Battle of Wadi (1916) 1916
Recorded location from Wikidata; battle sites are often approximate.
Key facts
| Date | 13 January 1916 | Wikidata |
|---|---|---|
| Year | 1916 | Wikidata P585 (point in time) |
| Era | World War I era (1914–1918) | derived from year |
| Location | Iraq | Natural Earth (modern borders) |
| Continent | Asia | Natural Earth |
| War / conflict | Mesopotamian campaign | Wikidata P361 |
| Participants | Ottoman Empire, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland | Wikidata P710 |
| Coordinates | 32.6288, 46.1863 | Wikidata P625 |
About the battle
The Battle of Wadi, occurring on 13 January 1916, was an unsuccessful attempt by British forces fighting in Ottoman Iraq during World War I to relieve beleaguered forces under Sir Charles Townshend then under siege by the Ottoman Sixth Army at Kut-al-Amara.
Pushed by regional British Commander-in-Chief Sir John Nixon, General Fenton Aylmer launched an attack against Ottoman defensive positions on the banks of the Wadi River. The Wadi was a steep valley of a stream that ran from the north into the River Tigris, some 6 miles (9.7 km) upstream towards Kut-al-Amara from Sheikh Sa'ad. The attack is generally considered as a failure, as although Aylmer managed to capture the Wadi, it cost him 1,600 men. The British failure led to Townshend's surrender, along with 10,000 of his men, in the largest single surrender of British troops up to that time. However, the British recaptured Kut in February 1917, on their way to the capture of Baghdad sixteen days later on 11 March 1917.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Battle of Wadi (1916) (revision 1370592884), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section; formatting and citations removed. No text added.
Nearby battles
- Battle of Hanna 1916 · 13 km
- Battle of Dujaila 1916 · 37 km
- Siege of Kut 1915 · 37 km
- Battle of Es Sinn 1915 · 37 km
- Battle of Sheikh Sa'ad 1916 · 37 km
- Siege of Wasit 749 · 40 km
Other battles of the Mesopotamian campaign
- Fao Landing 1914
- Battle of Ctesiphon (1915) 1915
- Battle of Es Sinn 1915
- Battle of Shaiba 1915
- Siege of Kut 1915
- Battle of Dujaila 1916
- Battle of Hanna 1916
- Battle of Sheikh Sa'ad 1916
- Battle of Istabulat 1917
- Battles of Ramadi (1917) 1917
All 13 battles of the Mesopotamian campaign →
Browse more: battles in Iraq · Asia · World War I era battles