Dunsterforce

Dunsterforce
Dunsterville (far left) with staff
Active	1917 - 1919
Country	Britain, Commonwealth
Allegiance	Allies
Type	Infantry
Role	Detachment
Size	Brigade
Engagements	Battle of Baku
Commanders
Notable commanders	Lionel Dunsterville, Ranald MacDonell

Established in 1917, Dunsterforce was an Allied military mission of under 1,000 Australian, New Zealand, British, and Canadian troops (drawn from the Mesopotamian and Western Fronts), accompanied by armoured cars, deployed from Hamadan some 350 km across Qajar Persia. It was named after its commander General Lionel Dunsterville. Its mission was to gather information, train and command local forces, and prevent the spread of German propaganda. Later on, Dunsterville was told to take and protect the Baku oil fields. The force was initially delayed by 3,000 Russian Bolshevik troops at Enzeli but then proceeded by ship to the port of Baku on the Caspian Sea. This was the primary target for the advancing Turkish forces and Dunsterforce endured a short, brutal siege in September 1918 before being forced to withdraw.

Order of battle

Soldiers of the 39th Brigade at Enzeli after being evacuated from Baku.

The British element of Dunsterforce comprised 39th Brigade of 13th (Western) Division. On July 1, 1918 the brigade received orders to be detached from the division for attachment to the North Persia Force. The brigade's component units left the division between July 10 and August 19 . Brigade HQ arrived in Baku at Dunsterforce HQ on August 24.

39th Brigade

9th (Service) Battalion, The Royal Warwickshire Regiment

7th (Service) Battalion, The Gloucestershire Regiment

9th (Service) Battalion, The Worcestershire Regiment

7th (Service) Battalion, The North Staffordshire Regiment

39th Machine Gun Company, Machine Gun Corps (MGC)

39th Supply & Transport Column, Army Service Corps (ASC)

39th Trench Mortar Battery

Soviet account

Soviet archivist Vasili Mitrokhin claimed that Dunsterforce's objective was, under the guise of defending British India, to secure a foothold in the Caucasus. The force would then co-operate with counter-revolutionary forces to overthrow the Baku Soviet and seize control of the whole of the oil-rich Caucasus, the Caspian Sea, and all surrounding regions. Mitrokhin claimed that Gen. Dunsterville had "forty Ford vans loaded with gold and silver" to pay for the operation.

See also

• Battle of Baku
• 26 Baku Commissars

Further reading

• Major M. H. Donohoe, With the Persian Expedition (1919? Reprinted by The Naval & Military Press)
• Major-General L. C. Dunsterville C.B., The Adventures of Dunsterforce (London, 1920)
• Paul Easton, 'Tough little Kiwi fought to the death,' The Dominion Post (Wellington), 17 April 2010, p.A5
• Joyce Marlow, Billy Goes to War - illustrated, fictionalised account of the Dunsterforce expedition based on a real soldier's diary and photographs (London: Ronald Whiting & Wheaton, 1967)
• Official History of the New Zealand Rifle Brigade
• Bryan Perrett and Anthony Lord, The Czar's British Squadron (London: William Kimber, 1981)
• Australians In Mesopotamia

External links

• The Adventures of Dunsterforce by L.C. Dunsterville
• article on Dunsterforce's top ranking Canadian officer, Lt. Col. John Weightman Warden