The Australian Remount Unit in Egypt 1915-19

Abstract

While the war on the western front was distinguished by its beleaguered immobility, the campaigns in Sinai, Palestine and Syria were full of movement and manoeuvre. The mounted arm of the Egyptian Expeditionary Force, in particular the Australian contingent, was the decisive factor in strategic planning from March 1916 until the armistice with Turkey in October 1918. General Murray regarded the Australian and New Zealand mounted troops as 'the keystone of the defence of Egypt' and the patient conquest of Sinai was founded upon the lonely long-range patrolling of the Anzac Mounted Division. When General Allenby released his assault on the Turkish positions in southern Palestine in October 1917, the Anzac Mounted Divison and the Australian Mounted Division were his most experienced mounted troops. As late as July 1918, when the west bank of the Jordan was practically clear of Turkish forces, he still depended upon them and resisted pressure from the War Office to dismount the latter division and send it to France.