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The minelayer Nusret, believed to be the only surviving warship from the famous Gallipoli Campaign of World War One, has been restored and converted into a museum located in the southern Turkish city of Mersin.
At a ceremony Saturday, the restored warship was unveiled in Mersin’s Çanakkale Park, where it will now serve as a public museum.
Having spent the past 15 years lying on mud flats in the port of Tarsus, where the Nusret had been abandoned by its former owners, who had used it as a cargo ship after it had been sold out of the navy in 1957.
Speaking at the ceremony, Tarsus mayor Burhanettin Kocamaz said the Nusret had a famous place in the history of Turkey and deserved to be saved.
“Volunteers rescued the Nusret and donated it to the Mersin State Hospital and Turkish Red Crescent Society,” he said. “The Tarsus Municipality eventually decided to repair the ship and convert it into a museum in 2002.”
The Nusret won immortality for its role in the defeat of the Allied fleet as it tried to fight its way through the Dardanelles Strait on March 18, 1915.
Days before the battle, the Nusret slipped into the strait under the cover of darkness and laid a new minefield parallel to the shore in Erenköy Bay after Allied ships had been seen to manoeuvre in the position during preliminary bombardments.
On March 18, a fleet of 18 British and French battleships, accompanied by dozens of smaller vessels, entered the strait. Using their heavy guns to try and subdue the Turkish defences, the fleet planned to sail through the Dardanelles into the Sea of Marmara and then on to Istanbul and force the Ottoman government to surrender, knocking Turkey out of the war.
The Allied commander, Admiral John de Robeck, believed that most of the mines had been swept from the strait, making the passage relatively safe for his fleet. However, he had not counted on the Nusret and her secret minefield.
At the height of the battle, two British battleships, the Ocean and the Irresistible, blundered into the minefield laid by the Nusret and were severely damaged, both being abandoned by their crews and later sinking. With the loss of the French battleship Bouvet with nearly all her crew of 650, de Robeck conceded defeat, ordering the fleet to return to its base at Mudros.
The Turkish victory, in no small part inspired by the Nusret, marked the last time the Allied fleet attempted to force the straits. Five weeks later, the Allies launched a land invasion of the Gallipoli Peninsula, which ended in an even more bloody defeat seven months later. | |
