The truth was that he had received most contradictory instructions from Berlin, which did not allow him to do his utmost to win Bulgaria for the German cause. The Imperial Chancellor seems even then—it was after the great German summer offensive against Russia—to have given serious consideration to the possibility of a separate peace with Russia, and was quite convinced that Russia would never lay down arms without having humiliated Bulgaria, should the latter prove a traitor to the Slavic cause and turn against Serbia.
In diplomatic circles in Berlin this knowledge and the decision—so naïve in view of all their boasted Weltpolitik—to pursue the quite illusory dream of a separate peace with Russia, seemed to outweigh, at any rate for some time, anxiety with regard to the state of affairs in Gallipoli and the complete lack of munitions shortly to be expected, and lamed their initiative in their dealings with Bulgaria.
It is probably not generally known that here again the military party assumed the lead in politics, and took the Bulgarian matter in hand themselves. In the space of no time at all, Bulgaria's entry on the German side was an accomplished fact. It was Colonel von Leipzig, the German military attaché at the Constantinople Embassy, that clinched the matter at the critical moment by a journey to Sofia, and the whole thing was arranged in less than a fortnight. But that journey cost him his life. On the way back to the Turkish capital Herr von Leipzig—one of the nicest and most gentlemanly men that ever wore a field-grey uniform—visited the Dardanelles front, and on the little Thracian railway-station of Uzunköprü he met his death mysteriously. He was found shot through the head in the bare little waiting-room of this miserable wayside station.
It so happened that on my way to the Dardanelles on that day at the end of June 1915, I passed through this little station, and was the sole European witness of this tragic event, which increased still further the excitement already hanging over Constantinople in these weeks of lack of ammunition and terrible onslaughts against Gallipoli, and which had already risen to fever-heat over the nervous rumours that were going the rounds as to Bulgaria's attitude. The occurrence, of course, was used by political intriguers for their own ends.
I wrote a warm and truly heartfelt appreciation of this excellent man and good friend, which was published in my paper at the time, and it was not till long afterwards, weeks, indeed, after my return, that I had any idea that the sudden death of Herr von Leipzig on his return from a mission of the highest political importance was looked upon by the German anti-English party as the work of English spies in the service of Mr. Fitzmaurice, who was formerly at the English Embassy in Constantinople.
I was an eye-witness of the occurrence, or rather, I was beside the Colonel a minute after I heard the shot, and saw the hole in his revolver-holster where the bullet had gone through. I heard the frank evidence of all the Turks present, from the policeman who had arrived first on the scene to the staff doctor who came later, and I immediately telegraphed to my paper from the scene of the accident, giving them my impression of the affair.
On my return to Constantinople I was invited to give evidence under oath before the German Consulate General, and there one may find the written evidence of what I had to say: a pure and absolute accident.
I must not omit to mention here that the German authorities themselves in Constantinople were so thoroughly convinced that the idea of murder was out of the question, that Colonel von Leipzig's widow, who, believing this version of the story, hurried to Turkey, to make her own investigations, had the greatest difficulty in being officially received by the Embassy and Consulate. I had a long interview with her in the "Pera Palace," where she complained bitterly of her treatment in this respect. I have tarried a little over this tragic episode as it shows all the political ramifications that ran together in the Turkish capital and the dramatic excitement that prevailed.
The day came, however, when the Entente troops first evacuated Anaforta-Ariburnu, and then, after a long and protracted struggle, Sedd-ul-Bahr, and so the entire Gallipoli Peninsula. The Dardanelles campaign was at an end.
The impossibility of ever breaking down that solid Turkish resistance, the sufferings of the soldiers practically starved to death in the trenches during the cold winter storms, the difficulties of obtaining supplies of provisions, drinking water, ammunition, etc., with a frozen sea and harbourless coast, anxiety about the superior heavy artillery that the enemy kept bringing up after the overthrow of Serbia—everything combined to strengthen the Entente in their decision to put an end to the campaign in Gallipoli.