L is for London, HMS London - Gallipoli and the Dardanelles

These all come from an old envelope with an Edwardian stamp and the faded message "Taken aboard HMS London" in pencil, although some of them have clearly been taken ashore at 'Anzac Cove'. My Grandfather, eventually Admiral Hall, was conscripted across from the Merchant Marine (in 1915 - I think?) and served on HMS London, from Wikipedia;

"HMS London was the lead ship of the London class of pre-dreadnought battleships built for the British Royal Navy. The Londons were near repeats of the preceding Formidable-class battleships, but with modified armour protection. The ship was laid down in December 1898, was launched in September 1899, and was completed in June 1902. Commissioned the same month, she served with the Mediterranean Fleet until early 1907. She was assigned to the Nore Division of the Home Fleet for nearly a year before transferring to the Channel Fleet. Rendered obsolete with the emergence of the new dreadnoughts in late 1906, she underwent an extensive refit in 1909, after which she served with the Atlantic Fleet. She was assigned to the Second Home Fleet in 1912 as part of the 5th Battle Squadron, and was temporarily fitted with a makeshift ramp for experiments with naval aircraft until 1913.

Following the outbreak of World War I, the squadron was attached to the Channel Fleet before London was detached in March 1915 to participate in the Dardanelles Campaign, supporting ANZAC forces as they landed at Gaba Tepe and Anzac Cove on 25 April 1915. She remained in the Mediterranean, supporting the Italian Royal Navy in the Adriatic Sea until October 1916. Returning to the United Kingdom, she was inactive until being converted to a minelayer in early 1918, which entailed the removal of her main armament. She served with the Grand Fleet's 1st Minelaying Squadron until the end of the war. Placed in reserve in 1919, she was eventually broken up for scrap in 1920."

The photographs appear to be 'official' or semi-official enough to assume there will be copies in national archives somewhere (IWM or NMM), and apart from the developers stamp and a penciled number (suggesting they are from a larger set) there is nothing else to date or place them, so I can only post them here with minimal blurb and the requested acknowledgement to Alfieri!

Convoying

Seems to be a ship's service with the ship's company to the left, a god-botherer and some officers in the middle and soldiers (presumably ANZAC's) to the right. I don't think this is on London - too many turrets?

Some soldiers getting a bit of sun on deck - note the shadows.

Bombardment in support of the landings?

Landing Fleet

On Board Ship

Summer dress.

Winter dress.

My brief research seems to say London only lost seven crew in the whole war, each death having a different date, so likely to be accidental or medical/natural causes rather than a major action; she had a 'quiet' war, however, there is a second series of Dardanelles shots, which I packed, sealed and took to storage before remembering I wanted to scan them as well (so we'll have them in a year or two now!), among which was a shot which appears to show one of the main six-inch guns blown-up (overheating, cooked-off round, lucky Turkish shot?), which - in doing so - appears to have damaged the pom-pom/12-pounder (?) in the center of the anchor-chain capstan (?) to the left here; that is not their normal configuration!

So; it may be that what we see here is someone getting an award for actions undertaken in that incident? Equally it could be something as boring as a pay-parade, they seem to be receiving something in their hats, and there's a queue behind the guy in the center.

ANZAC Positions

Remarkably similar to the scenes at the end of 'Gallipoli' the movie as Mel Gibson's 'Franc' is running through the line to try and get the message through.

One of those Light Horsemen?

A limber, a stack of bicycles (?) and landing barges in the background.

Relaxing on an unloading pontoon.

Look at the pile of stores at the foot of the scarp.

The previous shot must have been taken from the far pontoon, looking across the nearer pontoon toward where the photographer is standing in this picture, the stores now to the left.

A landing barge up against a pontoon

Eventually I will hand all this archival material to a museum, but this is only a fraction of what I've found, and while most of it is going to storage without being scanned, I will get it all up here over the next few years, god willing! There is a fascinating sequence taken off Murmansk/Archangel, obviously of the 1919 Anglo-American invasion of Russia (one of the last boxes we had to tick! There's only about 15 nations on the planet we haven't at least shot-at now!), which shows shell-damage (presumably from 'Red' shore-batteries), one hole being inspected by a member of the Queen Alexandra's Royal Naval Nursing Service, who was on-board ship! While the bulk of it is later inter-war or RIN/IN stuff.