ORDER OF BATTLE // April 25, 1915
Landing at Anzac Cove
Estimated force strength by side, with confidence labels per surviving record.
Forces engaged
2 sides catalogued · combined 30,000 estimated
British Empire
20,000
Medium-confidence figure
Ottoman Empire
10,000
Medium-confidence figure
Battle context
The landing at Anzac Cove on 25 April 1915 opened the land phase of the Gallipoli campaign, itself part of a broader British Empire effort to force the Dardanelles and open a sea route to Russia. Approximately 20,000 British Empire troops came ashore against an Ottoman force of around 10,000, sustaining some 2,000 casualties in the initial operation. The landing, commanded on the Allied side by William Birdwood and opposed by Mustafa Kemal Bey, established a contested beachhead that would anchor the Anzac sector of the Gallipoli front. Known to Ottoman forces as the Arıburnu Battle, the action set the conditions for the prolonged attritional struggle on the peninsula that would define the campaign's character and ultimate failure to achieve its strategic objectives.
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