Rensselaer Union, Volume 10, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 February 1878 — The Fortifications of the Dardanelles. [ARTICLE]

The Fortifications of the Dardanelles.

A writer In the AUgcmeine Zeituno says: “ The straits at Gallipoli are about a German mile (four English) broad. To the southeast is Lamsaki, on the woody Asiatic shore, just opposite the mouth of the A£goepotamos; a little farther on the straits gradually beoomo more narrow up to Sestos and Abydos, celebrated as the scene of the story of Hero and Leander, and still more as the place where the Army of Xerxes and that of Alexander under Parmenion crossed to the European Bhore. The first Turkish fort is on the adjoining cape of Nagara-Burun.” “The straits then turn directly to the south, and here is their narrowest part, not quite two thousand meters wide, between ‘the Castles of the Dardanelles' at Tchanak-Kalessi, on the Asiatic, and Kilid-Bahri, on the Roumelian side. The old fortifications consist mainly of towers and brick walls, which shortly before the outbreak of the war were armed with big guns of a very old pattern, some with stone projectiles. A short time ago some of these walls were pulled down, especially those to the south of Tchanak-Kalessi, in order to lay down the huge Krupp guns presented by Herr Krupp to the late Sultan Abdul Aziz. The Castle of TchanakKalessi commands the whole of the southern part of the Dardanelles up to the /Egean Sea; and it is therefore the central point of all the maritime defences between Kum-Kaleh on the south and Gallipoli on the north. Beside the above castle three batteries —Medjdio, Kische-Burun and NagaraBurun—have been recently armed with Krupp guns of various calibers and twenty and six-and-thirty-pounders. Kilid-Bahri, on the European shore, formerly also had an imposing park of artillery consisting of old guns, which, however, were of but little practical use. Some of them bore the arms of the Venetian Republic, and there was an immense quantity of stone projectiles. These have all been- removed, and most of the cannon have been replaced by Krupp guns, which are stated to be fifteen in number. There are also in the neighborhood of Kilid-Bahri three shore batteries: Dermen Tabia, with eleven guns (including five Krupps); Tchan-Tabia, with seven guns, and Boali-Tabia, with twenty old twelve and six-and-thirty-pounders. “In proceeding southward from the Castles of the Dardanelles, one perceives on the Asiatic side a lofty and commanding shore, which has hitherto not been fortified, the site of the ancient Dardania, which has given its name to the straits. At the southern entrance to the Hellespont are the two forts of Kum-Kaleh and Sedil-Baliri, the former on the coast of the Troad, and the latter at the extreme southerly end of the Thracian Chersonese. These forts were erected by Sultan Mohammed IV. in 1659, and they have lately been strengthened by several batteries on the Roumolian shore. Their position is not, on the whole, so favorable from a military point of view as that of the Castles of the Dardanelles, and Sedil-Bahri, from its isolated position, might easily be threatened by a land force coming from the shores of the jEgean. “As to the question of the possibility of forcing a passage through tho straits, the writer thinks that such an undertaking, though not absolutely impossible, could in the present state of the fortifications not be carried out by an iron-clad fleet without several ot its snips. He believes, however, that owing to the strength of the current, especially when a north wind is blowing, it would be scarcely possible to close up the channel by means of torpedoes.”