een silenced. Mine
sweeping operations were then begun. For this work English-Scotch
trawlers from the North Sea had been brought down and the crews of
these little unprotected boats added many pages of heroism to the book
of great deeds of the Dardanelles operations.

The following day a division of the battleship fleet entered the
straits for a distance of four miles, the mine sweepers having cleared
the channel for that distance. The _Albion_, _Vengeance_ and
_Majestic_ opened fire with their 12-inch guns on Fort Dardanos, a
battery mounting nothing but 5.9-inch guns, situated on the Asiatic
shore some distance below the Narrows. Fort Dardanos bravely replied,
however, until put out of action, as did several concealed batteries,
the presence of which the British and French had not suspected.

With the completion of this operation the allied command believed they
had not only permanently silenced the forts guarding the entrance to
the Dardanelles but had, as well, made both sides of the straits then
too warm for the Turkish troops. Accordingly forces of marines were
landed to complete the work of demolition. They were successful except
at Kum Kale where the Turks proved to have maintained a large force.
The British landing party was driven back to its boats in a hurry
after suffering a score of casualties.

The apparent success of these naval operations raised high hopes in
Great Britain and in the other allied countries. The British
Government, which had established a censorship for all news that might
tend to depress the British public, saw no reason for interfering to
prevent the publication of news that might tend unduly in the other
direction. The newspapers and the so-called military experts gave the
public what they evidently wanted. The attack upon the Dardanelles,
according to the majority of these, was practically over. A few voices
of warning were raised, but they were immediately silenced as
"croakers" and "pessimists" and even "pro-Germans." Absurd reports of
consternation and panic in Constantinople were sent broadcast
throughout Great Britain, and thence to the whole world. Thousands of
Turks, in abject fear, were pictured as spending most of their days
and nights on the housetops of the sacred city, anxiously awaiting the
first glimpse of the victorious allied fleet sailing up the Golden
Horn. Hundreds of thousands were said to be fleeing into Asia Minor
and preparations were being made by the sulta