Exceptional Naval and Polar Awards from the Collection of RC Witte

‘The Naval History of Britain contains no page more wonderful than that which records the prowess of her submarines at the Dardanelles.’

Winston Churchill

An outstanding Great War submariner’s D.S.M. group of five awarded to Artificer Engineer L. C. Allen, Royal Navy, onetime attached Royal Australian Navy, who was decorated for his gallantry in E. 11’s epic patrols in the Sea of Marmara - patrols that resulted in the destruction of at least 90 enemy vessels and the award of the V.C. to his skipper, Martin Nasmith

Distinguished Service Medal, G.V.R. (R.A.N. 8286 L. C. Allen, Ch. E.R.A., H.M. Sub. E. 11); 1914-15 Star (269714 L. C. Allen, C.E.R.A. 2, R.N.); British War and Victory Medals (Art. Eng. L. C. Allen, R.N.); Royal Navy L.S. & G.C., G.V.R., 1st issue (269714 L. C. Allen, C.E.R.A. 2 Cl., H.M.A.S. Penguin), generally very fine or better (5) £4000-5000

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, Exceptional Naval and Polar Awards from the Collection of RC Witte.

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D.S.M. London Gazette 19 November 1915.

Leonard Charles Allen was serving on attachment to the Royal Australian Navy on the outbreak of hostilities in August 1914, and gained seagoing experience in the Australian submarines AE. 1 and AE. 2 prior to being recalled by the Royal Navy with an appointment in the E. 11 in May 1915.

“E. 11” - Scourge of the Marmara

Commanded by Martin Nasmith, who had been told by the C.-in-C. to ‘go and run amuck in the Marmara’, the E. 11 inflicted a devastating toll on enemy shipping over three patrols in the period May-December 1915, an extraordinary chapter of operational success recounted in many publications, not least Dardanelles Patrol - The Incredible Story of the E. 11, by Peter Shankland and Anthony Hunter, a definitive history drawn from eye-witness accounts. The following account of her work, however, has been drawn largely from Deeds That Thrill The Empire.

Having joined the Mediterranean Fleet in the Spring of 1915, E. 11 departed on her first patrol through the Narrows in the middle of May, and quickly found the enemy for, on surfacing to get fresh bearings on negotiating the Narrows, two battleships were seen to be lying a little further on. Such an opportunity was not to be let slip without an effort, and, necessarily keeping the periscope above water, Lieutenant-Commander Nasmith at once proceeded to put his boat in a suitable position for launching a torpedo. Unfortunately, the Turks sighted the periscope a minute or two too soon, and instantly the battleships began blazing away with their light guns as hard as they could. At the same time they ‘upped anchor’ and got under way, so there was nothing for it but for the E.11 to dive and hide herself until the furore had subsided. She was far too slow to catch the battleships if she ran submerged, and if she rose to the surface she would almost certainly have been breached by a shell. After a little, therefore, she gently settled herself on the bottom of the Straits, and there she remained until dusk.


That same evening she pushed on into the Sea of Marmara, where for several days she alternately rested and cruised about without finding anything that was worth the expenditure of a torpedo. Lieutenant-Commander Nasmith made Constantinople the centre of his operations during the whole of this raid, and his first reward came one Sunday morning, just before half-past six, when a big gunboat was seen cruising off the port. The submarine was ready for instant action, and in less than a minute the fatal torpedo was underway. At 6.25 the gunboat was hit; at 6.30 she had sunk, but not without giving the E.11 something of a shock. While she was heeling well over to the water's edge, a shot was fired that went clean through the submarine's periscope, carrying away about four inches of the diameter a few feet from the base, and leaving the rest standing. Had the shot struck about six feet lower, it would very probably have made a breach in the conning tower, and so rendered the submarine helpless, as she would not have been able to dive.

The very next day brought an adventure which, if it was not so exciting, at any rate did not lack in interest. A big steamer was sighted making her way from Constantinople towards the Dardanelles, and the E.11 came to the surface a short distance ahead, fired a shot across her bows, and brought her to a standstill. There happened to be a facetious American newspaper correspondent on board, and when Lieutenant-Commander Nasmith hailed “Who are you?” - meaning, of course, to inquire what the ship was and what was her business - this gentleman replied by giving his own name and that of the paper for which he was working. This was not good enough for the E.11. A few more questions elicited the fact that the ship was a Turkish transport, the Nagara, and when he got as far as that, Nasmith promptly replied, “Right. I am going to sink you”. “May we have time to get off?” queried the newspaper man, by this time rather subdued. “Yes”, came the answer from the submarine, “but be d..... quick about it.”

The Turks were so quick that they upset two of their boats in lowering them, and capsized several men into the water, though all of them managed to get into safety again. Then Nasmith went on board the ship to see what she carried. There was a six-inch gun, destined to strengthen the forts on the Dardanelles; there were several sets of mountings for weapons of large calibre; and there was a great quantity of ammunition for heavy guns on its way to the Dardanelles. The ship was, in fact, loaded from keel to upper deck with war material; and when the crew, and the American correspondent, had withdrawn to a safe distance, the submarine drew off, fired a torpedo, and sent the ship to the bottom.

The most audacious act of the E.11 was, however, her raid on Constantinople itself. Early one morning, while she was slowly cruising off the mouth of the harbour, she hailed a Turkish merchantman to stop; but the enemy ignored the demand and ran for all he was worth toward the harbour, with the E.11 in hot pursuit. It may have been this incident that gave Nasmith his inspiration; but however that may be, the E.11 found herself early one morning lying actually within the port of Constantinople itself. Observations were cautiously taken, and it was seen that a number of enemy transports were lying alongside the wharfs and that some of them actually had troops on board. The harbour of Constantinople is traversed by tricky currents, and although the E.11 fired two torpedoes, neither of them hit the object at which it was aimed. Nasmith's intention was, of course, to sink the transports, and although the first torpedo did not do that, it blew up a barge with such force that the transport Stamboul, lying close by, was so badly damaged that she had to be run ashore in order to save herself from sinking. The second torpedo did not hit a ship, but it exploded against the quayside and destroyed a considerable length of it. In the Turkish capital itself the moral effect of this attack was tremendous. Hearing the explosion of the two torpedoes and the noise of the guns - for the Turkish batteries went on firing long after the E.11 was safely out of sight - the civil population jumped to the conclusion the Allied Fleet had arrived before their city.

This by no means ended the thrilling experiences of the E.11. Before she set out on her return journey from the Sea of Marmara she had sunk in all one large gunboat, two transports, three small ships, and one ammunition ship (the Nagara), and had forced another store ship to run ashore; and when, on her way back, she was about to enter the Dardanelles again, Nasmith sighted another transport coming up astern, and he waited until she came along and then torpedoed her and sent her to the bottom. In all the E.11 destroyed eleven ships, no bad record for a small vessel with a crew of 30 officers and men, who had to face the gravest perils single-handed from the time they entered the Dardanelles until they left them. On the way out these perils were encountered in a most alarming form. As the E.11 was making her way seawards beneath the surface, those on board became aware of a resistance which was not of the sea, and every now and then a faint bump was heard against the vessel's side. Instinctively and instantly everyone on board realised what had happened.

The submarine had fouled the cable by which a floating mine was chained to its anchor on the sea bed, and the cable, instead of slipping past the smooth hull, had somehow become entangled in the forward hydroplanes. Any one of those ominous bumps might suffice to explode the mine and send the submarine to the bottom like a log. It was impossible for Nasmith to manoeuvre his boat in an effort to get rid of the thing, for he was passing through the most thickly mined area of the whole Straits, and any deviation from the set course would almost certainly have taken the boat straight to destruction. Nor could he rise to the surface and send a man out to detach the machine, for the churning screws of the patrol boats could be heard overhead. There was nothing for it but to carry on as slowly and as carefully as possible and to trust to Providence. For eleven miles the submarine crept on with sudden death dangling from her bows, a death from which those on board were saved only by the lightness of the bumps by which the mine had announced itself. A sharp blow would have detonated it. One can imagine what feelings of relief there were when the boat at last reached an area where she could 'break surface' in safety. Once afloat again, it did not take long to disentangle the cable and drop the mine over the side.

His courageous services brought Lieutenant-Commander Nasmith the award of the Victoria Cross, while his junior officers, Lieutenant Guy d'Oyly-Hughes and Lieutenant Robert Brown, R.N.R., received the Distinguished Service Cross, and all the Petty Officers and men the D.S.M., Allen among them.

Remarkably, Nasmith, his crew and the E. 11 returned to the Sea of Marmara for two further protracted and highly successful patrols. On the first of them, in July-August 1915, which lasted for 29 days, they sank the Turkish battleship Barbarossa, a gunboat, six transports, a steamer and 23 dhows, in addition to bombarding enemy troops and other military objectives along the coast. And on the second, which lasted for 42 days in November-December 1915 - the longest patrol accomplished by any submarine to date - they sank a destroyer, 11 steamers and 35 sailing ships.

And a closing glimpse of Allen at work may be found in Smoke on the Horizon:

‘But Nasmith had not given up hope. In the bowels of his ship was lodged a sage counsellor in matters concerning iron and steel. “Send for the Chief E.R.A. to have a look at it,” was all he said, and in due course Chief Engine Room Artificer L. C. Allen hove himself up through the conning-tower, and cast a sagacious eye over the ill-starred piece.

Could anything be done with it, Allen was asked, and replied that he thought something could. By cutting away the upper part of the mounting, which was fractured, and dropping the gun down into the lower part, he thought it could once more be fired, the only drawback being that one must be careful or one might fire through one's own ship.

So, while Nasmith took his boat away to unfrequented waters and saw to it that Allen was able to work undisturbed on the surface, the artificers set to work with cold chisel, hammer, and drill, and in twenty-four hours the gun was ready for action once more.’

Sold with an original letter from the Naval Representative, Commonwealth of Australia, in London, dated 10 May 1915 and addressed to the recipient’s mother, reporting that her son was not aboard the AE. 2 at the time of her loss in the Sea of Marmara - owing to the fact he was convalescing in hospital in Malta after being injured in an earlier incident; together with a newspaper cutting featuring a report on an incident at Dovercourt, Essex, in which Allen was commended for his attempt to save a man from drowning.