The purpose of the attack was to remove the immediate Ottoman threat from the exposed Suvla landing and to link with the ANZAC sectors to the south.

Launched on 21 August 1915 to coincide with the simultaneous attack on Hill 60, it was a costly failure, in which the Turks were forced to use all their reserves in "severe and bloody fighting" far into the night, with some Turkish trenches lost and retaken twice.

[3] Paralysis had set in to the British campaign in the Dardanelles after repeated failures to advance at Helles on the tip of the peninsula since the original 25 April landings.

Their capture had originally been first-day (7 August) objectives but General Stopford was exceedingly hesitant about making any major advances without artillery support.

On the morning of 9 August, the British made their first effort to advance towards the high ground to the east, a ridge called Tekke Tepe.

Scimitar Hill, which guarded the approach to this ridge from the southwest along the Anafarta Spur, had been captured unopposed by the 6th Battalion, The East Yorkshire Regiment, on 8 August but was then abandoned.

Instead, he intended to secure the ground he held and make a strong link to Anzac to the south, where, as at Suvla, the original August objectives had proven unreachable.