High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! The Battle of Katia (also known by the British as the affair at Katia) was an engagement fought east of the Suez Canal and north of El Ferdan Station, in the vicinity of Katia and Oghratina, on 23 April 1916 during the Defence of the Suez Canal Campaign of World War I. An Ottoman force led by the German general Friedrich Freiherr Kress von Kressenstein made a surprise attack on the British 5th Mounted Yeomanry Brigade, which was widely scattered to the east of Romani. The mounted brigade had been ordered to the area to protect the new railway and water pipeline being built from Kantara on the Suez Canal, as this infrastructure extended out past the Canal`s zone of defences into the Sinai Peninsula towards Romani. Von Kressenstein`s attack was completely successful, wiping out the equivalent of a regiment. On the same day, an associated Ottoman attack on Duidar, very close to the Suez Canal, failed when it met with strong British opposition.