915 Archive.org. The husband of author Mabel Dearmer was appointed as Chaplain to the British units in Serbia, so she volunteered as an orderly with the Stobart Serbian Unit. She died at Kragujevatz of typhoid fever July 1915.

The Retreat from Serbia through Montenegro and Albania by Olive M Aldridge 1916. The author was with the Serbian Relief Fund under Mrs Stobart from July 1915, until she reached London in December 1915. Archive.org

"The Great Retreat In Serbia In 1915" by M. I. Tatham. (Scroll down). First published in Everyman at War: Sixty Personal Narratives of the War edited by C. B. Purdom 1930. Miss M I Tatham served (1915) with Stobart Field Hospital (Serbian Relief Unit), Kraguyevatz, Serbia. edinburghs-war.ed.ac.uk

A Farmer in Serbia by Ellen Chivers Davies. 1916 Hathi Trust Digital Library, accessible to those in some areas such as North America. An account of the nursing (not agricultural) experiences of the 2nd British Farmers Unit [so called because of the funding], Serbian Relief Fund. The author became a prisoner.

• With Serbia into Exile; an American's Adventures with the Army that Cannot Die by Fortier Jones 1916 Archive.org. The author was initially (most likely) with the Columbia University Relief Expedition, for the relief of non combatants. These men were recruited as drivers - each to have an automobile for carrying supplies together with an English-speaking Serb to act as an interpreter. He subsequently joined the Christitch Mission at Valjevo, run by Mlle Anna Christitch, of the London Daily Express.
• The Stricken Land: Serbia as we saw it by Alice and Claude Askew 1916 Archive.org. In 1915, both Alice and Claude Askew, who were authors, travelled to Serbia as part of a relief effort with a British field hospital that would be attached to the Second Serbian Army. They were also Special Correspondents for the British newspaper Daily Express. (Wikipedia)
• "Serbia", page 79, Part Three: A History of the Scottish Women's Hospitals by Eva Shaw McLaren 1919 Archive.org, (from a microfilm copy).

"Diary of a Dresser of the Serbian Unit of the Scottish Women’s Hospital" by L E Fraser page 776 Blackwood’s Magazine, no 197 January-June 1915 Archive.org

At the Serbian Front in Macedonia by P E Stebbing 1917 Archive.org. The author was Transport Officer to a Unit of the Scottish Women’s Hospitals (The author had previously spent many years in the Indian Forest Service.)

• Experiences of a Woman Doctor in Serbia by Dr Caroline Matthews 1916 Archive.org. The author worked independently in Serbia in a Military Hospital as a Red Cross doctor. She subsequently became a POW and was suspected of being a spy. Later in her captivity in Hungary she was placed with a group of fellow prisoners from a Scottish Women’s Hospitals Unit.
• A Nation at Bay: What an American woman saw and did in suffering Serbia by Ruth S Farnam 1918 Archive.org. She initially worked at a hospital run by Madame Grouitch, an American married to a Serbian diplomat. Subsequently she joined a group connected with Prince and Princess Alexis where she was in charge of medical stores for hospitals in the area, Later she raised funds in England and America, and visited the American unit of the Scottish Women’s Hospitals at Ostrove.
• Amelia Peabody Tileston and her canteens for the Serbs by Mary Wilder Tileston 1920 Archive.org.
• Behind the Wheel of a War Ambulance by Robert Whitney Imbrie 1918 Archive.org. The author was a volunteer with the American Ambulance, in France and the Balkans, (Macedonia, Albania) where he was attached to the French “Army of the Orient” L’Armee Francaise d’Orient (French Expeditionary Force). The author was, or became, part of the American Field Service. Some extracts from this book are included in

"In the Orient" [Balkans], page 341 History of the American Field Service in France, “Friends of France", 1914-1917, Volume I. 1920. Archive.org

• An English woman-sergeant in the Serbian Army by Flora Sandes 1916 Archive.org. LibriVox audio recording Archive.org

The Autobiography of a Woman Soldier: A Brief Record of Adventure with the Serbian Army 1916-1919 by Flora Sandes c 1927 Archive.org

• With the French in France and Salonika by Richard Harding Davis New York 1916 Archive.org
• From The Motor Cycle, Volume 16 Archive.org
  • "The Supreme Test. The Motor Cycle makes good in the Balkans" page 116B February 3rd, 1916.
  • "Despatch Riding including Salonika" page [1]74 February 24th 1916.
  • "With the Salonika Forces" page 214 March 2nd 1916.
• The Story of the Salonica Army by G Ward Price, the official Correspondent of the Allied Forces in the Balkans 1918. New York edition, published by Edward J Clode Archive.org
• In Salonica With Our Army by Harold Lake Archive.org. Also published as Campaigning in the Balkans by Lieutenant Harold Lake, New York 1918. Archive.org. The author was with the British Army, an officer in what appears to be an infantry regiment.
• The Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers in the World War by Sir Frank Fox. [With plates and maps.] 1928. British Library Digital. Includes a chapter on Salonika .
• Regimental Records of the Royal Welch Fusiliers (23rd Foot). Volume IV 1915-1918 Turkey-Bulgaria-Austria by Major C H Dudley Ward 1929 Archive.org.
• On Four Fronts with the Royal Naval Division by Geoffrey Sparrow MC, and J N MacBean Ross MC Surgeons RN 1918 Archive.org. Includes Gallipoli and Salonica
• "The Royal Marines in Serbia" page 409 Britain's Sea Soldiers. A Record of the Royal Marines during the War 1914-1919. Compiled by General Sir H. E. Blumberg, Royal Marines 1927. Hathi Trust Digital Library.
• "Obstruction’s Gentle Art" by Douglas Walshe pages 433-449 Blackwood’s Magazine January-June 1919, Volume 205. The start of the Salonika Campaign from 30 September 1915.

With the Serbs in Macedonia by Douglas Walshe 1920 Archive.org. The author was an officer with 708 Company M T, ASC, a Light Supply and Ammunition Column of Ford vans attached to the Serbian Army.

• Macedonian Musings by V J [Vincent Julian] Seligman 1918 Archive.org. The author was an officer in the ASC, the Requisitioning or Purchasing Officer for the Xth Infantry Brigade (page 51).

The Salonica Side-show by V J Seligman 1919 Archive.org

• The Song of Tiadatha by Captain Owen Rutter (‘Klip-Klip’), first published 1919. The author was with the 7th Battalion, Wiltshire Regiment and edited the Balkan News. He formerly was in the North Borneo Civil Service.
• Salonica and After, the Sideshow that ended the War by H. Collinson Owen, Editor of the Balkan News, and Official correspondent in the Near East 1919 Archive.org
• The Salonika Front by Arthur James Mann, late Recording Officer 22 Balloon Company; paintings by William Thomas Wood. 1920 Archive .org
• Serbia and Europe, 1914-1920 by Dr Lazare Marcovitch (Lazar Markovic) 1920 Archive.org
• A Subaltern in Serbia and some Letters from the Struma Valley by Captain A Donovan Young, Captain, Indian Army. Catalogued 1922. Archive.org
• The Macedonian Campaign by Luigi Villari 1922 Archive.org
• Reports of the American Red Cross Commissions upon their activities in Macedonia, Thrace, Bulgaria, the Ægean Islands and Greece 1919 Archive.org

The American Red Cross Commission to Greece: Final report, Department of civilian relief, exclusive of the districts of the Aegean Islands and eastern Macedonia 1919

The American Red Cross Commission to Greece:Relief work in eastern Macedonia 1919

• Serbia To Kut by Joseph T Parfit 1917. Pdf download, Digital Library of India - full title: Serbia to Kut: an account of the War in the Bible Lands [Balkans, Egypt, Palestine, Syria and Mesopotamia]. An overview of the conflict. The author, then or subsequently, was Canon of St George’s Jerusalem.
• Vocabularies: English, German, Magyar, Serbian, Bulgarian, Roumanian, Greek, Turkish Compiled by the Geographical Section of the Naval Intelligence Division, Naval Staff, Admiralty. HMSO. 1920 Archive.org