The Dardanelles Campaign

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

THE DARDANELLES CAMPAIGN — CHAPTER I THE ORIGIN

On November 3, 1914, the silence of the Dardanelles was suddenly broken by an Anglo-French naval squadron, which opened fire upon the forts at the entrance of that historic strait. The bombardment lasted only ten minutes, its object being merely to test the range of the Turkish guns, and no damage seems to have been inflicted on either side. The ships belonged to the Eastern Mediterranean Allied Squadrons, commanded by Vice-Admiral Sackville Carden, and the order to bombard was given by the Admiralty, Mr. Winston Churchill being First Lord. The War Council was not consulted, and Admiral Sir Henry Jackson, Commander-in-Chief in the Mediterranean, in his evidence before the Dardanelles Commission described the bombardment as a mistake, because it was likely to put the Turks on the alert. Commodore de Bartolomé, Naval Secretary to the First Lord, also said he considered it unfortunate, presumably for the same reason.1 Even Turks, unaided by Germans, might have foreseen the ultimate necessity of strengthening the fortification of the Straits, but at the beginning they would naturally trust to the long-recognised difficulty of forcing a passage up the swift and devious channel which protects the entrance to the Imperial City more securely than a mountain pass.

War between the Allies and Turkey became certain only three days before (October 31), but from the first the temptation of the Turkish Government to throw in their lot with “Central Europe” was powerful. It is true that, during three or four decades of last century, Turkey counted upon England for protection, and that by the Crimean War and the Treaty of Berlin England had protected her, with interested generosity, as a serviceable though frail barrier against Russian designs. But the British occupation of Egypt, the British intervention in Crete and Macedonia, and perhaps also the knowledge that a body of Englishmen fought for Greece in her disastrous campaign of 1897, shook Turkish confidence in the supposed protection; while, on the other hand, Abdul Hamid’s atrocious persecution of his subject races proved to the British middle classes that, though the Turk was described as “the gentleman of the Near East,” he still possessed qualities undesirable in an ally of professing Christians. Besides, within the last eight years (since 1906), the understanding between England and Russia had continually grown more definite, until it resulted in open alliance at the outbreak of the war; and Russia had long been Turkey’s relentless and insatiable foe. For she had her mind steadily set upon Constantinople, partly because, by a convenient and semi-religious myth, the Tsars regarded themselves as the natural heirs of the Byzantine Emperors, and partly in the knowledge that the possession of the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles was essential for the development of Russia’s naval power.

Germany was not slow in taking up the part of Turkey’s friend as bit by bit it fell from England’s hand. If, in Lord Salisbury’s phrase, England found in the ’nineties that at the time of the Crimean War she had put her money on the wrong horse, Germany continued to back the weak-kneed and discarded outsider. Germany’s voice was never heard in the widespread outcry against “the Red Sultan.” German diplomacy regarded all Balkan races and Armenians with indifferent scorn. It called them “sheepstealers” (Hammeldiebe), and if Abdul Hamid chose to stamp upon troublesome subjects, that was his own affair. With that keen eye to his country’s material interest which, before the war, made him the most enterprising and successful of commercial travellers, Kaiser Wilhelm II., repeating the earlier visit of 1889, visited the Sultan in state at the height of his unpopularity (1898), commemorated the favour by the gift of a deplorable fountain to the city, and proceeded upon a speculative pilgrimage to Jerusalem, which holy city German or Turkish antiquarians patched with the lath and plaster restorations befitting so curious an occasion.

The prolonged negotiations over the concession of the Bagdad railway ensued, the interests of Turkey and Germany alike being repeatedly thwarted by England’s opposition, up to the very eve of the present war, when Sir Edward Grey withdrew our objection, providing only for our interests on the section between Bagdad and the Persian Gulf.2 During the Young Turk revolution of 1908–1909, English Liberal opinion was enthusiastic in support of the movement and in the expectation of reform. But our diplomacy, always irritated at new situations and suspicious of extended liberties, eyed the change with a chilling scepticism which threw all the advantage into the hands of Baron Marschall von Biberstein, the German Ambassador in Constantinople. His natural politeness and open-hearted industry contrasted favourably with the habitual aloofness or leisured indifference of British Embassies; and so it came about that Enver Pasha, the military leader of Young Turkey, was welcomed indeed by the opponents of Abdul Hamid’s tyranny at a public dinner in London, but went to reside in Berlin as military attaché.

Germany’s object in this astute benevolence was not concealed. With her rapidly increasing population, laborious, enterprising, and better trained than other races for the pursuit of commerce and technical industries, she naturally sought outlets to vast spaces of the world, such as Great Britain, France, and Russia had already absorbed. The immense growth of her wealth, combined with formidable naval and military power, encouraged the belief that such expansion was as practicable as necessary. But the best places in the sun were now occupied. She had secured pretty fair portions in Africa, but France, England, and Belgium had better. Brazil was tempting, but the United States proclaimed the Monroe doctrine as a bar to the New World. Portugal might sell Angola under paternal compulsion, but its provinces were rotten with slavery, and its climate poisonous. Looking round the world, Germany found in the Turkish Empire alone a sufficiently salubrious and comparatively vacant sphere for her development; and it is difficult to say what more suitable sphere we could have chosen to allot for her satisfaction, without encroaching upon our own preserves. Even the patch remaining to Turkey in Europe is a fine market-place; with industry and capital most of Asia Minor would again flourish as “the bright cities of Asia” have flourished before; there is no reason but the Ottoman curse why the sites of Nineveh and Babylon should remain uninhabited, or the Garden of Eden lie desolate as a wilderness of alternate dust and quagmire.

But to reach this land of hope and commerce the route by sea was long, and exposed to naval attack throughout its length till the Dardanelles were reached. The overland route must, therefore, be kept open, and three points of difficulty intervened, even if the alliance with Austria-Hungary permanently held good. The overland route passed through Serbia (by the so-called “corridor”), and behind Serbia stood the jealous and watchful power of the Tsars; it passed through Bulgaria, which would have to be persuaded by solid arguments on which side her material interests lay; and it passed through Constantinople, ultimately destined to become the bridgehead of the Bagdad railway—the point from which trains might cross a Bosphorus suspension bridge without unloading. There the German enterprise came clashing up against Russia’s naval ambition and Russia’s rooted sentiment. There the Kaiser, imitating the well-known epigram of Charles v., might have said: “My cousin the Tsar and I desire the same object—namely, Constantinople.” There lay the explanation of Professor Mitrofanoff’s terrible sentence in the Preussische Jahrbücher of June 1914: “Russians now see plainly that the road to Constantinople lies through Berlin.” The Serajevo murders on the 28th of the same month were but the occasion of the Great War. The corridor through Serbia, and the bridgehead of the Bosphorus, ranked among the ultimate causes.

The appearance (Dec. 1913) of a German General, Liman von Sanders, in Constantinople shortly after the second Balkan War, if it did not make the Great War inevitable, drove the Turkish alliance in case of war inevitably to the German side. He succeeded to more than the position of General Colman von der Goltz, appointed to reorganise the Turkish army in 1882. Accompanied by a German staff, the Kaiser’s delegate began at once to act as a kind of Inspector-General of the Turkish forces, and when war broke out they fell naturally under his control or command. The Turkish Government appeared to hesitate nearly three months before definitely adopting a side. The uneasy Sultan, decrepit with forty years of palatial imprisonment under a brother who, upon those terms only, had borne his existence near the throne, still retained the Turk’s traditional respect for England and France. So did his Grand Vizier, Said Halim. So did a large number of his subjects, among whom tradition dies slowly. With tact and a reasonable expenditure of financial persuasion, the ancient sympathy might have been revived when all had given it over; and such a revival would have saved us millions of money and thousands of young and noble lives, beyond all calculation of value.

But, most disastrously for our cause, the tact and financial persuasion were all on the other side. The Allies, it is true, gave the Porte “definite assurances that, if Turkey remained neutral, her independence and integrity would be respected during the war and in the terms of peace.”3 But similar and stronger assurances had been given both at the Treaty of Berlin and at the outbreak of the first Balkan War in 1912. Unfortunately for our peace, Turkey had discovered that at the Powers’ perjuries Time laughs, nor had Time long to wait for laughter. Following upon successive jiltings, protestations of future affection are cautiously regarded unless backed by solid evidences of good faith; but the Allies, having previously refused loans which Berlin hastened to advance, had further revealed the frivolity of their intentions the very day before war with Germany was declared, by seizing the two Dreadnought battleships, Sultan Osman and Reshadie, then building for the Turkish service in British dockyards. Upon these two battleships the Turks had set high, perhaps exaggerated, hopes, and Turkish peasants had contributed to their purchase; for they regarded them as insurance against further Greek aggression among the islands of the Asiatic coast. Coming on the top of the Egyptian occupation, the philanthropic interference with sovereign atrocity, the Russian alliance, and the refusal of loans, their seizure overthrew the shaken credit of England’s honesty, and one might almost say that for a couple of Dreadnoughts we lost Constantinople and the Straits.4

With lightning rapidity, Germany seized the advantage of our blunder. At the declaration of war, the Goeben, one of her finest battle-cruisers, a ship of 22,625 tons, capable of 28 knots, and armed with ten 11-inch guns, twelve 5·9-inch, and twelve lesser guns, was stationed off Algeria, accompanied by the fast light cruiser Breslau (4478 tons, twelve 4·1 inch guns), which had formed part of the international force at Durazzo during the farcical rule of Prince von Wied in Albania. After bombarding two Algerian towns, they coaled at Messina, and, escaping thence with melodramatic success, eluded the Allied Mediterranean command, and reached Constantinople through the Dardanelles, though suffering slight damage from the light cruiser Gloucester (August 8 or 9). When Sir Louis Mallet and the other Allied Ambassadors demanded their dismantlement, the Kaiser, with constrained but calculated charity, nominally sold or presented them to Turkey as a gift, crews, guns, and all. Here, then, were two fine ships, not merely building, but solidly afloat and ready to hand. The gift was worth an overwhelming victory to the foreseeing donor.5

Germany’s representatives pressed this enormous advantage by inducing the Turkish Government to appoint General Liman Commander-in-Chief, and to abrogate the Capitulations. They advanced fresh loans, and fomented the Pan-Islamic movement in Asia Minor, Egypt, Persia, and perhaps in Northern India. They even disseminated the peculiar rumour that the Kaiser, in addition to his material activities, had adopted the Moslem faith. The dangerous tendency was so obvious that, after three weeks’ war, Mr. Winston Churchill concluded that Turkey might join the Central Powers and declare war at any moment. On September 1 he wrote privately to General Douglas, Chief of the Imperial General Staff:

Two days later, General Callwell, the D.M.O., wrote a memorandum upon the subject, in which he said:

He added that it would not be justifiable to undertake this operation with an army of less than 60,000 men.6

Here, then, we have the first mention of the Dardanelles Expedition. It will be noticed that the idea was Mr. Churchill’s, that he depended upon a Greek army to carry it out, and that General Callwell, the official adviser upon such subjects, considered it extremely difficult, and not to be attempted with a landing force of less than 60,000 men.

In mentioning a Greek army, Mr. Churchill justly relied upon M. Venizelos, at that time by far the ablest personality in the Near East, entirely friendly to ourselves, and Premier of Greece, which he had saved from chaos and greatly extended in territory by his policy of the preceding five or six years. But Mr. Churchill forgot to take account of two important factors. After the Balkan Wars of 1912 and 1913, King Constantine’s imaginative but unwarlike people had acclaimed him both as the Napoleon of the Near East and as the “Bulgar-slayer,” a title borrowed from Byzantine history. Priding himself upon these insignia of a military fame little justified by his military achievements from 1897 onward, the King of Greece posed as the plain, straightforward soldier, and, perhaps to his credit, from the first refused approval of a Dardanelles campaign, though he professed himself willing to lead his whole army along the coast through Thrace to the City. The profession was made the more easily through his consciousness that the offer would not be accepted.7 For the other factor forgotten by Mr. Churchill was the certain refusal of the Tsar to allow a single Greek soldier to advance a yard towards the long-cherished prize of Constantinople and the Straits.

Turkish hesitation continued up to the end of October, when the war party under Enver Pasha, Minister of War, gained a dubious predominance by sending out the Turkish fleet, which rapidly returned, asserting that the ships had been fired upon by Russians (Oct. 28)—an assertion believed by few. On the 29th, Turkish torpedo boats (at first reported as the Goeben and Breslau) bombarded Odessa and Theodosia, and a swarm of Bedouins invaded the Sinai Peninsula. Turkey declared war on the 31st. Sir Louis Mallet left Constantinople on November 1, and on the 5th England formally declared war upon Turkey.

CHAPTER II THE INCEPTION

The breach with Turkey, so pregnant with evil destiny, did not attract much attention in England at the moment. All thoughts were then fixed upon the struggle of our thin and almost exhausted line to hold Ypres and check the enemy’s straining endeavour to command the Channel coast by occupying Dunkirk, Calais, and Boulogne. The Turk’s military reputation had fallen low in the Balkan War of 1912, and few realised how greatly his power had been re-established under Enver and the German military mission. Egypt was the only obvious point of danger, and the desert of Sinai appeared a sufficient protection against an unscientific and poverty-stricken foe; or, if the desert were penetrated, the Canal, though itself the point to be protected, was trusted to protect itself. On November 8, however, some troops from India seized Fao, at the mouth of the Tigris-Euphrates, and, with reinforcements, occupied Basrah on the 23rd, thus inaugurating that Mesopotamian expedition which, after terrible vicissitudes, reached Bagdad early in March 1917.

These measures, however, did not satisfy Mr. Churchill. At a meeting of the War Council on November 25, he returned to his idea of striking at the Gallipoli Peninsula, if only as a feint. Lord Kitchener considered the moment had not yet arrived, and regarded a suggestion to collect transport in Egypt for 40,000 men as unnecessary at present. In his own words, Mr. Churchill “put the project on one side, and thought no more of it for the time,” although horse-boats continued to be sent to Alexandria “in case the War Office should, at a later stage, wish to undertake a joint naval and military operation in the Eastern Mediterranean.”8

On January 2, 1915, a telegram from our Ambassador at Petrograd completely altered the situation. Russia, hard pressed in the Caucasus, called for a demonstration against the Turks in some other quarter. Certainly, at that moment, Russia had little margin of force. She was gasping from the effort to resist Hindenburg’s frontal attack upon Warsaw across the Bzura, and the contest had barely turned in her favour during Christmas week. In the Caucasus the situation had become serious, since Enver, by clever strategy, attempted to strike at Kars round the rear of a Russian army which then appeared to threaten an advance upon Erzeroum. On the day upon which the telegram was sent, the worst danger had already been averted, for in the neighbourhood of Sarikamish the Russians had destroyed Enver’s 9th Corps, and seriously defeated the 10th and 11th. But this fortunate and unexpected result was probably still unknown in Petrograd when our Ambassador telegraphed his appeal.

On the following day (January 3, 1915) an answer, drafted in the War Office, but sent through the Foreign Office, was returned, promising a demonstration against the Turks, but fearing that it would be unlikely to effect any serious withdrawal of Turkish troops in the Caucasus. Sir Edward Grey considered that “when our Ally appealed for assistance we were bound to do what we could.” But Lord Kitchener was far from hopeful. He informed Mr. Churchill that the only place where a demonstration might have some effect in stopping reinforcements going East would be the Dardanelles. But he thought we could not do much to help the Russians in the Caucasus; “we had no troops to land anywhere”; “we should not be ready for anything big for some months.”9

So, by January 3, we were bound to some sort of a demonstration in the Dardanelles, but Lord Kitchener regarded it as a mere feint in the hope of withholding or recalling Turkish troops from the Caucasus, and he evidently contemplated a purely or mainly naval demonstration which we could easily withdraw without landing troops, and without loss of prestige. In sending this answer to Petrograd, he does not appear to have consulted the War Council as a whole. His decision, though not very enthusiastic, was sufficient; for in the conduct of the war he dominated the War Council, as he dominated the country.

The War Council had taken the place of the old Committee of Imperial Defence (instituted in 1901, and reconstructed in 1904). The change was made towards the end of November 1914, but, except in one important particular, it was little more than a change in name. Like the old Committee, the Council were merely a Committee of the Cabinet, with naval and military experts added to give advice. The main difference was that the War Council, instead of laying its decisions before the Cabinet for approval or discussion, gave effect even to the most vital of them upon its own responsibility, and thus gathered into its own hands all deliberative and executive powers regarding military and naval movements. Sir Edward Grey, as Foreign Secretary, Mr. Lloyd George, as Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Lord Crewe, as Secretary for India, occasionally attended the meetings, and Mr. Balfour was invited to attend. But the real power remained with Mr. Asquith, the Prime Minister, Lord Kitchener, the Secretary for War, and Mr. Winston Churchill, First Lord of the Admiralty. In Mr. Asquith’s own words: “The daily conduct of the operations of the war was in the hands of the Ministers responsible for the Army and Navy in constant consultation with the Prime Minister.”10

This inner trinity of Ministers was dominated, as we said, by Lord Kitchener’s massive personality. In his evidence before the Dardanelles Commission, Mr. Churchill thus described the effect of that remarkable man upon the other members:

These sentences accurately express the ideal of Lord Kitchener as conceived by the public mind. His large but still active frame, his striking appearance, and his reputation for powerful reserve, in themselves inspired confidence. His patient and ultimately successful services in Egypt, the Soudan, South Africa, and India were famed throughout the country, which discovered in him the very embodiment of the silent strength and tenacity, piously believed to distinguish the British nature. Shortly before the outbreak of war, Mr. Asquith as Prime Minister had taken the charge of the War Office upon himself, owing to Presbyterian Ulster’s threat of civil war, and the possibility of mutiny among the British garrison in Ireland, if commanded to proceed against that rather self-righteous population. When war with Germany was declared, it so happened that Lord Kitchener was in England, on the point of returning to Egypt, and Mr. Asquith handed over to him his own office as Secretary for War. The Cabinet, and especially Lord Haldane (then Lord Chancellor, but Minister of War from 1905 to 1912), the most able of army organisers, urged him to this step. But he needed no persuasion. He never thought of any other successor as possible. As he has said himself:

By the consent of all, Lord Kitchener was the one man capable of conducting the war, and by the consent of most he remained the one man, though he conducted it. Yet it might well be argued that the public mind, incapable of perceiving complexity, accepted a simple ideal of their hero which he himself had deliberately created. A hint of the mistake may be found in Mr. Asquith’s speech.13 He admitted that Lord Kitchener was a masterful man; that he had been endowed with a formidable personality, and was by nature rather disposed to keep his own counsel. But he maintained that he “was by no means the solitary and taciturn autocrat in the way he had been depicted.” One may describe him as shy rather than aggressive, genial rather than relentless, a reasonable peacemaker rather than a man of iron. Under that unbending manner, he studiously concealed a love of beauty, both human and artistic. Under a rapt appearance of far-reaching designs, his mind was much occupied with inappropriate detail, and could relax into trivialities. He was distinguished rather for sudden flashes of intuition than for reasoned and elaborated plans. During the first year of the war, his natural temptation to occupy himself in matters better delegated to subordinates was increased by the absence in France of experienced officers whom he could have trusted for staff work. He became his own Chief of Staff,14 and diverted much of his energy to minor services. At the War Council he acted as his own expert, and Sir James Murray, who always attended the meetings as Chief of the Imperial General Staff, was never even asked to express an opinion. The labours thus thrown upon Lord Kitchener, or mistakenly assumed, when he was engaged upon the task of creating new armies out of volunteers, and organising an unmilitary nation for war while the war thundered across the Channel, were too vast and multifarious for a single brain, however resolute. It is possible also that the course of years had slightly softened the personal will which had withstood Lord Milner in carrying through the peace negotiations at Pretoria, and Lord Curzon in reforming the Viceroy’s Council at Simla. Nevertheless, when all is said, all-powerful, imperturbable, reserved, Lord Kitchener dominated absolutely the counsels of the war’s first year, and his service to the country was beyond all estimate. It raises his memory far above the reach of the malignant detraction attempted after his death by certain organs of that “intelligent and prescient Press” which had shrieked for his appointment.15

Second in authority upon the War Council and with the nation, but only second, stood Mr. Asquith. For six years he had been Prime Minister—years marked by the restlessness and turbulence of expanding liberty at home, and abroad by ever-increasing apprehension. Yet his authority was derived less from his office than from personal qualities which, as in Lord Kitchener’s case, the English people like to believe peculiarly their own. He was incorruptible, above suspicion. His mind appeared to move in a cold but pellucid atmosphere, free alike from the generous enthusiasm and the falsehood of extremes. Sprung from the intellectual middle-class, he conciliated by his origin, and encouraged by his eminence. His eloquence was unsurpassed in the power of simple statement, in a lucidity more than legal, and, above all, in brevity. The absence of emotional appeal, and, even more, the absence of humour, promoted confidence, while it disappointed. Here, people thought, was a personality rather wooden and unimaginative, but trustworthy as one who is not passion’s slave. No one, except rivals or journalistic wreckers, ever questioned his devotion to the country’s highest interests as he conceived them, and, as statesmen go, he appeared almost uninfluenced by vanity.

Balliol and the Law had rendered him too fastidious and precise for exuberant popularity, but under an apparent immobility and educated restraint he concealed, like Lord Kitchener, qualities more attractive and humane. Although conspicuous for cautious moderation, he was not obdurate against reason, but could sing a palinode upon changed convictions.16 Unwavering fidelity to his colleagues, and a magnanimity like Cæsar’s in combating the assaults of political opponents, and disregarding the treachery of most intimate enemies, surrounded him with a personal affection which surprised external observers; while his restrained and unexpressive demeanour covered an unsuspected kindliness of heart. In spite of his lapses into fashionable reaction, most supporters of the Gladstonian tradition still looked to him for guidance along the lines of peaceful and gradual reform, when suddenly the war-cloud burst, obliterating in one deluge all the outlines of peace and progress and law. The Tsar who, with assumed philanthropy, had proposed the Peace Conferences at The Hague; the ruler to whom the ambition of retaining the title of “Friedenskaiser” was, perhaps honestly, attributed; the President who had known how passionately France clung to peace; the Belgian King who foresaw the devastation of his wealthy country; the stricken Emperor who, through long years of disaster following disaster, had hoped his distracted heritage might somehow hang together still—all must have suffered a torture of anxiety and indecision during those fateful days of July and August 1914. But upon none can the decision have inflicted deeper suffering than upon a Prime Minister naturally peaceful, naturally kindly, naturally indisposed to haste, plagued with the scholar’s and the barrister’s torturing ability to perceive many sides to every question, and hoping to crown a laborious life by the accomplishment of political and domestic projects which, at the first breath of war, must wither away. Yet he decided.

Third in influence upon the War Council (that is to say, upon the direction of all naval and military affairs) stood Mr. Winston Churchill. In his evidence before the Commission, Mr. Churchill stated:

The Commissioners add in comment that Mr. Churchill here “probably assigned to himself a more unobtrusive part than that which he actually played.” The comment is justified in relation to the Dardanelles, not merely because it is difficult to imagine Mr. Churchill playing an unobtrusive part upon any occasion, but because, as we have seen, the idea of a Dardanelles Expedition was specially his own. It was one of those ideas for which we are sometimes indebted to the inspired amateur. For the amateur, untrammelled by habitual routine, and not easily appalled by obstacles which he cannot realise, allows his imagination the freer scope, and contemplates his own particular vision under a light that never was in office or in training-school. In Mr. Churchill’s case, the vision of the Dardanelles was, in truth, beatific. His strategic conception, if carried out, would have implied, not merely victory, but peace. Success would at once have secured the defence of Egypt, but far more besides. It would have opened a high road, winter and summer, for the supply of munitions and equipment to Russia, and a high road for returning ships laden with the harvests of the Black Earth. It would have severed the German communication with the Middle East, and rendered our Mesopotamian campaign either unnecessary or far more speedily fortunate. On the political side, it would have held Bulgaria steady in neutrality or brought her into our alliance. It might have saved Serbia without even an effort at Salonika, and certainly it would have averted all the subsequent entanglements with Greece. Throughout the whole Balkans, the Allies would at once have obtained the position which the enemy afterwards held, and have surrounded the Central Powers with an iron circle complete at every point except upon the Baltic coast, the frontiers of Denmark, Holland, and Switzerland, and a strip of the Adriatic. Under those conditions, it is hardly possible that the war could have continued after 1916. In a speech made during the summer of the year before that (after his resignation as First Lord), Mr. Churchill was justified in saying:

The strategic design, though not above criticism (for many critics advised leaving the Near East alone, and concentrating all our force upon the Western front)—the design in itself was brilliant. All depended upon success, and success depended upon the method of execution. Like every sane man, professional or lay, Mr. Churchill favoured a joint naval and military attack. The trouble—the fatal trouble—was that in January 1915 Lord Kitchener could not spare the men. He was anxious about home defence, anxious about Egypt (always his special care), and most anxious not to diminish the fighting strength in France, where the army was concentrating for an offensive which was subsequently abandoned, except for the attack at Neuve Chapelle (in March). He estimated the troops required for a Dardanelles landing at 150,000, and at this time he appears hardly to have considered the suggested scheme except as a demonstration from which the navy could easily withdraw.

Mr. Churchill’s object was already far more extensive. Like the rest of the world, he had marvelled at the power of the German big guns—guns of unsuspected calibre—in destroying the forts of Liége and Namur. In his quixotic attempt to save Antwerp (an attempt justly conceived but revealing the amateur in execution) by stiffening the Belgian troops with a detachment of British marines and the unorganised and ill-equipped Royal Naval Division under General Paris, he had himself witnessed another proof of such power. For he was present in the doomed city from October 4 to 7, two days before it fell. Misled by a false analogy between land and sea warfare, he asked himself why the guns of super-Dreadnoughts like the Queen Elizabeth should not have a similarly overwhelming effect upon the Turkish forts in the Dardanelles; especially since, under the new conditions of war, their fire could be directed and controlled by aeroplane observation, while the ships themselves remained out of sight upon the sea side of the Peninsula. It was this argument which ultimately induced Lord Kitchener to assent, though reluctantly, to a purely naval attempt to force the Straits, for he admitted that “as to the power of the Queen Elizabeth he had no means of judging.”19

But, for the moment, Mr. Churchill contented himself with telegraphing to Vice-Admiral Carden (January 3):

At the same time he stated that it was assumed that “older battleships” would be employed, furnished with mine-sweepers, and preceded by colliers or other merchant vessels as sweepers and bumpers. On January 5 Carden replied:

Next day Mr. Churchill telegraphed: “High authorities here concur in your opinion.” He further asked for detailed particulars showing what force would be required for extended operations.20

Among the “high authorities,” Carden naturally supposed that one or more of the naval experts who attended the War Council were included. These naval experts were, in the first place, Lord Fisher (First Sea Lord) and Sir Arthur Wilson, Admirals of long and distinguished service. Both were over seventy years of age, and both were regarded by the navy and the whole country with the highest respect, though for distinct and even opposite qualities. Lord Fisher had been exposed to the criticism merited by all reformers, or bestowed upon them. Especially it was argued that his insistence upon the Dreadnought type, by rendering the former fleet obsolete, had given our hostile rival upon the seas the opportunity of starting a new naval construction on almost equal terms with our own. But, none the less, Lord Fisher was recognised as the man to command the fleet by the right of genius, and his authority at sea was hardly surpassed by Lord Kitchener’s on land. The causes of the confidence and respect inspired by Sir Arthur Wilson are sufficiently suggested by his invariable nickname of “Tug.” Both Admirals were members of the War Staff Group, instituted by Prince Louis of Battenberg in the previous November,21 and both attended the War Council as the principal naval experts. Admiral Sir Henry Jackson and Vice-Admiral Sir Henry Oliver (Chief of the Staff) were also present on occasion.

The expert’s duty in such a position has been much disputed. The question, in brief, is whether he acts as adviser to his Minister only (in this case, Mr. Churchill), or to the Council as a whole. Lord Fisher and Sir Arthur Wilson, supported by Sir James Wolfe Murray, Chief of the Imperial General Staff under Lord Kitchener (who was always his own expert), maintained they were right in acting solely as Mr. Churchill’s advisers. Though they sat at the same table, they did not consider themselves members of the War Council. It was not for them to speak, unless spoken to. They were to be seen and not heard. The object of their presence was to help the First Lord, if their help was asked, as it never was. In case of disagreement with their chief, there could be “no altercation.” They must be silent or resign. Their office doomed them, as they considered, to the old Persian’s deplorable fate of having many thoughts, but no power.22 In this view of their duties, they were strongly supported among the Dardanelles Commissioners by Mr. Andrew Fisher (representing Australia) and Sir Thomas Mackenzie (representing New Zealand). Following official etiquette, they were, it seems, justified in holding themselves bound by official rules to acquiesce in anything short of certain disaster rather than serve the country by an undisciplined word.23

If this attitude was technically correct, it is the more unfortunate that the Ministers most directly concerned, as being members of the War Council, should have taken exactly the opposite view, though masters of parliamentary technique. In his evidence before the Commission, Mr. Churchill, the man most closely concerned, protested:

Mr. Asquith said “he should have expected any of the experts there, if they entertained a strong personal view on their own expert authority, to express it.”25 Lord Grey, Lord Haldane, Lord Crewe, Mr. Lloyd George, and Colonel Maurice Hankey, the very able Secretary to the War Council, gave similar evidence. Mr. Balfour said: “I do not believe it is any use having in experts unless you try and get at their inner thoughts on the technical questions before the Council.”26 In the House of Commons, at a later date, Mr. Asquith maintained:

These views appear so reasonable that we might suppose them unofficial, had not the speakers occupied the highest official positions themselves. The result of this difference of opinion regarding the duty of expert advisers was disastrous. The War Council assumed the silence of the experts to imply acquiescence, whereas it sprang from obedience to etiquette. Before the Commission, Lord Fisher stated that from the first he was “instinctively against it” (i.e. against Admiral Carden’s plan);28 that he “was dead against the naval operation alone because he knew it must be a failure”; and he added, “I must reiterate that as a purely naval operation I think it was doomed to failure.”29 It may be supposed that these statements were prophecies after the event, and the Commissioners observe that Lord Fisher did not at the time record any such strongly adverse opinions. Nevertheless, on the very day when a demonstration was first discussed, he wrote privately to Mr. Churchill:

Two days later he sent Mr. Churchill a formal minute, saying that our policy must not jeopardise our naval superiority, but the advantages of possessing Constantinople and getting wheat through the Black Sea were so overwhelming that he considered Colonel Hankey’s plans for Turkish operations vital and imperative, and very pressing. The object of these plans (circulated to the War Council on December 28, 1914) was to strike at Germany through her allies, particularly by weaving a web around Turkey; and for this purpose Lord Fisher sketched a much wider policy requiring the co-operation of Roumania, Bulgaria, Greece, and Serbia.31 The scheme was not identical with another design of naval strategy which was already occupying Lord Fisher’s mind, and the frustration of which by the Dardanelles Expedition ultimately caused his resignation (in May). But the evidence here quoted shows that Lord Fisher could not be included among the “high authorities” referred to by Mr. Churchill as concurring with Admiral Carden’s opinion. Mr. Churchill said in his evidence that he did not wish to include either Lord Fisher or Sir Arthur Wilson (who throughout agreed with Lord Fisher in the main). He was thinking of Admirals Jackson and Oliver. Yet to Admiral Carden’s mind Lord Fisher would naturally be suggested as one of the high authorities; and was suggested.32

So soon as a demonstration of some sort was decided upon, Mr. Churchill asked Admiral Jackson to prepare a memorandum, which the Admiral described as a “Note on forcing the passages of the Dardanelles and Bosphorus by the Allied fleets in order to destroy the Turko-German squadron and threaten Constantinople without military co-operation.” The last three words are important, for it is evident that, though Admiral Jackson expressed no resolute opposition at the time, he was strongly opposed to the idea of a merely naval attack. In this memorandum he pointed out facts which even a layman might have discerned: that the ships, even if they destroyed the enemy squadron, would be exposed to torpedo at night, to say nothing of field-guns and rifles in the Straits, and would hold no line of retreat unless the shore batteries had been destroyed; that, though they might dominate the city, their position would not be enviable without a large military force to occupy it; that the bombardment alone would not be worth the considerable loss involved; that the city could not be occupied without troops, and there was a risk of indiscriminate massacre.33

The dangers of an unsupported naval attack were so obvious that Admiral Jackson can have needed no further authority in urging them. Yet he may have recalled a memorandum drawn up by the General Staff (December 19, 1906), stating that “military opinion, looking at the question from the point of view of coast defence, would be in entire agreement with the naval view that unaided action by the Fleet, bearing in mind the risks involved, was much to be deprecated.”34

Admiral Jackson’s discouraging memorandum of January 5 was not shown to the War Council. Yet it was of vital importance. In his evidence, Admiral Jackson insisted that he had always stuck to this memorandum:

Long afterwards, Mr. Churchill suggested that what Admiral Jackson meant by a mad thing was an attempt to rush the Straits without having strong landing-parties available, and transports ready to enter when the batteries were seen to be silent.35 It is just possible to put that interpretation on the words, but both they and the memorandum itself appear naturally to imply a far larger military force than landing-parties as essential.

On January 11 Vice-Admiral Carden telegraphed a detailed scheme for gradually forcing the Dardanelles by four successive stages, the operations to cover about a month. The plan was considered by the War Staff Group at the Admiralty, and in subsequent evidence all agreed that they were very dubious, if not hostile. Lord Fisher said he was instinctively against it. Sir Arthur Wilson said he never recommended it. Admiral Oliver and Commodore Bartolomé said they were definitely opposed to a purely naval attempt. But all agreed that the operations could not lead to disaster, as they might be broken off at any moment.36 Admiral Jackson (not a member of the Group) also drew up a detailed memorandum upon all stages of the plan, “concurring generally,” and suggesting that the first stage should be approved at once, as the experience gained might be useful. He insisted in evidence that he recommended only an attack on the outer forts. He accepted the policy of a purely naval attack solely on the ground that it was not for him to decide. His responsibility was limited to his staff work, which he performed.37

The two decisive meetings of the War Council on January 13 and January 28 followed. At the former meeting Mr. Churchill explained the details of Admiral Carden’s plan, adding that, besides certain older ships, two new battle-cruisers, one being the Queen Elizabeth, could be employed.38 He thus revived his Antwerp experience of big-gun power against fortresses. When the exposition of the whole design was completed, Lord Kitchener gave it as his opinion that “the plan was worth trying. We could leave off the bombardment if it did not prove effective.” In this delusive belief the War Council arrived at the momentous decision:

Although the word “take” is used, the Council had no intention at this time of employing a military force. It was assumed that none was available. The same meeting sanctioned Sir John French’s plan for an offensive in France (the offensive which degenerated into the attack on Neuve Chapelle in March). In case of a naval failure, the ships could be withdrawn; in case of success, there was talk of a revolution in Constantinople, and upon that hope the Council gambled.40

During this meeting Lord Fisher, together with Admiral Wilson and Sir James Murray, sat dumb as usual, and his silence was as usual taken for assent. When the Council had arrived at their resolution, he considered his sole duty was to assist in carrying it out. The very next day he signed a memorandum from Mr. Churchill strongly advising that we should devote ourselves to “the methodical forcing of the Dardanelles,”41 and he added the two powerful battleships Lord Nelson and Agamemnon to the fleet allotted for this operation. But his underlying difference of opinion became steadily stronger. In evidence, Mr. Churchill said he “could see that Lord Fisher was increasingly worried about the Dardanelles situation. He reproached himself for having agreed to begin the operation.... His great wish was to put a stop to the whole thing.... I knew he wanted to break off the whole operation and come away.”42 On January 25 Lord Fisher took the unusual course of writing to Mr. Asquith and stating his objections. He considered the Dardanelles would divert from another large plan of naval policy which he had in mind; further, that it was calculated to dissipate our naval strength, and to risk the older ships (besides the invaluable men) which formed our only reserve behind the Grand Fleet.43

Mr. Churchill replied in a similar memorandum to the Prime Minister, defending his Dardanelles plan on the plea of its value, even at a cost which, after all, would be relatively small. In hope of obtaining some agreement, Mr. Asquith invited Lord Fisher and Mr. Churchill to his room just before the meeting of the War Council on January 28—the second decisive meeting. After discussion, the Prime Minister expressed his satisfaction with Mr. Churchill’s view, and all three proceeded to the Council. It was a fairly full meeting, Sir Edward Grey and Mr. Balfour being present, besides the three dominating members and the experts. Mr. Churchill pressed his plan with eloquent enthusiasm. “He was very keen on his own views,” said Sir Arthur Wilson in evidence; “he kept on saying he could do it without the army; he only wanted the army to come in and reap the fruits ... and I think he generally minimised the risks from mobile guns, and treated it as if the armoured ships were immune altogether from injury.”44 Mr. Churchill re-stated the political and strategic advantages of success. He said that the Grand Duke Nicholas had replied with enthusiasm, and that the French Admiralty had promised co-operation.45 He said the Commander-in-Chief in the Mediterranean believed it could be done in three weeks or a month. The necessary ships were already on their way.

All the members of the War Council were won by these persuasive arguments. They needed little persuasion, and no persuasion is so strong as an enterprise begun. But Lord Fisher for once broke silence. He said he had not supposed the matter would be raised that day, and that the Prime Minister was well aware of his views. When he found that a final decision was to be taken, he got up to leave the room, intending to resign. But Lord Kitchener intercepted him, and taking him to the window strongly urged him to remain, pointing out that he was the only dissentient and it was his duty to carry on the work of his office as First Sea Lord. Whereupon Lord Fisher reluctantly yielded to the entreaty and returned to his seat.46

It is remarkable that at a meeting of such decisive moment no mention was made of Lord Fisher’s memorandum, nor of Mr. Churchill’s reply, nor of their conference with the Prime Minister an hour before. None the less, not only Mr. Asquith and Mr. Churchill knew of Lord Fisher’s opposition. Lord Kitchener knew of it; so did Sir Edward Grey. Yet the opinion of the chief naval authority in England was overruled. Mr. Asquith subsequently stated that “the whole naval expert opinion available to us (the War Council), whether our own or the French, was unanimously and consentiently in favour of this as a practical naval operation. There was not one dissentient voice.” As to Lord Fisher, he continued, it was quite true that he expressed on the morning of that day an adverse, or at least an unfavourable opinion, but not upon the ground of its merits or demerits from a technical naval point of view:

“Lord Fisher’s opinion and advice were not founded upon the naval technical merits or demerits of this operation, but upon his avowed preference for a wholly different objective in a totally different sphere.”

No doubt Lord Fisher insisted mainly upon that different objective as being the more important cause of his opposition. But it seems evident that from the first he was also opposed to a merely naval attack and bombardment. His letter to Mr. Churchill on January 2 (quoted above) proves this. And so does the following clause in his memorandum to the Prime Minister on January 25:

Yet, in this case, there was no suggestion or possibility of forcing a decision at sea.

In the afternoon of the same day (January 28) Mr. Churchill had a private interview with Lord Fisher, and “strongly urged him to undertake the operation.” Lord Fisher definitely consented. Mr. Churchill says that if he had failed to persuade him, there would have been no need to altercate, or to resign, or even to argue. He would have gone back to the War Council and told them they must either appoint a new Board of Admiralty or abandon the project. “For the First Sea Lord has to order the fleets to steam and the guns to fire.”48 Lord Fisher, on the other hand, insisted in evidence that he had taken every step, short of resignation, to show his dislike of the proposed operations; that the chief technical advisers of the Government ought not to resign because their advice is not accepted, unless they think the operations proposed must lead to disastrous results; and that the attempt to force the Dardanelles as a purely naval operation would not have been disastrous so long as the ships employed could be withdrawn at any moment, and only such vessels were employed as could be spared without detriment to the general service of the fleet.49

The divergence of opinion here is not so complete as it seems; for by admitting that the War Council could have appointed a new Board of Admiralty if Lord Fisher had refused to carry out their decision, Mr. Churchill showed that, though the First Sea Lord could order the fleets to steam and the guns to fire, the ultimate control did not lie with him. The ultimate control lay with the Government (in this case the War Council), and Lord Fisher was undoubtedly right in thinking his constitutional duty consisted in carrying out the Council’s decisions or resigning his office. He did not resign at this time, because he thought the naval attack did not necessarily imply disaster. He agreed to undertake the charge. He considered it his duty simply to carry out the Council’s decision as best he could. With Mr. Churchill he attended another Council meeting later in the afternoon, and there the fateful, if not fatal, step was taken. It was decided that an attack should be made by the fleet alone, with Constantinople as its objective.50

Though Lord Fisher agreed to do his best, and though the members of the War Council accepted the plan with more or less enthusiasm, the ultimate decision was arrived at owing to Mr. Churchill’s insistence upon his own brilliant idea, and his resolve to attempt it even without military aid. The Commissioners remark that in this resolve he was carried away by his sanguine temperament and his firm belief in the success of the undertaking which he advocated.51 They were probably right. But as evidence of the complexity in all natures—even in a character apparently so self-confident, impetuous, and sanguine—we may recall the passage in Mr. Churchill’s speech upon these events, where, after referring to “the doubts and the misgivings which arise in every breast when these great hazards of war are decided,” he went on to say:

If ever the heart of man was searched by serious and painful stress, it may well have been in that Council chamber of January 28, 1915. For then a decision was taken, and an order given, as a result of which great ships were lost, great interests permanently ruined, and thousands of men sent to their last account.

CHAPTER III THE NAVAL ATTACKS

At the War Council meetings of January 28 a demonstration extending to the possible capture of Constantinople was thus decided upon, and the demonstration was to be purely naval. All the members of the Council would have agreed that a joint naval and military (or “amphibious”) attack would have made success surer; but Lord Kitchener declared the necessary troops could not be supplied, and his decision was accepted without question. The evidence shows that when first Admiral Carden was commanded to attack, no hint of military support was given him. He was expected to depend entirely upon small landing-parties of his own marines to demolish the forts.53 Mr. Churchill has himself told us that, if an amphibious attack had then been thought essential or seriously contemplated, nothing at all would have been done. Nothing less than 100,000 or 150,000 men could have been asked for, together with large supplies of high explosives and artillery. Whereupon, “all the military experts” (i.e. Lord Kitchener, with the possible addition of Lord French) “unanimously would have said that the men were not available, and the ammunition could not be spared from the French front.”54 Whether it would not have been well, even at this last moment, to abandon the whole scheme rather than act contrary to the best judgment of experts and laymen alike, has now, unfortunately, become a matter of vain speculation.

Hardly had the naval orders been given, and the ships dispatched, when the Council began to waver. It is impossible to fix a day for this change, for the change itself wavered. In his evidence, General Callwell (the D.M.O.) said: “We drifted into the big military attack”;55 and “drift” is the precise word for the Council’s uncertain course. By the middle of February the feeling had evidently set towards an amphibious movement; but up to the middle of March they hoped that the need of landing troops upon a large scale might be avoided by purely naval success. It appears that early in February Lord Kitchener began to yield. Probably his former decision was shaken by the abandonment of a large-scale offensive in France, and by the failure of the Turkish attack upon the Suez Canal (February 3 and 4). Though the Turkish force was allowed to retreat without the destruction which greater energy in the Egyptian Command might have brought upon it, the troops then in Egypt had proved more than sufficient for defence; and Egypt, as we have noticed, was always Lord Kitchener’s peculiar care. On February 9 he remarked in the War Council that “if the Navy required the assistance of the land forces at a later stage, that assistance would be forthcoming.”

But, by the majority of the Council, the claim for assistance was not postponed to a later stage. On February 15 Sir Henry Jackson sent a long memorandum of “suggestions” to Admiral Carden in regard to the approaching naval attack. Not only did this memorandum speak of strong military landing-parties with strong covering forces as necessary, but it added that “full advantage of the undertaking would only be obtained by the occupation of the Peninsula by a military force acting in conjunction with the naval operations.” The very next day (February 16) the War Council decided to send the 29th Division (hitherto destined for France) at the earliest possible date to Lemnos; to arrange for a force from Egypt, if required; and to order the Admiralty to prepare transport for the conveyance and landing of 50,000 men.56 The navy and army were thus at last committed to an amphibious enterprise; but nineteen days had been lost. What was worse: the 29th Division was to have started on February 22, but on the 20th Lord Kitchener, on his own initiative, without consulting the First Lord or the Admirals, told the Director of Naval Transport to stop the preparation of transport, as the Division was not to go. In spite of Mr. Churchill’s vehement protests (for even his confidence in a purely naval attack was now shaking), Lord Kitchener stood by his decision till March 10, and the Division did not begin to start till March 16. Twenty-two more days lost! Add the nineteen of the Council’s hesitation, and forty-one days were lost in all. Forty-one days in an enterprise which depended upon speed and secrecy!

Undoubtedly Lord Kitchener had sufficient reason for delay. The Russian armies were hard pressed on their right or northern flank, and in the centre Hindenburg was pushing his third attempt upon Warsaw. If the Germans were successful at either point, it was probable that they would transfer large forces to their Western front, with which the French were then heavily engaged in Champagne and between the Moselle and Meuse, while the British were preparing and executing the assault at Neuve Chapelle (March 10 to 14).57 There may have been other reasons, but those were enough to justify caution in allowing a splendid Regular Division like the 29th to be diverted from the critical strategic lines in France. Its retention, without due notice to the War Council, was sudden and arbitrary. That was Lord Kitchener’s way, and no more could be said. Perhaps the Division should not have been offered, and the Secretary for War, who also held supreme military command, could not be blamed for retaining it under his hand. Nevertheless, its retention stands high among the causes of ultimate disaster.

By the middle of February the War Council had tacitly abandoned the idea of a mere demonstration from which the ships could be at any moment withdrawn. But both Lord Kitchener and Mr. Churchill still thought that troops, if used at all, would be wanted only for “minor operations,” such as the final destruction of batteries, and both clung to this idea for about four weeks longer. Yet, in the first week of March, General Birdwood, who had been sent from Egypt to report upon this very question, telegraphed to Lord Kitchener that he was doubtful if the navy could force a passage unassisted, and that Admiral Carden’s forecast was too sanguine.58

By that time General Birdwood had definite experience to guide him; for, in obedience to Mr. Churchill’s orders, Admiral Carden had on February 19 begun to execute his detailed plan for forcing the Straits by naval power alone. The scene of our narrative accordingly shifts from the Council Chambers of Whitehall to that famous channel which, like a broad, deep river, divides the European from the Asiatic coast. Celebrated beyond all other waters of the world by legend and history, and by one of mankind’s noblest poems, it is haunted by almost overwhelming memories, to which the great tragedy here described has added new. At the very entrance, where the passage is three miles broad, you see upon your right hand the flat and gently curving beach upon which Agamemnon tied his ships for the prolonged siege of a low hill, formed even in his time of ruined and piled-up cities. It rises, still quite visible from the opposite shore, above the marshes where Simois and Scamander unite their small and immortal streams.

Steering north-east, a vessel beats up against the swirling eddies of a tideless current, always pouring down against her bows, with a force that varies from three knots to four, and even to five in the centre when the wind drives it on. Sailors have told me that they believe an undercurrent passes the water back; else, they think, it could not perpetually run so strong. What was the experience of submarine officers like Lieutenant Holbrook, who, on December 13, 1914, groped his way below the surface and through the mines till he emerged near the entrance to the Sea of Marmora, and destroyed the Turkish warship Messoudieh, I do not know. But it seems probable that enough water is poured into the Black Sea by the Dnieper, Dniester, and Don, rivers of the Steppes, to account for a rapid current, not to speak of the glacier streams issuing from the snows of the Caucasus beyond the magic Phasis. All the more likely is the current to be swift since the waters from the shores of Azoff, the Euxine, and Marmora are discharged down a constricted funnel, which at the narrowest point, between Chanak and Kilid Bahr, is hardly more than three-quarters of a mile across. At Chanak, as a ship makes its way against the stream, the strait turns north from north-east for about four miles, and at the point of Nagara (the old Abydos) the channel becomes again almost as narrow as at Chanak. That part of the strait between Chanak and Nagara (both on the Asiatic side) is called especially “The Narrows,” and it forms, as it were, “The Gut” of the whole salt river. Here Xerxes stretched his bridge of boats, having chained and flogged the turbulent waters. Here Alexander crossed upon his way to India. Seven hundred years later the Goths crossed here, and the Turks here entered Europe, a century before they stormed the city of Constantine, which still retained the traditions of the classic world. Beyond the Narrows the strait runs north-east again with a channel about two miles broad for some twenty miles, until between Gallipoli and Chardak it begins to widen gradually into the Sea of Marmora. The total length of the strait from Cape Helles to Gallipoli is between thirty-five and forty miles. The Asiatic side is the coast of the ancient Troad, rising to high hills when the plain of Troy is passed. On the European side the long promontory or peninsula of Gallipoli precludes the channel from issuing into the Gulf of Xeros at the neck of Bulair, or lower down into the Ægean Sea. It is the south-western third of that peninsula which is the scene of the present tragic episode in history. There is no railway on either side of the strait. A coast road is marked from Kum Kali (at the entrance on the Asiatic side) up to Chanak; but it is probably of the usual Turkish quality, as were all roads upon the peninsula. Along both coasts the inhabitants in peace-time communicate chiefly by water, in spite of the current.

The small island of Tenedos lies about fifteen miles south-west from Kum Kali, and the domed hill at the farther end of the island stands up like a large haycock, visible not only from the Trojan plain, but from all the surrounding seas and islands. The town is a pleasant and well-built place, serviceable to the French for the purchase of extra luxuries in the months following; and as Turkey had refused to yield the island to Greece at the end of the Balkan Wars of 1912–1913, it had been seized by the Allies as a station for watching the mouth of the strait. From epic times, however, it was known as an untrustworthy anchorage, and for a naval base the Allies occupied the great harbour of Mudros upon the island of Lemnos, sixty miles from the scene of action. The greater part of this island is bare of trees, and barren but for patches of cultivation around the scattered villages. In summer the low hills are scorched to a pale brown, and, for an Ægean island, the country possesses little beauty or interest apart from the hot springs for which it was consecrated to the god of fire.59 But into the centre of the southern coast runs a deep and broad inlet, protected at its entrance by two small islands, and affording space and anchorage enough for a vast navy. Its size is indeed excessive; for when the wind sweeps down from the north-east across the dismal and dusty town of Mudros, it can raise such a storm in the harbour that pinnaces and smaller boats have trouble in lying alongside the ships, and in loading up or unloading. There are, of course, no docks or wharves, though our sailors subsequently constructed a few small piers and landing-stages. All supplies, including most of the water, had to be brought from the remote base at Alexandria; but the harbour became, none the less, invaluable as a secure port for our navy and transports, a forwarding station for supply and ammunition, the headquarters of the Communication and Transport departments, and an advanced hospital base. The use of it was granted by the Greek Government under Venizelos; for the island had fallen into Greek possession in consequence of the Balkan Wars; and King Constantine appears to have acquiesced graciously in a concession which could not be refused.

In this vast harbour, and upon the open roadstead of Tenedos, Admiral Carden had gathered a large fleet by the middle of February. Ships were collected from various parts of the world (the Triumph had lately come from China);60 but Gibraltar, Malta, and Egypt supplied most of them. At Lord Fisher’s own suggestion the super-Dreadnought Queen Elizabeth had been added to the pre-Dreadnought ships upon which Mr. Churchill had originally depended. The Inflexible was also a “Dreadnought” battle-cruiser (she had shared in the Falkland Islands battle of December 8, 1914), and the sister ships Agamemnon and Lord Nelson, which Lord Fisher also added a little later than the rest of the fleet, were generally regarded as fit to fight in line with “Dreadnoughts.” The French Admiralty, at our request, also supplied a few ships, though of old types, which have an overhampered and top-heavy appearance. The most important units in the fleet as concentrated at that time may be tabulated thus:

British.

To these main fighting ships were added four light cruisers (the Amethyst, Sapphire, Dublin, and Doris), two destroyer depôts, sixteen destroyers, six submarines, twenty-one mine-sweeping trawlers, and a seaplane ship (the Ark Royal) accommodating six seaplanes; besides from the French navy six torpedo-boats and fourteen mine-sweepers.

Out of this fleet, Admiral Carden selected the British ships Inflexible, Agamemnon, Cornwallis, Triumph, and Vengeance, together with the French ships (under Admiral Guépratte) Suffren, Bouvet, and Gaulois, covered by a large number of destroyers, for the first attack upon the outer forts. Orders for washing and clean clothes (to avoid septic wounds) were issued on February 18, and next morning, in clear and calm weather, “General Quarters” was sounded. The firing began at eight, and the first scene in the drama of the Dardanelles Expedition was enacted.62

The main forts to be destroyed were four in number; two on either side the entrance. One stood on the cliff of Cape Helles, just to the left or south-west of the shelving amphitheatre afterwards celebrated as V Beach. Another lay low down, on the right of the same beach, close in front of the medieval castle of Seddel Bahr, where still one sees lying in heaps or scattered over the ground huge cannon-balls of stone, such as were hurled at Duckworth’s fleet more than a century before. Upon the Asiatic side stood the fort of Kum Kali, at the very mouth of the strait, not far from the cliff village of Yenishehr, and separated from the plain of Troy by the river Mendere, near neighbour to the Simois and Scamander conjoined. About a mile down the coast, close beside Yenishehr village, is the remaining fort of Orkhanieh. None of these forts was heavily armed. The largest guns appear to have been 10·2 inch (six on Seddel Bahr, and four on Kum Kali), and when our squadron drew their fire, as before narrated, on November 3, 1914, their extreme range was found to be 12,500 yards.

Throughout the morning Admiral Carden concentrated his bombardment upon these forts at long range, and they made no reply. Hoping that he had silenced or utterly destroyed them, he advanced six ships to closer range in the afternoon, and then the reply came in earnest, though the shooting was poor. At sunset he withdrew the ships, though Kum Kali was still firing. In evidence, he admitted that “the result of the day’s action showed apparently that the effect of long range bombardment by direct fire on modern earthwork forts is slight.”63 It was a lesson repeated time after time throughout the campaign. The big naval shells threw up stones and earth as from volcanoes, and caused great alarm. But the alarm was temporary, and the effect, whether on earthworks or trenches, usually disappointing. For naval guns, constructed to strike visible objects at long range with marvellous accuracy, have too flat a trajectory for the plunging fire (as of howitzers) which devastates earthworks and trenches. It was with heavy howitzers that the Germans destroyed the forts of Liége, Namur, and Antwerp, and, owing to this obvious difference in the weapons employed, Mr. Churchill’s expectation of crushing the Dardanelles defences by the big guns of the Queen Elizabeth and the Inflexible was frustrated.64

Nevertheless, after a few days of driving rain and heavy sea (a common event at this season, which might have been anticipated), Admiral Carden renewed the bombardment on February 25, employing the Queen Elizabeth, Irresistible, Agamemnon, and Gaulois. The Queen Elizabeth, firing beyond the enemy’s range, assisted in silencing the powerful batteries on Cape Helles, and though the Agamemnon was severely struck at about 11,000 yards range, the subsidiary ships Cornwallis, Vengeance, Triumph, Albion, Suffren, and Charlemagne stood in closer, and by the evening compelled all the outer forts to cease fire. Next day landing-parties of marines were put ashore to complete their destruction; which they did, though at Kum Kali they were driven back to their boats with some loss. The story that marines had tea at Krithia and climbed Achi Baba for the view—places soon to acquire such ill-omened fame—is mythical. But certainly they met with no opposition on the Peninsula, and if a large military force had then been available, the gallant but appalling events of the landing two months later would never have occurred. Had not the War Council persisted in the design of a solely naval attack, even after their resolve had begun to waver, a large military force might have been available, either then, or to co-operate with a similar naval movement only a week or two later.

Stormy weather delayed further attack till March 4, when a squadron, including the Triumph, Albion, Lord Nelson, and Ocean, passed up the strait to a position beyond the village of Erenkeui, conspicuous upon a mountain-side of the Asiatic coast, and bombarded Fort Dardanus. The fort stands upon Kephez Point, which projects as though to defend the very entrance of the Narrows. Over the top of the promontory the houses and mosques of Chanak and Kilid Bahr could be plainly seen, where those towns face each other across the narrowest part of the passage. Of the eight lines of mine-field drawn across the strait, five lay between Kephez Point and Chanak. Day and night our mine-sweeping trawlers were engaged upon them, and considerable praise must be given to the courage and endurance of their crews, who for the most part had been North Sea fishermen before the expedition. Their service throughout, whether for mine-sweeping or transport, was of very high value. It almost justified the remark made to me by a skipper whom I had met before on the Dogger Bank: “If the Kayser had knowed as we’d got trawlers, he would never have declared war!”

A similar advance to engage the forts at Dardanus, and, after those were thought to be silenced, the forts at Chanak and Kilid Bahr, was made next day, and again, in stronger force, on March 6.65 The Prince George, Albion, Vengeance, Majestic, and Suffren were employed, and suffered damage, though without loss of life. At the same time, on the 6th, the Queen Elizabeth, stationed off Gaba Tepe on the outer coast, flung her vast shells clear over the Peninsula into the Chanak forts, her fire being directed by aeroplanes. She was supported by the Agamemnon and Ocean, and there were high hopes of thus crushing out the big guns defending the Narrows, some of which were believed to be 14-inch. Nevertheless, when the four French battleships advanced up the strait on the following day (March 7), supported at long range by the Agamemnon and her sister ship Lord Nelson, the Chanak forts replied with an effective and damaging fire. It was impossible to say when a fort was really out of action. After long silence, the Turkish and German gunners frequently returned and reopened fire, as though nothing had happened. In his evidence, Admiral Carden stated that when the demolition parties landed after the bombardment of the outer forts, they found 70 per cent. of the guns apparently intact upon their mountings, although their magazines were blown up and their electrical or other communications destroyed.66 Still worse than these disappointing results was the opportunity left to the enemy of moving, not only bodies of men, but field-guns and heavy howitzers from one point of the Peninsula and Asiatic coast to another, and opening fire upon the ships from concealed and unexpected positions. Our landing-parties of marines also suffered considerably from the advantage thus given to the enemy, as happened to a body which landed at Kum Kali for the second time on March 4. All such dangers and hindrances would have been removed if the navy had been supported by sufficient military force to occupy the ground behind the ships as they advanced.

A bombardment of the Smyrna forts farther down the coast of Asia was carried out on March 5 and 7 by a detachment under Vice-Admiral Peirse. It was hoped that the Vali of Smyrna might come over to us, and that in any case the attack would detain a Turkish force there by means of a rather obvious feint.67 Nothing of vital importance was as yet accomplished there or in the Straits, but up to about March 10 the Admiralty at home remained sanguine, in spite of General Birdwood’s rather discouraging telegram of March 5, mentioned above. They had a right to consider that the attack upon the Dardanelles had produced a stirring effect in the Near East. The Turks withdrew large forces from the Caucasus, greatly easing the situation for the Russian Grand Duke. They concentrated more troops round Adrianople, fearing that Bulgaria might clutch this opportunity for retrieving her loss of that city in 1913. Bitter as was the Bulgarian hatred of Serbia and Greece for their reversal of the Balkan League policy in that year, and for their breach of treaties and territorial arrangements, it now seemed certain that if Bulgaria departed from neutrality at all, she would stand among our Allies. Only a few days later (March 17) General Paget, then engaged on a special mission to the Balkans, telegraphed to Lord Kitchener:

That was a high hope, for the attitude of Bulgaria was then, as it became still more definitely later on, the key of the Near Eastern situation. But for the moment, the effect upon Greece appeared even more propitious. M. Venizelos had in the previous month refused to allow Greece to be drawn into a war for the defence of Serbia, though England and France promised a Division each at Salonika, and it was believed that this strategy was specially favoured by Mr. Lloyd George. Now, however (March 1), he voluntarily offered our Minister in Athens three Greek Divisions for Gallipoli on condition that Greece received the vilayet of Smyrna; and next day our Minister telegraphed that the King had been sounded and “wanted war.”69 The proposal was abruptly checked by the jealousy of the Tsar’s Government, which refused to allow a Greek soldier to approach the long-desired prize of Constantinople. But to make Constantine “want war” must have required a miraculous interposition, and the effect of three Divisions—even Greek Divisions—landing upon the Peninsula at that moment might have been more miraculous still.70 Of even greater ultimate importance was the influence upon Italy; for it was now that, under the guidance of Baron Sonnino, and the strong encouragement of Mr. Asquith, she entered upon the devious negotiations which led to her declaration of war against Austria on May 23.

But valuable as were these political results, the naval attack itself was going slow, and Mr. Churchill read the daily telegrams with increasing impatience. The fact was that the enemy, having the free run of the Peninsula as well as of the Asiatic coast, could plant and conceal his movable howitzers and other armaments where he pleased, and it was becoming increasingly evident that, unless the Peninsula was occupied by our military forces, the passage of the Narrows would mean extreme risk for our ships, and, even if they got through, the channel would not be cleared for transports following them. Now was the moment when a permanent landing would be of the highest service, and on March 10 Mr. Churchill evidently realised the need of troops acutely. But it was only on that very day that Lord Kitchener finally decided to allow the 29th Division to start from England, and they did not leave port till the 16th. Regarding the other detailed troops as less trained and experienced than they really were, Lord Kitchener refused to allow a landing till the Regular Division arrived. And, indeed, he still clung to the idea that no landing would be necessary.

Accordingly, Mr. Churchill, though striving to restrain his impatience, strongly urged Admiral Carden to press forward the naval attack with the utmost vigour. In a telegram of March 11 he wrote:

To this Admiral Carden replied that he considered the stage for vigorous action had now been reached, but that, when the fleet entered the Sea of Marmora, military operations on a large scale should be opened at once, so as to secure communications. On March 15 Mr. Churchill, still anxious not to allow his impatience to drive him into rashness, telegraphed again that, though no time was to be lost, there should be no undue haste. An attempt to rush the passage without having cleared a channel through the mines and destroyed the primary armament of the forts was not contemplated. The close co-operation of army and navy must be carefully studied, and it might be found that a naval rush would be costly without military occupation of the Kilid Bahr plateau. On these points the Admiral was to consult with the General who was being sent out to take command of the troops. To all of this Admiral Carden agreed. He proposed to begin vigorous operations on March 17, but did not intend to rush the passage before a channel was cleared. This answer was telegraphed on March 16. But on the same day the Admiral resigned his command owing to serious ill-health.71

Rear-Admiral Sir John de Robeck, second in command, was next day appointed his successor. He was five years younger, was, of course, fully cognizant of the plans, and expressed his entire approval of them. Yet it appears from his evidence that though strongly urged by Mr. Churchill to act on “his independent and separate judgment,” and not to hesitate to state objections, his real motive in carrying on the pre-arranged scheme was not so much his confidence in success as his fear lest a withdrawal might injure our prestige in the Near East; and, secondly, his desire to make the best he could of an idea which he regarded as an order. “The order was to carry out a certain operation,” he said, “or try to do it, and we had to do the best we could.” If the ships got through, he, like many others, expected a revolution or other political change in Turkey. Otherwise, he saw that transports could not come up, and that the ships could not remain in the Sea of Marmora for more than a fortnight or three weeks, but would have to run the gauntlet coming down again, just as Admiral Duckworth did in 1807.72 In his telegram accepting the command, however, he made no mention of these considerations, but only said that success depended upon clearing the mine-fields after silencing the forts.

Indeed, he had small time for any considerations. For on the very first day after receiving his command (March 18) he undertook the main attempt to force the Narrows. The weather was favourable—no mist and little wind. The scheme was to attack in three squadrons successively. The first blow was given by the four most powerful ships—Queen Elizabeth, Inflexible, Lord Nelson, and Agamemnon—which poured heavy shell at long range into the forts at Chanak and Kilid Bahr, while the Triumph and Prince George bombarded Fort Dardanus on the Asiatic coast, and Fort Soghandere, opposite to it upon the Peninsula. This bombardment lasted from about 11 a.m. till 12.30 p.m., and all six ships found themselves exposed to heavy fire from the forts, and from hidden howitzers and field-guns in varied positions upon both shores. At about 12.30 the second squadron, consisting of the four French ships, came up into action, advancing beyond the former line in the direction of Kephez Point. Though suffering considerably (chiefly owing to their inability to manœuvre in such narrow waters, thus presenting very visible and almost fixed targets to the enemy’s guns), the ten ships maintained the bombardment for about an hour (till nearly 1.30). The enemy’s forts then fell silent, and it was hoped that many of them, at all events, had been destroyed.

Accordingly, the third squadron, consisting of six British ships (Irresistible, Vengeance, Ocean, Swiftsure, Majestic, and Albion), were brought up, with the design of advancing first through the Narrows, so as to ensure a clear passage for the greater ships which made the first attack. At the same time the four French ships, together with the Triumph and Prince George, were ordered to withdraw, so as to leave more room for the rest. During this manœuvre, all or nearly all the guns in the forts opened fire again, their silence having been due, not to destruction, but to the absence of the gunners, driven away by the gases or terror of our shells. Most of the ships suffered, and as the Bouvet moved down channel with her companion ships, she was struck by three big shells in quick succession. The blows were immediately followed by a vast explosion. It is disputed whether this was due to a shell bursting in her magazine, or to a torpedo fired from the Asiatic coast, or, as the Admiralty report said, to a mine drifting down the current. In two or three minutes she sank in deep water just north of Erenkeui, carrying nearly the whole of her crew to the bottom. The cries of the men dragged down with her, or struggling in the water as they were swept downstream, sounded over the strait.

At 2.30 the bombardment of all the forts was renewed, but they were not silenced. At 4 o’clock the Irresistible drew away with a heavy list. Apparently she also was struck by a mine adrift; but she remained afloat for nearly two hours, and nearly all her crew were saved by destroyers, which swarmed round her at great risk to themselves, since they offered a crowded target. A quarter of an hour after she sank, the Ocean was struck in a similar manner (6.5 p.m.) and sank with great rapidity. Most of her crew, however, were also saved by destroyers near at hand. Many of the other ships were struck by shell. The Inflexible and Gaulois suffered especially, and only just crawled back to be beached, the one at Tenedos, the other at Rabbit Island. At sunset the fleet was withdrawn. It had been proved once more that, in an attack upon land forts, ships lie at a great disadvantage. In this case the disadvantage was much increased by the narrowness of the waters, which brought the ships within range of howitzer and other batteries hidden upon both shores, and also gave special opportunity for the use of mines drifting on the rapid current, or anchored right across the channel in successive rows. The mines of the second row were opposite the intervals in the first, and so on, until the passage was covered as with a net, each row containing twenty-six mines. Whether shore-torpedoes were also used is still uncertain. But, without them, the fleet suffered under sufficient disadvantages to explain the failure. The first serious attempt to force the Straits was the last.73

Mr. Churchill wished to renew the attempt at once. Perhaps he thought that English people are given to exaggerate the loss of a battleship. After all, the loss of even three battleships is far surpassed by the loss of lives and calculable wealth in one day’s ordinary fighting in France, and the objective in the Dardanelles was at least as vital.74 Lord Fisher and Sir Arthur Wilson agreed that the action should be continued, and the London and Prince of Wales, in addition to the Queen and Implacable, were actually sent to reinforce. The French also sent an old battleship (the Henri IV.) to replace the Bouvet. At first Admiral de Robeck shared this view. It was suspected at the Admiralty that the ammunition in the forts was running short, and, at a much later date, Enver Pasha is reported to have said:

That delay of six weeks was fatal, but the navy was not to blame. On March 22 Admiral de Robeck and Admiral Wemyss consulted with Sir Ian Hamilton (who on the very day before the engagement had arrived at Tenedos to take command of the land forces) and with General Birdwood; and as their decision to await the concentration of the army was accepted by Lord Fisher and the other Admiralty advisers, Mr. Churchill reluctantly yielded. General Birdwood, it is true, wished to land at once, even with such troops as were at hand. Sir Ian “thought there was a good deal to be said for it,” and as to the fleet, he urged the Admiral to keep on hammering the forts. But his orders from Lord Kitchener were “not to land if he could avoid it,” and in any case to await the arrival of the 29th Division.76

And where was the 29th Division? On March 23 its first transport was just reaching Malta, where nearly all the officers attended a special performance of Faust.77

CHAPTER IV THE PREPARATION

As was mentioned, Sir Ian Hamilton reached Tenedos on March 17, the day before the naval engagement. The appointment to command the military forces had come to him unexpectedly but five days earlier, and on March 13 he started from London. He had received only slight and vague instructions from Lord Kitchener, but on certain limitations the Secretary for War insisted, and all of them strongly influenced Sir Ian’s subsequent action. If possible a landing was to be avoided; none was to be attempted until the fleet had made every effort to penetrate the Straits and had failed; if a landing became unavoidable, none should be made until the full force available had assembled; and no adventurous operations were to be undertaken on the Asiatic side. All these instructions were followed.78

But they revealed the hesitating reluctance with which the Dardanelles campaign was regarded, not only by Lord Kitchener himself, but by his subordinate generals at home and in France. The “Westerners” were, naturally, in the ascendant. The danger to the Allied cause lay close at hand. It had only recently been averted from the Channel and from Paris. The British Staff, equally with the French, represented that not a man could be spared from France, and that the only assured road to victory lay straight through the German lines. The opposition to any “side-show,” especially if it diverted a Regular Division such as the 29th, was expressed with the emphasis of jealous alarm.

Even the appointment of Sir Ian Hamilton to the distant enterprise was likely to be received with mingled sentiments. He counted forty-two years of service in the army. Since the days of the Afghan War and Majuba Hill (where his left hand was shattered), he had risen step by step to all but the highest commands. The Nile, Burma, Chitral, and Tirah had known him. He commanded the infantry in the rapid but vital engagement at Elandslaagte, and during the siege of Ladysmith had charge of the extensive and dangerous sector known as Cæsar’s Camp and Wagon Hill. In the final months of the Boer War he was Lord Kitchener’s Chief of Staff, and commanded mobile columns in the Western Transvaal, greatly contributing to the conclusion of the war. Since then he had served at home as Quartermaster-General, as G.O.C.-in-Chief of the Southern Command, and as Adjutant-General. Abroad he had served as Military Representative of India with the Japanese army in Manchuria (1904–1905, when, in A Staff Officer’s Scrap-Book, he foretold the disappearance of cavalry and the prevalence of the trench in future warfare), as General Officer-Commanding-in-Chief in the Mediterranean, and Inspector-General of the Overseas Forces (1910–1915). Except that he had never yet held supreme command in any considerable campaign, his experience in military affairs and in almost every phase of our army’s activity was hardly to be surpassed.

On the other hand, he was sixty-two; and, though he was a year younger than Lord French, and retained a slim and active figure such as enabled Lord Roberts to take command in South Africa at seventy, sixty-two was regarded as a full age for any officer in so difficult a campaign upon a desert promontory. From a mingled Highland and Irish descent he had inherited the so-called Celtic qualities which are regarded by thorough Englishmen with varying admiration and dislike. His blood gave him so conspicuous a physical courage that, after the battles of Cæsar’s Camp and Diamond Hill, the present writer, who knew him there, regarded him as an example of the rare type which not merely conceals fear with success, but does not feel it. Undoubtedly he was deeply tinged with the “Celtic charm”—that glamour of mind and courtesy of behaviour which create suspicion among people endowed with neither. Through his nature ran a strain of the idealistic spirit which some despise as quixotic, and others salute as chivalrous, while, with cautious solicitude, they avoid it in themselves. It was known also that Sir Ian was susceptible to the influence of beauty in other forms than those usually conceded to military men. He was an acknowledged master of English prose, and though our people read more in quantity than any other nation, the literary gift is regarded among us as a sign of incapacity, and is not, as in France and ancient Greece, accepted as assurance of far-reaching powers. What was worse, he was known to have written poetry.

Before the war, his opposition to the introduction of conscription in the United Kingdom had roused the animosity of all who aimed at establishing militarism as a permanent system in this country. Thus political animosity was added to the official prejudice against a buoyant and liberal temperament, conjoined with a politeness and an open-hearted manner startlingly at variance with official usage. One must acknowledge that, in choosing the man for command, Lord Kitchener hardly took sufficient account of qualities likely to arouse antipathy among certain influential classes and the newspapers which represent their opinions. But careless of such prudent considerations, as his manner was, he allowed his decision to be guided by the General’s long experience of warfare, and designedly selected an eager temperament, liable to incautious impetuosity, but suited, as might be supposed, to an undertaking which demanded impetuous action. It was, however, probably in fear lest natural impulse should be given too loose a rein that the instructions mentioned above impressed only caution upon the appointed commander. In view of the strong opposition to the whole enterprise, it was also assumed that no reinforcements could be promised, and none should be asked for. Even the allotted Divisions were not allowed the ten per cent. extra men usually granted to fill up the gaps of immediate loss.

After that conference in the Queen Elizabeth on March 22 (when Sir Ian left the final decision to the naval authorities), it was evident that a military landing could not be avoided, unless the whole expedition were abandoned. It is easy now for belated prudence to maintain that Sir Ian should then have abandoned it, secured (if he could) the acquiescence of the navy in defeat, counter-ordered the assembling troops, and returned to London. Prudence could have said much for such a retirement. Small preparation had been made; the strongest part of the striking force was still distant; the number of the enemy (though roughly estimated at 40,000 on the Peninsula, and 30,000 in reserve beyond Bulair) was quite unknown; ever since the appearance of our fleet, Turks had been digging like beavers every night at most of the possible points of our offence; and it had been proved that the cross-fire of naval guns could not dislodge them even from the toe of the Peninsula, where, for about five miles up to the rising ground in front of Achi Baba, the surface appeared comparatively level. All these objections could have been urged, and, indeed, were urged at the time by Generals to whom, as to the German commanders of the Turkish defence, a landing appeared impossible. But if any one believes that a high-spirited and optimistic officer was likely to consider a retirement to be his duty just when he had received a command which he regarded as the surest means of terminating the war, he errs like a German psychologist in his judgment of mankind.

So, in the face of all objections, the preparations for an assault upon the Peninsula began. The immediate difficulty was a question of transport. Besides 5000 Australians from Egypt, the Royal Naval Division (less three battalions) had already arrived at Mudros, and their twelve transports were anchored in the great harbour. But it was found that the ships were indeed well enough packed for peace conditions, but the freight had not been arranged with a view to launching separate units complete upon the field of action. Men were divided from their ammunition, guns from their carriages, carts from their horses. Perhaps, for a long voyage, it is impossible to load transports so as to make each unit self-supporting. At all events, it was not done, and on the desert shores of the Mudros inlet it was impossible to unload and sort out and repack. Unless incalculable time was to be lost, such a confused piece of work could not be undertaken apart from wharves and cranes and docks. Wharves and cranes and docks were to be found at Alexandria, but no nearer; and to Alexandria the transports were ordered to return. That historic city thus became the main base—Mudros harbour, which had previously been selected, now serving as intermediate or advanced base.79 Lord Kitchener approved the return and repacking of the transports, and certain advantages in the matter of drill and organisation were gained by the delay, to say nothing of the inestimable advantage of more settled weather. But the enemy also gained advantages, and in the extra month allowed them they increased their defensive works with laborious anxiety.

On March 25 (a calendar month before the great landing) Sir Ian Hamilton followed the transports to Egypt and remained there till April 7. While he was there his Administrative Staff arrived (April 1). It had been appointed after he left England, and until its arrival the administrative work had been, with much extra exertion, carried on by his Chief of Staff, General Braithwaite, and the rest of the General Staff. Sir Ian took the opportunity of his presence in Egypt to inspect the 29th Division (under Major-General Hunter-Weston), which began to arrive in Alexandria on March 28 and was encamped at Mex outside the city while its transports were being reloaded for the landing. He also inspected the Royal Naval Division (under Major-General Paris) at Port Said, and the French Division (under Général d’Amade) near Alexandria, where their transports also were being reloaded. At least equally significant, when viewed from what was then the future, was his inspection of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, or “Anzacs,” as they came to be called. The corps was commanded by Lieut.-General Sir W. R. Birdwood: the Australian Division under Major-General W. T. Bridges, the mixed New Zealand and Australian Division under Major-General Sir Alexander Godley. The Australian Division was encamped at Mena, near the Pyramids; the mixed Division at Heliopolis on the other side of Cairo. Sir Ian also inspected the 42nd (East Lancashire) Division (under Major-General W. Douglas, the first Territorials to volunteer for foreign service), although they were not as yet part of his own force, but stood under command of Major-General Sir John Maxwell for the defence of Egypt. Beside these fighting Divisions, since so renowned, there remained the Assyrian Jewish Refugee Mule Corps (better known as “the Zionists”), organised only a few days before out of Jewish refugees from Syria and Palestine, chiefly Russian subjects, who had sought safety in Egypt. Colonel J. H. Patterson had been commissioned to select a body of about 500, with 750 transport mules. Orders were given in Hebrew and partly in English; the men were armed with rifles taken from the Turks in the battle of the Canal; and the regimental badge was the Shield of David. Probably this was the first purely Jewish fighting corps that went into action since Jerusalem fell to the Roman armies under Titus.80

The fortunate presence of the “Anzacs” in Egypt was due to Lord Kitchener’s constant apprehension of a Turkish attack upon the Suez Canal and the main country, in which it was natural to suppose that a nationalist and religious feeling would rally a large part of the inhabitants to the enemy’s side. At the outbreak of war with Germany thousands of the youth in Australia and New Zealand (including large numbers of Maoris) had eagerly volunteered, moved by love of adventure and a racial affection for the mother-country. After nearly three months’ preparation—a difficult task, persistently effected in Australia by Major-General Bridges, who for three years had been commandant of Duntroon Military College—the whole force assembled at King George Sound on October 31, 1914, and set sail next day (the day of Turkey’s entrance into the war as the Central Powers’ Ally). Thirty-eight transports carried the army corps, and they were convoyed by cruisers, one of which (the Sydney, under Captain Glossop) gained the distinction upon the route of destroying the active raider Emden at Cocos Island, and taking her gallant and resourceful captain, Karl von Müller, prisoner (November 9). Having reached Egypt on December 3, the “Anzacs” went into camps at points near Cairo for further training, and some selected battalions took part in the repulse of Djemal Pasha’s attack upon the Canal near Ismailia in the first week of February 1915.

A finer set of men than the “Anzacs” after their three months’ training upon the desert sands could hardly be found in any country. With the aid of open-air life, sufficient food, and freedom from grinding poverty, Australia and New Zealand had bred them as though to display the physical excellence of which the British type is capable when released from manufacturing squalor or agricultural subjection. Equally distinguished in feature and in figure—the eyes rather deep-set and looking level to the front, the nose straight and rather prominent, shoulders loose and broad, moving easily above the slim waist and lengthy thighs, the chest, it is true, rather broad than deep, owing to Australia’s clear and sunny air—they walked the earth with careless and dare-devil self-confidence. Gifted with the intelligence that comes of freedom and healthy physique, they were educated rather to resourceful energy in the face of nature than to scientific knowledge and the arts. Since they sprang from every Colonial class, and had grown up accustomed to natural equality, military discipline at first appeared to them an irritating and absurd superfluity, and they could be counted upon to face death but hardly to salute an officer. Indeed, their general conception of discipline was rather reasonable than regular, and their language, habitually violent, continued unrestrained in the presence of superiors; so to the natural irony of our race was added a Colonial independence.

Except in action, the control of such men was inevitably difficult. Released from a long voyage, exposed to the unnatural conditions of warfare, and beguiled by the curious amenities of an Oriental city, now for the first time experienced, many availed themselves of Cairo’s opportunity for enjoyment beyond the strict limit of regulations. The most demure of English tourists upon the Continent, having escaped from the trammels of identity, have been known in former times to behave as they would not behave in their own provincial towns; much more might unrestrained behaviour be expected in men whose sense of personal responsibility in a foreign city had been further reduced by uniform, and who were encouraged to excess by the easy standard of military tradition, and by the foreknowledge that, to get beforehand with death, the interval for pleasure might be short. It was no wonder, therefore, that, while twenty per cent. of the Colonial forces (later ten per cent.) poured into Cairo daily upon any animal or conveyance which could move, the beautiful city became a scene of frequent turmoil.81

Upon his journey back to the advanced base, there were many thoughts to divide and even oppress the mind of the most sanguine Commander-in-Chief. The fateful decision had now to be made—a decision upon which the future destiny of the war, and, indeed, of his country, so largely depended. The burden of responsibility lay upon his head alone. To his single judgment were entrusted, not only the lives of many thousand devoted men, but the highest interests of an Alliance in the justice of whose cause he whole-heartedly believed. As the inevitable hour approached, the difficulties of the appointed task were recognised as greater even than foreseen. The strongest nerve might well hesitate to confront them. Even at this crisis of decision, the chief among his commanding Generals were inclined to turn aside from the Peninsula as from impossibility. One advocated an attack upon Asia Minor, with a view to diverting the enemy’s main force, and so clearing a passage for the fleet. Another favoured further delay and continuous training, in hope of some more propitious opportunity. A third, while offering no alternative, considered the attempt too desperate to be tried. Upon a sensitive and imaginative nature the risk, the sacrifice of lives, the difficulties of a small force too rapidly organised, insufficiently equipped with modern ammunition, and unsupported by reinforcements, weighed heavily. To these were added the discouraging representations of friendly, trusted, and experienced officers, upon whose diligent co-operation the success of the whole design entirely depended. In such hours as those, deep searchings of mind and heart are the unenviable lot of the man whose word decides.

But Sir Ian’s decision was already taken, and subsequent conference with the Admirals de Robeck and Wemyss only confirmed it. On their arrival at Mudros, his Generals also agreed, and the General whose objections to landing on any condition had been the most serious, became enthusiastic for the scheme, if landing was attempted. Various lines of attack were possible, and each was carefully considered. To the lay mind, an assault upon the neck of the Peninsula at Bulair appeared so obvious that, from the very outset of operations, Sir Ian was blamed for not attempting it. The neck is narrow—not more than three miles across. If it were cut, the enemy on the main Peninsula might be expected to surrender for want of supplies; the Straits would then be free from obstacle on the European side, and the Asiatic side could be commanded by big guns on Achi Baba and the Kilid Bahr plateau opposite Chanak. The main objection to this obvious strategy was the disconcerting truth that the enemy’s chief line of communication did not run through Bulair, but across the strait itself, chiefly from the Asiatic coast to the town of Gallipoli, and even if Bulair were occupied, the supply of the Turkish army on the Peninsula could be maintained; while an Allied force advancing from Bulair towards the Narrows (which was the objective of the whole expedition) would be perpetually threatened from the rear. Bulair itself was also a formidable obstacle. The famous lines, originally fortified by the Allies in the Crimean War, and renewed to resist Russian, Bulgarian, and Greek attacks from the north, had been incalculably strengthened in the preceding weeks under German direction. On his first survey (March 18) Sir Ian had observed the labyrinth of white lines marking the newly-constructed trenches upon which thousands of Turks had already been long at work. The gleam of wire was apparent around the only two possible points of landing, both difficult, and unsuited for naval co-operation. An assault upon Bulair would have involved immense losses, and, even if successful, could not have advanced the solution of the problem—the problem of the Narrows—without further dubious and speculative fighting, front and rear.

Another proposal, which found favour with some, was a landing at Enos, on the mouth of the Thracian river Maritza (the ancient Hebrus). Except that the actual landing upon the level coast might have been easier, the same objections held, but in exaggerated form. The distance from the Narrows was more than twice as long. An army on the march round the head of the Gulf of Xeros would have had its left flank exposed the whole way to the large Turkish reserves known to be stationed at Rodosto and Adrianople. The two main roads from those important towns meet at Keshan, about fifteen miles from the Xeros coast, and from that base fairly good roads extend to Enos on the one side, and to Kavak, at the head of the Bulair neck, on the other. The Turkish armies could thus concentrate as at the handle of a fan, ready to strike at any point along the edge where the British were moving within reach of the coast. Nor could the navy have afforded much protection to our troops upon the march, the head-waters of the gulf being shallow far out from shore. Had Sir Ian attempted, as others have suggested, to turn inland and fight his way towards Constantinople, disregarding his appointed task at the Straits, he would, of course, have lost the assistance of the navy altogether, except as defence to his precarious base and lines of communication along the bit of coast; and, apart from the navy, he had no transport available for a long march.

Between Bulair and the sharp northern point of Suvla Bay, steep cliffs and the absence of beach, except in tiny inlets, prevent the possibility of landing. But inland from Suvla Bay itself there is open ground, and a practicable beach extends south as far as the cliff promontory of Gaba Tepe, although the main mass of the Sari Bair mountain rises close behind the southern part of the beach in a series of broken precipices and ravines. From Suvla Point to Gaba Tepe it would certainly have been possible to put the whole united force ashore, and, to judge from subsequent events, this might have been the wisest course. On the other hand, Suvla is far removed from the Narrows; a straight line thence to Maidos measures nearly fifteen miles; it passes over the top of Sari Bair, a formidable barrier; while, upon the long and devious route alone possible for a movement of troops, the army would have had both flanks exposed, on the right to the strong Turkish position of Kilid Bahr plateau, and on the left to large forces available to the enemy from Rodosto and Gallipoli. It is probable that Sir Ian’s troops were not then numerous enough to hold so long a line of communications and at the same time resist flank attacks, especially the strong attack to be anticipated from the left.

A landing at Gaba Tepe itself, where north and south the ground is open, and a fairly level gap between the Sari Bair range and the Kilid Bahr plateau allows the long and wandering road from Krithia to cross the Peninsula to Maidos, would have exposed the army to similar flank attacks; but the distance is short (not much over five miles), and in all probability a landing in full force might have been attempted here had not the fortification and armament on the promontory itself, and on the gradually sloping land upon both sides of it, appeared too powerful for assault. The barbed-wire entanglements extended into the sea, and the country formed the most dangerous of all approaches—a glacis with no dead ground and little cover. South of this position the cliffs rise abruptly again, and along all the coast round Cape Helles to Morto Bay (which was commanded by guns from the Asiatic side) a survey showed no beach or opening, except at a few small gaps and gullies, so soon to be celebrated.

As he rejected the coast between Suvla and Gaba Tepe, Sir Ian was compelled to disregard Napoleon’s maxim of war and divide his forces. His object was to shake the enemy’s moral, and puzzle the command by several simultaneous attacks, threatening front and rear, and keeping the Turkish Staff in flustered uncertainty where the main defence should be concentrated. Accordingly, a few of those small but practicable landing-places round the extremity of the Peninsula were selected. Here the assault upon the Turkish defences was to be made chiefly by units of the 29th Division. The chosen points were S Beach, or De Tott’s Battery, on the farther side of Morto Bay, where only a small force was to attempt holding on so as to protect our right flank; V Beach, just below the large village and ancient castle of Seddel Bahr, where a main attack was to be made and the ground permanently occupied; W Beach, where a similar force was to land, and link up with V Beach, having the same object in view; X Beach (round the point of Cape Tekke, looking out towards the Gulf of Xeros), where a force was to work up the face of a cliff and attempt to join hands with W Beach; and Y Beach, about three and a half miles north along the cliffs, where a small body was to scramble up a precipitous ravine and make a feint upon Krithia. Both flanks of the main attack were further protected by the sea and the naval guns.

Such was the task of the 29th Division, their general objective being the low but formidable position of Achi Baba, a hill sitting asquat almost across the Peninsula about five miles from Cape Helles, and rising by gradual and bare slopes to a truncated pyramid, some 600 to 700 feet high. About nine miles along the coast beyond Y Beach, between a point north of Gaba Tepe and a slight projection then called Fisherman’s Hut, three miles farther up the coast from Gaba Tepe, the Anzacs were to land on Z Beach, and work their way into the defiles and up the heights of Sari Bair. Their main purpose was to distract the enemy forces south of Achi Baba by threatening their rear and communications. With a similar object the greater part of the Royal Naval Division, which had no guns, and for which no small boats could be supplied, was to make a feint near the Bulair lines at the head of the Gulf. Further to distract the enemy’s attention, one infantry regiment and one battery from the French mixed Division were instructed to land on the Asiatic shore near Kum Kali; but not to remain there, nor advance beyond the river Mendere. Such, in brief, was the general design for attacking the Peninsula position, confidently described by German authorities as impregnable.

By the middle of April the force appointed to accomplish this overwhelming task had assembled in the Mudros harbour or loch. Large as that inlet is, the surface was so crowded with ships that the naval authorities, among whom Commodore Roger Keyes was Chief of Staff to Admiral de Robeck, had difficulty in finding anchorage for all. Beside the ships of war, places had to be fixed for 108 transports and other vessels. The 29th Division had arrived in twenty transports;82 the Anzacs in forty; the Royal Naval Division in twelve; the French Division in twenty-three; the Supply and Store Ships numbered twelve, and the Arcadian was detailed for General Headquarters.

The names of the officers appointed to the most important positions upon Sir Ian’s Staff may here be mentioned, his personal Aides being Captain S. H. Pollen and Lieutenant G. St. John Brodrick:

Headquarters of Base.

Headquarters of Administrative Services.

The total number of the Staff at the beginning of the great enterprise was eighty-four. Brigadier-General Woodward and Surgeon-General Birrell did not arrive till April 19, having remained in Egypt under orders to organise the hospitals. In their absence the general scheme for the evacuation of the wounded was drawn up by Lieut.-Colonel A. E. C. Keble, R.A.M.C.

The military force under Sir Ian’s command at the beginning of the campaign was composed as follows:

The 29th Division.

The Mounted Units had left their horses behind them in Egypt, and the popular pictures representing cavalry charging over broken ground upon the Peninsula are imaginative.

Most unfortunately, the Indian Brigade, under General Cox, was for the present left in Egypt, though its service there was no longer required, and Sir Ian had appealed to Lord Kitchener for it. Ultimately it arrived, just too late, on May 1.

The total number of the force was under 70,000; of these certainly not more than 60,000 could be used for action, even including the necessary reserves.

Landing was intended on April 23, but on the 20th a heavy wind arose, and blew for forty-eight hours, rendering the movement of small boats difficult even in Mudros harbour. On the 21st the Commander-in-Chief issued the following address to his forces:

A few further points remain to be mentioned. On April 17, one of our submarines, E15, ran aground off Kephez Point, and by a very gallant action was destroyed by the two picket-boats of the Triumph and Majestic (ships afterwards sent to the bottom by submarines). Lieut.-Commander Eric Robinson was in command, and, though coming under heavy fire, he succeeded in torpedoing the submarine and rendering it useless to the enemy.

On the 23rd, just after the transports had started, news came from the rugged island of Skyros, eighty miles south-west of Lemnos, that Rupert Brooke, the poet, had died there of blood-poisoning that evening. During his visit to the Royal Naval Division at Port Said, Sir Ian had seen him in his tent upon the sand, prostrate with fever, and had offered him a place on his Staff. With fine resolution, and a modesty equally characteristic, Brooke refused, being determined to abide by the Royal Naval Division, which he had joined before the quixotic fiasco at Antwerp. On April 20 he took part in a field-day on Skyros, and in an olive grove there, high up on the mountain Pephko, looking over Trebaki Bay, he was buried at midnight of the 23rd, his own petty officers carrying his body over the rocks and prickly bushes. A wooden cross, surrounded by lumps of marble, marks the spot. His colonel in the Hood Battalion, Arnold Quilter, Grenadier Guards, who was killed a fortnight later, wrote to his mother: “His men were devoted to him, and he had all the makings of a first-rate officer.” Alas! his friends know that he had all the makings of so much beside, and for them the world was darkened by the loss of so singularly beautiful a character, a personality so fine and full of the noblest promise.83

Upon other fronts of the war, the chief events of the weeks following the costly and inconclusive movement at Neuve Chapelle (March 10) were the capture of Przemysl by the Russians (March 22), followed by heavy fighting in the Carpathian passes, and the second battle of Ypres, inaugurated (April 22) on the German side by the earliest use of poison gas.

CHAPTER V THE LANDINGS

The wind, which had continued to blow hard on April 22, abated next day, and in the afternoon the transports bearing the covering force of the 29th Division began very slowly to move out from Mudros harbour. In that land-locked inlet, the water was now still, and singularly blue. “The black ships,” as the navy called the transports owing to their fresh coat of black paint, wound their way in and out among others still lying at anchor. They passed the battleships and cruisers of our own fleet; they passed the Anzac transports, which were to follow them next day; they passed the battleships and transports of the French contingents, and the five-funnelled Russian cruiser Askold, lying nearer the little islands which protect the entrance of the far-extended haven; and as they passed, the pellucid air which still illuminates the realms of ancient Greece rang with the cheers of races whose habitation the Greeks had not imagined. Perhaps it is in Greek history that we find the nearest parallel to such a scene of heroic joy, the preface to heroic disaster. For when the bright troops of Athenians started for the conquest of Sicily, we read that nearly the whole population of the city accompanied their five-mile march down the Piræus; that there, in sacred silence, libation to the gods was made; and issuing in line ahead from the harbour, the transport galleys raced, in pure exhilaration of heart, to the pointed island of Ægina, fifteen miles away, while far in the air bystanders heard the cries of invisible spirits, like the wailings of women upon the Phœnician shore lamenting the beauty of Adonis yearly wounded.84

The British covering force consisted mainly of the 86th Brigade (29th Division), under Brigadier-General S. W. Hare, but two battalions of the 87th Brigade and half a battalion of the 88th were attached to it, beside the Plymouth Battalion of the Royal Naval Division, as the General’s own reserve, and the Anson Battalion, detailed for beach duties. Their three transports were escorted by the Euryalus (flagship of Admiral Wemyss, commanding the first and fourth of the seven squadrons into which the fleet was divided), the Implacable, and the Cornwallis, and their station was Tenedos. The next afternoon (Saturday, April 24) they were followed from Mudros harbour by the Queen Elizabeth (flagship of Admiral de Robeck), with Sir Ian Hamilton and the General Headquarter Staff on board, leading the other battleships in line ahead. After them went the Anzac covering force, consisting of the 3rd Brigade under Colonel Sinclair Maclagan (the Queensland, South Australian, West Australian, and a mixed Australian and Tasmanian battalion). The remainder of the Anzac army corps followed, escorted by the Queen (flagship of Admiral Thursby, commanding the second squadron), the London, and the Prince of Wales. Their destination was a point off Imbros, near Cape Kephalos, where they were to wait during the night till the moon went down. The covering force occupied four transports, beside the 1500 men of the brigade placed upon the Queen. General Birdwood’s headquarters were on the Minnewaska, and about thirty transports carried the remainder of his corps. As they passed out of harbour, leaving the Lemnian shore with which many, by practised landings, had become familiar, they too were greeted with tumultuous cheering by the ships which had not started yet, and tumultuously they replied. Moved onward irresistibly into imminent death, knowing that by the morrow’s afternoon at least one in ten of their numbers would have fallen in all the splendour of youthful vitality, still they cheered like schoolboys bound for a football match or a holiday by the sea. Excitement, comradeship, the infectious joy of confronting a dangerous enterprise side by side, made them cheer. Never before had those men known what battle means, but the sinking dread of the unknown, which all men feel as the shadow of extreme peril approaches, was allayed by the renunciation of self, and the clear belief that, whoever else was wrong in the world, it was not they.

The night was very still. The three-quarter moon set soon after 3 a.m., and there was total darkness over sea and mountains until a cold and windless dawn gradually appeared. The water was smooth as a mirror, and a thin veil of mist covered the shore. Just before the sun rose in a blaze of gold, four of the battleships and four cruisers opened fire upon the defences at the main landing-places round Cape Helles, and continued a heavy bombardment. At the same time, the landing of the covering parties at the five selected points around the end of the Peninsula began, and account of them may here be given in succession from the extreme right flank at S to the extreme left at Y.

On the evening of the 24th, about 750 of the 2nd South Wales Borderers under Colonel Casson had come on board the Cornwallis in four trawlers from their transport. Just before sunrise they put off in the trawlers again, each trawler towing six boats, and proceeded up the strait for about 2½ miles to the point called Eski Hissarlik or De Tott’s Battery, on the north-east end of Morto Bay. The Cornwallis followed, with the Lord Nelson as covering ship, but, being delayed by the Agamemnon and some French mine-sweepers coming across her course, she did not reach the point till the men had approached the shore, rowing the boats as best they could, though unaccustomed to the water, and encumbered with their packs, rifles, and trenching tools. Almost before the boats grounded, they leapt into the sea, and struggled to shore, under a heavy rifle fire which immediately opened from the Turkish trenches.

In perfect order, but at great speed, these veteran troops made for the height, some scrambling up the cliff, some approaching by a gradual slope on the west side. They were already nearing the summit when a mixed naval party of about 100 marines and sailors put to shore, and were of great assistance in taking two lines of trenches and working side by side with the South Wales Borderers, who were already driving the Turks down the farther slope of the ridge. Guns from the Asiatic side opened fire upon the beach, but most of the shells, striking the mud at the water’s edge, did not burst, and the Cornwallis, firing by signal from shore, silenced the battery about 10 a.m. Being urgently summoned from W Beach, and seeing that the soldiers now held the position firmly, Captain Davidson then withdrew the naval party, and steamed to his second position down the strait.85 Colonel Casson’s battalion clung to the point they had gained for the critical forty-eight hours of the landing, thus preventing Turkish reinforcements from coming down to Seddel Bahr, and protecting the right flank of our possible advance. The post was then taken over by the French, who held it throughout the campaign, though much exposed to the Asiatic guns. This successful enterprise cost about sixty casualties, including Major Margesson, who was killed.

Walking along the coast south-west from De Tott’s Battery, one rounds the two-mile arc of Morto Bay, near the middle of which the combined “Deres” or watercourses of the Krithia region run out into the strait. Across the valley, nearly a mile inland, a few lofty piles of an ancient, perhaps Byzantine, aqueduct then stood, probably at one time carrying water to a more ancient town than Seddel Bahr. Later in the campaign they were destroyed, but for some months they formed a conspicuous landmark. Along the rest of the bay the land slopes gently down to the beach, and had been laid out in gardens cypress-fringed, such as Islam loves. The gardens were now entrenched and thickly netted with barbed wire; but the bay would have afforded the finest landing-place upon the southern Peninsula, had it not been fully commanded by guns across the strait. Upon the south-west point of the bay, the old Turkish castle and fortress of Seddel Bahr, projecting boldly into the sea, guards the entrance to the strait, and, as already described, at the foot of its towers and curtain-walls are still heaped the huge round stones which the Turks once deemed sufficient to hurl at intruders beating up against the current. Behind the castle was huddled a grey stone village or small town, of the usual Turkish character, with narrow and winding alleys between secretive houses, and just beyond the point there projected a low reef of rocks round which the deep-blue water, hurrying out to the open sea, perpetually eddied.

From the Seddel Bahr point the coast falls back a little into the shallow arc of a bay barely over a quarter of a mile long if one follows the sandy beach. Around the curve, the ground rises rather steeply, almost exactly in the form of a classic theatre, to which the beach would serve as orchestra and the sea as stage. This little bay, to be renowned as V Beach, ends on the western side in precipitous cliffs, round the foot of which it is possible to clamber over masses of fallen rocks, but no path leads. On the top of the cliff stood one of the most powerful of the entrance forts destroyed by the naval attack on February 19. The beach itself is narrow—about 10 yards across—and was edged by a small but perpendicular bank, not over 4 or 5 feet in height. The slopes of the theatre were at that time covered with grass, to be changed later on for dust and heavy sand. The slope measures about 200 yards from beach to summit. Along the edge of the beach ran an entanglement of the peculiarly strong barbed wire used by the Turks; a second entanglement ran round the curving slope two-thirds of the way up, and a third joined the two at right angles at the eastern end of the bay. The upper part of the semicircle was strongly entrenched and armed with pom-poms, while in the ruins of the old fortress, in the village, and in a shattered barrack on the top of the western summit, machine-guns and a multitude of snipers were concealed. Nature and man’s invention had converted the little bay into a defensive engine of manifold destruction.

At daybreak the Albion opened a heavy bombardment. There was no answer. The little semicircle remained still as an empty theatre, and sanguine spirits hoped that defence had been abandoned. Transhipping rapidly from a fleet-sweeper, three companies of the 1st Dublin Fusiliers and a party of the Anson Battalion, Royal Naval Division, arranged themselves in six tows, each made up of a pinnace and four cutters, and carrying 125 men apiece. In line abreast the tows started for the shore over the glassy water, pale with morning. Except for the continuous crash of our bursting shells, not a sound came from the shore. On the right of the main party of tows loomed a large collier, called the River Clyde, but known to the classical as the “Trojan Horse,” and to the unlearned as the “Dun Cow.” She carried the 1st Munster Fusiliers, half the 2nd Hampshire Regiment, one company of the Dublin Fusiliers, and details of sappers, signallers, field ambulance, and an Anson beach-party. Commander Edward Unwin, R.N., was in charge of her, a man of eagle features and impetuous but noble personality, inclined to pour imprecations upon “the Army” while he assisted them with untiring ingenuity and a courage conspicuous even on that heroic day. His orders were to run his ship hard aground after the tows had landed their first party. A hopper alongside the collier was then to proceed under her own steam and momentum, towing a string of lighters so as to form a pontoon for the troops, who were to issue from square iron doors opening close up to the ship’s bow on the port and starboard sides. But the tow-rope attaching the lighters to the hopper fouled; the current drove the River Clyde ashore 30 yards west of the spot designed; and tows and ship touched ground almost at the same moment. The hopper ran forward with the lighters, which were secured after a short delay. The gangways dropped. Shoving each other eagerly forward, the Munster Fusiliers rushed from the opened ports.

Hardly had the first man set foot on the gangways, when the invisible enemy broke the silence with an overwhelming outburst of rifle fire, pom-poms, and machine-guns. The Munster Fusiliers of the first company fell so thick that many were suffocated or crushed by the sheer weight of the dead dropping upon them. Few if any of those eager Irishmen struggled across the lighters to the beach unwounded. In the tows, the boats were riddled with holes, and the greater number destroyed. The Dublin Fusiliers and the crews supplied by the navy were shot down either in the boats or as they leapt into the shallow water and attempted to rush across the narrow beach. A few succeeded in reaching the low and perpendicular bank of sand, and lay under its uncertain cover, unable to show a head above the top without death. The Turks had carefully marked the ranges of every point along the shore with stakes, and they fired in security from dug-outs and deep trenches, against which no naval bombardment availed.

Inspired by a courage which baffles reason with amazement (for what reasonable motive had these men—these Irishmen—to spring into the face of instant death?), the second company of Munster Fusiliers crowded upon the gangway, and rushed along the lighters over the dead bodies of their friends. As they ran, the end of the pontoon nearest the shore was torn loose by the rip of the current, and drifted off into deep water. The men fell in masses, and many, either to escape the torrent of bullets or in passionate eagerness to reach the shore, attempted to swim to land, but were dragged down by the weight of their equipment, and lay visible upon the sand below. With unwavering decision, the sailors laboured to restore the pontoon. Commander Unwin ran down the gangway and, plunging into the sea, worked beside the men. Midshipman Malleson and Midshipman Drewry (in honour of whom the French afterwards named the jetty which they built on the spot) swam out, carrying ropes to and from the drifting lighters under the ceaseless splash of bullets and shells. The names of all these have become celebrated, and they won the most envied of all our country’s distinctions, but it is almost invidious to select even such names as theirs among the men and boys of every rank, and of both services, whose self-devotion made that day and place so memorable.86

By such devoted efforts, a reserve lighter was brought into position, and the pontoon again completed. A third company of the Munster Fusiliers dashed along it, with similar heroism, towards the shore, suffering terrible loss from accurate and low-firing shrapnel, now added to the other missiles of death. The survivors joined the survivors under shelter of the low bank of sand. There was a brief pause in the attempt to land, but when it began again, the pontoon was again carried adrift by the current, bearing upon it a number of Hampshire men, together with Brigadier-General Napier, commanding the 88th Brigade, and his Brigade-Major, Captain Costeker. They lay down flat upon the lighters, but nearly all were killed as they lay, including these two officers of distinguished military name. Connection with the shore was thus severed. Nearly all the boats in the tows had been destroyed, and some were idly drifting, manned only by the dead. The dead lay upon the lighters, and below the water, and awash upon the edge of the beach. The ripple of the tormented sea broke red against the sand.

One of the tows had taken half a company of the Dublin Fusiliers to a point called the “Camber Beach,” just north-east of the Seddel Bahr castle. Perhaps they were intended to threaten the enemy’s position from his left flank by creeping round the castle and attacking the village streets. This they proceeded to do, and, as the Turks had not entrenched this position, the Irishmen with great skill crawled from cover to cover till they reached the village windmills and the entrance to the houses. There they were overwhelmed by the crowd of snipers. Many were killed, some cut off, only twenty-five returned. The wounded had to be left. One who afterwards saw the dead in a room said the bodies were charred, and the base of a 6-in. shell lay there. Probably hence arose reports of mutilation.87

Before noon, any further attempt to effect a landing was abandoned, and the main body of troops which was to have followed close upon the covering party was diverted to W Beach. The mixed survivors of Dublin and Munster Fusiliers, and of the Hampshire companies, remained crouching behind the low parapet of the bank, with no food or water beyond such small quantities as they had brought with them. There they lay, exposed to the full blaze of sun, and only just sheltered from the incessant rain of bullets and shells. But for some machine-guns mounted on the bows of the River Clyde and protected by sandbags, the Turks would have found little difficulty in exterminating their whole number. With them were two officers of the General Staff—Colonel Doughty-Wylie, our humane and gallant military consul at Konia during the Adana massacres in 1909, and Colonel W. de L. Williams (Hampshire Regiment), who did their utmost to hearten the men during the remaining hours of that terrible day and through the night. As the Turks had no big guns on the spot, and the fire of the Asiatic guns was to some extent checked by the fleet, the remainder of the party on board the River Clyde were comparatively secure. The heavy loss in officers included the General of the 88th Brigade, as we have seen, and Colonel Carrington Smith, commanding that brigade’s Hampshire Regiment, both killed. During the afternoon and evening the naval boats were constantly engaged in removing the wounded from the River Clyde and other points where they could be reached. In this duty Commander Unwin again distinguished himself, going along the shore in a lifeboat and rescuing the wounded lying in shallow water, under persistent fire from the semicircular heights. Throughout the day and far into the moonlit night the Queen Elizabeth, Cornwallis, and Albion and other ships maintained a heavy bombardment, which restrained the furious Turkish attempts at counter-attack, and assisted the remainder of the covering party in landing from the River Clyde under the comparative darkness. But later in the night the noise of battle was renewed. Outbursts of rifle and machine-gun fire, varied by shells thrown over from W Beach by two of our own field guns, allowed the wearied men no rest; and at dawn the Albion turned on her 12-in. shells, like trains rushing headlong down a tunnel to the crash of collision.

At V Beach, in spite of the incalculable courage and skill of the Irish Regulars and the sailors combined, the landing on the 25th had failed. At W Beach, not much more than half a mile north-west, over the cliff of Cape Helles where the lighthouse and Fort I had stood, the English covering party displayed equal heroism and gained greater success. W Beach is a shallower but longer arc of sandy shore, curving between Cape Helles and Cape Tekke, the two extreme points of the Peninsula. Between the two inaccessible cliffs and the fallen rocks which the sea washes, a gully has been cut by a short watercourse, draining the extremity of the high and slightly undulating plateau in which the Peninsula ends. Except after heavy rains, the gully is dry, but its occasional stream, working upon the sandstone formation, and aided by the north-east wind blowing dust over the plateau’s surface, has piled up low heaps of sand dune, at that time covered with bent-grass, spring flowers, and the aromatic herbs which flourish upon the dry seacoasts of the Near East. Along its gentle curve the actual beach is rather more than a quarter of a mile in length, and its broadest part, where the gully runs out, is some 40 yards across. Hidden in the shallows a strong wire entanglement had been laid, and another protected the whole length of the beach from end to end at the water’s edge. To check communication with V Beach, two redoubts had been constructed upon the plateau south-east, and from them thick entanglements ran down to the cliffs edge at Cape Helles. Other entanglements on the north-west cut off communication with the more distant X Beach. The top rows, as it were, of the theatre, broken near the centre of the gully, were strongly entrenched; machine-guns, commanding the beach by converging fire, were lodged in caves upon the cliffs on both sides; and the land and sea were planted with mines. In his dispatch, Sir Ian Hamilton justly says:

These unsurpassed soldiers were men of the 1st Lancashire Fusiliers (86th Brigade), and, in their honour, W Beach was afterwards generally known as “Lancashire Landing.” The Euryalus was the guardian ship of this covering party, and after half an hour’s naval bombardment, to which no answer came, eight picket boats in line abreast, towing four cutters apiece, steamed toward the shore till they reached the shallows, and the tows were cast off to row to land. As at V Beach, the Turks maintained their silence till the boats grated. Then, in an instant, a storm of lead and iron swept down upon the Lancashire men. Some leapt into the water, and were caught by the hidden entanglement there. The foremost hurled themselves ashore, and struggled with the terrible wire, compared with which our British barbed wire is as cotton to rope. In vain the first line hacked and tore. Machines and rifles mowed them flat as with a scythe. Witnesses eagerly watching from the distant ships asked each other, “What are they resting for?” But they were dead.

Fortunately two of the tows, carrying a company, with which was General S. W. Hare, C.O. of this 86th Brigade, put to shore a little to the left of the central beach, and found shelter under a ledge of rock at the foot of Cape Tekke cliff. Here they escaped the cross-fire, and were able partly to enfilade the enemy’s trenches. The Brigadier-General was severely wounded, either at this time or a little later, but part of the company succeeded in scrambling up the rocks in front of them to the summit, and a party from three tows to the right of the beach were equally successful upon the Cape Helles side.89 Meanwhile the covering warships had moved close in to bombard the trenches along the edge of the summit, and the beach entanglements were at last broken. The companies, re-formed under cover of the cliffs on both sides of the beach, chiefly to the left, and supported by the arrival of further tows, began the assault on the highest point of the plateau above the bay (known as Hill 138, about the spot where the military cemetery was afterwards laid out). In the centre the assault was made with bayonets only, the rifles being clogged with sand. By 11.30 three trenches had been taken—in spite of the explosion of many land mines—the point was occupied, and communication established with the landing-party at X Beach, to be afterwards described.90

Similarly, a small party of Lancashire Fusiliers succeeded in scrambling to the summit of the cliff on the right above Cape Helles, but were there held up by the redoubts and entanglements, and there they lost Major Frankland, Brigade-Major of the 86th. No further advance could be made till 2 p.m., when, owing to the positions held by the companies on the left, the landing had become fairly secure. Colonel Woolly-Dod, of the Divisional General Staff, then took the place of General Hare in command, and the Worcester and Essex Regiments were sent to reinforce the covering party. Following a heavy naval bombardment they advanced, the Essex leading, cut passages through the entanglements, and after two hours’ contest captured the redoubt, though with heavy loss.

An attempt was then made to relieve the terrible situation at V Beach by advancing along the top of the headland north-east. Lancashire and Royal Fusiliers from W and X Beaches came over in small parties to assist the Worcesters. The distance to V Beach was not great—barely half a mile—and if it could have been covered, the enemy must have abandoned their V Beach trenches. Wire-cutters fearlessly advanced. From headquarters on the Queen Elizabeth they could be watched, clipping the powerful entanglements as though pruning a garden at home. But the rows of wire were too thick, the fire from the ruins of No. 1 Fort too deadly. Exhausted by a sleepless night and the hot day’s fighting, these bravest of men abandoned the attempt, and sought rest in the trenches along the summit of the cliffs now deserted by the enemy. Violent counter-attacks were repeated through the night. Except the Anson Battalion beach-party and a company of sappers, there were no available reserves. But the lines defending W Beach were held, and the landing of stores, rations, and water in kerosine tins (for the Divisional supply of which General Hunter-Weston’s Staff had provided) began without interruption. Part of the remainder of the division also disembarked, and the sappers set to work at constructing the road which afterwards wound up the dusty ascent from the beach to the plateau.

If one could scramble round the foot of Cape Tekke till the face of the cliff looking westward towards the Ægean and Gulf of Xeros was reached, rather over half a mile along the sea-washed rocks, one would come to a narrow strip of sand about 200 yards long. The cliff above it is lower and less steep, the surface soft and crumbling. This is X Beach, to be known afterwards as “Implacable Landing,” owing to the fine service of the guardian battleship Implacable (15,000 tons, 1901; Captain Lockyer). Here half the battalion of the 2nd Royal Fusiliers was disembarked from the Implacable in four tows of six boats each, the battleship advancing in the centre of them with anchor hanging over the bows to six fathoms, when it dragged. Captain Lockyer opened fire upon the slope and summit of the cliffs at very short range with every available gun, and under this protection the half-battalion landed with small loss. Using the same tows as they returned empty, the second half-battalion followed from two mine-sweepers. But the advanced party were already swarming up the face of the cliffs under Lieut.-Colonel Newenham (C.O., 2nd Royal Fusiliers). At the summit the fire from rifles, machine-guns, and shrapnel was very heavy. Securing his left with one company, and the front with part of another, and leaving one company to bring up ammunition and water, Colonel Newenham proceeded to effect communication with the Lancashire Fusiliers on W Beach. This was accomplished by a violent bayonet attack up the height on the top of Cape Tekke (Hill 114). In this attack the remainder of the battalion was engaged, encouraged by cheers from the Implacable, so close to shore had the ship put in. After heavy loss, the summit was taken about noon, and Royal Fusiliers shared with the W Beach troops in the endeavour to relieve V Beach. But meantime the centre above X Beach was severely threatened; Colonel Newenham was wounded; and the situation was only saved by the arrival of the 1st Borderers and the 1st Inniskilling Fusiliers of the 87th Brigade, whose Brigadier, General Marshall, had also been wounded.91

Rather less than a mile farther up the coast from X Beach one comes to a wide opening in the cliffs, known at that time as Y2, and later as Gully Beach. Along the shore it could be reached by climbing over rocks, but there was then no path. Along the summit it was easily reached by the usual Turkish tracks from the high ground at Cape Helles and Cape Tekke, but these tracks, like the rest of the Peninsula inland, were hidden from the sea by the slope of the ground from the edge towards the centre. The opening is caused partly by a short gully running from the summit almost at right angles to the beach, but especially by a long, deep gully, or “cañon,” coming down from the Krithia direction, and running for about three miles almost parallel with the sea, from which its existence is entirely concealed. In dry weather it shows a trickle of water in some places; after rain it becomes the bed of a torrent or a channel of liquid mud. Owing to our want of trustworthy maps, its course was at that time unknown, but it came to be called the Gully Ravine, or the Gully simply (in Turkish, Saghir Dere). Its depth might conceal an army in ambush, and its issue upon the shore forms a broad, flat beach, commanded by heights in a semicircle fronting the sea. Here the Turks had massed large forces of infantry, deeply entrenched, and supported by machine and Hotchkiss guns. Formidable as the position was, it could hardly have been stronger than V or W Beach, and one may conclude it was refused by the General in command mainly for want of men to storm another point at which the enemy would naturally expect attack. Perhaps also he considered the position not far enough removed from Helles to turn the defences there and threaten the line of retreat.

About two miles farther up the coast there is another beach known to the end of the campaign as Y. The navy put it at 7000 yards from Cape Tekke. So small is it, and the cleft or dry waterfall which forms it so steep and narrow, that the Turks had neglected the position as unassailable. Nevertheless, lying south-west from Krithia village, and about four miles from Cape Helles, it was chosen as a protection to our left flank and a threat to the enemy’s line of communication, or of retreat in the event of his withdrawal from the end of the Peninsula. It was intended to serve the same purpose as De Tott’s Battery (Eski Hissarlik) upon our extreme right, and, if it were securely held, its value was obvious.

The 1st King’s Own Scottish Borderers and one company of the South Wales Borderers had been detailed for this service, but the Commander-in-Chief added the Plymouth (Marine) Battalion, R.N.D., on account of the importance of the position, or because the landing-party was beyond reach of reinforcement. The Goliath, Sapphire, and Amethyst were the conducting ships, and at the first light the troops were put ashore by trawlers with four tows. They had to leap out into deep water owing to reefs, but reached the shore without opposition, and at once climbed the precipitous watercourse and cliffs on each side. The battleship Goliath shelled only the reported emplacements near X Beach, hoping to delude. But Turkish snipers immediately set to work, and the fire became more and more searching as the day went on. Still there was no organised attack, and the men dug shallow and far-extended trenches along the summit on both sides of the deep ravine, the Marine Battalion on the left, the K.O.S.B. in the centre, the S.W. Borderers on the right. Colonel Matthews of the Plymouth Battalion was in command throughout, but his second in command, Colonel Koe (K.O.S.B.), was mortally wounded early in the day. It was impossible to fulfil Staff orders by gaining touch with X Beach, because communication was shut off by the powerful Turkish force at Y2—a misfortune which might have been foreseen. During the afternoon, the sniping developed into assault. Turks were seen swarming out from Krithia, and others probably came up from Y2 along the Gully Ravine (Saghir Dere), which at this point is only a short distance away, and was hitherto unknown to our men.

At twilight the repeated assaults increased in violence. Under the rising moon, line after line of Turks advanced, at some points reaching the trenches before they were cut down. Sir Ian mentions a pony led right through the trenches with a machine-gun on his back, and an eye-witness saw a German officer killed by a blow from a shovel as, with grenade in hand, he called upon a trench to surrender. All night the savage conflict continued, the Turks charging with religious courage, our men driving them back with the bayonet when the rifles became foul and choked with dirt. But just before daylight the shrapnel terrifically increased, the Turks swarmed round in irresistible crowds, the centre of the K.O.S.B. trenches was rushed, and the men driven headlong down the gorge. Only those who know the nature of the ground, the cliffs some 200 feet high, and the depth of the ravine, half hidden by thick and prickly scrub, can realise the horror of that scene, or the superb devotion of those who still remained to hold the summit while the wounded were being carried on waterproof sheets (without stretchers) down to the beach. More than half the officers and nearly half the men were killed or wounded. By morning it had become impossible to cling any longer to the position. Protected by a small and heroic rearguard, and by the heavy fire of the ships Goliath, Talbot, Dublin, Sapphire, and Amethyst, the wounded, the stores, and the survivors of the two battalions and the S.W. Borderers company were taken off by the boats and returned in the early afternoon on the warships to the southern end of the Peninsula. In spite of the heroism displayed, and in spite of the service in holding up a large Turkish force for the critical twenty-four hours, the effort at Y Beach failed, and the failure was serious.

About nine miles from Y Beach farther north along the coast, the snub-nosed promontory of Gaba Tepe suddenly projects. It is of no great height—just under 100 feet—but deep water washes the foot of the steep and rugged cliffs, its caves and artificial tunnels concealed guns which no shell could touch, and from those caves and tunnels nearly the whole coast north and south could be enfiladed. North, the coast falls into an open, gently sloping shore of quiet meadows and scattered olive groves, crossed by a track to the Old Village (Eski Keui) in the centre of the Peninsula, and so to Maidos on the strait. Next to Bulair, this is the shortest way over, for it measures less than five miles in a straight line. But on the right stands the threatening plateau of Kilid Bahr, strongly held, and forming a central base for the enemy’s army, and on the left rise the heights of Sari Bair, intersected by inextricable entanglements of gully and ravine. At the northern end of that gentle slope, rising like the fields around a Lowland loch, just where the cliffs begin again, the main landing of the Anzac corps was intended. Remembering the V and W Beaches, no one can call any position impregnable to such men as ours; but the spot was thickly wired from the water’s edge; it was fully exposed to the guns hidden on Gaba Tepe, in an olive grove farther inland, and on Kilid Bahr plateau itself; to advance over the gradual slope would have meant advancing up an unsheltered glacis crossed by almost impenetrable obstacles, in the face of entrenched and invisible machine-guns and rifles. It was fortunate that man’s proposals here went astray.

The object of the Anzac landing was to detain the Turkish forces on Kilid Bahr plateau, to check the reinforcement of the southern Peninsula by them or by other troops from the Bulair district, and to threaten the Turkish line of retreat. The enemy’s forces in these central regions were vaguely estimated at about 20,000; but reconnaissance had been impossible, the country was unknown, except in so far as it can be surveyed from the sea, and hitherto the Staff had no maps even fairly trustworthy, as the maps afterwards found on the bodies of Turkish officers were. The landing was officially called Z Beach, but was always known as “Anzac,” and so history will know it. As already stated, the covering force consisted of the 3rd Australian Brigade under Colonel Sinclair Maclagan. It was conveyed in four transports, but the first landing-party (about 1500 men) had been transferred at Mudros to the warships Queen (Admiral Thursby’s flagship), the London, and the Prince of Wales. Twelve tows were provided, each consisting of a steam pinnace and a trail of four cutters or “lifeboats,” and carrying about 125 men.92 As soon as the first party had started in the tows, the remainder of the covering party was to tranship from the transports into eight destroyers, and to follow slowly towards shore until taken off by the returning tows, three tows being allotted to each pair of destroyers. When the covering brigade had made sure of the landing, the transports of the whole army corps were to close in to shore and disembark. The Triumph, the Majestic, and the cruiser Bacchante were to cover the landing by gun-fire. As throughout the expedition, the entire organisation on the water was directed by the navy, and the boats were commanded by boy midshipmen, whose imperturbable calm in moments of extreme peril was, from beginning to end, and at every crisis, only rivalled by the dogged heroism of their crews.

The whole force assembled at a point about half-way between Imbros and the intended landing. It was 1.30 a.m. of the 25th. The smoke rising against the westering moon probably betrayed their presence, but they waited till the moon set behind the jagged mountains of Imbros soon after three. As directed, the first tows were then manned, and the three warships moved abreast slowly towards the shore, followed by the trailing boats. At 4.10 a.m. they stopped, within about one and a quarter mile of shore, and the tows moved slowly forward, the destroyers following them at about half an hour’s interval. Probably it was in that interval that the salutary mistake occurred. Whether misled by ignorance of the coast and by the starlit darkness, or carried unconsciously by a current which sets along shore towards the Gulf of Xeros, the tows approached land rather more than a mile north of the appointed landing. The beach to which they made is a shallow arc of sand stretching for about half a mile between two small projections in the coast-line—Ari Burnu to the north, and what the Australians called Hell Spit to the south. One deep ravine, starting from an almost precipitous cliff (to be known as “Plugge’s Plateau”) divides the arc near the northern extremity at right angles to the shore; but confusedly broken and steep, though not absolutely precipitous, ground rises all around the cove—“Anzac Cove”—to a general height of over 200 feet. Wherever the ground—a mixture of soft sandstone and marl—was not too steep for vegetation, it was then covered with thick green or blackish scrub, chiefly prickly oak, difficult to penetrate, and in places six feet high. In later months the scrub served as a danger signal, for the spots where it remained were exposed to rifle or shell-fire. Everywhere else it disappeared, leaving the yellow surface bare.

The tows approached the beach in absolute silence. Trusting to the cliffs, the Turks had neglected defence at this point, but for two slight trenches—one close to the water’s edge, the second a little up the height. Even these seem to have been left unmanned, for about a battalion of Turks was dimly perceived running along the shore, no doubt hurried up from the open ground where our landing had been intended. Just before 5 a.m. they opened fire, and many of the soldiers and crews were struck in the boats. The Australians made no answer, but before the keels grated, leapt into water up to their chests, and surged ashore. Throwing off their packs, they dashed straight with the bayonet upon the enemy wherever they could see him. The two trenches were carried with a rush, and still the men charged on. They began to struggle up the gully and the steep ascent on its right (afterwards called Maclagan’s Ridge). The tows returned for the remainder of the brigade on the destroyers, and these men joined in the rush and scramble. Some of the tows crossed each other, and added to the excited confusion. Some, either for want of space or yielding to the current, passed north of Ari Burnu and attempted a landing on the broad and open beach beside fishermen’s huts, standing almost in front of the perpendicular and strangely shaped cliff afterwards called “The Sphinx.” Here they suffered terrible loss from rifles and machine-guns; for this beach, gradually broadening out till it merges into the open, marshy plain at the mouth of Anafarta Biyuk valley, extends to Suvla and the Salt Lake, and the Turks were here prepared to oppose a landing. A few of the boats went adrift, having no men left to control them. One at least swayed with the current, full of dead. Several had to be left for some days aground against the beach, full also of dead.

Crossing the top of Maclagan’s Ridge, the scattered groups of the 3rd Brigade suddenly looked down into a deep valley running right across their advance. It was the hidden valley afterwards known as Shrapnel Gully. From its issue upon the beach just south of Hell Spit, it runs up north-east for something over a mile through the very heart of the subsequent position. Many gullies and small watercourses (all dry except after heavy rain) lead into it, and it afterwards became the chief means of communication with the outposts along the centre of the Anzac lines. Down into this valley the 3rd Brigade plunged. The thick bushes and devious watercourses split them up. Battalions and companies lost touch in haphazard advance. Shrapnel from the opposite height and both flanks swept the valley in bursting storms. From the rear and every side, hidden snipers picked the isolated men off as they struggled forward. Officers fell. Orders ceased. In separate knots, without leading or control, the men ran, and leapt, and stumbled on. Right across the valley they struggled, shouting their battle-song, “Australia will be there,” bayoneting all Turks they caught, and cursing as they fell. Up the opposing heights they climbed—heights so steep on the face that, later in the campaign, steps had to be cut for paths, and supplies were hauled up by pullies. Over the top of that steep ridge the groups charged on. Many got farther than Anzacs were ever to go again. Some looked down into the valleys where the nearest Turkish camps of Koja Dere and Boghali stood. Many disappeared for ever into the unknown wilderness. “They refused to surrender,” the Turks said at the armistice of a month later—“they refused to surrender, so we had to kill them all.”

In a contest of such confusion, the thought of time is lost, and it becomes impossible to trace the course of consecutive events. But early in the morning—some say at 5.30, others about 9.30—there was a pause in the firing for about an hour. The Turks appear to have been overwhelmed by the dash and violence of an assault such as that leisurely and dreamy race had never imagined. It seems to have been about this time that Major Brand (Brigade-Major of the 3rd Brigade) with a party of the 9th (Queensland) and 10th (South Australian) battalions, standing on one of the sharp crests, and seeing a redoubt and earthworks upon a hillside below, charged down the valley and captured a battery of three Krupp guns. The Turks, after the pause, were then advancing to their first counter-attack, and the Australians were compelled to spike and destroy the guns instead of getting them away. But it was a serviceable deed.

So soon as it was light, the guns hidden on Gaba Tepe and hidden guns on some hill to the north poured converging shrapnel upon the boats coming to shore, and upon the beach itself, although it was to some extent protected by Hell Spit and Ari Burnu. The Triumph and Bacchante succeeded in keeping down the fire from Gaba Tepe at intervals, but it repeatedly burst out again with fury. Under this recurrent storm of shell, the 1st (New South Wales) and the 2nd (Victoria) Brigades, closely followed by two brigades of the New Zealand and Australian Division (the New Zealand and the 4th Australian), put to shore. All had landed soon after midday, and two batteries of Indian mountain guns came into action. But the losses were severe, and the shelling so heavy that the remaining artillery could not be landed. In the extremity of peril and excitement, battalions and brigades became hopelessly mixed up, and many groups lost touch with units and officers. But for the most part, the 2nd Brigade appears to have climbed to the right of the 3rd or covering brigade, to have crossed the long (Shrapnel) gully nearer its mouth, and to have advanced up the continuation of the farther ridge towards the point afterwards called M‘Laurin Hill (Colonel M‘Laurin being C.O. of the Victorians). The 1st Brigade appears to have supported the 3rd, and held a position on its left, probably near “Pope’s Hill.” The extreme left of the whole position, which gradually took the shape of an irregular semicircle or triangle, was later occupied and held by the joint Division of New Zealanders and Australians. Near the centre the Auckland Battalion under Colonel Plugge held “Plugge’s Plateau,” overlooking the beach. To the left, the New Zealanders stormed the steep ridge afterwards known as “Walker’s,” from Brigadier-General H. B. Walker, of the General Staff. Just beyond “The Sphinx” it rises steeply from the beach to a height which faces the sea in a sheer precipice of 150 feet, and its long summit became the main line of defence on the north and north-east. Moving still farther left, over a broad beach (“Ocean Beach”) and fairly open ground, afterwards crossed by the “Great Sap,” Captain Cribb with a party of New Zealanders rushed a strong redoubt and store at the “Fishermen’s Huts” and established the outlying position of “No. 1 Post.”

In the afternoon and early evening, the 4th Australian Brigade (2nd Division) under Colonel Monash, apparently advancing from the beach straight across the central ridge, filled in the dangerous gaps between the Australian brigades on the right and the New Zealanders on the left. The upper end of “Shrapnel Gully,” leading up to “Pope’s Hill” between “Walker’s Ridge” and the steep farthest line of defence afterwards held by “Quinn’s Post,” “Courtney’s” and “Steel’s,” was accordingly known as “Monash Gully.”

By the evening the Anzac position, which varied little for the next three months, was thus roughly drawn, and the names of the officers who had seized the various points were vaguely attached to them. The whole position was hardly more than three-quarters of a mile deep by a mile and a half long, not counting the outpost by Fishermen’s Huts. In fact, on the first day hardly more than a mile in length was gained. But to the end it was almost impossible to realise how small the area was, so steep are its heights and so entangling its valleys and ravines. Entangled in those ravines, exhausted by scaling the heights, and lost in the deep scrub of that unknown country, the Anzacs fought till dark to maintain their plot of ground against repeated counter-attacks. There was no time to dig in. From Koja Dere, Boghali, and Kilid Bahr plateau, the Turks rolled up waves of reinforcement. It was estimated that 20,000 came clashing against the 3rd Brigade and the left of the 2nd in the middle morning. The attack was renewed at 3 p.m. and again at 5. Groups of Australians were driven back from the most advanced positions; many were cut off and shot down. Only along the edge of the heights beyond Shrapnel Valley a thin line held, growing hourly thinner.

In the afternoon, General Birdwood came ashore with the Divisional Generals. The beach was a scene of wild and perilous confusion. Men, stores, ammunition, and watercans were being dumped on the sand as the boats brought them in. Parties loaded up with rations, water, and cartridges were climbing out to supply the firing lines. In long streams the wounded were staggering or being carried down to lie on the beach till boats could take them off, at first to hospital ships, and afterwards to any kind of ship which the navy could allot. For here, as elsewhere, the casualties had been greatly underestimated. Originally only two hospital ships had been provided for the whole attack, and though the navy lent two more, the supply was not nearly adequate. On the small beach, Colonel N. R. Howse (Assistant Director of Medical Service to the Corps) hurriedly erected a dressing-station; but the wounded, however heroic in their suffering, suffered much. And over the whole scene, shrapnel crashed and shrieked perpetually, while the air was filled with the tearing wail of bullets passing in thousands across the beach from the cliffs above, and dropping like hail-stones upon the boats and sea. At nightfall the Turks, shouting their battle-cry of “Allah, Allah Din!” renewed the attack with intensified violence. Appeals for reinforcement came pouring in. It seemed impossible to hold on. Orders to prepare for evacuation were whispered from group to group.93

Still farther up the coast, at the head of the Gulf of Xeros, the Royal Naval Division (less the Plymouth Battalion detailed for Y Beach) was engaged upon a feint, as though a landing were intended either north of the Bulair lines, or at Karachali on the opposite coast. Accompanied by destroyers and the battleship Canopus (Captain Grant) of Admiral Thursby’s squadron, the division proceeded in its own transports. The destroyers opened fire at Karachali and other points along the shore. Towards nightfall the Canopus bombarded the Bulair lines, and preparations as though for a landing were ostensibly made. There was no answer from the enemy, but silence never proved that their trenches were not manned, and their guns ready. Later in the campaign one heard rumours of a landing having been effected here without opposition by a party of Marines, but the only man who went ashore was Lieut.-Commander Bernard Freyberg of the Hood Battalion. Painted brown and thickly oiled, he was dropped from a destroyer into a boat at 10 p.m. on the 24th and from the boat swam ashore, about two miles, carrying four Homi flares and three oil flares. Landing at midnight, he crawled 400 yards up to a trench, and there heard talking, which proved that the trenches were occupied. Crawling back, he lit three lots of flares a quarter of a mile apart, along the shore in the direction of Bulair. Two of the destroyers at once opened fire, and the Turks fired back. Lieut.-Commander Freyberg then swam out, and was picked up an hour later.

During the night the Canopus was recalled to Anzac to support the dubious contest there.

Another feint, on a much larger scale, was made by the French Division upon the Asiatic entrance to the Straits. The object was partly to hold a Turkish force, partly to check the fire from the Asiatic side upon the S and V landings. For this purpose, General D’Amade selected the 6th Regiment (Lieut.-Colonel Noguès), mixed Senegalese and Lyons men, of the Brigade Coloniale, supported by the Jeanne d’Arc and the Russian cruiser Askold (called the “Woodbines,” because she has five thin funnels close together, like the five cigarettes in a penny “Woodbine” packet). At the same time, the remainder of the French squadron was ordered to Besika Bay, five or six miles south of the point. Landing from the boats of their own transports, the infantry captured Kum Kali and Yenishehr villages after severe fighting, taking about 600 prisoners. In spite of violent counter-attacks, they held on through that night and the following day, not advancing farther along the coast than the mouth of the Mendere, but drawing the fire of the Asiatic guns, and thus defending both our transports and landings. The action was in every respect successful, but the regiment was re-embarked after nightfall on the 26th in accordance with pre-arranged plans, since Lord Kitchener had forbidden Asiatic adventures. The French lost 167 killed, 459 wounded, and 116 missing. They put the Turkish casualties at 2000, apart from prisoners.94

When night came, the small force at De Tott’s Battery (Eski Hissarlik) was fairly secure; the landing at V Beach had failed, and the few survivors ashore were barely sheltered from extreme peril by the low bank of sand; W Beach was held, but the partially entrenched troops on the plateau which protected it were exposed to repeated attack; X Beach was comparatively safe, owing to dead ground and the Implacable’s guns, and connection with W had been established; in shallow trenches above the ravine on Y Beach the diminishing companies desperately clung to the ground, but were exposed to irresistible numbers; at Z Beach (Anzac) the cove and a rough triangle of unexplored cliffs and ravines were barely held against persistent onsets; near Bulair the feint was probably successful in holding a certain number of Turkish troops, and Captain Freyberg was lighting his flares, a daring and lonely figure; at Kum Kali the French were fulfilling their task, but under orders to withdraw. Of the three Brigadier-Generals in the 29th Division, one had been killed and the other two wounded. Upon those scenes of anguish and death, of scarcely endurable anxiety and a self-devotion unsurpassed in any annals, the Sabbath evening closed, but scarcely for one moment did the tumult of battle cease.

CHAPTER VI THE TEN DAYS AFTER

Throughout the long and anxious hours of the 25th, while the fate of his army hung uncertain, the Commander-in-Chief was compelled to remain on board the Queen Elizabeth with his Headquarter Staff. There was no place for him ashore. In modern warfare a commanding General cannot allow himself to become entangled in one part of the widely-extended front or in another. When once his dispositions have been made and his orders issued, the control passes out of his hands; and the more complete his dispositions and orders have been, the less is the part he is justified in taking upon himself. He can but await the result, listening anxiously to reports as they come. The wretchedness of such a position, for a soldier born to lead forlorn hopes or to command the rush of onset, was here increased by the sea. At no point was it possible even to remain on land without losing touch with all the other points. Only at sea could communication be maintained and reports delivered. The Commander-in-Chief was reduced to a position of inactive but restless security, all the more pitiable because, from the shelter of the great battleship, telescopes revealed incidents of heroic resolution in which it was impossible to share.

The day passed. In the evening the Queen Elizabeth flung a violent bombardment upon the defences of V Beach, bringing renewed courage to the line of survivors still crouching under the bank. At midnight, Sir Ian was called upon to take a decision as rapid as vital. It has been already mentioned that rumours of evacuation went round Anzac cove at sunset. The men were much exhausted by prolonged fighting, extreme danger, and heavy loss; the battalions were mixed; ammunition was running short; water, though brought ashore in boats, and already found by digging in one or two places, was scarce, and had to be carried up the cliffs on men’s backs; the wounded—over 2000 in number—though energetically tended, as already mentioned, and taken off rapidly to any available ship, still lay thick on the beach, or came dribbling back from the heights; along the bit of coast, over sea and shore, the shrapnel crashed and whirled perpetually; brave as the Anzacs had proved themselves, they were new to battle. If evacuation was unavoidable, now, at night, was the only possible time.

Sir Ian’s decision was unhesitating. The Turks were actually pressing upon the Anzac lines. Evacuation could not remain secret, and would take many hours. It would involve incalculable slaughter on the shore and in the boats. It meant defeat. It meant withdrawal such as Lord Kitchener had specially ordered him never to consider. It meant a breach in any high-spirited soldier’s instinct. The command was quick. Let them dig for their lives. Let them cling on like tigers. Help would come in the morning.

And in the morning help came. Just after daylight the Queen Elizabeth herself appeared off Anzac cove. For three hours she threw her huge shrapnel from 15-in. guns, each shell flinging out a cone of some 13,000 bullets far to both sides and front.95 The Triumph and Bacchante supported her. The Anzacs, outworn by the night struggle against repeated charges, stood their ground with courage renewed. Along the very edge of the steep cliff or ridge on the farther side of Shrapnel Gully they furiously dug. Battalions and brigades remained still confused. Men and groups fought or dug where they were wanted at the nearest line. By extreme effort thus was gradually formed that famous arc, or more properly triangle, which contained the Anzac of the next three months. It had the beach as base, Pope’s Hill near the apex (where a dangerous gap remained), Walker’s Ridge as one irregular side, and the long and devious line through Quinn’s Post, M‘Laurin’s Hill, and Bolton’s Hill to the coast as the other side, more irregular still.

The trenches began to afford some cover from shrapnel. A few 18-pounder guns were dragged up hastily constructed paths, and placed right in the firing line. But so continuous were the Turkish counter-attacks throughout the whole of Monday and the greater part of Tuesday the 27th that little attempt at reorganising the brigades was possible, the only recognisable distribution being that as a whole the Australians held the right side of the triangle, and the New Zealanders the left. Even within our lines many Turkish snipers continued for some days hidden in the scrub, maintained there by bags of provisions and cartridges brought with them to the lairs. The main or Shrapnel Gully was especially exposed to snipers of this kind and to more regular fire from the Nek, a narrow connecting link between the chief Anzac ridges and the main range of Sari Bair. To the last the southern end of the gully on its right side was so harassed by rifle fire that it retained its thick coating of scrub, as being too dangerous for dug-outs or any movement of men. For this reason the gully was sometimes called by the longer name of the Valley of the Shadow of Death, and it appears to have been while reconnoitring here that Colonel M‘Laurin, Brigadier of the 1st Brigade, and Major Irvine, his Brigade-Major, were killed side by side.96

The more regular attacks were chiefly aimed at the apex, near the top of the gully, between Pope’s Hill and Quinn’s Post. The dominating position of Pope’s Hill had been stormed early on Sunday by a party of the 1st Battalion, and was taken over that evening by Colonel Pope with a mixed force of 400 men, who proceeded to entrench it as the valuable fortress which it remained. Quinn’s Post, always a point of danger, being within a few yards of the enemy’s line, was gallantly held for the first three days by a party of the 14th Battalion, and on Wednesday (28th) was taken over by Major Quinn (15th Battalion).97

On Wednesday (April 28) the general reorganisation and sifting out of Anzac could begin, but no attempt to reach the objective of Koja Chemen Tepe (Hill 971, the highest point of the Sari Bair range) or to cross the Peninsula to Maidos could then be made. In the fighting of Sunday and Monday alone, the three Australian brigades had lost 4500 killed and wounded. By Wednesday, at least one-fifth of the total force was out of action. Fortunately for General Birdwood, the Anzacs could fill up many gaps by the ten per cent. margin usually allotted to divisions on active service, but refused to Sir Ian’s troops from home. Hardly any amount of untried formations can reinforce an army in action so serviceably as drafts added to divisions which have proved their quality on the field, as the 29th had proved theirs.

By early afternoon of Monday the 26th, the position at the south end of the Peninsula had greatly improved. After dark on the previous evening, the remainder of the landing force on V Beach had come ashore, as already narrated, and though exposed to a violent outbreak of fire under the clear moonlight about 1.30 a.m., they had found better cover among the rocks at the foot of old Seddel Bahr castle. At daylight, Admiral Wemyss opened a heavy bombardment upon the castle, village, and slopes of the semicircular theatre. Thus encouraged, the wearied relics of the Hampshires and Dublin and Munster Fusiliers prepared for advance. To such an advance they were largely inspired by Lieutenant-Colonel Doughty-Wylie and Lieutenant-Colonel Williams of the Headquarter Staff, who, as narrated, had remained under the parapet of sand all night to keep the men in good heart. Only magic personality can organise a fresh assault out of hungry and thirsty men, who have for the most part been lying under almost continuous fire for twenty-four hours, and who leave more than half of their friends lying dead or wounded behind them. Yet it was done. Led by Doughty-Wylie and Captain Walford (Brigade-Major, 29th Divisional Artillery), the men fought their way up into the village under a stream of rifle and machine-gun fire, and from the village advanced to the attack of the plateau above it. On the slope Captain Walford was killed. Between the village and the summit, fearlessly leading the men forward, Doughty-Wylie, a noble type of English soldier and administrator, was killed in like manner.98 Irreparable as was the loss of that knightly figure, the attack pushed onward. By 2 p.m. Hill 141, the old castle, and the battered village were securely gained. On the south-west side of the theatre, connection with W Beach was confirmed, and V Beach became a fairly safe landing-place at last.

That evening and next day the French Corps began to disembark upon that scene of death and persistent courage. To the end of the campaign, V Beach remained the French landing-place and depôt for stores. The French constructed a solid pier out to the bow of the River Clyde, and kept also a gangway of lighters for approach to the floating platforms under shelter of her port side. A British naval and a military officer remained on board to direct the landing of troops or stores and the embarkation of the wounded. The ship’s bridge was fortified with sandbags, and as forming a north-east breakwater to the small harbour the old collier performed useful service. Though fully exposed to the Asiatic guns, she was rarely shelled, perhaps because her funnel served as a guide to the gunners for dropping over the headland heavy shells which burst upon W Beach. This they sometimes did with deadly success. The remainder of V Beach and the sandy theatre above it the French organised with characteristic exactness and practical skill. Stores were arranged in faultless piles, and a light railway for bringing up stone was laid along the shore to the cliff of Cape Helles. The old castle served as a depôt for ammunition. Compressed forage was piled up to limit the effect of shell-fire. In everything except “sanitation” the arrangement of the French lines surpassed ours. They were forbidden to our officers and men, but between adjacent battalions friendly communication was frequent, and by simple barter our tedious ration of apricot jam was frequently exchanged for the French ration of a light red wine, though these articles of exchange were received with scornful hilarity by each side.

On the 27th, two days after the landing, the whole line was able to advance without opposition so as to cover all the landing beaches except Y, which had so unfortunately been abandoned under extreme pressure of numbers. The strong Turkish position at the mouth of the Gully Ravine (“Gully Beach,” or “Y2”) was found deserted. The Turks had withdrawn farther up the ravine, their flanks being now exposed to an advance of the Royal Fusiliers from X or “Implacable Landing.” At Gully Beach the left or western end of our line was accordingly fixed, and the line extended for about three miles to the right, across the Peninsula to the point S, or Eski Hissarlik. This point was soon afterwards taken over by the French, who now put four battalions on their front. The expansion of ground left room for a landing of stores and guns upon the beaches, and also slightly increased the water supply, a few old wells being discovered within the area, and new wells dug. But, owing to the heavy losses, the men holding the front made but a thin line of defence, and the want of water, here as at all points throughout the campaign, remained a perpetual anxiety.

Worn out as his men were by Wednesday (the 28th) morning, almost deprived of sleep since the Saturday before, reduced by heavy loss, especially in officers, and calling in vain for reinforcements to fill up their ranks, Sir Ian resolved to press forward upon the Turks while they were still disorganised. At 8 a.m. a general advance was ordered, the 29th Division moving forward on the left and centre, with the deserted village of Krithia as objective, the French on the right aiming to reach the western or right slope of Kereves Dere, a broad and deep valley which runs down from the foot of Achi Baba and issues into the strait about a mile above De Tott’s Battery (Eski Hissarlik). Next to Seddel Bahr, the village of Krithia was the largest collection of houses upon the end of the Peninsula. It stands on the gradual slope leading up to Achi Baba, about four and a half miles from Cape Helles, whence its grey walls and squat windmills are distinctly visible. The land between the high plateau at Helles and the approaches to Achi Baba falls from both ends into a long and shallow scoop, like the inside of a flattish spoon. On the Ægean, or Xeros side, the rim of the spoon looks fairly complete, though in fact it is broken at the Gully Beach by the mouth of that long and hidden valley of Saghir Dere or Gully Ravine. On the side of the strait the rim is much less obvious, being broken at Morto Bay by the combined watercourses which drain the western and central slopes of Achi Baba, and farther north by the Kereves Dere. At the time of landing, the centre, or scoop of the spoon, was still bright with grass and aromatic plants. Olive trees were scattered over it, and here and there thin woods of stunted fir. At one spot, near the bottom of the curve, rose large trees like elms, which afforded a welcome grove of shade to the Royal Naval Division’s headquarters during the greater part of the campaign. On the whole, the French lines on our right were rather more thickly wooded than ours. At rare intervals stood the ruins of some isolated cottage, surrounded by a patch of cultivation for maize or vines.

Almost exactly down the centre ran the Krithia road from Seddel Bahr, having the “Achi Baba nullah,” which runs into Morto Bay, close on the right. Almost parallel to the road, at an average distance of 300 yards to the left or west side, runs the main or “Krithia” gully, which drains the greater part of the central scoop, and also issues into Morto Bay. A track, which became a road, ran beside this gully as far as a dividing-point, called “Clapham Junction,” where the trickle of water branched into East Krithia and West Krithia nullahs. Almost every yard of this wide scoop of land was fully exposed to the guns on Achi Baba, and some of it to the Asiatic guns as well. In consequence, as the campaign continued, it rapidly became covered with a network of trenches and dug-outs, looking like a vast graveyard, and terminating in an almost inextricable maze at the front, where it was checked by the Turkish system, equally elaborated. Except close to the front, however, transport and other communications were always carried on above ground; the grass was turned into sandy waste, and the paths into roads thick with dust. About half-way between Cape Helles and Krithia, the Peninsula was cut right across from sea to strait by the Eski or Old Line, which crossed the Gully Ravine near Gully Farm, and the Krithia nullah about 250 yards north of Clapham Junction, and ended about a third of a mile below the mouth of Kereves Dere.

Over this slightly hollow plain, and these roads and gullies then unnamed, the advance of April 28 was made. The 87th Brigade led upon the left or seacoast flank, and penetrated rapidly over the open ground almost parallel to the Gully Ravine for nearly two miles. As the K.O.S.B. and S.W. Borderers had been separately engaged at Y and S Beaches, the Drake Battalion, R.N.D., took their place, the remainder of the brigade consisting only of the 1st Border Regiment and 1st Inniskillings. The 88th Brigade was on their right; the 86th, which had covered the first landings, was held in reserve under Colonel Casson (S.W. Borderers). In spite of weariness and the prolonged shock of battle, the relics of this unsurpassed Division advanced sturdily against increasing opposition; but by midday their progress was stopped. Small parties came within a short distance of Krithia, but the 86th Brigade reinforced them in vain. There is a human limit even for the bravest; ammunition ran short, and could not be brought up; and only a few guns had yet been landed. The brigades, accordingly, made a rough line conforming with the 88th in the centre, and the hope of reaching Achi Baba faded, though near fulfilment. The French on our right had reached the approaches to Kereves Dere, but an attempt to advance towards Krithia failed. In the afternoon the Turks counter-attacked with the bayonet, and the French line shook. A rapid retirement exposed the Worcesters to heavy loss on their right flank, and a line had to be rapidly secured from a point about three miles up the coast from Tekke Bornu to a point about a mile farther up the strait than De Tott’s Battery. Here it rested, and two days were spent in strengthening the defences and sorting out the confused battalions.

In order to encourage the worn-out divisions (for it was impossible for any soldiers to maintain the spirit of the first landing without flagging), Sir Ian issued the following order on April 29:

The enemy was not long in taking up the challenge. On the 29th, Sir Ian visited the front lines at Helles and Anzac with his personal staff. Next day he visited the British position at Helles again, and on May 1 the French lines in the same manner. There he found the trenches in the firing line incomplete compared with ours, but the celebrated “75’s” were already in action, and from that time onwards the French gunners, never being stinted in shells, were the envy as well as the admiration of our artillery. On May 1 also the promised reinforcements began to arrive, the 29th Indian Infantry Brigade from Egypt, under Major-General Sir Herbert Cox, being the first comers. Hardly had they taken their position as reserve, with some battalions of the R.N.D., when, in the darkness before the waning moon had risen, the Turks began a furious attack upon the whole French and British front. The Turks’ enthusiasm in defence of their splendid city (for the fate of Constantinople was involved) had been further stimulated by the following proclamation over the signature of their German commandant, General von Löwenstern:

The Turks responded to this appeal with unusual hardihood in attack, and it was evident that the best Nizam troops were now on the Peninsula. For this attack 16,000 were employed, with 2000 in reserve.99 They came on in three solid lines. All crawled on hands and knees till the word was given, and the front was allowed no cartridges, but bayonets only. Their first charge aimed in the centre at the 86th Brigade, so much shaken by loss of men and officers. Here they forced a gap, dangerous had not the 5th Royal Scots at once filled it. This battalion (88th Brigade), under Lieutenant-Colonel J. D. R. Wilson, was the only Territorial unit in the 29th Division. It was anxious to prove itself worthy of that unequalled corps, and now it proved itself. Facing to their right flank, the men charged with the bayonet, the Essex (of the same brigade) supporting them. The next attack fell heavily upon the Senegalese, immediately on our right. Two battalions of the Worcesters (also 88th Brigade) were sent to strengthen the line, and later in the night one R.N.D. battalion reinforced the extreme right of the French.

Between 11 p.m. and 2 a.m., the conflict appeared strangely terrific. The boom and flash of guns, the ceaseless repetition of machine-guns and rifles, the shouts of “Allah! Allah!” answered by British cheers and the yells of savage Africans, the liquid brilliance of star shells, the Bengal lights, red, white, and green, fired by Turkish officers from their pistols as signals to their gunners to lengthen range, or to avoid firing on taken trenches and main positions—all produced the din and spectacle of some battle in hell, lit by infernal fireworks. To spectators on the ships or the high ground in our rear, the scene was the more terrible as the bursting shells and variegated lights came farther and farther into the hollow land, down the centre of which the Allies were being forced.

But with approaching light the worst was over, and at dawn the whole of the Allied line advanced to counter-attack. The British forced their way onward for about a quarter of a mile. But the French made no progress. Machine-guns and barbed wire were used by the Turkish defence with deadly result, and before noon the whole of our line was withdrawn to its former position. It had been an appalling night for both forces, and the Turks spent the next day burying their dead under the Red Crescent. That night and the next (May 2 and 3) violent attacks were repeated, especially upon the French front, and terrifying rumours of disaster flew. On May 4 the 2nd Naval Brigade, R.N.D. (under Commodore Backhouse, R.N.), took over part of the French line, and the whole position was reorganised. Next day the Lancashire Fusilier Brigade (East Lancashire Division) disembarked as welcome reinforcement. While Sir Ian was in Egypt he had watched this Division (the 42nd) with admiration, and now, by order from Lord Kitchener, General Maxwell sent it in his support. Barely in time they began to arrive. The Division was under command of Major-General Sir William Douglas, and consisted of the Lancashire Fusiliers (125th Brigade), the East Lancashire (126th), and the Manchester (127th). All were Territorials.100

While the British and French were thus strengthening their hold upon the southern end of the Peninsula, the Anzacs clung desperately to the rugged triangle which was to be “a thorn in the enemy’s side.” By Friday, the 30th, units had been sorted out, the firing line was reinforced by the 1st Light Horse Brigade (Brigadier-General Chauvel) and by four battalions of the R.N.D. Part of the original fighting line, worn out by continuous firing, digging, sleeplessness, and want of warm food, was withdrawn into sheltered gullies to cook and rest. For the next day (May 1) a general advance was ordered. The Australian Division on the right was to make for the villages Koja Dere and Boghali, the mixed Australian and New Zealand Division on the left to attempt the main Sari Bair ridge, leading up to the dominating heights of Chunuk and Koja Tepe. On the previous evening, however, General Monash, commanding the 4th Brigade, and defending the serious gap in the lines at the top of Shrapnel Gully, protested that such a movement would only extend the gap still more dangerously. As it was, the R.N.D. battalions, which had been thrust in to hold this gap at the triangle’s apex, were at that moment very hard pressed, and after further reconnoitring both General Godley and General Bridges appear to have agreed that the contemplated advance was impracticable. At all events it was not attempted.101

To close that gap at the apex was obviously the first essential move, and on Sunday, May 2 (a week after the landing), a determined effort was made. The objective was a round knoll, known as Baby 700, on the slope of Sari Bair. It stood about three hundred yards beyond the lines on Pope’s Hill, and its possession would have blocked the entrance from which the enemy commanded large sections of Monash Gully and Shrapnel Gully. The attempt began at 7 p.m. with a rapid bombardment, and throughout the night the Australians of the 13th and 16th Battalions endeavoured to storm the terrible position. The Otago Battalion was sent in support; then part of the Nelson (R.N.D.), and after midnight the Portsmouth and Chatham (R.M.L.I.). The Australians gained some trenches near the Bloody Angle, but the plateau had by now been carefully fortified with wire and machine-guns. It was impossible for our destroyers, firing up the length of Shrapnel Gully, to distinguish friend from foe. Five shells, perhaps coming from them, temporarily checked and divided the Portsmouth Battalion in its advance. It was speedily rallied, but under the heavy machine-gun and rifle fire no support was able to establish the position at the Bloody Angle. Parties of the 13th, 16th, and Otago Battalions clung to the edges of the steep ascent till far into May 3. But in the end, all survivors returned to the original lines. The attempt failed, and it cost 800 men.102 On the following day (May 4) an effort to seize Gaba Tepe and end the continuous loss inflicted by its shrapnel upon the beach and upon bathers in Anzac Cove also failed, owing to the mass and strength of wire along the edge of the sea. Meantime, the warships had been continuously assisting all troops on sea and land. On the 27th the Queen Elizabeth, hearing from a seaplane that the Goeben had ventured down the strait, apparently with the object of firing over the Peninsula, forestalled that intention by dropping one of her largest shells from near Gaba Tepe into the strait. Narrowly missed, the Goeben retired under shelter of the steep shore, but the Queen Elizabeth’s second shell sank a transport in the middle of the current.

By May 5 the phase of the landing was completed. A firm hold had been gained upon the end of the Peninsula and at Anzac. The world’s history had been enriched by hardly credible examples of courage, élan, and the fortitude of endurance which Napoleon accounted a more valuable quality in soldiers than courage and élan. But the objects specified in the scheme of attack had not been gained. The Turks were still at Krithia. They still held the lines drawn across the slopes of Achi Baba. Koja Dere and Boghali were still far from the eager youths clinging like flies to the Anzac cliffs. Maidos was farther beyond, nor was the fleet a cable’s length nearer to the Narrows than before. It was evident to all that the campaign, deprived of the incalculable advantage of surprise by the hesitation, delay, and disapproval or indifference at home, would now be long and costly in life. Already in ten days the losses were officially reckoned:

These figures give a total casualty list of 13,979. The loss may be realised by another table. On April 30 the Fusilier Brigade (86th) of the 29th Division, out of a normal strength of 104 officers and about 4000 men, mustered as follows:

For no such numbers of casualties had estimate or preparation been made. The casualties, in fact, amounted to something like three times the estimate, and the treatment of the wounded became a serious, if not insoluble, difficulty. In his dispatch, Sir Ian notices that his “Administrative Staff had not reached Mudros by the time when the landings were finally arranged.” We have seen that they did not reach Alexandria from home till April 1; that they were left there to embark the remaining troops and complete the base hospital arrangements, and did not reach Mudros till April 18. The Administrative Staff included Brigadier-General E. M. Woodward, who, as Deputy Adjutant-General, was ultimately responsible for all questions of personnel and casualties. And it included Surgeon-General W. E. Birrell, who, as Director of Military Services, was immediately responsible for the treatment of the wounded. In the absence of these officers, Sir Ian says “all the highly elaborate work involved by these landings was put through by my General Staff working in collaboration with Commodore Roger Keyes,” who was Chief of the Staff to Admiral de Robeck. But Lieutenant-Colonel A. E. C. Keble, R.A.M.C., Assistant Director of Medical Services, reached Mudros before the chief officers of the Administrative Staff, and to him, as above noticed, the scheme for dealing with the wounded was due. Merely owing to a mistaken estimate of the enemy’s opposition, the means provided were inadequate for the actual numbers. As we have seen, only two hospital ships, each accommodating about 500 cases, had been allotted for the army. The navy lent two more, and supplied such transport as could now be spared, but these were not fitted with hospital necessities. Doctors, nurses, and orderlies, all were short. Army surgeons and stretcher-bearers displayed their fine devotion in bringing the wounded to the beaches both at Helles and Anzac; but in spite of the navy’s energy and fearlessness in control of the boats, many of the wounded remained waiting long for treatment; in one case a fleet-sweeper crowded with Australian wounded went wandering from ship to ship in vain, and at last tied up against the General Headquarters ship (at that time, May 9, the Arcadian, to which Sir Ian had transferred); and upon the transports taking them to Alexandria—a voyage of two to three days and nights—the wounded suffered much. Many were unable to move without help, and no help was there. Most had been treated only with first dressings. In some cases the wounds corrupted. Many died. Warships, like the Cornwallis, afforded as much room as they could, acting as clearing-stations for the wounded, and transmitting the dead to a trawler which daily went round the fleet to collect them.104 The efforts of the fleet surgeons were untiring. But no scheme and no effort could avail against a false estimate of the enemy’s strength and defensive power. Rightly or wrongly, the campaign had from the first been regarded in London as of secondary importance, and secondary provision had been made for an estimate of secondary loss.

My main authorities for this chapter, as for the last, have been the Dispatches of Sir Ian Hamilton and Admiral de Robeck, Mr. Ashmead Bartlett’s Dispatches from the Dardanelles, the late Phillip Schuler’s Australia in Arms, the Rev. D. Creighton’s With the Twenty-ninth Division in Gallipoli, The Immortal Gamble, by Commander A. T. Stewart, R.N., and the Rev. C. J. E. Peshall, With Machine-guns in Gallipoli, by Lieutenant-Commander Josiah Wedgwood, M.P., and my own observation of the ground and conversations with eye-witnesses on the spot.

CHAPTER VII THE BATTLES OF MAY

In Constantinople the naval attacks of February had created the dismay natural to a crowded population threatened with destruction. Preparations were hurriedly made for removing the Government to Eski Chehir in Asia, or even to Konia. In spite of Enver’s dominance, the Committee was charged with bringing ruin on the land, and the German Ambassador, Baron von Wangenheim, feared a separate peace. Ahmed Riza, the honourable visionary, aging survivor of the Parisian Young Turks whose revolution seven years before inspired all Europeans but the Governments with enthusiasm, now stole about the streets honoured but shunned. In his palace on the Bosphorus, the Sultan, Mehmed V., for some inscrutable reason called El Ghazi (the Hero), maundered with imbecility. Removed in March from his palace-prison of Beyler-bey on the Bosphorus to the ancient city of Magnesia, near Smyrna, the “Red Sultan,” Abdul Hamid, surrounded by ministering daughters, beguiled an abstemious and peaceful old age by watching the progress of Christianity with sardonic appreciation.105

The failure of the naval attempt to force the Narrows in March restored the city’s confidence. People felt that, since the British Navy failed, the Dardanelles indeed formed an impregnable pass. Enver and Liman von Sanders regained power, if not popularity. The German bureaucracy, organising every department with efficient despotism, justified the satiric compliment which cried, “Deutschland, Deutschland über Allah!” During the subsequent five weeks of our silence it was believed that the British Government admitted failure and had abandoned the campaign. The distant sound of Russian ships bombarding the Black Sea forts at the entrance to the Bosphorus was listened to periodically with the indifference of custom. When news of the landings began to filter through, decisive Turkish victories over France and England were proclaimed. In Asia and on the Peninsula the enemy, it was said, had been repulsed with incredible loss. If any still clung to the shores of Islam, in a day or two they would be driven into the water. The anxious citizens had Enver’s word for that.

Enver himself was hurrying reinforcements to the front. Some went by the Bulair road, though it was exposed to possible fire from British warships in the Gulf of Xeros. The majority were transported down the Sea of Marmora to Gallipoli or Maidos. But within a few days of the landings, this route was rendered equally dangerous by the skill and gallantry of our submarines, two of which—E14 under Lieutenant-Commander Edward Courtney Boyle and E11 under Lieutenant-Commander Eric Naismith—explored their way under the minefields of the strait, entered the Marmora and played havoc among Turkish transports and gunboats. E14 sank two gunboats and one transport with troops. E11 was even more successful, sinking two transports, one gunboat, one communication ship, and three store ships, and driving another store ship ashore. It created alarm in the city by emerging close to the quays, and on its return down the strait it stopped and backed to torpedo another transport.106 After this, most reinforcements were sent either through Muradhi (the nearest station to Rodosto), risking the Bulair road, or by ships hugging the Asiatic coast by night to the ferry at the Narrows, both routes long and arduous. Some also went by rail to Smyrna and thence by rail to Panderma on the Marmora before being embarked. In early May, Enver admitted that the Turkish losses already amounted to 45,000, and all Turkish towns, even to the distance of Kirk Kilisse, were crammed with wounded. Liman, in command at the front, called for 50,000 reinforcements, and about 30,000, chiefly brought in from Adrianople and Smyrna, were actually sent. Within a few weeks, divisions were also withdrawn from Syria for the same destination. For Turkish troops, the equipment was unusually good—arms, guns, and other stores passing freely through Bulgaria, or coming from the Roumanian port of Constanza down the Black Sea, where the Russian patrols remained torpid or unfortunate. For Turkish troops, the commissariat was also sufficient, the disaster of Lula Burgas having taught the authorities that even Turks cannot fight beyond a certain degree of starvation.107

Before the Turkish reinforcements could consolidate a new position across the southern slopes of Achi Baba, and convert it into an impenetrable maze of trench and wire, it was essential for Sir Ian to continue striking at their front. Only so could the pressure upon the beaches be relieved, and the continuous danger from dropping shells to some small extent be reduced; and only so could the Turks be interrupted in their schemes for driving us into the sea. So heavy had been the losses of the 29th Division that the new Lancashire Fusilier Territorials and the 29th Indian Infantry Brigade were added to the 87th and 88th Brigades so as to make up the Division, the 86th being now so much reduced in numbers that it was temporarily divided between the other two brigades. Two brigades (the 2nd Australian (Victoria) and the New Zealand Infantry) were withdrawn from Anzac and formed into a composite division in reserve with the Drake and Plymouth Battalions, R.N.D. Two battalions of the 2nd Naval Brigade, R.N.D. (Howe and Hood), were sent to reinforce the French Division on the right.

On May 6, when the attempt to push forward began, Sir Ian could count only on about 33,000 rifles, of which only 5000 were British and Irish Regulars. This total included about 8000 French troops; but of these at least 5000 were Africans. The remainder of his army consisted, as we have seen, of Lancashire Territorials, Anzacs (both excellent), and the Royal Naval Division, that finely tempered, though partially trained, body, made up partly of public-school men, but chiefly of northern and west of England miners, R.F.R. stokers and marines, whose heavy losses were due rather to devotion and courage than to lack of skill. Against them were arrayed at least 40,000 regular Turkish troops (Nizam), skilfully disposed in a system of trenches and redoubts designed by German officers and held with Turkish tenacity. As to guns, the French at this time had twenty-four of their “75’s,” together with five or six howitzers, and they never ran short of ammunition. The British had something over fifty 18-pounders, a few old and inaccurate howitzers, very few H.E. shells, and other ammunition always so short that a bombardment in preparation for attack had to be rigorously limited for fear of drawing on the small reserve. The Turkish guns in concealed positions on Achi Baba and its slopes, or behind its shelter, were estimated at about a hundred. In addition, the Turks had large guns and howitzers on the Asiatic side, the most dangerous being hidden between the Trojan plain and Erenkeui village. From time to time they exploded “Black Marias,” as the soldiers called the 9·2 and 11-inch shells, among the French depôts on V Beach and among the British signalling stations and stores on Lancashire Landing. Except beneath the cliffs on the Xeros coast, no point upon the southern Peninsula was secure from fire.

The battle lasted three days (May 6 to 8 inclusive). The reorganised 29th Division began the attack on the left, the French being on the right, the Plymouth and Drake Battalions keeping the two sections in touch from the centre. At 11 a.m. the advance was prepared by a brief bombardment, the French batteries as usual expending far the greater number of shells, and firing with their customary method and precision. The 87th Brigade and Lancashire Fusiliers (Territorials) on the British left then moved along the flat and open ground between the Gully Ravine (Saghir Dere) and the sea. Part also penetrated up the gully itself, which swarmed with Turkish snipers, and at the farther end was commanded by machine-guns. On their right, the 88th Brigade with the Indians attempted to conform to the advance, fighting for every yard over ground affording cover to the enemy in unsuspected pits and dry ravines, but especially in a scattered wood of firs, which grew along the edge of a downward slope near the centre. Against this wood, company after company of the 88th Brigade was led in vain. Hidden machine-guns also checked the progress of the R.N.D. battalions. On the right the French threw forward a swarm of Senegalese in open order. They struggled almost to the crest overlooking Kereves Dere, but were there encountered by a strong redoubt. The French troops advanced through the Senegalese as they came back, but made no further progress. All the R.N.D. battalions suffered heavy loss.108 The fighting developed into a struggle of scattered groups to push forward. The naval guns continued a heavy bombardment, but so deep and narrow were the Turkish trenches that naval shells had little but moral effect, and moral effect rapidly diminishes. By middle afternoon (4.30) it became evident that the wearied and harassed men could go no farther, and the order was given to dig in, keeping a fairly connected line. By sheer hard “hammering,” between 200 and 300 yards had been gained, but no more, and the main Turkish defences were still far ahead.

In the night, the Turks rushed upon the French lines with the bayonet, but the French lines held. Next morning at ten o’clock our attack was resumed. After a short but violent bombardment, the Lancashire Fusiliers attempted to push forward again upon the extreme left so as to clear the Gully Ravine, about half-way between Gully Beach and Y Beach, but were stopped by a redoubt and machine-guns upon the ridge overlooking the sea. On their right, in the difficult ground of scrub and donga between the Gully Ravine and the Krithia Nullah, the 88th Brigade struggled to advance the line, and for a time the 5th Royal Scots obtained a footing in the savagely disputed fir wood. Here they discovered snipers perched on wooden platforms among the branches; and here, as in other places during the campaign, Turks had cleverly “camouflaged” themselves with green paint and boughs of trees till they looked like moving or stationary bushes, though hitherto the process of “camouflage” had not been generally practised. The Inniskilling Fusiliers of the 87th Brigade came up to the support of the Scots, but soon after 1 p.m. a violent Turkish counter-attack recaptured the firs. The French and Naval Brigade had made little progress, and in the early afternoon the battle paused. But it was impossible to lose the advantage of attack and leave the initiative to an enemy only eager to rush forward and chase the Allies back to slaughter upon the beaches. Accordingly, just before five o’clock, after another violent bombardment, especially from the French guns, Sir Ian ordered a general advance of the whole line. French, British, and Irish (the Dublins and Munsters having been united into the “Dubsters”) all rose visibly together, and charged forward with the bayonet. The firs were again taken and held. The line swept over the first Turkish trenches; considerable ground was gained, in places as much as 400 yards. The success was general, except on the extreme left. Here the original failure to hold Y Beach at the first landing was now bitterly felt, for in that direction the Lancashire Fusiliers found it impossible to advance. Indeed, their advance appears to have been counter-ordered at the last moment, perhaps in the belief that the position was too difficult to storm. For a time, on the right also, the situation was serious. Such a storm of shrapnel met the French advance that African fugitives in great numbers came sweeping down through the Naval Brigade, and spread a confusion only checked by the advance of the French reserves.109

The battle had now lasted without intermission for two days, and the nights brought little rest. The Regular troops had been fighting close upon a fortnight without relief. More than half their comrades were killed, wounded, or prisoners; more than half their officers gone. The relics of battalions were merged together; one whole brigade had disappeared. The surface of the hollow plain was strewn with dead, whom there was hardly time to bury; and before the lines, dead and wounded lay together in places which no one could reach and live. The bare sand, the flowering heaths, the groves of olive and fir were splashed with patches of sticky blood. The sinister smell of death pervaded all. On windless days the heat was severe, and a slight breeze from the north stirred up dust storms which increased with the increasing traffic, blinding the eyes, choking the throat, and streaming far out to sea in yellow clouds. Perpetually exposed to fire, no matter where they were placed, the men longed for sleep, shade, an interval of security, and drink of any kind. Short as is the time allowed for a soldier’s grief, yet grief for the loss of friends was there, and in the heart of each lurked the knowledge that in another day or another minute he might be as they.110

Though well aware of loss and exhaustion, Sir Ian resolved to make another call upon his troops for the following day. A new French Division had been long but indecisively promised, and it was gradually arriving during these three days.111 General Bailloud was in command, a bald-headed veteran of seventy, very small, active, and alert, endowed with an irrepressible sense of comedy, which he gaily diffused among men and officers alike. One of his brigades was at once sent forward to strengthen the French position. On the British section, the Lancashire Fusiliers and the Indian Brigade were withdrawn into reserve; the 87th Brigade was left to struggle on the terribly exposed and narrow height between the Gully Ravine and the sea; the New Zealanders were ordered to pass through the 88th Brigade and advance directly upon Krithia; the Australians remained temporarily on their right in reserve, and, as before, R.N.D. battalions formed the connecting link with the French on both sides of the main Krithia road.

Sir Ian and the Headquarter Staff had pitched camp in a depression of the ground above Cape Tekke, too close to the Divisional Headquarters, but the limited space allowed no choice. Before the neighbouring high ground above W Beach, beside the cemetery, the scene of battle lay openly extended, and the movements of each section could be watched from hour to hour, except when advancing lines disappeared for a while into dongas, or when the smoke and upheaval of bursting shells obscured the view with black or yellow clouds. Otherwise, all was visible except the enemy, and, from the vacant appearance of the ground before them, it would have seemed possible for the army to advance in uninterrupted lines across the gently rising slopes to Krithia or the truncated pyramid of Achi Baba itself.

At 10.15 on May 8, the customary bombardment from sea and land began, and was received with the customary silence. At 10.30 the infantry moved, and at once the roar of rifles and machine-guns arose from the Turkish trenches, while overhead the Turkish shrapnel burst incessantly. The 87th Brigade attempted to push forward, but could hardly advance a hundred yards, the South Wales Borderers losing heavily. Among the scattered trees and rugged ravines on the right of the gully, the New Zealanders, under Brigadier-General F. E. Johnston, advanced by short rushes for nearly 300 yards, but, exposed to machine-guns on both flanks, were forced to dig in soon after midday.112 Shortly before, General Paris, R.N.D., commanding the composite division, ordered the Australians to advance into the centre of the attacking line upon the New Zealanders’ right.113 They were under command of Brigadier-General J. W. M‘Cay, who, with his Brigade-Major, Major Cass, went up into the firing line with his battalions, recklessly exposing himself to the heaviest fire until evening, when he was wounded, as Major Cass had twice been at an earlier stage.

The Australians advanced to a slight hollow in the ground, giving some amount of cover. Here it seemed likely they would bivouac, for during the early afternoon an ominous pause ensued. But Sir Ian had determined upon one more effort to secure victory by movement. At 5.15 all the battleships and cruisers, all the French “75’s,” and such heavy guns as we possessed, opened a tremendous bombardment. The bursting shells concealed the slopes of Achi Baba on both sides. Sudden volcanoes spouted rock and earth in dark cones. The orange of the lyddite curled over the enemy’s trenches. It seemed impossible for human beings to survive that quarter of an hour. At 5.30 all guns ceased like one, and with bayonets fixed and rifles at the slope, the whole line again moved forward. The brunt of the fighting now fell to the Australians. Two battalions in front and two in support, they walked or ran in “rushes” of 50 or 60 yards on about 1000 yards of front to the left of the Krithia road. The ground was open, and their appearance was at once greeted by the roar of rifles, machine-guns and field-guns, which the bombardment had again utterly failed to silence. The Australians, though heavily laden with packs, shovels, picks, and entrenching tools, and exposed to intense fire, pressed on, rush after rush, their Brigadier directing and encouraging by waving a stick in front. Without a sight of their deadly enemy, they advanced over 800 yards, the support battalions joining up into the bayonet line. They swept across a long Turkish trench. They shot those who ran, and bayoneted those who stayed. They came within half a mile of the eastern approaches to Krithia itself. Seldom in this war has so reckless and irresistible an advance been recorded. None the less, after an addition of a quarter of a mile beyond our original lines, it was checked. Suddenly upon the right Major Cass, wounded in both shoulders, had discovered a yawning gap of 300 yards, into which groups of Turks were pouring down a gully to harass the Australian line on flank and rear.114

The French, though late, had advanced gallantly to the attack, drums beating, bugles blowing, as in a Napoleonic battle. The French white troops in good order fought their way about 300 yards farther along the Kereves Ridge, capturing the much-disputed redoubt. But the gap was left. The Naval Brigade were delayed in filling it, and in the falling darkness the whole line, exhausted and reduced, had barely life left in them to dig trenches for the night. An average advance of 500 yards had been accomplished.

Next day (May 9) Sir Ian issued the following special order to the Australians and to the British troops, which had now become the VIIIth Army Corps:

In spite of a heavy counter-attack against the French position on the night of the 9th-10th, comparative quiet prevailed during the next two or three days. But at Helles, even on the quietest days, shell-fire never ceased, and, to say nothing of the V and W Beaches, the troops withdrawn from the firing line to rest were continually exposed to danger. For such rest, it was time to withdraw the 29th Division, now that the East Lancashires (42nd) could take its place. The Division had lost about 11,000 men and 400 officers. The relics of those unyielding battalions began to come back on the 11th. That night and next day it rained heavily for the first time, but the over-wearied men sank down into mud or pools of water, indifferent to everything but sleep. In their honour, so well deserved, Sir Ian issued a second special order, dated May 12:

Only five days’ rest could be allowed. Immediately before the withdrawal began, the 29th Indian Brigade, as though to prove themselves worthy of the Division to which they were now attached, carried through a dashing adventure, suitable to the character of the men. The design was due to Sir Herbert Cox, commanding the brigade, and the object was to capture the high cliff or “bluff” overlooking the ravine of Y Beach on the farther side. It has been seen how greatly the failure to hold this position at the first landing had impeded the advance of our left wing. Upon the bluff, the Turks had constructed a formidable redoubt, whence machine-guns and rifles rendered movement along the west side of the Gully Ravine impossible. On the night of the 10th-11th, the scouts of the 6th Gurkhas (Lieut.-Colonel the Honourable C. G. Bruce) scrambled along the shore to the foot of the cliff, and climbed right up the precipitous face. On the summit they were met by heavy fire, and as a surprise the attempt failed. But on the evening of the next day but one (the 12th), the Manchester Brigade (one of those Territorial Corps fit to rank with veteran Regulars) made a feint upon the position from our right, assisted by the 29th Division’s artillery and the guns of the Dublin and Talbot from the sea. While the attention of the Turks was thus occupied, a double-company of Gurkhas again crawled up the cliff, and rushed the redoubt with a sudden charge. During the night and at early morning, they were supported by three Gurkha reinforcements of double-companies, the entrenchment was rapidly completed, and the position permanently held. It was afterwards always known as “Gurkha Bluff,” and its value for the protection of our extreme left was incalculable.

It had now become evident that victory by open movement upon the surface could scarcely be hoped for. As in France and Flanders, the two modern instruments of barbed wire and machine-guns had so strengthened the power of defence that open assault would always cost many lives, and was rendered impossible without a “barrage” of shells such as the Dardanelles force was incapable of affording. Indeed, the very word “barrage” was then hardly known to British troops. The opposing lines were brought almost to a standstill, and advance became possible only by trench and sap, as in an old-fashioned siege, varied by almost continuous attacks and separate exploits, designed partly to save our own men from the rot of inactivity, but chiefly to prevent the enemy from concentrating his efforts to drive us off the land. The line was, accordingly, organised into four permanent sections from left to right—the 29th Division (with the Indian Brigade), the 42nd Division (one brigade of which, the East Lancashire, was split up to gain experience with the 29th Division),116 the Royal Naval Division, and the French Expeditionary Corps, now counting two divisions. In the middle of May (the 14th) the French Commandant, General d’Amade, a soldier with unusual knowledge of foreign affairs, who knew the Far East well, was French Attaché in the South African War, and served with distinction in Morocco, retired from the Peninsula, having found the prolonged strain too great for nerves impoverished by illness. He was sent on a special mission to Russia, and was succeeded by General Gouraud, a cool, solid, and imperturbable soldier of the best French type, who had won high reputation in the Argonne.

At Anzac, although deprived for a few days (till May 15) of the two brigades withdrawn to Helles, the Australasians continued to strengthen their hold upon the perilous edges of their rough triangle. But in the middle of the month (May 15), just as the two brigades were returning, General Bridges, commanding the 1st Australian Division, was mortally wounded. In crossing the mouth of Shrapnel Valley, where the protecting parapets had not yet been completed, he was struck in the thigh by a sniper hidden somewhere in the bushes beyond Pope’s Hill. His last words on leaving Anzac in a hospital ship were, “Anyhow, I have commanded an Australian Division for nine months.”117 Before Alexandria was reached, he died: a stern, outwardly cold, and lonely man, pitiless to apathy, capable of organisation, and inspiring the confidence always felt in unyielding and unselfish capacity. The command of the 1st Division was at once taken over by Major-General H. B. Walker, a resolute and gallant leader, who had served in the British Army in the Soudan campaigns, the N.-W. Frontier, and South Africa. He was among the most determined opponents of evacuation on the night after the Anzac landing. His headquarters were fixed at the top of the “White Valley,” close to the region afterwards famous as Lone Pine.

On May 19, three days after the loss of their own General, the Australians, together with the rest of Anzac, were called upon to resist the most violent attempt that the Turks ever made to drive them off the cliffs. The enemy had now largely increased their artillery, which included at least one 11-inch gun, some 8-inch, and several 4·7-inch, all well posted and concealed. Liman von Sanders had also brought up forces amounting to 30,000 men, believed to include five fresh regiments, and he took command in person. Directly the moon set on the night of the 18th-19th, a tremendous fire of guns and rifles burst from the surrounding Turkish lines. This often happened at Anzac, and now, as usual, the noise died down after about an hour. But at 3.30, crowds of silent figures were detected in the darkness creeping close up to the centre of the Australian trenches. Directly the sentries fired, masses of the enemy in thick lines came rushing forward, yelling their battle-cry to the Prophet’s God. Though most severe along the ridge between Quinn’s and Courtney’s Posts, the assault extended over the whole front, with great violence at the dangerously exposed apex of the triangle. The assailants came on so thick, the ground to be covered was so narrow—in places only a few yards across between the confronting trenches—that the Anzacs had but to fire point-blank into the half-visible darkness before them, and at every shot an enemy fell. Many Australians mounted the parapet, and, sitting astride upon it, fired continuously, as in an enormous drive of game. Morning broke, the sun rose behind the teaming assailants, machine-guns and rifles mowed them down in rows, and piled them up into barriers and parapets of the dead and scarcely living. Still the peasants of Islam, summoned from quiet villages of Thrace and Asia, unconscious of the cause for which they died, except that it was the cause of Islam—still they came on, shouting their battle-cry. Emptying their rifles into trenches manned with equal constancy, rushing wildly up to the sandbag lines, they scrambled over them, only to die of rifles which scorched their skin, or of bayonets dripping blood.

From 3.30 till nearly 11 the conflict raged; but before the sun was at its height the noise and shouting gradually died away. The great assault was finished, and had failed. In heaps and lines, more than 3000 Turks lay dying or already dead. The defence lost only 100 killed, and about 500 wounded. Not a yard of Anzac had been yielded up. The enemy never again attempted an attack upon that scale.

So appalling had the thin strip of neutral ground now become owing to the ghastly heaps of swollen or shrinking bodies piled upon it, so overpowering was the stink of rotting men, that the Turks, waving white flags and red crescents, requested an armistice for burial. After some naturally suspicious hesitation (for the enemy mustered in thick lines, and fighting was frequently renewed) a Turkish officer was brought blindfold into Anzac Cove, four Australian officers carrying him through the sea round the end of the entanglement beyond Hell Spit. Major-General Braithwaite, Chief of Sir Ian’s Staff, met him at General Birdwood’s headquarters, close beside the beach opposite the chief landing-place, called “Watson’s Pier,” because built by Anzac signallers under Captain Watson. An armistice for May 24 was arranged, and duly carried out. It lasted from early morning till late afternoon, and was attended with the usual ironic circumstances. Within certain limits marked by white flags, Australians freely conversed with Turkish officers who spoke faultless English, and were lavish in politeness and cigarettes. It is said that General Liman von Sanders himself, disguised as a Red Crescent sergeant, mixed undetected with the crowd upon that wet and misty morning.118

It may have been so, nor was there cause for disguise. It was by his authority as Commandant of the 5th Ottoman Army that Lieutenant-Colonel Fahreddin concluded the armistice, as narrated. The note in which Sir Ian was informed of this authorisation concluded with the words: “J’ai l’honneur d’être avec l’assurance de ma plus haute considération, Liman von Sanders.” So the courteous amenities of slaughter were maintained, and the Turks buried 3000 corpses, all killed since May 18.

Formidable as the Turkish onset had been, a still more serious peril now threatened the expedition. For some days past, rumours of two hostile submarines had reached the Staff. Since all communication was by sea, since the guns were largely furnished by the fleet, and even General Headquarters were afloat, no news more ominous could have arrived. A foretaste of danger was given on May 13, when, in the darkness, a Turkish destroyer slid silently down the strait and torpedoed the battleship Goliath, lying at anchor off Morto Bay to support the French flank. She was a fifteen-year-old ship (12,950 tons), and she sank at once, carrying down her captain, Thomas Shelford, 19 officers, and over 500 men. As they drowned, they were swept by the current past the Cornwallis, lying nearly a mile astern, and their cries for help were pitiful. The Cornwallis boats saved 56, but only 183 were saved in all.119

Nearly a fortnight later (May 25 and 27), a large German submarine, U51, which had come round by Gibraltar (others perhaps hailed from the Austrian naval base at Pola), struck two heavy blows in succession. Off Anzac, the Triumph (11,800 tons, completed 1904) lay at anchor, with nets out. Suddenly she was struck by a torpedo, which cut through her nets like thread. In ten minutes she sank, carrying down three officers and sixty-eight men, within sight of the Anzac forces, which she had so finely served. All of the Anzacs volunteered a month’s pay toward the expense of salving her, but that was impossible. The next morning but one, the Majestic (Captain Talbot), 1895, 14,900 tons, Rear-Admiral Stuart Nicholson’s flagship, lying at anchor close off Helles, her nets out, and surrounded by small craft of all kinds, met the same fate. The submarine picked her out as a good sportsman picks out the king of a herd. Fortunately, she was prepared for the stroke, and only forty-eight men were lost. She sank in six fathoms, listing heavily to starboard, and then turning completely over, so that her keel remained visible, like the back of a huge whale, above the surface till near the end of the campaign, when she was blown up as an obstruction. On the same day as the disaster to the Triumph, a submarine also aimed at the Vengeance, the Lord Nelson (Admiral de Robeck’s flagship), and three of the French battleships. It was evident that the whole system of naval action, anchorage, and supply must be changed.

Warships and transports were rapidly withdrawn, for the most part to Mudros harbour. The Queen Elizabeth had been sent home at the first rumour of the peril, as being too valuable to risk upon a distant and secondary purpose. For the rest, the neighbouring island of Imbros, lying only from ten to twelve miles west and south-west from the landing-places on the Peninsula, afforded an open bay as roadstead, sandy, shallow, and fully exposed to the north wind. On the east side, the bay or inlet is protected by a long promontory of sand dunes and sandstone cliff, known as Cape Kephalos. On the west rise the mountains of Imbros, perhaps the most beautiful even of Ægean islands. On this part of the island only three small hamlets stand, squalid with poverty. But a mountain track over a pass in the central range leads to the chief village of Panaghía, and two other large villages, rich, as Greek islands go, in maize, vines, fig trees, and olives. About two miles beyond Panaghia lies the crumbling little port of Kastro, dominated by an ancient ruined castle, Byzantine, Venetian, or Turkish, into which slabs of white marble have been built, remnants of some Greek temple. The island appears to have small place in Greek history and literature, though an unknown staff officer, meeting me in one of the valleys, unexpectedly quoted perhaps from Sappho a passage about it or Lemnos. And, indeed, it is a haunt fit for rugged and pastoral gods rather than for polite literature, civilisation, and war. From the top of the pass the whole of the Peninsula is seen; the Straits and the plain of Troy beyond; and far in the distance the grey heights of Ida, and dim mountains of Mitylene. Looking west across a narrow water, one sees near at hand the vast red peaks of Samothrace, a natural home of savage mysteries.

The arrival of hostile submarines caused the dispersal of the fleet and transports, leaving the main supply of the army to indefatigable trawlers, fleet-sweepers, and other small craft, and involving the removal of General Headquarters from sea to land. For some days the Arcadian had a merchant ship lashed each side of her for protection, but the navy refused further responsibility, and at the end of May Sir Ian and his Staff put ashore on Imbros. There was no choice, for Tenedos was largely occupied by the French; Mudros was too distant; and on the Peninsula no place could be found for General Headquarters without entanglement in the headquarters of divisions or the Anzac Corps. Kephalos Bay was nearly equidistant from both landings (about twelve miles from Anzac, and ten from Helles), with both of which it was rapidly connected by telephone and telegraph. Accordingly, the camp was pitched among the sand dunes at the base of the Kephalos promontory, looking over the bay to jagged mountains beyond. A small stone pier was built, for Headquarter use only, whence Sir Ian visited the Peninsula on a torpedo boat three or four times every week. On the opposite side of the bay the navy constructed a similar but longer pier, and sank a collier and two smaller Italian vessels to form a breakwater against the north. Thus a fairly sheltered port was made for the trawlers running daily to the Peninsula with drafts and supplies, and for those which returned to Mudros for more. Level ground, stretching over a mile south-west, was used as a store-depôt, a rest-camp, and a training-place for reinforcements. Up in the hills a camp was laid out for Turkish prisoners, who worked at road-making. Two or three miles away, above a salt marsh, and upon the south coast, were stations for R.N.A.S. aeroplanes, which numbered about 60 in all, but never counted more than 25 or 30 in action. In the later months of the expedition, General Headquarters were removed to the entrance of the deep valley leading up to the pass, because gales, dust storms, hostile aeroplanes, and want of water and shade upon the sand dunes added, as might have been foreseen, to the inevitable discomforts of war.

On May 25 (one month after the landing) Sir Ian issued a special order “to explain to officers, non-commissioned officers, and men the real significance of the calls made upon them to risk their lives, apparently for nothing better than to gain a few yards of uncultivated land.” He pointed out that “a comparatively small body of the finest troops in the world, French and British, had effected a lodgment close to the heart of a great Continental Empire, still formidable even in its decadence.” Owing to their attacks, the Government at Constantinople was gradually wearing itself out. Understating the estimates received from the agents of neutral Powers, he showed that, at the beginning, the Peninsula had been defended by 34,000 Nizam (first line) troops and 100 guns, with 41,000 half-Nizam, half-Redif (second line) on the Asiatic side. By May 12 these had been reinforced by 20,000 infantry and 21 batteries of field artillery. Since then at least 24,000 had been added from Constantinople and Smyrna. Our small expeditionary force, though so much reduced,120 had during the month held in check nearly 130,000 of the enemy, and, at a low estimate, had inflicted on him the loss of 55,000, thus diminishing the fully trained men at his disposal. The order concluded with the words:

The task was indeed great, if not the greatest; but in London and on the fronts of war events combined to increase its difficulty. So far as the expedition was concerned, the collapse of the Russian armies under General von Hindenburg’s violent attacks in Courland, Poland, and Galicia was the event of most vital importance. In this month of May the enemy seized the port of Libau, approached Przemysl, threatened Warsaw, and drove the Russians back from the Carpathians into the basin of the Dniester. In consequence of these successive blows, it became certain that the Russian Army Corps of 43,000 men under General Istomine, which was to advance upon Constantinople from the eastern side as soon as our fleet and army dominated the Dardanelles, would be withdrawn, and the expectation of Russian assistance was abandoned. No longer threatened from the Black Sea, Turkey could now divert an equivalent force to the defence of the Peninsula, and did, in fact, divert four or five Divisions. What was worse, Ferdinand of Bulgaria, long hesitating on which side his interests lay, was encouraged by the Russian defeats to put his calculating trust upon the German alliance. Yet our diplomatists, apparently unpractised in deception and ingratitude, had fondly supposed that Bulgaria would never take arms against her Russian deliverer, and were even counting upon her co-operation in the Near East. In spite of such errors, it is currently believed that aristocratic diplomatists and Foreign Ministers are endowed with an ancestral instinct for diplomacy beyond the possible possession of people less nobly born, and for this reason, if for no other, we must indeed be thankful that our aristocracy has survived to protect us from blunders even more disastrous than their own.

In the middle of May the Salandra-Sonnino Ministry, urged on by the poet D’Annunzio and the Futurist Marinetti, declared war upon Austria; but Italy’s intervention had small influence on the position in the Dardanelles. Mr. Asquith’s deliberate overthrow of his own Cabinet, and his attempt to promote the national cause by a large Coalition Ministry, in which he might well have anticipated a hostility fatal to his leadership, had greater effect, and the effect was malign. Mr. Winston Churchill, who could be counted upon to promote the interests of the expedition as his own particular child, retired to the Duchy of Lancaster, resigning the Admiralty to Mr. Balfour’s charge. Just before his resignation his trusted adviser and opponent, Lord Fisher, had himself resigned, and refused to return, though called upon by the appeal of the whole nation, outside the industrious promoters of panic. His place as First Sea Lord was taken by Sir Henry Jackson; but the country deplored the loss to her service of a great personality. That element of luck which forms part of a successful General’s endowment was already turning against the expedition, and critics were beginning to advise retreat, foretelling disasters which the prophecy of evil often contributes to promote.121

CHAPTER VIII THE BATTLES OF JUNE

Thus, within five or six weeks of the first landing, the situation had become serious. At home, the originator of the campaign had ceased to hold important office; its opponents were encouraged by despondent criticism; and the Government, which had hitherto controlled it, was transformed. On the Continent, the retirement of the Russian armies in Galicia and Poland cancelled the expectation of a Russian force to co-operate from the Black Sea, and rendered the position of Bulgaria dubious. On the Peninsula, the only lines of communication were threatened by submarines; such assistance as naval guns could supply to the flanks was greatly diminished; the lack of guns and ammunition, specially of howitzers and H.E. shells, was severely felt; the new drafts were unacquainted with their officers, and the officers with each other; at Helles and Anzac the positions were fairly secured, but the men were much worn by almost continuous struggle, and harassed by repeated and random shelling. From this, indeed, the dead ground below the cliffs at Anzac offered protection, but hardly any point at Helles was safe, or even sheltered, whether the enemy’s guns fired from Achi Baba or the Asiatic coast. As reinforcement, Sir Ian had received the 42nd Division and already had been promised the 52nd (Lowland Territorial); but this did not begin to arrive till the middle of June, and he was now compelled to ask Lord Kitchener for two complete army corps in addition. Yet the expedition had justified itself in that, but for its presence in the Dardanelles, the whole of the Near East would have fallen to the enemy’s influence, the Russian left flank would have hung in air without hope of succour, and an overwhelming attack upon the Suez Canal would almost certainly have been attempted.

It was now essential to gain more room at Helles, and by repeated assaults to push the enemy’s lines farther away from the landing beaches. Accordingly, Sir Ian issued orders for another general attack on June 4. It was a Friday, the day after Przemysl had fallen into the enemy’s hands once more. At early morning Sir Ian and the Headquarter Staff crossed to Helles, and were there joined by General Gouraud. They stationed themselves on the high ground of the command-post above Cape Tekke, whence a prospect of the slightly hollow plain and opposite slopes of Krithia and Achi Baba could be obtained, although, under the northerly breeze, a violent dust storm blew. As before, the British VIIIth Corps (consisting of the remains of the 29th Division, together with Sikhs and Gurkhas of the Indian Brigade, the 42nd Division, and the R.N.D., in that order from left to right) held the left and centre of the line, while the French and Colonial Corps of two Divisions held the right. The Ægean and the Straits protected either flank, but, as was inevitable on the Peninsula, this very protection rendered flank movements in attack impossible, and every advance was necessarily made straight against the enemy’s front. The British front of about three and a half miles was occupied by 17,000 infantry, with 7000 in reserve.

The attack was preceded by a longer bombardment than usual, probably because the French General had generously lent the British two groups of “75’s” (six batteries of four guns apiece) with H.E. shell. The guns from sea and land opened fire at 8 a.m. and continued till midday, with short intervals. During the latest interval a feint was practised in the hope of inducing the Turks to fill up their first line of trenches, which were thinly held. Our men fixed bayonets, and waved them above the parapets, as though about to advance. The Turks swarmed down the communication trenches to their front line, and were caught by a sudden renewal of our bombardment. At noon the guns lengthened their range, and, protected by their “barrage,” as the manœuvre came to be called later in the war, the infantry advanced in earnest. For the first half-hour the advance was rapid, especially in the centre, and hope of decisive victory rose high.

This success was chiefly due to the extraordinary dash of the Manchester (42nd Division) and the 2nd Naval (R.N.D.) Brigades. Under young and high-spirited leaders such as few troops possessed,122 the so-called “amateurs” of the Anson, Hood, and Howe Battalions rushed forward through the bushes and small ravines of the neutral ground, stormed the first trench, and captured the southern face of a projecting Turkish redoubt. It was done in a quarter of an hour, and in five-and-twenty minutes their consolidating parties were at work upon the positions gained. The Manchester Brigade (always a model of what Lord Haldane’s Territorials could become) swept forward with even greater success. In five minutes they were over the first line; in half an hour they had captured the second, and it was believed that no defences lay between them and Achi Baba. The belief was probably too sanguine, but at all events they had won a third of a mile, and the working parties began reversing the aspect of the excellently constructed Turkish trenches.

Farther to the left, the 88th Brigade (29th Division), though exposed to heavy fire from front and left flank, and met with the bayonet by Turks who courageously awaited their assault, succeeded in capturing the first line of trenches, the Worcesters especially distinguishing themselves. But the farther advance of the division was checked because the 14th Sikhs on their left were held up by barbed wire at the first trench, remaining undamaged by the bombardment. For the same reason, the 6th Gurkhas, who had skilfully advanced along the extreme edge of the cliffs, were compelled to withdraw, and reinforcements were hurried up from the reserve. But even the new battalions were unable to advance against the heavy rifle-fire, and the left of the British line was thus kept in check, unable to conform with the victorious advance in the centre.

With the French upon our right, all seemed at first to go well. The 1st Division carried the first trenches. The 2nd or new Division, with characteristic élan, at last rushed the formidable redoubt which commanded the approach to the southern slope leading up to the crest above Kereves Dere, and had barred the French advance almost since the first advance. From its bulging crescent shape, the French called it the “Haricot.” Unfortunately, here again, as before, the Senegalese and Colonial troops were found unable to retain positions which they had won. Within an hour of the first infantry advance, the Turks projected an overwhelming counter-attack upon the “Haricot,” shelling it heavily and pouring masses of reinforcements down the deep communication trenches. A fatal gap was thus opened between the French and British lines. The right flank of the 2nd Naval Brigade became dangerously exposed. The fortune of the battle turned.

In less than half an hour from their great success, the Howe, Hood, and Anson Battalions were thus subjected to intense enfilading fire. The lately arrived Collingwood Battalion came to their support, but in this their first battle they were almost exterminated, losing over 600 men and their commanding officer, Commander Spearman, R.N., killed.123 Compelled to retire across the open ground over which they had charged, and exposed to a torrential rain of bullets from machine-guns and rifles, this brigade of the unfortunate but invariably noble division suffered the losses of massacre. Even worse followed. The retirement and partial destruction of the Naval Brigade left the right flank of the Manchesters “in air” upon a very advanced position. Their Brigadier, General Noel Lee, an excellent leader of men, and in civil life partner in a well-known Lancashire shipping and cotton firm, was wounded; many of their officers killed. Yet the men declared they would for ever hold the ground they had so rapidly won; they only asked for help upon their right. To check the enfilading fire their right flank was thrown back to face it, and in the midst of tangled scrub and enemy trenches the brigade fought on two fronts at right angles to each other. It was an impossible position, but still the men clung on. Our reinforcements had already been almost exhausted in drafts to the extreme left, where the advance was held up, as described.

At 6.30, General Hunter-Weston, commanding the VIIIth Corps, after consultation with Sir Ian, was constrained to “pull out” the Manchesters from their exposed and untenable salient. With almost mutinous reluctance the troops withdrew into the first line of Turkish trenches, taken in the first rush, and the remainder of the Division conformed. In spite of an endeavour made by the Royal Fusiliers at 4 p.m. to establish themselves beyond this first line, the 29th Division and the Indians had been unable to advance farther upon the left, and the gain so confidently expected, especially in the centre, was now reduced to an advance of 200 yards in some places and 400 yards in others. The prisoners amounted to 400, including 11 officers, among whom were 5 Germans, the relics of a machine-gun detachment from the Goeben.124

During the night an excellent piece of work was accomplished by the Nelson Battalion, R.N.D. (Colonel Evelegh).125 They were sent up to establish touch between the right of the 42nd Division and the left of the R.N.D. This task involved digging forward a “switch trench” under very heavy fire, but the connection between the exposed flanks was thus made good.

Late in the afternoon of the battle, Major-General De Lisle, famous as a dashing leader of mounted troops in the South African War, and now coming fresh from command of the 1st Cavalry Division in France, arrived at Helles to take over the command of the 29th Division. The news that met him there, illustrated by the streams of wounded passing down to W Beach, was not encouraging. As had happened before in this campaign, and was to happen more than once in the future, the hope of victory had been dashed at the moment when victory appeared most certain, and it had been frustrated by failure at one single point. The losses were unusually heavy—estimated at 5000 at the time—and large numbers of the best remaining officers in the 29th Division and the R.N.D., not to mention the Manchester Brigade, had fallen.126 Owing to the retirement of the line from the positions they had taken, some of the wounded were of necessity left on the neutral ground together with the dead, and uniforms, hanging loosely upon the shrunken corpses, were long visible at exposed points, whence nothing could be reclaimed. By Sir Ian’s personal orders attempts were made to recover the dead and wounded under the white flag, but they failed.127 The fact was that when small parties went out under a white flag they were fired upon. This frequently happened at the termination of a severe battle, though the Turks appear to have fired rather as a warning than with immediate intent to kill. But for this hostile attitude it is possible that a formal armistice might have been arranged, such as Sir Ian tacitly granted to the Turks at Helles on May 2, and by negotiation at Anzac on May 24.

Heavy fighting was renewed before dawn on the 6th, and continued at intervals for two days and nights, the Turks repeating their counter-attacks, especially down the upper reach of the Gully Ravine. Here the Royal Fusiliers (86th Brigade) suffered terrible loss. Major Brandreth, a singularly fine officer, then in command of the battalion, wounded on the day of landing, was now killed. Many of the new officers who had lately arrived with the drafts were killed also, including Captain Jenkinson of Oxford, one of the greatest authorities on embryology. By June 8 only one officer, the former Sergeant-Major, was left of those who had originally come out, besides the Quartermaster. Of the original regiment only 140 remained. All the ten officers who had recently joined were lost. Their places were taken by a new Captain from the Dublins, in command, and about fifteen other officers, collected from various regiments, and all strange to each other and the men. The Hampshires (88th Brigade) had fared still worse, having only about 100 of the original men left, and no officers at all.128 Thus, under the stress of frontal attacks upon entrenched and commanding positions, manned by Turks, and assaulted without suitable or adequate artillery, battalions dwindled to companies, brigades to battalions, divisions to brigades, and an army corps to a division. Amid losses so overwhelming it seemed impossible to retain a regimental spirit. Yet such is the power of a name endowed with traditional honour that in a week or two the new arrivals, both of officers and men, as they came drifting in, became inspired with a resolve to carry forward the inherited reputation maintained by so many deaths.

For the next fortnight repeated small assaults and counter-attacks continued to reduce the numbers, while holding the Turks in check and preserving the activity and confidence of the men. On June 21 the French Divisions captured the “Haricot” Redoubt. The attack began at dawn, and by noon the 2nd Division had occupied the position. But the 1st Division, after taking a line of trenches, was driven out in a counter-attack, and exposed to victorious troops on their left, as so often happened in the French engagements at Helles. In the afternoon General Gouraud called upon his right flank for a renewed effort, and at 6 p.m. the lines were taken again and held. The possession of these lines and the “Haricot” gave the French a partial command of the Kereves Dere, reduced the salient of our centre by bringing up their forces on the right, and generally shortened and straightened out our line across the Peninsula. The French loss was estimated at 2500,129 the Turkish at nearly three times that amount. But this estimate of “over 7000” is probably an exaggeration, though one of the Turkish trenches, 200 yards long and 10 feet deep, was described as brimming over with the dead,130 and 50 prisoners were taken.

By this time two brigades of the 52nd Division had arrived, and the third was nearly due. It was a Territorial Division (the “Lowland”), commanded for the first few months by Major-General G. G. A. Egerton. After the fighting of July 12 and 13, he was ordered to a hospital ship owing to natural fatigue; but returning next day, he retained command till mid-September, when he was succeeded by Major-General H. A. Lawrence, son of the great Lord Lawrence of the Indian Mutiny.131 It was a fairly homogeneous and steady division, and, though rapidly reduced in strength, its improvement after the first month or six weeks was much remarked.

It was not long before one of the newly arrived brigades was called into action. The artillery, even with French help, was now insufficient for another general advance. The shells were running out; few H.E. shells were left; the howitzers numbered eight, or two to a division (four others which arrived later had seen service at Omdurman in 1898); whereas, even at the beginning of the war, eighteen howitzers went to each division in France. Among the field-guns were batteries of old 15-pounders, which had established their futility in the Boer War (one Vickers gun was reported to have come from a well-known museum); but such things were thought good enough for the Dardanelles. Except the 29th and the Anzacs, the Divisions had no other field-guns, and the R.N.D. had no guns at all. It was, therefore, essential to limit the thrust, and General Hunter-Weston formed a scheme for pushing forward on the left, so as to clear the obstacles which had hitherto checked our advance along the coast, and to reduce the salient in the centre, as the French had reduced it by seizing the “Haricot.” While the centre remained steady about a mile from the sea, the left was to swing forward upon it as upon a pivot, covering less ground as the pivotal point was approached. Thus five Turkish lines had to be captured by the 29th Division on the extreme left, and two by the 156th Brigade (52nd Division), which had been inserted on their right.

The battle began on June 28 with a severe but brief bombardment, limited to the Turkish trenches on our front nearest the coast. The batteries were assisted from the sea by the light cruiser Talbot (5600 tons, 1896) and the destroyers Wolverine and Scorpion, which were able to enfilade such positions as remained visible. But, for want of ammunition, the land bombardment was limited in extent, and lasted only twenty minutes. The 87th Brigade (Major-General W. R. Marshall),132 supplied with the new drafts which had been gradually coming in, at once advanced on both sides of the Gully Ravine (Saghir Dere). Their part in the attack was to clear a further lap of this long and deep ravine or cañon, which forms one of the most surprising features of the southern Peninsula. Advance along the bottom was impossible. Near the entrance from the sea the cliffs on both sides rise 200 feet. The slope upwards along the Gully is very gradual, and the sides nearly up to the very end remain steep, in parts bare sandy cliff, in parts covered with bush. The ravine curves frequently, twice turning for a short distance almost at right angles. Here and there, along the middle and upper reaches, the bottom was dangerously exposed to snipers creeping down and hiding among the bushes. Up to the last, even after it became the main line of communication with our positions on the left, it was constantly shelled, and beyond a point about two-thirds up its length no horses were allowed to proceed. In spite of screens and sandbag barriers, shrapnel and unaimed or dropping rifle-fire frequently inflicted loss upon the drafts, reliefs, and supply parties continually passing to and fro. There was the greater danger because, under the stress of thirst and extreme heat, men and animals gathered round the water which was in places discovered, especially at one clear and cold spring rising from the foot of a precipitous cliff upon the right. About half-way up, the Turks had barred the valley with a complicated entanglement reaching from side to side, and other entanglements existed farther on. The only possibility of clearing such a ravine was to clear the rough and bush-covered plateau on both sides.

Upon the left, after the brief bombardment, three battalions of the 87th Brigade (South Wales Borderers, K.O.S.B., and Inniskilling Fusiliers) advanced along the strip of land between the sea and the ravine, already the scene of gallantry and loss. By eleven o’clock, forty minutes after the opening of the gun-fire, they had rushed the first three trenches. They were at once followed by the 86th Brigade, which pushed right through them, over the three captured trenches. Led by the 2nd Royal Fusiliers, and keeping their formations in spite of the scrub and a searching rifle-fire, this renowned Fusilier Brigade stormed onward till two more trenches were taken, and the task of the 29th Division completed. At the same time, the Gurkhas had worked forward along the edge of the sea cliffs, and secured a green knoll projecting from the end of a spur which marked our farthest advance. A few nights after (July 2), the Gurkhas were driven out here, but the position was retaken by the Inniskilling Fusiliers, though with great loss, only two officers being left. On the seacoast west of the ravine our objective was gained, and in honour of the achievement the extreme point won was always known as Fusilier Bluff.

On the right of the Gully the remaining battalion of the 87th Brigade (1st Borderers) within five minutes stormed a redoubt overhanging the ravine, and called the Boomerang from its curved shape. Advancing rapidly, they next carried a stronger redoubt, known as the Turkey Trot, perhaps from the speed of the enemy in abandoning it, though the trenches right up to the redoubt remained in Turkish possession, separated by a sandbag wall. These rapid successes were mainly due to two trench-mortars, lent by General Gouraud and dropping bombs containing some 30 lb., some 70 lb., of melinite, vertically into the trenches at short range. The British force at this time possessed a few Japanese trench-mortars—very effective, but numbering only six, and these short of ammunition. We had no others of any kind. Yet, in the scarcity of howitzers, trench-mortars were more needed than any gun. Our hand-grenades were improvised out of jam-pots.

To the right of the Borderers, the 156th Brigade of the newly arrived 52nd Division came into action for the first time. The 4th and 7th Royal Scots quickly gained the two trenches allotted to them, but the rest of the brigade (7th and 8th Scottish Rifles), owing to severe losses (22 officers and 509 men killed) could hardly advance, and an attempt upon the trenches in front of Krithia that afternoon also failed. Nevertheless, the morning’s work was a victory. It marked the most decisive advance upon the Peninsula hitherto. Three-quarters of a mile along the coast, and about half a mile up the Gully Ravine were won, and the Gully’s lower reaches and beach rendered more secure. Large quantities of stores and ammunition were taken, together with about 100 prisoners. The Gully was for some distance cleaned of the dangerous filth and rubbish characteristic of Turkish lines—the more dangerous owing to the unimaginable hosts of flies which now added to the discomfort of life on the Peninsula, and probably diffused the malignant type of diarrhœa with which almost every one was afflicted. Our casualties for the day were 1750, the Royal, Lancashire, and Dublin Fusiliers suffering most. The losses of the 156th Brigade included their Brigadier, General Scott-Moncrieff, who was killed on “Worcester Flat.”

The Turks lost more heavily, especially in their determined counter-attacks during the next few nights, when they attempted to recover the lost trenches by rushing upon them with bayonet and bombs, their supply of which was plentiful. All these attempts were vain, and the useless loss of life severe.133 They seem to have been prompted by Enver Pasha, in opposition to his German advisers, and the Turkish troops were specially stimulated to the sacrifice by the following divisional order, discovered upon a wounded officer. The trenches referred to were the five captured by the 29th Division on June 28:

To this order a regimental commander added the following note:

Two days before the battle, a Turkish aeroplane scattered copies of a long proclamation intended to shake the discipline of the Mohammedan Indian troops. It called upon Mussulmans to ask themselves why they were sacrificing their lives for English people, who had grabbed their country, made them slaves, and now ruled them by tyranny, sucking their blood by taxes, taking their wealth to London, and regarding them as more contemptible than English dogs. It further dwelt upon the desperate position of the Allies, the triumphs of Germany in Belgium, France, Russia, and by submarines on the sea. It said that in Singapore and Ceylon the native armies had killed all the English and occupied the forts. It asserted that many more submarines were coming, and the British communications on the Peninsula would be entirely cut off. Therefore, it called upon the Indian soldiers to slay their tyrant enemies, or at least to join their fellow-Moslems in the Turkish army, where they would be treated as brothers. It concluded by offering a grim dilemma:

The Sikh and Gurkha troops, however, preferred to risk the latter alternative.134

To both the main battles at Helles during this month (June 4 and 28) the Anzac corps rendered valuable support. Their task was to retain in position the large Turkish forces which hemmed them round in their triangle of cliff and ravine. By repeated threatenings and attacks they continually remained “a thorn in the side” of the enemy’s defence, always endangering his communications and delaying his reinforcement. The chief share of the service naturally fell to the troops allotted in “shifts” to maintain the apex of the triangle at the farthest end of Monash Gully, the continuation of the main ravine or valley called “Shrapnel.” This position was mainly guarded by Pope’s Hill, throughout commanded by Lieut.-Colonel Harold Pope, 16th Battalion (South and Western Australia), and by Quinn’s, Courtney’s, and Steel’s Posts, stationed at short intervals along the edge of the steep ridge on the right, slightly in advance of “Pope’s.” By the digging of narrow and complicated trenches and subterranean passages, all these points had been converted into small forts; but the proximity of the enemy’s counterworks exposed them to continuous danger; for the lines of trench approached each other in places within 15 yards, and even within five. It was easy to lob bombs and grenades over from one side to the other, and to converse with taunts or ironic compliments in such languages as Colonials and Turks could master in common.

But perilous as the whole position was, “Quinn’s,” hanging on the summit of its almost precipitous ascent, was regarded as the point of greatest danger and highest honour. Here Major Quinn, 15th (Queensland and Tasmania) Battalion, was killed on May 29 in repelling a violent and almost successful Turkish assault, preceded by a mine explosion, which obliterated part of his carefully dug defences. After this severe loss, the position was commanded by Lieut.-Colonel Malone, Wellington (New Zealand) Battalion, for a little over two months, until he fell in the great assault upon Sari Bair in August. Though not a professional soldier, being a solicitor in civil life, he was, none the less, an Irish officer of the finest type. Never tired of impressing upon myself and other friends the true and serviceable paradox that “the whole art of war lies in the exercise of the domestic virtues,” he maintained his exposed position by the unflinching practice of the cleanliness, punctuality, courage, and humorous endurance of perpetual provocation in which the domestic virtues consist.

From this Post a sortie was made on the night of June 4 to destroy an enemy’s trench close in front. The trench was taken, but the small party was bombed out of it in the early morning. Next night a somewhat larger party (100 men and 2 officers, 1st Australian Infantry Brigade) assaulted the strong position to the right from Quinn’s, known as “German Officers’ Trenches” from the appearance of German officers there during the armistice. Here a special party of ten men, under Lieutenant E. E. L. Lloyd, 1st Battalion (New South Wales), was told off to destroy a dangerous machine-gun. It was a difficult task, for, like most Turkish trenches in this quarter, the trench was protected by heavy overhead beams. But one of the ten discharged a few rounds into the gun through holes at 5-foot range, and the remainder of the sortie party destroyed some of the trench. These sorties cost 116 casualties—a heavy loss in proportion to the numbers engaged; but the Turkish loss was reported considerably greater.

Fighting of some sort was continuous day and night along that ridge of Posts. Bombs, rifles, machine-guns, and artillery were incessantly at work. At night especially the Turks would sometimes be seized with a kind of frenzy, and pour out streams of bullets, most of which went wailing and whining overhead to fall in showers upon the sea. But on the 29th they made another genuine night attack under orders from Enver, who again called upon them to chase the Infidel from the soil of Islam. It was further provoked by a sortie the previous afternoon from the southern end of the Anzac position. About half a battalion of Queenslanders (1st Australian Light Horse Brigade, of course unmounted) and some of the Queensland Infantry (9th Battalion, 3rd Australian Brigade), led by Lieut.-Colonel H. Harris, rushed from the trenches near the so-called “Wheat Field,” where the farthest Anzac ridge falls gradually towards the coast, and dashed upon a strongly held Turkish position opposite. The object seems to have been to divert Turkish reinforcements making for Krithia, and in this the movement was successful. Large numbers of Turks were seen coming up from Eski Keui, supposing the Australian outburst to be a serious assault, and when they were entangled in the scrub and gullies, exposed to various fire from Anzac and from destroyers close off shore, the Queenslanders withdrew.

Next day was fairly quiet until afternoon, when the Turks were seized by one of the frenzies above mentioned. It died away, but at midnight, after various feints, they made a violent assault up the Nek, or apex of the triangle. It began with heavy firing for an hour and a half, and then in the moonlight swarms of Turks were seen trotting forward across the narrow Nek against our trenches, hardly more than 100 yards away, and shouting “Allah! Allah!” as their religious manner was. They were Nizam troops—18th Regiment, 6th Division—fresh arrivals from Asia. As they came on, they encountered an overwhelming fire from the New Zealand Mounted Rifle Brigade (Brigadier-General Russell, one of the most distinguished of N.Z. officers), together with some South Australian Light Horse under Brigadier-General F. G. Hughes, destined to win still higher reputation upon the same scene. These were stationed on Russell Top, commanding the Nek and the complicated Turkish position known as the Chessboard, close beyond it. Three times the Turks ran forward, but rifles and machine-guns shattered them as they came, and the shadowy forms ceased to move. Others tried to work round the Nek on each side, down Monash Gully on their left, and by the precipitous front of Walker’s Ridge on their right. Both attempts failed. Few survived. Next morning the Nek and defiles were littered with the dead. At least 600 were counted. It was the last Turkish attack upon the heights of Anzac.135

So the midsummer month drew to an end. There was a sense of victory in the air. Officers and men grew elated by confidence in superiority. All felt the Turks were beaten, if only Helles and Anzac could maintain the pressure. Drafts came dribbling in, a hundred or so at a time. But, though nominally in sufficient numbers to fill up the gaps reported when they left England or Egypt, they arrived only to find the gaps had meantime increased, and their numbers never filled them. Since the landing, two Divisions (Territorials) had now arrived. Three more (New Army or “Kitchener’s”) had been promised, but were delayed for another month, and few soldiers can retain the elation of victory at high pitch through weeks of inaction. “You cannot bottle up enthusiasm for future use, as you do pickled herrings,” said Goethe. Guns were short; ammunition was worse than short; the lack of it was perilous; trench-mortars and hand-grenades hardly existed. Heat, dust, flies, want of water, and the restriction of large forces to narrow limits of ground increased sickness and wastage in the trenches and dug-outs of both Helles and Anzac landings. On the whole, the French retained health and vigour best, their rations being less monotonous, and themselves more fastidious in cookery. But on the last day of the month the French, and, indeed, the whole army, suffered an almost irreparable blow. General Gouraud, commanding the French Army Corps, was visiting the wounded on V Beach when an 8-inch shell from Asia burst within six yards. As though by miracle, the fragments missed him, but the explosive force flung him over a six-foot wall and into a fig tree, which perhaps lessened the shock. His thigh, ankle, and arm were broken, and he was compelled to surrender the command, though ultimately he recovered, and won further fame at Châlons and in command at Rheims. General Bailloud, that volatile and high-spirited veteran, succeeded to the command till he was transferred to Salonika in October, and was succeeded by General Brulard, of the 1st Division.

Upon the Russian front, of which the Dardanelles should always have been regarded as an essential strategic part, the course of war continued disastrous for the Allies. As noticed above, Przemysl was retaken by German-Austrian armies on June 3. The fall of Lemberg followed on June 22; nearly the whole of Galicia was reoccupied; Warsaw was threatened; and at various points, north and south, the Russian frontier was crossed. So far as Turkey was concerned, the Russian armies were withdrawn from the war, and Sir Ian’s mixed and mainly inexperienced forces, insufficient in numbers, ill supplied with guns, worse supplied with ammunition, dependent upon long and hazardous communications, were left to confront the full strength of the Turkish Empire alone.136

During the month, the Italians crossed the Isonzo, but against Turkey no declaration of war had yet been made. Both sides in the European struggle still looked to Bulgaria as a vital point. Each was still trying to outbid the other by offers of territorial advantage, and both were equally confident of a successful bargain with that tough and secretive, but, in point of territorial ambitions, typically Balkan race.

CHAPTER IX THE PAUSE IN JULY

While dwelling upon prominent actions in our efforts to advance, such as those of June 4, June 21, and June 28 and the following days, one must always realise that the fighting in various parts of the front lines was in fact continuous by day and night. On both sides local attempts were repeatedly made to capture or destroy some section of the opposing trenches. It frequently happened that different parts of the same trench would be held by the enemy and our companies. At the turn of an angle, or the mouth of a communication trench, the men on either side would suddenly find themselves face to face with the enemy, and a combat, waged for bare life with bombs, bayonets, and revolvers, ensued. Sandbag barriers were quickly erected across entrances, but sometimes, while one section was at rest or engaged in cooking, a sentry would give warning that a party of about fifty men in blue-grey uniforms had crept over the parapets to right or left, cleared out the section there, and threatened to enfilade. At such moments the safety of a line depended upon the alert resource of some junior officer and the steady nerves of the platoon under his command. No history will ever record the deeds of silent self-sacrifice which ennobled these daily struggles, and passed almost unnoticed at the time, except by the men who witnessed them and were themselves too often afterwards obliterated with their memories.

Nor must it be forgotten that the Turkish bombardment was daily repeated at intervals in so-called “hates.” Though the front lines both at Helles and Anzac were too close together to be shelled with safety to their own men, all the beaches, except Gully Beach, were exposed; and though the effect of the fire could not be seen on Anzac Cove and Lancashire Landing, the range on both was accurately registered, and no one there was safe, whether disembarking stores, or dressing wounds, or just coming to land, or at rest, or bathing, or engaged in workshops and signalling offices, plump into which at Helles I saw a large shell fall on August 1 with terrible results in deaths and wounds.137 But, certainly, V Beach, beside the River Clyde, was most openly exposed. The French depôt there constantly suffered, especially after the Turks late in June placed four heavy batteries on the opposite shore in a hidden position between Erenkeui and the Trojan plain. Nor were communications safe. On July 4 a large transport, the Carthage, a British ship but used by the French, was torpedoed by a submarine just off W Beach. Fortunately, she was empty.

Every day and night at the end of June and beginning of July was marked by minor attacks from the Turkish lines. But the attack on July 2 was evidently intended to be more than minor. It began with a violent bombardment of our extreme left, to which our guns, for mere want of ammunition, could make no efficient reply. At 6 p.m. the Turks came swarming down from the upper reaches of the Gully Ravine. Checked by machine-guns and the fire of the destroyer Scorpion, they renewed the bombardment, and immediately afterwards two battalions were seen advancing in regular order, shoulder to shoulder, across the open, their officers waving their swords, and running bravely forward to encourage their men. To machine-guns the shrapnel of the 10th Battery, R.F.A., was now added, and the Gurkhas were sent up to reinforce. No one could stand against our fire. The surviving Turks ran back into the ravine in disorder. Two clearly marked lines of dead showed the limit of the advance.

A similar attack on a grand scale was tried only two days later (the night of July 4–5). Anzac was heavily bombarded, a Turkish battleship in the Narrows near Chanak throwing at least twenty 11·2-inch shells into the lines there, right across the Peninsula, to say nothing of the guns in the Olive Grove and on the Anafarta Hills. At Helles, every gun on Achi Baba and the Asiatic shore was brought to bear. On W Beach alone, 700 big shells from Asia fell. At least 5000 shells exploded on our lines and beaches. At 7.30 a.m. the Turkish infantry attempted to storm, rightly choosing the junction of the Royal Naval Division with the French as our weakest point. A few yards of front line were entered, but in fifteen minutes cleared again. A similar attempt to cut in between the 42nd Division and the 29th entirely failed, and again the Turks were driven to the shelter of the upper Ravine. The General Staff estimated the enemy’s losses during the preceding week at over 5000 killed and 15,000 wounded. So encumbered was their position with the dead rotting in the intense heat that on July 10 a request for five hours’ armistice to bury them came from the German Commandant, signing himself “Weber Pasha.”138 Unwillingly, and only in justice to his own men, Sir Ian refused. For it was known that Turks, even more than most troops, were reluctant to charge over their dead comrades, whose bodies thus became for us an extra barrier of defence, equal to a barbed-wire hedge.

As the enemy’s loss was so heavy, the advantage in their repeated counter-attacks would have rested with us, had it not become evident that they could draw upon large reinforcements. Early in July five fresh Nizam divisions arrived on the Peninsula. They were perhaps partly released by the disappearance of danger from Russia; but, as most of them came from Adrianople, their presence was more probably due to the growing understanding between the Central Powers and Bulgaria—an understanding believed to have developed into a secret Treaty about the middle of July. The arrival of these fresh troops rendered the enemy’s attacks more serious and more frequent. Only by strong counter-attack could our position at Helles be maintained and the initiative remain with us. Accordingly, a formal assault, similar to those in June, was ordered for July 12. This time the main attack devolved upon our right and right-centre, the French and the 52nd (Lowland) Division being chiefly engaged. After the customary bombardment, supported by heavy naval guns, the infantry rushed forward and gained the first two lines, but the French and Scots (155th Brigade) lost touch, the 4th K.O.S.B., parties of whom actually reached the slopes of Achi Baba, came under gun-fire, and nothing further was possible till the afternoon. Then, after another bombardment, the 157th Brigade pushed on and captured a strong redoubt on the edge of the Kereves Dere. Soon after dawn on the 13th, however, this Brigade was attacked by bombers, and a portion of its right was driven back. It was speedily rallied, and three battalions of the R.N.D. were sent up to reinforce and advance the position.139 A certain advance was also made on their left, while on the extreme right the French succeeded in reaching the mouth of the Kereves Dere itself. Nearly 500 prisoners were taken, and but for inefficient Staff work, considerable advantage might have been secured. But little advance was thus effected towards the summit of the elaborately entrenched and fortified hill, the base of which was protected by great redoubts and sprinkled with concealed guns beyond the maze of trenches. After this action our supply of shell was so much reduced, the reserve so dangerously encroached upon, that further attack became for the present impossible without heavy risk. Even such bombardment as was sanctioned for those two days could only be effected by borrowing French guns—about six batteries of “75’s” and a few howitzers.

Under the strain of these successive days and nights of fighting Major-General Egerton, as already mentioned, was ordered to hospital for twenty-four hours’ rest, and the command of the 52nd Division was entrusted to Major-General F. C. Shaw, recently arrived to command the 13th Division (“Kitchener’s” or New Army) now coming in. General Egerton resumed his command next day, and retained it till mid-September, when he was appointed Base-Commandant at Alexandria, and was succeeded by Major-General Lawrence. But in mid-July the army suffered a still more serious loss in Major-General Hunter-Weston, the experienced Officer Commanding the famous 29th Division in the earlier battles, and subsequently the VIIIth Army Corps. For three months, without cessation by day or night, this General, who certainly never spared his troops, had himself endured all the perils, anxieties, and sorrows of an officer directing a series of desperate actions, or rather one continuous desperate action, which, as the price of an unparalleled achievement, had deprived him of nearly all his most trusted subordinates, devastated devoted troops with irreparable loss, and stretched his mind on the rack of ceaseless apprehension how best to encounter imminent dangers with insufficient means. Burning sun, dust storms, and repeated incalculable crises of peril may wear down the bravest physical nature, and in high fever he was compelled to seek refuge first in the Admiral’s Triad, and then in a hospital ship leaving the scene of his great exploits. Such consolation as is possible for a man so placed he might derive from the eulogy justly bestowed upon “the incomparable 29th Division” by the Commander-in-Chief when the brigades were withdrawn in turn for a brief rest at Imbros after the battle of late June. For, after speaking of their recent deeds, Sir Ian concluded:

The command of the VIIIth Army Corps was temporarily taken over by Lieut.-General Sir Frederick Stopford, who had arrived at Imbros with his Staff on July 11. He was thus given an opportunity of experience in the kind of fighting required of his forces when he commanded the IXth Army Corps, then gradually concentrating for a new enterprise. Major-General Douglas (42nd Division) next took command for a time. For the permanent command, perhaps, Sir Bruce Hamilton might have been appointed but for his deafness. Ultimately Lieut.-General Sir F. J. Davies, who had seen much service of every kind since entering the Grenadier Guards in 1884, was sent out. He arrived from France on August 5, took over the command on August 8, and commanded the VIIIth Army Corps to the end.

On the part of the French, the losses during the first half of July were also heavy. Of individual losses, the most serious were caused in the early morning of July 12 by a heavy shell which destroyed the 1st Division command-post, killing Major Romieux, Chief of Staff, and mortally wounding General Masnou, commanding the 1st Division. He was succeeded by General Brulard, who had seen much service in Morocco. Lieut.-Colonel Vernhol was his Chief of Staff.

Some idea of the habitual life in the fighting lines during the next two or three weeks of comparative quiet may be gathered from notes which I wrote hurriedly at the time. Towards the end of July I was staying on the wreck of the River Clyde, daily visiting one section or other of the British lines (the French being “out of bounds,” though in later months I found all French officers and men anxious to welcome us). One day when I had been chiefly with the 42nd Division and the 38th Brigade (13th Division) temporarily attached to them for training, I made the following notes among others:

The food thus cooked was abundant but monotonous. The chief luxury was the ration of apricot jam—welcome for a time, but always apricot. Officials naturally find monotony the easiest form of supply, and forget that variety is essential in human food. The case of “bully beef” was worse. Certain kinds of it (South American) were so salt that it ought to have been stewed or boiled before issued. Salt meat, unvaried week after week under a burning sun and in stifling trenches where water is limited to teacupfuls, is not attractive. To troops afflicted with violent diarrhœa it is uneatable and dangerous. When the Anzac men threw over tins of meat to the Turks in exchange for packets of cigarettes, it was a cheap gift, and the enemy returned the message, “Bully Beef Non. Envoyez milk.” Salt, hard and distasteful food, in persistent monotony, increased the prevalent disease until the demand for castor oil (which was considered the most soothing remedy) far exceeded the calculated supply, and at Anzac General Birdwood was obliged to issue orders against excessive indulgence, lest castor oil should become Australia’s national drink. Appeals for a canteen where variety could be purchased remained unheeded till much later in the campaign. At Imbros, a few Greeks were licensed to erect stalls where fruit, cigarettes, “Turkish Delight” (lakoumi), candles, and various tinned goods could be purchased by the brigades mustering there, or withdrawn there for rest. Greek sailing-boats anchored along K Beach, the main landing-place on that island, also did a similar trade, especially in fruit. At Helles, on W Beach, stood a canteen shed, nearly always empty. Late in August or in September a canteen ship at last reached Anzac, but the supply was so small that the representative purchaser from each battalion was not allowed more than a sixth of what he asked and had money to pay for. Yet whenever the simplest alteration in rations was possible, such as the issue of rice, cocoa, raisins, or even a different jam, the health of the men improved.

The water supply was a perpetual anxiety, especially at Anzac. Water could be found in a few places by digging, especially near the shore, where, however, it soon became brackish. At Helles there were a few springs and a few old wells. At the extreme left or north of the Anzac position (near the hill known as Fort 3), Colonel Bauchop, then in command there, showed me in July an excellent spring of pure water, said to have been discovered by a “diviner,” Sapper Stephen Kelly, of Melbourne, with a hazel twig. As it was close to the sea, at the mouth of one of the largest watercourses that drain the range of Sari Bair, though dry on the surface in summer, it might have been possible to divine the presence of water beneath the surface without supernatural aid; but the source was soon fitted up with pumps and cisterns, supplying that district well. For the centre of Anzac and the outlying trenches along the heights, most of the water was brought from the Nile in lighters and pumped into iron reservoirs upon the Cove beach in front of General Headquarters. A larger one containing 30,000 gallons was also constructed on a platform up the cliff, but without great success, owing to the breakdown of the pumping-engine. The water was carefully rationed out into water-bottles or tins—so carefully that a man was fortunate to get a mugful for washing and shaving. “Having a good clean up?” said General Birdwood, in his friendly way, to an Australian thus engaged. “Yes, sir,” the man replied, “and I only wish I was a bloody canary!”

From notes written down by myself in the middle of that July, I take the following description:

July 23 was the anniversary of the “constitution” proclaimed by the Young Turks in 1908, and it was expected that the enemy would celebrate the dawn by another attack. Being then at Anzac, I made the following notes, which are here included as giving some idea of usual daily life upon the outer lines:

That was a special occasion, but no matter where one slept at Anzac, the air overhead wailed ceaselessly with bullets, and from time to time shrapnel burst or heavy shell exploded, especially around headquarters close to the beach in the centre of Anzac Cove. There, up a short flight of steps, General Birdwood had his dug-out, and there during the night of July 27, Lieutenant B. W. Onslow (11th K.E.O. Lancers), the General’s A.D.C., an excellent soldier, sleeping on the top of his dug-out owing to the intense heat, was killed instantly as he slept.

At the advanced base in Mudros harbour (the third vital point in the expedition at this time), an important change in command was effected in the middle of this month. Throughout the first weeks of fighting and organisation, this base was left destitute of an Inspector-General of Communications. The heavy and complicated work involved, especially in the transhipment of all drafts and supplies and ammunition from the ordinary transports to trawlers and small craft after the danger of submarines was reported, fell upon the Principal Naval Transport Officer (Admiral Phillimore) and the Quartermaster-General (Brigadier-General S. H. Winter). In June, Major-General Wallace was appointed to the office, but his long experience as an executive officer in India had not specially qualified him for a peculiarly difficult piece of administrative work, and complaints arose of the confusion and delay on board the s.s. Aragon, assigned to him as headquarters. Hitherto this liner (hired at great cost from the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company) had served as offices for the Principal Naval Transport Officer, and as the General Post Office. The new Staff of enormous size was now added, and the ship also became a kind of clearing-house or depôt for officers passing to and fro. She acquired an evil name owing to frequent loss of parcels from home for officers and men upon the Peninsula. Unhappily, there was no question about the losses; but this unpardonable crime against the fighting men, who were literally dying for want of variety and small pleasures in food, may have been committed at other points of the postal service. More definite, though less serious, was the charge of luxury on board. Certainly, to any one coming fresh from the dug-outs, dust storms, monotonous rations, and perpetual risks of the Peninsula, the Aragon was like an Enchanted Isle. All who have campaigned in a desert land know the first physical delight of getting on board a well-equipped vessel—the plenty and variety of food, the clean cooking, the iced drinks, tablecloths for dinner, sheets in the bunks, a good chance of washing, and baths. To the campaigning soldier, those are comforts beyond the dreams of luxury, but in ordinary life the most ascetic of saints does not renounce them all as necessarily sinful. Perhaps it was the arbitrary exclusion of many passing officers from the delights of a real dinner and other pleasurable contrasts to life at the front which made the Aragon a byword, as though she were “a sink of iniquity”; and from the same contrasts arose the report that at the end of the campaign she was discovered to be aground upon empty bottles, as upon a coral reef. This appears unlikely, since the harbour took battleships with ease, to say nothing of the Aquitania and the largest liners afloat.140

In the first half of July, Major-General Altham (Royal Scots), a Christ Church, Oxford, man, who served as Chief Intelligence Officer under Sir George White in Ladysmith, succeeded as Inspector-General of Communications, and he also made his headquarters in the Aragon. The expense of maintaining the ship was estimated at £300 a day, and proposals were made for removing the headquarters to land in order to save money. But on the east side of the harbour stood the dusty and unwholesome town or village of Mudros, together with various camps, and the western shore and rising slopes behind it were covered with hospitals, Australian, Irish-Canadian (run by women), and others, besides rest-camps beyond. It was also thought necessary to remain on the water in order to keep touch with the naval organisation under direction of the flagship Europa (Admiral Wemyss), and this, together with the absence of deep-water piers and wharves, was probably the decisive reason. And as to expense, the saving of some £9000 a month has, unfortunately, never been regarded as particularly praiseworthy in this war. The Minnetonka (Atlantic Transport Company) served as headquarters of the Ordnance Services and depôt for the supply of engineering implements, tools, and ammunition, which, however, was not usually unloaded from the smaller craft. Brigadier-General R. W. M. Jackson, Director of Ordnance Services, worked sometimes at Mudros, sometimes at the base in Alexandria. Brigadier-General F. W. B. Koe, Director of Supplies and Transports, did the same.

In spite of the lamentable experiences at the first landings, the arrangements for the removal of the wounded from the Peninsula were still inadequate. The four original hospital ships were present—two military and two lent by the navy—each adapted to receive about 500 men. The remainder of the wounded had to be put on transports not specially prepared, and not protected by The Hague Convention from attack. Before new hospital ships arrived (about fifty at the end), this lack of accommodation caused many deaths and much suffering after a battle on the Peninsula. A particular instance, much spoken of and strongly condemned at the time, was the case of the transport Saturnia, which appeared at Mudros after the attack of June 28 with about 700 on board, crowded haphazard into any corner, in much confusion, and so neglected that their wounds were in many cases putrefying and full of maggots. The transport, having been used for horses and mules, was also in a filthy and stinking condition. Naval and military surgeons were ordered to assist. Among the foremost was Staff-Surgeon Levick of the cruiser Bacchante (Captain Boyle), who had accompanied Captain Scott on the Antarctic expedition, and was the author of an excellent scientific monograph on penguins. Supported by Surgeon Lorrimer of the same ship, and a priest, Father Barry, he remained on board four days and nights, constantly operating. But, for want of adequate assistance, and owing to the lack of bandages, dressings, and instruments, comparatively little could be effected, and many died who might have recovered with proper care.

Such incidents were but further evidences of the general confusion due to an unexpected war, and of the secondary position assigned to the Dardanelles in the Cabinet’s strategy. Prompted, perhaps, by the depressing reports which had lately reached them, the “Dardanelles Committee” of the Cabinet, as the former “War Council” was called after June,141 resolved to institute an inquiry for themselves. On the Peninsula it was widely rumoured that Mr. Winston Churchill was coming, and variegated opinions were expressed. Perhaps it would have been well if he had come; for he, at all events, realised the vital importance of the expedition in relation to the war as a whole. Ultimately, Colonel Maurice Hankey, Secretary to the Committee of Imperial Defence since 1912, came alone—a man of high reputation for intelligence and capacity. He arrived in the last week of July, and stayed till August 20, but before his arrival the Cabinet had already resolved upon sending out such reinforcements as they considered sufficient to comply with Sir Ian’s demands.

On July 13 a new and strange type of warship, called a “Monitor,” arrived at Kephalos, and next day began bombarding the guns on the Asiatic coast. The monitors were originally constructed for operations in another sphere. They were, in fact, large floating platforms or flat-bottomed forts, supporting, some two 12-inch, and others two 14-inch, guns of American make, without further armament. Their tonnage was about 6000, and their chief peculiarity a broad, flat shelf or platform extending from the hull just below the water-line; so broad and flat that numbers of men could walk upon it while bathing, so that they appeared to be walking upon the water. The shape of the vessels rendered them difficult to steer, and so slow in motion that their progress against such a current as ran in the Narrows would have been very gradual. About the same time, smaller “monitors” arrived. They were nicknamed “Whippets,” and were marked by numbers only. Four “blister ships” (cruisers protected against torpedoes by bulging protuberances along both sides) also came. The “blisters” reduced their speed by about three knots, but, being safe at anchor, they served especially as marking points for survey and “registration.” All these ships played an important part in the coming operations; and in the later months of the campaign, when cross-observation from De Tott’s Battery point and Cape Helles had been established, the large “monitors” stationed off Rabbit Island did invaluable service by suppressing the heavy guns on the Asiatic side.

Almost equally surprising was the appearance of several motor-lighters, inevitably called “Beetles.” Originally constructed for the same proposal as the monitors, they were long, iron barges moving under their own oil power, and built to transport 500 men or 50 horses apiece. From the prow projected a swinging platform or drawbridge, which, hanging elevated as the lighter moved, had the look of a beetle’s forceps and antennæ. The iron deck and sides gave absolute protection against rifle-fire or shrapnel, and if the lighters had been sent out for the first landings, hundreds of lives might have been saved and the history of the war transformed, but only few were ready before May or June.

As to military reinforcement, its necessity was obvious, since by the end of July the casualties amounted to nearly 50,000; in round numbers, 8000 killed, 30,000 wounded (many, of course, returned to service), and 11,000 missing (many killed).142 The 29th Division was the best supplied with drafts, but on the last day of July it counted only 219 officers and 8424 men. As we have seen, the brigades of the 13th (Western) Division, under Major-General F. C. Shaw, began to arrive in the first half of July, and were stationed with the divisions at Helles to gain experience, which served them well.143 The 11th (Northern) Division, under Major-General Frederick Hammersley, began to arrive early in the second half of July, two brigades being stationed at Imbros, and one (the 33rd) sent to Helles for a brief experience.144 The 10th (Irish) Division, under Lieutenant-General Sir Bryan Mahon, arrived towards the end of July, and half of it was stationed at Mitylene (Lesbos) on the inlet of Iero (about 6 miles from the town of Mitylene), guarded by the old battleship Canopus (Captain Grant).145 These three Divisions belonged to the New (so-called Kitchener’s) Army. The infantry of two Territorial Divisions were also promised—the 53rd (Welsh) and 54th (East Anglian)—but they did not begin to arrive till August 10. They were about half below their nominal strength, and had no guns.146

As to aeroplanes, compared with subsequent developments the service was necessarily rather primitive. The six or eight seaplanes attached to the Ark Royal were unable to rise to any great height—not over 2000 feet. Commander Charles Samson established an aerodrome at Tenedos early in the campaign for British and French planes,147 and there was an emergency landing-place at Helles. In June, Tenedos was left to the French, and Colonel Frederick Sykes, R.N.A.S., took command over the two British wings (Commander Samson and Lieut.-Colonel Gerard) stationed at Imbros. At the end of July about 30 planes of different types were in action, doing excellent service in observation and photography. But none of them were “fighting machines,” and, as no anti-aircraft guns were supplied till just at the end of the campaign, the Turkish “Fokker” planes from Chanak were able to continue bombing our lines on the Peninsula and the General Headquarters at Imbros. On the sandy cliff beside the headquarters a large shed was erected for a few small airships, cigar-shaped, with silvery balloons (they were known as “Silver Babies”), which were used to scout over the channel between Imbros and the Peninsula on the watch for submarines. The late autumn gales tore the green canvas covering off the shed, and ultimately it was removed to Mudros.

By the beginning of August, Sir Ian Hamilton had the following military forces under his command: VIIIth Army Corps (29th, 42nd, and 52nd Divisions); IXth Army Corps (10th, 11th, and 13th Divisions); Anzac Army Corps (Australian and New-Zealand-and-Australian Divisions); French Corps Expéditionnaire d’Orient (1st and 2nd Divisions); General Headquarter Troops (Royal Naval Division), together with the infantry of the 53rd and 54th Divisions then on their way out. Eleven divisions present and two more coming represented a nominal force of about 240,000 to 250,000. The actually available forces amounted to less than half those numbers (about 120,000 rifles), always short of howitzers, guns, shells, trench-mortars, and bombs. The Turkish forces on the Peninsula at the same time were estimated at about 61,000, with 39,000 in reserve.148

The reinforcements by land and sea rendered a change of strategy possible. They were, in fact, supplied for this purpose. It had now become evident that the Achi Baba lines were too strong for direct assault. Its gradual slopes, free from dead ground, made the hill an ideal position for defence, and this natural advantage had been so increased by a complicated system of frontal and communication trenches, by barbed wire, machine-guns, scattered batteries, and a series of powerful redoubts, that an almost impregnable fortress by this time checked further advance. In fact, the army at Helles was like a besieged garrison, being continually threatened with assault from the front, and by the Asiatic guns on its right flank and rear. The sea remained open, but that outlet for communication, already exposed to the enemy’s submarines and heavy artillery, would soon be imperilled by autumnal storms. The Army Corps at Anzac was similarly besieged, except that the dead ground sheltered by precipitous cliffs reduced the danger to life in rear of the firing trenches. To break down the siege a sortie in force had become essential. The only alternative was to cling to the positions in the hope of a diversion from Russia or Bulgaria. But during July the great Russian retreat from Galicia and Poland continued almost uninterrupted, and on August 4, Warsaw fell. As to Bulgaria, the Russian disasters confirmed Tsar Ferdinand’s confidence in the ultimate victory of his German compatriots, and a resolute people’s ancestral detestation of the Serbs gave him the support of their passionate desire to recover the lands lost to them in the second Balkan War.

The design of breaking down the siege and freeing the Narrows for the fleet, by cutting the neck of the Peninsula at Bulair, by a landing at Enos, or by a direct attack, was obvious and tempting. As before, its weakness was that the occupation of Bulair would neither have cut the enemy’s communications nor freed the Narrows. In spite of the daring resource of our submarines in penetrating into the Sea of Marmora, and even shelling the trains and destroying the culverts on the railway which runs from Scutari along the north coast of the Gulf of Ismid, the main Turkish supplies and drafts still came to the Peninsula by sea. Some crossed to the Asiatic side from Constantinople; some came up by train from Smyrna to Panderma; in either case, the transports edged along the coast by stages at night till they reached the Straits and crossed at Gallipoli, Galata, or Maidos, always keeping beyond the range or vision of any guns on Bulair. A landing at Enos would have lengthened the journey from Mudros by about 50 miles. An attempt at Bulair would have implied a landing against lines long reputed impregnable, and lately developed even more carefully than the April defences at Helles. The attempt also would have contained no element of surprise; for an attack at that point would be the merest amateur’s first expectation.

An advance in Asia, as from Adramyti Bay opposite Mitylene, with a view to reaching the Smyrna-Panderma railway, might have looked more promising. It was much favoured by British authorities in Mitylene. The arrival of half the 10th Division appeared to point that way, and Mr. Compton Mackenzie was sent there to encourage the false report, for the benefit of Turkish spies. The French, harassed by the Asiatic guns, were probably anxious for some movement along that coast. But Sir Ian was perhaps still bound by Lord Kitchener’s express orders not to entangle himself in Asia. At all events, he refused to dissipate his comparatively small forces at such distances apart. Committed to the Peninsula, he felt that there or nowhere lay his hope of victory. Already in June, with the full concurrence of Generals Gouraud and Birdwood, he had laid his plan. Anzac, instead of remaining subsidiary as “a thorn in the side,” was now to become the main base of attack. The first objective was to be the Sari Bair range; the ultimate object an advance across the five miles to Maidos. A new frontal attack was to detain the enemy at Achi Baba. A surprise landing at Suvla Bay was to protect the Anzac left flank, occupy the heights threatening that flank with artillery, and assist the assault upon the central mountains of Sari Bair range—Koja Chemen Tepe (Hill 971) and Chunuk Bair. When once those heights were gained, the Turkish communications would indeed be cut in two; the positions on Achi Baba and Kilid Bahr plateau would be turned and taken in rear; the very gate of the Narrows would be exposed to our guns. It was a high hope. The battle for its realisation is generally known as Suvla, but more accurately as Sari Bair. In the first week of August it began.

CHAPTER X THE VINEYARD, LONE PINE, AND THE NEK

Friday, August 6, was the day fixed for the new attempt. The waning moon was due to rise at 2 of the 7th. To have waited longer would have meant a month’s delay, until moonless nights returned. A month’s experience would have increased the fighting value of the new Divisions, as was seen in the case of the 13th Division at Helles; but the collapse of Russia in Poland, and the growing danger of Bulgaria’s attitude, would have given the greater advantage to the enemy; and the approach of autumn had to be considered. Accordingly, utterly untried as four of his five new Divisions were, Sir Ian resolved to strike at once, even before two of them had arrived, chiefly in hope of gaining the incalculable advantage of surprise. To distract the enemy’s attention, he had arranged a scare at Mitylene by sending a brigade and a half (31st and 30th) of the 10th Division there, as we have seen; by visiting the island himself on August 2; by causing maps of the Asiatic coast to be distributed with surreptitious freedom; and by deputing Mr. Compton Mackenzie and others to spread indiscreet rumours among the gossips and spies there under pledge of deathlike secrecy. Beyond the extreme left of his new line, of which Anzac had now become the centre, he also arranged a smaller but more violent scare by dispatching a party of about 300 men (chiefly Greek and Cretan “Andarti,” under command of a Levantine, Captain Binns) to Karachali, on the northern shore of the Gulf of Xeros, as though an attack on the Bulair lines were contemplated.149 But the two chief “containing” movements to distract the enemy’s notice from the main attack, and at the same time to make any possible local advance, were directed against the enemy opposite the centre of our line at Helles, and opposite the right at Anzac.

At noon on August 6 the forces were thus situated: At Anzac the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, together with the 13th Division, the Indian Brigade, and the 29th Brigade of the 10th Division, all of which had been secretly and with great skill added to the Anzac force in the darkness of the two preceding nights, and stowed away in prepared dug-outs among the most hidden ravines; at Helles, the 29th, the 42nd, the 52nd, the R.N.D., and the two French Divisions; at Mitylene, the 31st Brigade and half the 30th of the 10th Division; at Mudros, the other half of the 30th Brigade; and at Imbros, the 11th Division. The infantry of the 53rd and 54th Divisions, to be kept as general reserve, were on the sea, approaching Mudros, whence they were ultimately hurried to Suvla without disembarking.

The day was fine; the water perfectly calm; and at Imbros the 11th Division spent the hot and sunny hours in practising disembarkation from the unaccustomed “beetles,” or playing in naked crowds among the shallows of Kephalos beach. The first anniversary of the war had only just passed; most of the men had volunteered at the very beginning; the Division had been organised for nine or ten months, and held a high reputation in the New Army. Nevertheless, the physique and bearing were not exceptionally fine, and, though the men displayed the cheerful and ironic stoicism usual among English working-people, observers noticed an absence of eager enthusiasm—of that excitement straining for adventure which had illuminated the departure from Mudros three months before. Hope was not so high; knowledge of the enemy’s power, or the depressing criticism which had permeated the nation at home, increased the common apprehensions of war; and it may be that the unconscious paralysis of cautious and uninspiring age had crept downwards from the higher commands, through that infection of personality which acts as by magic for good or evil.

As though perceiving this absence of devoted enthusiasm, Sir Ian issued a characteristic Order, calculated to stir the spirits of the troops.150 As Commander-in-Chief, he was himself compelled to remain at Imbros, so as to retain communication with the three principal scenes of action, and, in case of emergency, to visit one or other point; Suvla, the most distant, being fifty minutes, and Helles, the nearest, only forty minutes away by torpedo-boat. So narrow is the dividing sea that all that afternoon of August 6 the booming of the guns, and even the incessant rattle of rifle-fire at Helles and Anzac, could be plainly heard in the headquarters at Imbros, and by the newcomers enjoying their last security upon the beach. For that afternoon the two main blows designed as feints to deceive the enemy regarding our real objective, and to hold him to his positions, were struck, the one at Helles, the other at Anzac, as far away as was possible from our intended advance on the left.

At Helles the main attack covered about two-thirds of a mile along the right centre of the British lines, and was carried out by the 88th Brigade of the 29th Division, and the 42nd (East Lancashire) Division. The advance across open ground began just before 4 p.m., the brigades pushing forward resolutely against massed fire from crowded Turkish trenches, which our want of howitzers and trench-mortars prevented us from suppressing. The Essex Battalion of the 88th Brigade especially distinguished itself by plunging into a trench crammed with the enemy; but, exposed to rifle-fire on both flanks and to showers of bombs, the men were shattered. Nor could the 42nd Division make headway against the withering fire. It was evident that in the pause of the last three weeks the Turks had gained in confidence owing to the success of their Allies in Galicia and Poland, their reinforcement by two fresh Divisions, and the fast of Ramazan or its termination. Officers’ night patrols discovered that they had even designed an attack on our lines that very evening, which was the reason why their trenches were so crowded with men. Better intelligence, either by aeroplane or the investigation of spies and prisoners, might have warned us of this intention, and our object in holding the Turks to their position would in that case have been gained with greater loss to them and less terrible loss to ourselves.

Nevertheless, Sir Ian resolved to renew the attack the following morning. It was August 7, the first and critical day at Anzac and Suvla—the day which was expected to be decisive. At all costs the Turks at Helles were to be prevented from reinforcing their vitally threatened positions, and as long as possible to be kept ignorant of the threats. In the early morning they appear to have remained ignorant, for they were preparing a counter-attack upon our centre when they were confronted by our renewed onset along a half-mile front. Why an advance was not then attempted by all the Divisions upon our lines from sea to sea has not been stated. Guns and gun-ammunition were short, but that was an invariable condition on the Peninsula, and big attacks had been made in spite of helpless deficiency. Probably the higher command had now concluded that frontal attacks against the complicated works on Krithia and Achi Baba only implied fruitless loss; but now if ever, when the enemy’s rear and communications were threatened, an opportunity might have offered itself.

Yet the attack was made only in the centre, chiefly by two brigades of the 42nd Division (the 125th and 127th—Lancashire Fusiliers and Manchesters). A few yards of ground were won, but lost again. Only exactly in the centre of our lines the fighting continued all that day, and indeed, with short intervals, for six days longer. Here there was an oblong vineyard, running for about 200 yards beside the left of the straight Krithia road, about 250 yards from the junction of the East Krithia nullah with the West Krithia nullah still farther to the left. The vineyard had hitherto lain just outside our firing line, but now the East Lancashire Brigades seized and clung to it. All that day and through the night they clung to it, in spite of a massed counter-attack at night, the 6th and 7th Battalions, Lancashire Fusiliers, showing the finest endurance. The next day (Sunday, 8th), when the chances of our main strategy were just hanging in the balance, two more counter-attacks were delivered, before dawn and after sunset, but still the Lancastrians held, the 4th East Lancashire Battalion now coming into action.151 On the Monday the position seemed comparatively secure, and these battalions were relieved, though fighting continued. But three days later the enemy attacked in mass again at night, and captured the vineyard. Next day (the 13th) they were bombed out of it, and a line across the oblong, nearly up to the farther end, was finally wired, loopholed, and consolidated. The actual territory gained was not much—barely 200 yards—but “The Vineyard” will always remain a memory in Lancastrian annals. The 42nd Division’s own C.O., Major-General Douglas, who had taken over the command of the VIIIth Army Corps at Helles after Hunter-Weston’s departure, shared the almost ruinous honour. For on August 8, Lieut.-General Davies had assumed command of the Army Corps himself, and Major-General Douglas had returned to his Division.

Though the feint at Helles did not gain much local advantage, its service to the general strategic plan must not be overlooked; for the violence and partial success of the attack retained the new Turkish divisions, which otherwise would have reinforced the enemy on Sari Bair and at Suvla. The second great feint, from our right at Anzac, was even more violent and more successful. It began about an hour and a half later on the same afternoon (August 6), and its scene was the section of Turkish trenches known as Lone Pine.

Just a week before the action (on the night of July 31), the extreme right of the Anzac position, close to Chatham’s Post where that side of the triangle ended at the centre of “Brighton Beach,” was further strengthened by a dashing sortie to destroy a hundred yards of trench which the Turks, working through a tunnel, had constructed within bombing distance of the so-called Tasmania Post. After two rapidly excavated mines had been exploded at the ends of the trench, four parties of fifty men each (11th West Australian Battalion, 3rd Australian Brigade) crossed our wire entanglements on planks placed in position by the sappers, and plunged straight into the midst of the confused and chattering Turks, almost before the explosions were over. After severe fighting, in which the Australians were heavily bombed from the Turkish communication trenches, they succeeded in barricading the entrances, transferring the Turkish parapets to the other sides of the trenches, and including the position within the Anzac lines. The Anzac loss was comparatively small—11 killed and 74 wounded, against 100 Turks killed; but Major Leane, who commanded the storming party, was mortally wounded, and the trenches afterwards bore his name.152

This enterprise had strengthened the Anzac right at the extreme end, securing that flank from attack across the comparatively flat and low-lying ground between our lines and Gaba Tepe. The “containing attack” or feint from Anzac was now to be delivered about half a mile farther up the same right flank or side of the Anzac triangle.

From the beach past Chatham’s Post and along the Tasmanian trenches, the Anzac lines rose steeply to a height of some 400 feet until they crossed a small plateau, known as Lone Pine. The name was due to a solitary tree which the Turks had left standing alone out of a small wood or fringe of firs lining their side of the ground. They had cut down the rest for their dug-outs or head-cover, and in fact the solitary pine itself was felled just before the attack, or even on the very morning; but the place kept its name, to be remembered in all records of the war. Upon the plateau, which measured little over 300 yards across and was covered with heath and low bushes, our lines bulged slightly into a salient, called the Pimple, separated from the Turkish lines by an open space, in some points a little over 100 yards broad, in others only 60 yards. Opposite this slight salient, over the southern portion of the plateau, the Turks had been long and busily engaged in constructing complicated lines and trenches to the strength of an underground fortress. Always apprehensive of attack at this point, as commanding a deep gully (known to Anzac as “Surprise Gully”), up which they brought their water and supplies for the front in this section, they had further covered the position and the open ground between the lines by strongly fortifying another small plateau across a shallow gully on their right, to the north. This fortress was known in Anzac as “Johnston’s Jolly,” and the two fortresses combined to subject any attack to a cross-fire of field-guns, machine-guns, and rifles.153

The chief feint from Anzac was directed against the Lone Pine fortress; and it was not merely a feint, for the position itself was of value in covering the approach of the main army to Maidos. For the attack, the 1st New South Wales Brigade (Brigadier-General N. M. Smyth) of the Australian Division, commanded now by that resolute British officer, Major-General H. B. Walker, was selected, and it was soon to rival the exploits of the 3rd Brigade at the landing, and of the 2nd Brigade on May 7 at Helles. It numbered barely 2000 strong as it came up White Gully and mustered round Brown’s Dip, a depression behind the firing lines of the Pimple. The men wore white armlets and a square white patch on the back, to distinguish them from the enemy in the dust and confusion of such fighting. They carried their packs and full equipment. The 2nd (Colonel Scobie, killed), the 3rd (Colonel Brown, killed), and the 4th (Colonel Macnaghton) Battalions were to lead the attack, the 1st Battalion (Colonel Dobbin) being held in reserve. The three battalions took up their positions, crouching below the parapets, from which the barbed wire had been cautiously removed. A small party was stationed along an advanced subterranean trench or corridor, connected with the main firing trench by tunnels, which the miners had elaborately constructed. Thence it was to burst out through the thin coating of earth overhead, and join in the charge.154

The attack was timed for 5.30 in the afternoon. A casual bombardment of the Turkish guns in the olive grove behind Gaba Tepe had been carried on all day by the monitor Humber, but at 4 o’clock the cruiser Bacchante appeared, and began shelling the Turkish lines in earnest. At 4.30 the land batteries joined in, but the bombardment was not more severe than usual, so that the Turks continued uncertain of the approaching event. Slowly the minutes passed, the officers standing watch in hand, as time ticked out for so many the remaining seconds of life. Only fifty from each of the three battalions were to spring over the parapet first, but so thickly did the men press up against the fire-step to get a good start that there was hardly room along the 200 yards of front.155

Just before 5.30 the guns suddenly stopped. The officers passed the word, “Prepare to go over.” Next second the Brigade-Major blew his whistle. Whistles sounded all along the trench. The 150 clambered over the sandbags without a word. There was no cheering. With eyes fixed upon the low white line of loopholed parapet in front, the heavily laden men trotted and stumbled forward across that open patch of heath, rugged with pitfalls, fragments of shell, and wire. The Turkish guns, sighted for our trenches, could not range upon them, and in the first rush few fell. In less than a minute from the start, nearly all had reached that white and loopholed line, and, with sharpened bayonets raised, were prepared to burst through the entanglements and leap into the trench below. They burst the entanglement, but there was no visible trench below. The whole trench was thickly roofed with heavy baulks of fir timber, railway sleepers, branches of trees, earth, and rocks. The trench was one prolonged, impenetrable dug-out, loophooled along the front line like a subterranean castle.

Some of the advanced party ran forward over the solid roof, reached the open second line of trenches, reached the communication trenches up which the Turks were crowding, and fired into the thick of the enemy wherever they found them. They sprang down separately into the midst of them, and fought single-handed with bayonet and bombs, spreading terror and confusion before they died. But the majority scattered out in line along the face of the first parapet, as though along a curb, peering and poking for an entrance, while the Turks poured bullets upwards upon them through loopholes and imperceptible apertures. Some of our men fired back through the loopholes; some, in groups, with desperate strength, wrenched up the heavy beams and tore the roof open; some discovered narrow man-holes left in the covering for the exit and entrance of “listeners” at night. Wherever a sufficient opening was made or found, a man wriggled feet foremost down through it, helpless and exposed until he dropped into the thick of foes scarcely visible in the cavernous obscurity. It took fifteen minutes for all the men standing exposed in the open to get down.

Close upon the heels of the advanced party, the main bodies of the three battalions had followed, leaving only their reserves. Before twenty minutes had passed, the reserves also went forward. Within a few minutes of the start, the Turkish guns had the range of the open ground, and swept it from end to end with a cross-fire of machine-guns and low-bursting shrapnel. At the same time, Turkish 6-in. howitzers continued to fling their crunching shells sheer into the emplacements of the Anzac guns, drawn right up among the parapets of the firing line. So thick was the air with shrieking missiles of death that it seemed impossible to live unsheltered. Yet as soon as the gun parapets were shattered, they were rebuilt, and across that deadly open space of heath, now thickly strewn with lumps of khaki marked with white, group after group of companies steadily ran forward, and the wounded—only the wounded—came staggering or crawling back. Along the foot of that first white parapet the dead lay in line, and here, as at the landing on W Beach, eager watchers in our trenches asked each other what the men were doing there.

Fifty minutes from the start, the 1st Battalion was sent up to reinforce and consolidate, but the blind struggle for life or death continued in the trenches. No one will ever fully describe what happened in those twisting galleries and passages and pits, for neither actors nor witnesses of the deeds survived. Crowded in places so tightly together that they could hardly use their rifles, in other places hidden singly in dark corners, or lurking in groups behind angles of traverses, the unhappy Anatolians, Syrians, and peasants from the Asiatic shores awaited and repelled the fiery and tumultuous onset with unyielding persistence. Rifles were fired at scorching range; bayonet clashed with bayonet, and plunged into the softness of living bodies full of blood; bomb-thrower flung his bomb into the face of bomb-thrower flinging at him. It was like a battle of infuriated beasts tearing each other to death in the narrow confines of a pit. The bottom of the trenches was soon so thick with the dead and dying that Australians and Turks alike trampled upon bodies without discrimination of race, and the sides of the trenches no longer sheltered from fire the heads of those who still fought on.

Where all displayed a reckless disregard of life beyond the imagination of peace, it is hard to select conspicuous courage. But one may mention Major Fullerton, an army surgeon, who stumbled through the rain of fire across the open ground, and stayed for six hours dressing the wounded in the midst of the fighting; also Captain J. W. Bean, who went to and fro under the terrifying shell-fire which crumbled up the parapets of our former line, and attended to the wounded till he fell wounded himself. Of the calm gallantry of some signallers, his brother, Captain C. E. W. Bean, the correspondent, made mention in some notes which he jotted down hour by hour on that wild evening and night, until he himself fell wounded also; at 7 p.m. he wrote:

The Turks thus seen were indeed massing for a counter-attack. At 6.30 the signal, “Everything O.K.,” had been passed to the Brigade Headquarters, but about half an hour later the enemy came swarming up the slope through communication trenches, bent upon recovering the position with bombs and bayonets. The desperate hand-to-hand conflict was renewed in the gathering darkness; but, impeded though they were by prisoners, wounded, and the numbers of dead bodies (which they attempted to arrange in rows along the sides of the trenches so as to leave a gangway clear), the Australians held the ground already won. Again, at 1.30, in the blackness of night, the Turks in great masses attempted to bomb them out with showers of hand missiles, and for seven hours the counter-attacks continued. So heavy were the losses that the 12th Battalion (South Australian, West Australian, and Tasmanian), which had been held as reserve for the 3rd Brigade, was thrown in to reinforce. At 1.30 p.m. of Saturday the 7th, the attacks were renewed, and the struggle lasted till about 5 p.m. (twenty-four hours after our first assault), broke out again at midnight, and was continued till dawn on Sunday the 8th.

Meantime, the peril of crossing the open ground had been to some extent averted by parties of sappers under Colonel Elliott and Major Martyn. In the early afternoon of the 6th, before the attack began, three mines had been exploded from tunnels thrown forward from the subterranean trench or gallery above mentioned. Taking advantage of the craters thus made, the sappers hurriedly bored tunnels through into the Turkish trenches, so connecting the gallery with the Lone Pine position. Down these new tunnels the wounded and prisoners could be safely conveyed on the 7th, past the craters into the gallery, and from the gallery down the old tunnels into our original trenches on the Pimple. It was a noble piece of engineering, saving many lives, and for the rest of the campaign all communication with the Lone Pine outpost passed through tunnels.

Sunday was chiefly spent in barricading the entrances of the enemy’s communication trenches with hundreds of sandbags, and in fortifying the position at other points. As it was impossible to bring away all the dead for burial, some of the bodies, both Turk and Australian, were buried by being built in among the sandbags and other barricades, so that for many weeks afterwards the position was haunted by the smell of corruption. During this fortification, the men were continually exposed to bombing and assaults. So heavy had been the 2nd Battalion’s loss that on Sunday it was relieved by the 7th Battalion (Victoria), which had been held in reserve for the 2nd Brigade. The reinforcement was fortunate, for at dawn on Monday the 9th the new battalion was called upon to resist the last of the violent counter-attacks, when for nearly three hours the Turks attempted to recover the position by repeated assaults up the southern and eastern slopes. After this repulse, the enemy continued to attack with bombs and guns till Thursday the 12th, but with less determination. Thus the conflict lasted for six days and nights in all. The position was finally won and held, but Lone Pine remained a dangerous or “unhealthy” point to the end. Our losses were very heavy. After the first counter-attacks, 1000 dead—Anzac and Turk—were roughly reckoned in the trenches. But the service in gaining the fortress, and in holding a large Turkish force in position, was incalculable. Praising the resolute tenacity of the Australian men and officers, Sir Ian wrote in his dispatch:

In this manner Lone Pine was taken and held. But before the sun rose on August 7, the remainder of the Australian Division’s line from the Pimple running left or north to the apex of the triangle at the Nek was the scene of contests no less heroic though less successful. The whole line was engaged, but the points from which our attacks issued were four—Steel’s Post, Quinn’s Post, Pope’s Hill, and Russell’s Top—from right to left. The 2nd Infantry Brigade (Victoria) was holding the line at Steel’s Post, and the 6th Battalion (Colonel Bennett) was chosen for an assault upon the opposite Turkish stronghold, known as German Officers’ Trenches, because at the armistice some German officers came out of them. It was a position of strength almost equal to Lone Pine, and here also tunnels had been dug forward from our lines and connected by a gallery at the end. Three mines were exploded between eleven and twelve on the night of the 6th, and a heavy bombardment was concentrated on the Turkish position, but without much effect beyond warning the enemy to expect attack. On the stroke of midnight, the first line struggled out of the gallery through holes in the surface, but were at once mowed down by concentrated machine-gun fire. Few advanced more than 2 yards. Most fell back dying or wounded into the gallery. A second attempt was made just before 4 a.m. on the 7th, but failed in like manner. It seems that a third attempt was contemplated by General Walker, but Brigadier-General Forsyth perceived the uselessness of further sacrifice, believing that the object of holding the Turks in position had been gained now that the main attacks on Sari Bair and at Suvla were in full progress.157

Farther to the left, the line was held by the 1st Light Horse Brigade (Brigadier-General H. G. Chauvel), and from Quinn’s Post the 2nd Regiment (Queensland) was ordered to attack in four lines of fifty each, apparently about dawn. The Turkish trenches were barely more than 15 yards away, but not one of our first line reached them, unless it was Major Logan, who led one of the two parties into which the line was divided, and is believed to have fallen dead over the Turkish parapet. Lieutenant Bourne, who led the other party, was killed in the first 10 yards. All in the line were killed or wounded, except one man, who said he observed where the machine-gun bullets were striking our parapet most thickly, and leapt clean above them and over the top. So terrible was the loss that the order for the other three lines to attack was cancelled.158

During this brief and deadly attempt, the 1st Regiment (New South Wales) of the same Light Horse Brigade made a sortie from Pope’s Hill, lying to the left of Quinn’s but slightly in rear. The object was to recover some trenches dug by the 4th Infantry Brigade on May 2 upon the farther side of a steep cleft in which one of the ravines contributing to Monash Gully ends. From these trenches, one above the other, the Turks harassed, not only Pope’s Hill and Monash Gully, but exposed parts of the main Shrapnel Gully itself. Soon after dawn Major T. W. Glasgow led the attack with two squadrons, and succeeded in storming the first three trenches, though at one moment the men in the second trench were bombing their own comrades in the third, in ignorance of their rapid advance. It was a fight with bombs, and our supply had to be brought from Pope’s across the open. The Turks, flinging bombs from the top edge of the steep gully, which is only 40 or 50 yards across at this point, had every advantage, and after two hours’ conflict the survivors of the squadrons were withdrawn, but carried in the wounded. Major Glasgow, though in the thick of the fighting throughout, was almost the only man untouched.

Even more terrible than these lesser contests along the right side of the Anzac triangle was the attempt to capture the open Nek, still farther to the left, just at the apex of the whole Anzac position, as has been before explained. The Nek itself is an isthmus of high cliff, flat and open at the top, connecting the main range of Sari Bair with the elevated Anzac position known as Russell’s Top. It is about 80 yards long and little over 100 yards in breadth across. On the right or south-east side it falls steeply down into Monash Gully, and looks across to Pope’s Hill and Quinn’s. On the left or north-west side it falls as a precipitous and almost inaccessible cliff, looking over the deep ravines that run to Ocean Beach. Since the furious counter-attacks in the days following the landing, the Nek had been a vital point for both sides, and at their end, to guard against a sortie across the isthmus, the Turks had constructed a powerful redoubt, known as “The Chessboard” from its complicated chequer of trenches. Behind this redoubt the ground slopes gradually up to the smooth, round knoll, called Baby 700, whence the main ridge could be easily ascended to the height of Chunuk Bair. But Koja Chemen Tepe (Hill 971), the loftiest point of the Sari Bair range, is divided from Chunuk Bair by a precipitous ravine visible only from the Suvla district.

The assault from Russell’s Top across this terrific position was entrusted to the 8th (Victorian) and the 10th (West Australian) Regiments of the 3rd Light Horse Brigade (Brigadier-General F. G. Hughes). Two parties of 150 men apiece were selected for the charge from each of the two regiments—600 men in all. Just before dawn on Saturday, the 7th, they filed into the Russell’s Top trenches, all in their shirts and “shorts,” with sleeves rolled up, but carrying water-bottles and their packs containing food, photographs, letters, and “souvenirs,” such as soldiers like, though hardly one of them wanted food or looked at mementoes again. Each man had 200 rounds also, but was ordered to trust to the fixed bayonet alone. The first line took two scaling-ladders, and the fourth was provided with picks and shovels.

At 4 a.m. a heavy bombardment from all available guns was poured upon the carefully registered Chessboard, and it lasted twenty-five minutes. Lieut.-Colonel A. H. White, commanding the 8th Regiment, said to the Brigade-Major, “Good-bye, Antill!” and with two other officers stood by the parapet watching the minute hand move. “Three minutes to go,” he said, and then simply “Go!”159 Springing from pegs placed in the parapet as foot-rests, the 150 leapt into the open. They leapt into a blinding storm of bullets. Turks, raised tier above tier in the Chessboard, poured bullets upon them at 80 yards’ distance. Machine-guns in the Chessboard and in the trenches opposite Quinn’s pumped bullets upon them as from fire-hoses in convergent streams. A French “75,” captured by the Turks from the Serbians in the first Balkan War, burst shrapnel low above their heads every ten seconds. Many rolled back from the parapet to die in their own trenches. Colonel White was killed within the first 10 yards. Not one of the 150 got more than half-way across the brief space of the Nek.

Two minutes later, the second line sprang over the parapet in like manner, and followed to the same destruction. But by some means unknown a few of them—probably not more than five or six—actually reached an enemy’s trench opposite our extreme right; for a small red and yellow flag was seen for about two minutes waving over the enemy’s parapet, and this was the agreed signal for another stage in the attack. It disappeared, but none the less a party of the 8th Royal Welsh Fusiliers (40th Brigade, 13th Division) answered the signal by attempting to force their way up the end of Monash Gully on to the Nek, and their first two groups shared the fate of the Australians on the open top. Almost at the same moment (ten minutes after the second line had gone) the third line (Western Australians) followed them. But while about forty were still under cover of a depression on our left, General Hughes, no doubt appalled at the useless slaughter, ordered the attack to cease, and a few crawled back into safety. The next night a private who had shammed death all day at the foot of the Turkish parapet also came in. The assault lasted just a quarter of an hour, and so far as holding a large force of the enemy went, it was successful. But in that quarter of an hour the loss was 435, including 20 officers and 232 men killed or missing—the words were identical.

If we seek a parallel to the 600 at Balaclava, it was there. But a Turkish schoolmaster, who fought in the first trench of the Chessboard that morning and was afterwards taken prisoner, said that the Turks did not lose a single man.160 Our two scaling-ladders remained abandoned in the open.

CHAPTER XI SARI BAIR — Evening, August 6, to evening, August 7. — From the evening of August 7 to the evening of August 8. — From the evening of August 8 to the evening of August 9. — From the evening of August 9 to the evening of August 10.

From the Nek, the Chessboard, and Baby 700, the main ridge or mountain of Sari Bair rises steadily, like a great rounded shoulder, to Battleship Hill (so called from an early naval bombardment), and thence, after a long but slight depression, which from the sea looks like a continuous ridge, rises again to the broad and massive front of Chunuk Bair, about 850 feet in height. Towards the sea, the mountain Chunuk shows an apparently precipitous face, split in the centre by a cleft too steep to be called a watercourse. It is rather what mountaineers mean by a “chimney.” But except on this actual face, the mountain range is not so steep as it appears, nor so inaccessible, being of softish sandstone mixed with marl, like the whole of the district. Hard limestones, or the only formations which are called “rock” by every one but geologists, are not found till one reaches the genuinely rocky hill on the south side of Suvla Bay, and the still more rocky edge on the north.

From Chunuk Bair the range continues its north-easterly trend, the sky-line again showing a slight depression or dip till it rises to a similar but lesser height, which we at first called “Nameless Hill,” but more generally “Hill Q.” Beyond “Hill Q” the ridge is again slightly lower and flattish along the summit till it is split across unexpectedly by a precipitous ravine, which appears to cut sheer down to a level of less than half the mountain’s height. Both sides of the ravine are unusually steep and jagged, so that it would be impossible for troops by continuing an advance along the sky-line of the ridge to gain the highest summit, which rises steeply from the farther side of the ravine. This summit, the crowning-point of the range gradually rising, as we have seen, from the beach at Chatham Post, is Koja Chemen Tepe, generally known as Hill 971 (its height in feet). The top, being thrown back to the north-east, is invisible from Anzac, but plainly seen from Imbros, the sea, and Suvla, dominating the region. The ravine is not revealed till Suvla is reached.

These joint heights of Chunuk and “Hill Q,” together with the disconnected height of Koja Chemen, were the first objectives in the main attack of August 6 to 10. The ultimate objective remained as before—the clearing of the Narrows by reaching Maidos, cutting the Turkish communications with Achi Baba and Krithia over the Kilid Bahr plateau, and dominating the forts on the Asiatic side. Some critics, both at the time and since, have maintained that the ultimate objective could better have been won by making the main attack from Suvla with all available forces. But at the time, when many believed this to be Sir Ian’s design, an advance from Suvla into the heart of the Peninsula appeared to me impossible so long as the enemy held the Sari Bair range as a perpetual threat to the right flank of our advancing columns; and not merely the heart of the Peninsula, but the coast-line of the Straits, would have to be reached before the enemy’s forces to the south could be cut off. It is true that an advance from Anzac, or even from Suvla, was partially threatened by forces on Kilid Bahr plateau. But from Anzac the passage to the Straits was brief, and from Suvla it was protected by Sari Bair itself, provided only that we held that mountain range. Otherwise it was out of the question.

So the objective of the main attack from Anzac was simple; but the means of approach presented extraordinary difficulties. As at Anzac itself, the front of the range breaks down to the sea in a crumbled and complicated formation of edges, ridges, spurs, cliffs, and ravines, the haphazard and perennial work of winter storms and rains acting for ages upon soft sandstone and sandy deposits mixed with clay and a little chalk. This labyrinthine region naturally follows the north-easterly course of the hills out of which water has carved it, leaving a gradually extending plain along the seacoast as far as the low hills forming Nibrunesi Point, the southern extremity of Suvla Bay. Sometimes at night small parties of chosen New Zealand officers stole out to explore the labyrinth, and their reconnaissance was of the highest value. But the district had never been surveyed, and the tortuous watercourses, the unexpected cliffs and ravines, complicated by almost impenetrable and spiky bush, threatened inextricable error to any wanderer there, even by daylight and in peace. Imagine, then, the perplexity of threading those unknown ways in a total darkness haunted by the expectation of deadly fire at every turn in the ravines, from the blackness of every thicket, and the edge of every cliff! One or two Greek and Turkish guides were available, but employed without much confidence.

For the better understanding of the great assault, the following points in the geography might be remembered. Proceeding by the Long Sap, then lately constructed, parallel with the seashore from Ari Burnu northward, soon after passing No. 1 Post one crosses Sazli Beit Dere, a dry watercourse on which the “Fishermen’s Huts” of the first landing stood. About 600 yards farther on, after passing No. 2 and No. 3 Posts, one reaches Chailak Dere, close to the mouth of which the “diviner” discovered copious subterranean water, as previously described. Both these Deres, or dry watercourses, run at right angles to the coast, coming down from the fort of Chunuk Bair by devious, zigzag courses, but generally parallel in direction, though the upper courses tend to converge. The steep and lofty ground standing between the two Deres is marked by the three points of Old No. 3 Post, Table Top, and Rhododendron Spur, which runs up to the shoulder of Chunuk Bair itself.

Emerging from the Long Sap near the mouth of Chailak Dere, and proceeding along the flats sheltered after this attack by a parapet for about 1000 yards, one reaches the Aghyl Dere, which runs fairly parallel with the other two in its lower course, but splits into two Deres about a mile from the mouth, the right-hand tributary converging rapidly with Chailak Dere, till they almost meet at the foot of Chunuk Bair, the left-hand tributary bearing away north-east towards the foot of Hill Q and Koja Chemen Tepe. The ground between Chailak Dere and Aghyl Dere is chiefly marked by Bauchop’s Hill and Little Table Top. At the source of Aghyl Dere’s southern tributary, high up the front of the mountain, and just at the foot of Chunuk Bair’s precipitous cliff, lies a small patch of cultivated ground, in that year yellow with corn stubble, conspicuous from Suvla and the sea. A few brown sheds and a sort of dwelling stood on the farther side. This was the Farm.

Proceeding northward again along “Ocean Beach” from the mouth of Aghyl Dere, one reaches a Dere commonly called Asmak, though it has other names (Iram Chai or Kasa Dere). This is the main watercourse draining the broad and open valley in which Biyuk (or Greater) Anafarta stands in a beautiful grove of cypresses, about three and a half miles from the sea. Several other Deres in the district are called “Asmak,” and it is probable that the name “Asma,” by which we knew the main tributary to this Dere, is really the same word. But, to keep the distinction, the Asma Dere runs into the Asmak nearly a mile from the mouth, and following its course, instead of going straight on to Biyuk Anafarta, one proceeds by a wide arc southward till the foot of Koja Chemen is reached. There one finds that the source is not far removed from the source of the northern branch of the Aghyl Dere, since both drain the highest section of the main ridge. The large space of ground thus almost enclosed between the Aghyl Dere on the south and the Asmak and Asma Deres beyond is singularly difficult and intricate. The low but steep hills and cliffs are sharply intersected by ravines running in every direction. The district is a jumble of sandy but hard mounds and scarps and fissures, with here and there a narrow slip or tongue of level ground running up among them. Few distinctive features mark locality, but about a mile from the sea stands a mass of low hill or broken plateau called Damakjelik Bair or Hill 40; and about another two-thirds of a mile inland to the north-east, across a brief but steep watercourse called Kaiajik Dere (another tributary to the Asmak), rises a similar but slightly higher mass of low hill or broken plateau called Kaiajik Aghala, soon to be famous as Hill 60. The Asma Dere runs past the farther side of Hill 60, and beyond the Asma rises the steep, long ridge of Abdel Rahman Bair, one of the main northern spurs or buttresses of Koja Chemen itself.

This bare analysis of a difficult country covers the ground of the main August attack, and the hills or watercourses named may serve as guides to the comprehension of the obscure and desperate conflicts. But no analysis or map or description can adequately express the roughness and complexity of that desert jungle, the steepness of its cliffs and spurs and edges, or the bewilderment of its dry watercourses, creeks, fissures, and ravines. Neither in the British island nor in Ireland is there a scene to compare with it, because in our islands the frequent rain and prevailing moisture smooth off the edges, fill the ravines with water, and cover even the crags with moss and ferns or grasses. The nearest resemblance I have seen was in the crinkled hills and cliffs upon the West Coast of Africa near Benguela. But there the yellow spurs and ravines are absolutely bare. On the Sari Mountains, parts of the lower slopes are concealed with the thick, prickly bush so often mentioned; parts with low pines. The summits are coated with thin grass and heath, while some of the ravines and sheltered spurs were then brilliant with the crimson flowering oleander, which our men called rhododendron, though it differs from the alien product introduced as an embellishment into English parks.

The design of the main attack was drawn by Brigadier-General A. Skeen, the very able Chief of Staff at Anzac. It was accepted by Lieut.-General Birdwood, and approved by Sir Ian. Its execution was entrusted to Major-General Sir Alexander J. Godley, commanding the New Zealand and Australian Division. It was a complicated scheme—perhaps necessarily complicated owing to the intricacy of the ground, which prevented the united action of large bodies of troops, and rendered advance impossible except by thin columns sinuously winding up the Deres like snakes. Accordingly, General Godley was compelled to divide his troops. For the night attack of August 6–7 he divided them into two columns—a right and a left—each column being subdivided into a covering or advanced force, and an assaulting or main force. In Anzac as a whole (Sir Ian in his dispatch tells us) the troops at General Birdwood’s disposal amounted in round numbers to 37,000 rifles and 72 guns, with naval support from two cruisers, four monitors, and two destroyers. Of these military forces the following contingents were allotted to Major-General Godley for his enterprise:

His own New Zealand and Australian Division (less the 1st and 3rd Light Horse Brigades, desperately engaged upon the Anzac heights and the Nek, as we have seen);

The 13th Division under Major-General Shaw (less the 38th Brigade allotted to Army Corps Reserve and two battalions of the 40th Brigade at Anzac);

The 29th Indian Infantry Brigade (Major-General Cox);

The Indian Mountain Artillery Brigade (Lieut.-Colonel Parker, R.A.).

The Army Corps Reserve was the 29th Brigade, 10th Division (less one battalion), the 38th Brigade, 13th Division, and two battalions of the 40th Brigade.

For the approach and first assault General Godley divided this force as follows, assigning to each of the four parts the objective mentioned below:

This force was to advance up Sazli Beit and Chailak Deres, and seize Old No. 3 Post, Big Table Top, and Bauchop Hill.

This assaulting column was to follow the covering force up the Sazli Beit and Chailak Deres, and push on to the attack of Chunuk Bair.

This force was to occupy Damakjelik Bair so as to cover the advance up Aghyl Dere, and to come into touch with the troops landing at Suvla.

This left assaulting column was to advance up the Aghyl Dere to the attack on Koja Chemen (Hill 971), and at the same time to protect the left flank of the whole force as soon as it had cleared its own covering force.

The Divisional Reserve was made up of remaining battalions of the 13th Division under Major-General F. C. Shaw, two battalions being stationed at Chailak Dere, and the 39th Brigade at Aghyl Dere, with half the 72nd Field Company R.E.

The total forces under General Godley’s command were estimated at about 12,000 men.161

For the sake of clearness, the ensuing movements may be divided into four stages of about twenty-four hours each, counting from evening to evening.

In the gathering darkness, about 9 p.m., on Friday, August 6, the whole force mustered between No. 2 and No. 3 Posts, having marched out from Anzac concealed by the shelter of the Long Sap. General Godley fixed his headquarters at No. 2 Post, and here the main supply of ammunition and water-cans was organised. The movements of the two covering forces and the two assaulting columns may be followed in the order given above, but it must be remembered that, in point of time, they were frequently simultaneous. The first task of the Right Covering Force (Brigadier-General Russell with his New Zealanders) was to clear the Turkish positions which dominated the lower course of the Sazli Beit and Chailak Deres—Old No. 3 Post, Big Table Top, between the Deres, and Bauchop’s Hill on the farther side of Chailak.

Old No. 3 Post is a steep and prominent hill, some 200 feet high, which we occupied as an extreme outpost soon after the landing, but lost on May 30, since when No. 3 Post, a similar but lower hill close to the shore, had been held as outpost by Lieut.-Colonel Bauchop with his Otago Mounted Rifles, other New Zealanders, and Maoris in turn. Since the Turks had recovered the Old Post they had converted it into a fortress of great strength, with entanglements, deep trenches, and head cover of solid timber balks. For its recapture a successful ruse was practised. For some weeks past, the destroyer Colne (Commander Claude Seymour) had turned a vivid searchlight on to the hill, and bombarded it from 9 p.m. to 9.10 p.m. precisely, always repeating both operations from 9.20 to 9.30. This regularity had persuaded the Turks to regard the bombardment as a kind of Angelus or signal for a consecrated interval during which it was permissible to retire from the front trenches into the restful seclusion of tunnels and dug-outs. When the rite concluded, an old Turk, naturally nicknamed Achmet, used to trot round like a lamplighter, tying up the broken wires, and in a friendly spirit the New Zealanders agreed not to shoot him.162 But now there was no more work for Achmet. Hidden beneath the blaze of the searchlight during the second customary bombardment, the Auckland Regiment (Lieut.-Colonel Mackesy) stole across to the hill and climbed to the very top of the trenches. The moment that the light was switched off they were in among the Turks with bayonet and bomb (no rifle cartridges were issued to the covering forces that night). They found many Turks taking their ease in the cool of the evening, without coats or boots. Seventy were captured. The rest died, or scurried away down communication trenches. These trenches were not finally cleared till 11 p.m.

Meanwhile the attack on Big Table Top had far advanced. This hill, so conspicuous from northern Anzac for its precipitous sides and a flat top which appears even to overhang the sides, in reality forms part of the same long spur as Old No. 3 Post, and is connected with it by a ridge worn to a razor-edge by weather. The main hill, which rises to about 400 feet, was heavily bombarded by howitzers from the shore and by the Colne, as she turned her guns off the Old Post at 9.30. It appears probable that the destroyer Chelmer (Commander Hugh T. England) joined in this bombardment; at all events, for this or other service she was coupled with the Colne in dispatches. The bombardment lasted half an hour, and at 10 p.m. the infantry assault began upon a precipice steeper than the angle noted in text-books as “impracticable for infantry.” The Canterbury Regiment led the way. Impeded by rifles, fixed bayonets, packs, and other equipment, in darkness lit only by stars, they scaled a height which appears as precipitous as any overhanging English cliff, held by a brave and religiously inspired enemy. Of this exploit Sir Ian in his dispatch justly observes, “there are moments during battle when life becomes intensified.” In such a moment the New Zealanders, some of whom had practised mountain-climbing in the New Zealand Alps under such mountaineers as Mr. Malcolm Ross, their correspondent, climbed that seemingly inaccessible redoubt, more like a huge fortress tower than a hill. Pulling themselves up by their arms, while their legs hung in air, they stood upon the summit and stormed in upon the Turkish defences. The surviving Turks escaped up a long communication trench running across a narrow dip or Nek to the main Rhododendron Ridge, and the second dominating height between the Sazli Beit and Chailak Deres was won. The time was close upon midnight.

Whilst part of the covering force was thus victorious, the Otago Mounted Rifles, with some Maoris, had been for a while checked in attempting to penetrate up the Chailak Dere. Not more than a few hundred yards up this watercourse (then no more watery than those mounted troops were on horseback) the Turks had constructed an enormously strong barricade of thick wire and beams, commanded by an outpost only a few yards farther up. Right against this obstacle the Otago men came. A sudden outburst of fire from the trench beyond cut many down. They were so thick and close that no bullet which made its way through the deep network of wires could miss. The cutters came forward and began snipping the spiky ropes of iron. But many fell before a party of New Zealand Engineers (Captain Shera) forced a narrow passage. The advance up the Dere was thus delayed; but we who saw the remains of that barricade after it was partially cleared know there was nothing to choose between the heroism of those who cut the way through and of those who scaled the Table Top.

Perhaps owing to this delay, or perhaps by plan, the main body of Otago Mounted Rifles did not follow up the Chailak Dere, but crossed it near the mouth, and turning sharply to the right a little farther on, advanced to assault the mass of low and complicated hill already known as Bauchop’s owing to his reconnaissance. Nature and military art had entrenched the position throughout, and it was intersected criss-cross by deep ravines. But the Turks did not hold it strongly. Startled by the Otago men, who worked round their right flank and attacked from the north side, they began to clear out of the bivouacs in which they had long lived in fairly comfortable leisure and were now surprised. At the first assault, Lieut.-Colonel A. Bauchop, while shouting, “Come on, boys! Charge!” fell mortally wounded by a bullet in the spine. The army thus lost one of its most capable officers, and a man of exceptionally attractive nature, who for months had commanded a position of great risk and responsibility. The occupation of the hill or system of ravines was completed just after 1 a.m. (August 7). The task set the Right Covering Force was accomplished.

Half an hour after midnight the Right Assaulting Column was thus enabled to begin its advance up the two Deres. As above mentioned, its main force was the New Zealand Infantry Brigade (Brigadier-General F. E. Johnston). The Canterbury Battalion proceeded alone up the Sazli Beit Dere, and met with small difficulty except from the nature of the ground, which, indeed, was so intricate that half the battalion lost its way and found itself back at the starting-point.163 In consequence, Colonel J. G. Hughes could not muster the battalion for the ascent of the main spur (Rhododendron Ridge, at first called Canterbury Ridge) till just before dawn. The other three battalions (Otago, Auckland, and Wellington, in that order) advancing up the Chailak Dere were equally hampered by the obscure and tangled country. They also encountered violent opposition, which compelled the leading battalion to deploy in the darkness. Some of the troops were told off to assist the covering force on their left in finally clearing Bauchop’s Hill and another smaller eminence known as Little Table Top.164 But pushing steadily forward, the three battalions succeeded, though late, in joining up with the Canterbury Battalion on the lower slopes of the main Rhododendron Ridge, which ran straight up to the right or southern shoulder of Chunuk Bair, now deep purple against the rising sun.

The attack upon this central height was to have been made before dawn. It was late. Under increasing daylight, shrapnel began to spit and shower overhead, striking with cross-fire from Battleship Hill and a position on the left crest of Chunuk. The men were much exhausted. They had accomplished a night march of extreme difficulty, exposed to continuous perils and surprises. Nevertheless, the united battalions struggled forward up the ridge, rough with every obstacle and rising with a steep gradient. After a toilsome climb, at 8 a.m. they reached a point (almost at once called the Mustard Plaster, but afterwards known as the Apex) where a depression in the ridge afforded some slight cover from the guns, and there they hurriedly entrenched a position. On the left it hangs above the Farm, upon which the farthest end of it looks steeply down. A narrow but uninterrupted Nek of some 400 or 500 yards (roughly a quarter-mile) extends the ridge to the sky-line summit—the right or southern shoulder of Chunuk Bair.

Meantime, on the previous evening, the Left Covering Force (Brigadier-General Travers) had followed so closely upon the heels of the Right Covering Force along the shore that they had to pass through them at the mouth of Chailak Dere. When clear, they proceeded straight forward along the level to Aghyl Dere, though exposed to desultory fire from Bauchop’s Hill, not yet fully occupied. Turning sharply up the Dere, they emerged from it to the left and seized the entrenchments on the confused heights of Damakjelik Bair with so impetuous a rush that some Turkish officers were caught in the unsuspecting security of pyjamas. In this attack the 4th South Wales Borderers (under Lieut.-Colonel F. M. Gillespie, an exceptionally fine officer) especially distinguished themselves, and by 1.30 a.m. the position was securely held. The force was thus able to cover the advance of the assaulting column up the Aghyl Dere, and to come into touch with the Suvla landing farther north.

The Left Assaulting Column, consisting, as was mentioned, of the 4th Australian Infantry Brigade (Brigadier-General Monash) and the Indian Brigade, the whole under command of Brigadier-General Cox, after breaking from their permanent camp at the foot of the Sphinx, came at once under a storm of shrapnel. They followed the Covering Force almost too closely, and found themselves strongly opposed after advancing some distance up the Aghyl Dere. General Monash threw out one battalion as a screen, and progress was very slow, the intersecting ravines making the ground almost impenetrable. At the confluence of the two tributaries which form the main Dere, General Monash moved up the northern fork, keeping two battalions well away to his left in the hope of co-operating with the Suvla force in the projected assault upon Koja Chemen Tepe. During this slow and obstructed advance, the Australians discovered the emplacements of two “75’s,” which had long troubled Anzac, where they were called “the Anafartas,” but the guns had been hurried away. It was not till dawn that the brigade reached the ridge above the upper reaches of the Asma Dere. There General Monash received the order to concentrate the battalions, leave a guard for his present position, and attack the towering height of Koja Chemen. The Sikh Battalion of the Indian Brigade was sent up from the southern branch of the Aghyl Dere in his support. But the enemy in front was now strong and fully aroused. The Australians were exhausted by their toilsome and hazardous march. No farther advance could be made, and the ridge overlooking the Asma was hurriedly entrenched.

The remaining three Indian Battalions (Gurkha Rifles) persistently clambered up the steep course of the Aghyl Dere’s southern fork, till they reached a position facing the Farm. Their right thus came into touch with the New Zealanders on Rhododendron Ridge, while their centre and left stood ready to climb the steep front of the main range and assault “Hill Q.” By about 9 a.m. (August 7) the whole force was thus extended in a broken and irregular line from the upper slopes of Rhododendron Ridge, past the front of the Farm, down the southern fork of the Aghyl Dere, along the northern fork, and across the rugged ground above the Asma Dere. The right flank rested on Anzac and held the important positions of Old No. 3 Post and Table Top. The left flank was guarded by Damakjelik Bair and by the division now landed at Suvla, whose co-operation was counted upon. Except for a delay of about three hours, all the movements had been carried out as designed. But the Turks could now be seen swarming along the summits from Battleship Hill. Every hour the heat was increasing to extreme intensity. General Birdwood truly said in his report, “The troops had performed a feat which is without parallel.” But by this feat they were now exhausted.

A general attempt to renew the attack was made at 9.30 a.m., but the task was too heavy. About 11 a.m. again, the Auckland Battalion, hitherto in reserve, bravely struggled up the narrow Nek (only some 40 yards broad), which, as described above, forms the end of Rhododendron Ridge, connecting it with the summit. But they were swept by Turkish guns apparently near “Hill Q,” and on reaching a Turkish trench only about 200 yards from the top, they were driven back.165 Orders were, therefore, issued to both columns to strengthen and hold their present positions with a view to further advance before dawn on the following day. Meantime, supplies were sent up, so far as possible, from the advanced base at No. 2 Post. As usual throughout the campaign, the supply of water was the greatest need and the greatest difficulty, fine as was the conduct of the Indian drivers of water mules. The convoys were also continually exposed to shrapnel from the heights, and to the rifle-fire of snipers still lurking in large numbers invisible among the bushes and ravines of the wide stretch of country occupied during the night.

During the evening both of the Assaulting Columns were reinforced. The Right Column (Brigadier-General F. E. Johnston) received the Auckland Mounted Rifles and the Maori contingent from the Right Covering Force, together with two battalions (8th Welsh Pioneers and 7th Gloucesters) from the 13th Division in reserve. The Left Assaulting Column (Brigadier-General H. V. Cox) received three battalions from the 39th Brigade, 13th Division (9th R. Warwicks, 9th Worcesters, and 7th North Staffords, the 7th Gloucesters going to the Right Column, as above), together with the 6th South Lancashire (38th Brigade). The Right Column was to proceed with the attack on Chunuk Bair; the Left Column to assault “Hill Q” in the centre, and with its left to work round north-east to the steep ridge called Abdel Rahman Bair for an assault upon Koja Chemen Tepe.

Before daylight on Sunday, August 8, the edge of the heights from Battleship Hill to “Hill Q” was heavily bombarded by monitors and cruisers, together with the batteries on the flats. At the first dawn (4.15) a column, led by Lieut.-Colonel W. G. Malone, the hero of Quinn’s Post, with his accustomed enthusiasm, dashed up the steep and narrow slope to the summit of Rhododendron Ridge. Colonel Malone’s own Wellington Battalion went first. The 7th Gloucesters closely followed. The Auckland Mounted Rifles and Welsh Pioneers came in support. The Wellingtons reached the actual top of the ridge. They sprang into a long Turkish communication trench, which they found empty but for an isolated party with a machine-gun just arrived from Achi Baba. They spread out towards the right. Immediately on their left, two companies of the Gloucesters also reached the summit, and sprang into the trench. Against the sunrise their figures could be dimly discerned from the sea, and the hope of victory rose high. Two other Gloucester Companies swung slightly to the right and entrenched below the sky-line in rear of the Wellingtons. But during the rush the Gloucesters had been exposed to a terrible storm of shrapnel and rifle-fire coming from the higher ground northward on their left, and were already much reduced. As often happens in a charge, the supports came under a heavier fire than the first lines, and though the Auckland Mounted Rifles got through and joined the Wellingtons, it was not till the afternoon. The remainder appear to have been checked.166

In the meantime the position of the British and New Zealanders upon the summit was indeed terrible. Perceiving how small their numbers were, the Turks turned every kind of fire upon the trench. Large parties of them kept creeping up the trench itself from the right or southern end, and hurling bombs. So exposed was the position that Colonel Malone drew his men out of the trench, and marked out a fresh trench 15 yards in rear of it. Here they dug; but tools were short, bombs were short, and water had run out. The trench was less than a foot deep. On the left, the Gloucester companies were almost annihilated. Attack after attack swept up against them. Every officer was killed or wounded. In his dispatch, Sir Ian says that by midday the battalion (apparently the other two companies had by that time come into line) consisted of small groups of men commanded by junior non-commissioned officers or privates.

In a few hours Colonel Malone was compelled to withdraw again to a new trench a few yards to the rear, because the trench recently dug was too full of dead and dying to give the slightest cover. He himself, as was told me by one present, carried a rifle pierced with bullets, which he said he was keeping as a trophy for his home. Whilst he was still carefully marking the completion of the new trench, sedulously cultivating the domestic virtues to the last, a terrific outburst of shrapnel showered down upon his devoted party, and he fell. It was about 4 p.m., just after the Auckland Mounted Rifles had succeeded in reaching the position. At 5 o’clock he died. Colonel Moore of the Otago Battalion succeeded him, but was wounded during the night while the dwindling force still clung to the position, and the south-west shoulder of Chunuk Bair was ours—was uncertainly ours.

In the centre, around the Farm at the foot of the precipitous front of Chunuk Bair, the remaining three battalions of the 39th Brigade attempted to advance up the mountain side by keeping to the right or south of the cultivated yellow patch and empty buildings. Similarly, on the left or north-east side, the three Gurkha battalions crept some distance up the spurs leading to the dip or saddle between Chunuk Bair and “Hill Q.” This advance served them well on the following day, but on the Sunday the proposed attack upon this section of the summit line came to nothing owing to the murderous fire poured upon both attempts.

On the same Sunday (August 8) the extreme left of Brigadier-General Cox’s assaulting columns was under orders, as mentioned, to attack the dominating height of Koja Chemen Tepe itself by way of the precipitous northern ridge or spur called Abdel Rahman Bair. The advance began in darkness at 3 a.m. Leaving the 13th (New South Wales) Battalion to hold the ridge overlooking Asma Dere and now entrenched, Brigadier-General Monash placed the 15th (Queensland and Tasmania, under Lieut.-Colonel Cannan) Battalion of his 4th Australian Brigade in front, the 14th (Victoria, under Major Rankine) and the 16th (S. and W. Australia, under Lieut.-Colonel Pope) following closely. Sliding down the steep descent of sandstone rock from the top of their ridge, the men formed up into column in the valley of Asma Dere below, and cautiously advanced, avoiding a field of standing wheat lest the rustle should arouse the enemy. They had not gone far over the rough and pathless waste when a few shots and dimly discerned figures hastening away showed that they had struck into the enemy’s outposts. The 15th Battalion accordingly deployed, and threw a platoon forward as a screen. Thus the advance was continued for about half a mile, when the dark mass of Abdel Rahman was seen against the gradually increasing light, running like a vast barrier straight across their course. Hardly had their right touched the first slopes when an overwhelming machine-gun and rifle-fire burst upon them from the whole length of the front. All three battalions deployed into platoons, and attempted to continue the advance in spite of continuous loss. A screen was thrown out to protect the left flank, which hung “in air,” exposed to attack from Biyuk Anafarta valley and any guns there chanced to be on Ismail Oglu Tepe (“W Hill”) beyond it.167 If only the Divisions landed at Suvla had seized that vital hill! Now if ever was their support called for. But no help came. The platoons struggled up the steep bastions of the ridge in their attempt to scale the height. But the fire was impenetrable: the deaths too numerous. It appears that the brigade had, in fact, fallen up against strong Turkish reinforcements coming from Biyuk Anafarta to the main range. Sir Ian’s dispatch describes the battalions as “virtually surrounded.” Overwhelmed, at all events, by numbers and forced into an untenable position, they had no choice but to hew their way back. Their loss was already 1000—more than a third of their force. Grimly they retired, bringing their wounded in. By 9 a.m. they were back behind the ridge they had entrenched the night before. There, though exhausted by heat, thirst, and the weariness of prolonged effort without sleep, they maintained themselves for the rest of the day against violent and repeated attacks.

That Sunday evening the Right Assaulting Column lay upon Rhododendron Ridge, the main body partially sheltered in the depression afterwards called the Apex, and the relics of three battalions clinging to the top where it reaches the summit of the Chunuk Bair right shoulder. The Left Assaulting Column was divided, part round the Farm and high upon its north-east ridges, part entrenched but heavily attacked upon the ridge overlooking Asma Dere.

For the renewed attack next morning, a third assaulting column was organised out of the 10th and 13th Divisions in the Army Corps reserve. Brigadier-General A. H. Baldwin (38th Brigade) was instructed to take two battalions of his own brigade (6th East Lancashire and 6th Loyal North Lancashire) together with two from the 29th Brigade (10th Hampshire and 6th Royal Irish Rifles) and one from the 40th Brigade (5th Wiltshire), and assemble in the evening of August 8 in the Chailak Dere. Advancing thence through the night, he was to follow up Rhododendron Ridge, and co-operating with the Right Assaulting Column (General Johnston’s) was to move in successive lines to the summit, and thence to the left towards “Hill Q.” This was to form the main attack of the day. General Baldwin sent the Loyal North Lancashires forward in advance, and with the remaining four battalions began the long and toilsome march upward. The track was by this time fairly well trodden, and every precaution was taken to keep it clear of wounded and “empties” coming down. Guides for the column were also provided. It is true, the night was pitch dark, the ascent rough and, towards the end, very steep. The column moved slowly, and was behind the appointed time; but it is difficult to imagine that, in Sir Ian’s words, “in plain English, Baldwin lost his way—through no fault of his own.” It was sunrise by the time the main ascent was reached. His column would be perfectly visible to the enemy’s artillery, and the fire was very heavy. Perhaps the officers were attracted by the Farm as a sheltered place in which to pause and reorganise. At all events, the column did not reach its appointed destination, but found itself at 5.15 a.m. down in the deep hollow of the Farm on the left of the ridge which it should have climbed to the Apex. The Farm, being a definite point visible for miles around owing to its patch of yellow stubble, and affording also a certain amount of cover against fire from the height, probably tended to attract or mislead guides and troops from their proper direction.

Just at the very time when General Baldwin’s brigade began at last to emerge upon the Farm, a tragic and much disputed scene was being enacted upon the summit far above them. On the previous day, as we have noticed, part of General Cox’s column had worked their way up the spurs on the left (north-east) of the Farm. During the night they pushed still farther up the height, which, as noticed, appears almost precipitous. The 6th Gurkhas were leading, under command of Major Cecil G. L. Allanson. The 6th South Lancashires (38th Brigade) were close behind, supported by the 9th Warwicks and 7th North Staffords (39th Brigade), sent up to reinforce this column on the night of August 7–8, as above mentioned. The Gurkhas climbed during the darkness to a line about 150 yards below the crest. Here they dug what trench or shelter was possible upon such an angle of slope, and two companies of the South Lancashires joined them. At early dawn, about 4.30, the warships, monitors, and guns along the shore began a terrible bombardment of the whole crest along Chunuk Bair, “Hill Q,” and the saddle between. The enormous shells burst upon the edge just above the small assaulting party which crouched below, almost deafened but unharmed. A monitor’s shell striking the sky-line flings up a spout of black smoke, huge fragments, and dust which spreads fan-shape like the explosion of a sudden volcano. With such explosions the whole mountain edge smoked and shook. All parapets and shallow trenches lining the top were torn to pieces, uprooted, and flattened out. It seemed impossible for any human being to endure so overwhelming a visitation or to remain alive. Yet Turks remained.

According to orders, this terrific bombardment was to be switched off on to the flanks and reverse slopes at 5.16 a.m.168 The moment came. Suddenly the guns were silent. It was the signal for the storming party. The little Gurkha mountaineers crawled up the precipice like flies. The South Lancashire crawled, mixed up among them. They reached the topmost edge. Hand to hand the Turks rushed upon them as they rose. The struggle was for life or death. Major Allanson was wounded. Men and officers fell together. But the fight was brief. Shaken by the bombardment, overcome in daring and activity by some 400 startling Gurkhas and solid Lancastrians, the surviving Turks suddenly turned and ran for life down the steep slope to the refuge of the steeper gullies below.

For a moment Major Allanson and his men paused to draw breath. They were standing on the saddle between Chunuk Bair and “Hill Q.” The dead lay thick around them. But below, straight in front, lit by the risen sun, like a white serpent sliding between the purple shores, ran the sea, the Narrows, the Dardanelles, the aim and object of all these battles and sudden deaths. Never since Xenophon’s Ten Thousand cried “The sea! the sea!” had sight been more welcome to a soldier’s eyes. There went the ships. There were the transports bringing new troops over from Asia. There ran the road to Maidos, though the town of Maidos was just hidden by the hill before it. There was the Krithia road. Motor-lorries moved along it carrying shells and supplies to Achi Baba. So Sir Ian had been right. General Birdwood had been right. This was the path to victory. Only hold that summit and victory is ours. The Straits are opened. A conquered Turkey and a friendly Bulgaria will bar the German path to the East. Peace will come back again, and the most brilliant strategic conception in the war will be justified.

In triumphant enthusiasm, Gurkhas and Lancastrians raced and leapt down the reverse slope, pursuing the Turks as they scattered and ran. Major Allanson, though wounded, himself raced with them. They fired as they went. It was a moment of supreme exultation. Suddenly, before they had gone a hundred yards, crash into the midst of them fell five or six large shells and exploded. In the words of Sir Ian’s dispatch: “Instead of Baldwin’s support came suddenly a salvo of heavy shell.”

Where those fatal shells came from was at the time, and still remains, a cause of bitter controversy. All on the summit believed them British. This may have been a mistake. It is a common error for an advance line to suppose it is being shelled by its own side. But probably the shells were British. Outside the navy, nearly every one at the time believed them to be naval,169 and though the range must have been some four or five miles, the accuracy of the naval shooting at a visible mark had been proved by that morning’s bombardment, over the same distance. But the general belief may have been founded on a mere suspicion constantly repeated. It has long appeared to me that two sentences in Sir Ian’s dispatch suggest a more probable explanation. As quoted above, he says the orders were for the bombardment to be switched on to the flanks and reverse slopes of the heights at 5.16 a.m. He further says that the Gurkhas and South Lancashires, after reaching the crest, “began to attack down the far side of it,” i.e. down the reverse slopes of the hill. It would be natural for our gunners to wait some minutes before bombarding the reverse slope, so as to catch the enemy retreating or reinforcements coming up. In any case, they were under orders to bombard the reverse slope, and they obeyed. But what guns could bombard a reverse slope? As was proved throughout the campaign, the trajectory of naval guns was so flat that either they hit the top of the mountain (as they almost invariably did) or their shells skimmed across the top to burst miles away in Asia. A reverse slope would be exactly the thing they could never hit. For a reverse slope, mortars or howitzers are wanted. There were howitzers near No. 2 Post and along the flats beside the shore, and their orders were to bombard the reverse slope after 5.16 a.m. This explanation is suggested, but the controversy will be forgotten before settled.

Whatever the cause, the effect was disaster irretrievable—disaster leaving its lamentable mark upon the world’s history. Amid the scattered limbs and shattered bodies of their comrades, the exultant pursuers stopped aghast. They began to stumble back. They scrambled to the crest and over it. Major Allanson with a small group stood firm, taking one last look upon that scene of dazzling hope. But the Turkish officers with the supports had observed the check. Seizing the moment, they urged their fresh companies upward, in turn pursuing. Against the gathering crowd a handful could not stand. Wounded and isolated, Major Allanson withdrew the last of his men. Down the face of the mountain they came upon the little trench from which they had adventurously started less than half an hour before. They alone had witnessed and shared the crisis. They alone had watched the moment when the campaign swung upon the fateful hinge. No soldier in our army was ever to behold that triumphant prospect again.170

Why the troops who were a little lower down the slope, in support, did not at once push up to the assistance of the Gurkhas and Lancastrians on the summit has not been explained. They belonged to the New Army, and were rushed into a most difficult and terrible conflict. It was Monday morning, and they had been given little sleep since Saturday, and little if any food or water except in the rations and water-bottles (1½ pint) which they brought with them. No doubt they were exhausted. But every one was exhausted, and others had been out longer in the assaulting column. One might have supposed that here their great opportunity had come. Why they did not take it, we are not informed.

It was in vain now that General Baldwin’s brigade, arriving at the Farm at the very crisis of frustrated design, began to push up the steep with the 10th Hants and two companies of the 6th East Lancashires. They appear to have attempted a spur nearer the Farm than the point where the Gurkhas climbed, which was half a mile away to the left. But they made little progress. The Turks, crowding the summit, now exultant in their turn, poured down such storms of fire that the new advance was checked, and General Baldwin was compelled to order re-concentration at the Farm, where the brigade remained.

The Turks in their triumph, though not daring as yet to advance far over the crest, turned in exultant assault upon the exhausted body of New Zealanders and Gloucesters still lying exposed near the summit of the Chunuk Bair shoulder, just to the right of the Nek on Rhododendron Ridge, up which Baldwin’s brigade ought to have advanced at dawn. About 800 men still clung to the shallow and hastily constructed trenches there. They lay unprotected by wire, and below the sky-line, so that when the enemy came swarming over the summit with bayonet or bomb, our rifles had only some twenty or thirty yards’ interval in which to mow them down. This mistake in position was thought at the time to spring from a memory of old South African tactics, in which the sky-line was always avoided. But we have seen the reasons why Colonel Malone had been compelled twice to remove the trenches a few yards farther from the top.

Through the heat of the day and afternoon the men lay there resisting repeated onset. Late on that Monday evening, they were at last withdrawn and relieved. The New Zealanders had been fighting continuously and under extreme strain since Friday night; the Gloucesters since Saturday. The noblest endurance could stand no more. The 6th Loyal North Lancashires (38th Brigade) and the 5th Wilts (40th Brigade) were sent up to occupy the extreme position which had been so steadfastly retained.

No more than these two battalions were ordered because, in Sir Ian’s words, “General Sir William Birdwood is emphatic on the point that the nature of the ground was such that there was no room on the crest for more than this body of 800 to 1000 rifles.” Had Major Allanson been able to hold his splendidly won position to the right of “Hill Q,” the whole crest of Chunuk Bair would have been free for our occupation. Had the expected advance from Suvla been pushed forward with vigour between August 7 and 9, the Turks could not have concentrated forces for the fatal counter-attack upon Chunuk Bair on the 10th. Those two failures combined to frustrate the admirably designed movement of August, and ultimately involved the whole campaign in failure.

As it was, the 6th Loyal Lancashires passed up the Rhododendron Ridge in good time during the night, and duly occupied the trenches near the summit as the New Zealanders and Gloucesters were withdrawn. Their commandant, Lieut.-Colonel H. G. Levinge, even attempted to improve the position by throwing out observation posts to the sky-line, so as to command the reverse slope. The 5th Wiltshire (Lieut.-Colonel J. Carden), delayed by the difficulties of the steep and encumbered ascent, did not arrive till 4 a.m., just as dawn was breaking, and lay down in a position believed to be covered but really exposed.

Hardly had they settled down when every available Turkish gun was turned upon the two weak and harassed battalions. The bombardment was endured for about an hour, and then, at 5.30 a.m., the Turks under German leaders directed an overwhelming counter-attack upon the devoted New Army men. For this attack they were able to employ a full Division and three extra battalions, certainly not less than 12,000 men, probably more. Crouching in their unfortunate positions, our two battalions were engulfed or swept away, as by an irresistible tide. They were driven from their shallow and hurriedly constructed trenches. Both their Colonels were killed. The Wiltshires were “literally almost annihilated.”171

Recognising the significance of the summit’s reoccupation, and triumphant as never before, the Turks swarmed over the edge down into the deep gullies on the right or south of Rhododendron Ridge, probably with the design of cutting our assaulting columns off from the base at Anzac and encircling them to destruction. This threatening movement was checked partly by the battalions in support upon the Ridge itself, but mainly by the naval guns (now secure of a visible target), the New Zealand, Australian, and Indian guns, and the 69th Brigade R.F.A. The service of a ten machine-gun battery, part of the New Zealand Machine-gun Section organised and commanded by Major J. Wallingford (Auckland Battalion),172 was the subject of great eulogy at the time. This battery “played upon their serried ranks at close range until the barrels were red-hot. Enormous losses were inflicted, especially by these ten machine-guns.”173 Reinforcements hurrying along the sky-line from Battleship Hill were similarly exposed to the larger guns. Brave as the Turks showed themselves in this their hour of apparent triumph, they could make no progress against so violent a storm of destruction. The attack melted away. Few struggled back into safety over the summit, and the right flank of our columns was secured.

Simultaneously with the onset which overwhelmed our two battalions on the summit, the Turks appearing in similar massed lines along the sky-line of Chunuk Bair itself and the saddle between that and “Hill Q,” began to pour down the face of the range. They must have swept over the thin defences which had sheltered the 6th Gurkhas. They broke through the outposts of General Baldwin’s central column. They broke through our line at various points. They reached the Farm. Some of our companies were driven in confusion down the tangled spurs and ravines. Near the foot of the mountain they were finely rallied by Staff-Captain Street, who was looking after the supply of food and water. By sheer force of personality, he led them unhesitatingly back into the thick of the intense conflict upon that conspicuous stubble-field. In Sir Ian’s words:

Here fell General Baldwin, whom I had known first as a Captain in the 1st Manchesters on Cæsar’s Hill in Ladysmith, and later in the lines at Helles. As in some medieval battle, all his Staff fell with him. Lieut.-Colonel M. H. Nunn, 9th Worcesters, was killed. The Worcesters were left that day without a single officer. So were the Warwicks. So, as we have seen, were the Gloucesters. At the Farm also Brigadier-General Cooper (29th Brigade) was severely wounded. Brigadier-General Cayley (39th Brigade) was mentioned for distinguished courage. The Farm, though recovered that day, was ultimately abandoned to the Turks, who drove an enormous trench across the stubble-field, and entangled the whole front with wire. But to the end the shrunken relics of the dead who fell that morning remained in lines and heaps upon the ground.

Hearing of the violent and almost successful counter-attack, General Birdwood hurried up the last two battalions of his Corps Reserve—the 5th Connaught Rangers (29th Brigade) being one.174 But by 10 a.m. the immediate danger was over. The force of the attack was spent. The few surviving Turks began to scramble back over the summit. As Captain Bean wrote at the time:

The Turks cleared the dead from the summit by dropping them over the edge at the highest point of Chunuk Bair, and letting them slide down that precipitous ravine or “chimney” which was mentioned above. To the end of the campaign that chimney was black with corpses and uniforms, weathered and wasting between the rocky sides.

Far away to the left, on the low but deeply intersected hills and ridges overlooking the Asma Dere, General Monash’s 4th Australian Brigade and the 4th South Wales Borderers were also compelled on the morning and afternoon of the same day (August 10) to resist violent counter-attacks coming across from the Abdel Rahman spur. They held their position, but the South Wales Borderers lost their commandant, the excellent soldier, Lieut.-Colonel Gillespie, who left his name on part of the district he had helped to win.

The total casualties in General Birdwood’s Army Corps from the Friday night to the Tuesday night amounted to 12,000,175 by far the greater proportion of whom were lost in General Godley’s two divisions allotted for the main attack on Sari Bair. The gallantry and skill of divisions cannot be estimated by losses. But still it is noticeable that the New Army Division (13th, under Major-General Shaw) lost more than 50 per cent. (6000 out of 10,500), and 10 commanding officers out of 13. The proportion of officers killed and wounded was, indeed, unusually high in all brigades. As to the troops in general, perhaps only those who are well acquainted with the extreme complexity of the country, and with the strain of night marches into the heart of an enemy’s positions, followed by assaults upon strongly held mountain heights at dawn, can fully appreciate the true significance of the last paragraph in General Godley’s report, as quoted in Sir Ian’s dispatch:

In his dispatch, Sir Ian mentions that at times he thought of throwing his reserves (the 53rd and 54th Divisions, coming up through Mudros) into this central battle. He thinks they probably would have turned the scale. The Corps and Divisional Commanders assured him there was no room for additional troops. But it was the water difficulty, he says, which made him give up the idea. The thirst of the troops in this part of the general attack was such that when the mules with the water “pakhals” arrived at the front, the men rushed up to them just to lick the moisture oozing through the canvas bags. Thirst is the most terrible of physical sufferings, and no one who has known it will wonder at Sir Ian’s decision. Still the want of water was almost equally cruel at Suvla, whither the Reserve Divisions were ultimately sent. There they arrived after the decisive days were passed, and fell under the curse of an inert spirit, very different from the spirit of the Sari Bair assault. If their presence at Anzac would indeed have turned the scale, it is part of the Dardanelles tragedy that the Commander-in-Chief, unable to foresee the Suvla conditions, or still hoping too much from the new landing there, did not venture upon the risk, however dangerous.

For in spite of all the gallantry and endurance (which Napoleon counted a more essential quality in a soldier than courage), and in spite of all the careful organisation of supply and medical care, the main attack had failed by sunset of Tuesday, August 10. A large extent of ground had been occupied. From Rhododendron Ridge on the right to Asma Dere on the left, and all between those two points and the sea, the country was now in our possession. Anzac was enlarged from barely 300 acres to about 8 square miles.176 It was possible now to walk or ride from Anzac to Suvla Bay, though snipers always endangered the route. Yet the attack had failed. The summits of Sari Bair were not held. The Straits were still closed; Constantinople still distant. Mistakes, no doubt, had been made, but mistakes could have been retrieved. The ultimate cause of failure was simply this: our attacking forces were outnumbered and checked by an enemy holding positions of enormous natural strength, and the task of diverting and reducing the enemy’s force from Suvla, or of actually contributing new troops thence to the central movement, was not fulfilled.

CHAPTER XII SUVLA BAY — From the evening of Friday, August 6, to the evening of August 7. — From the evening of August 7 to the evening of August 8. — From the evening of August 8 to the evening of the 9th. — From the evening of August 9 to the evening of the 10th. — From the evening of August 10 to the evening of the 11th. — From the evening of August 11 to the evening of the 12th.

Beyond the Asmak Dere, which, as described in the last chapter, formed the northern limit of the Anzac movement against the Sari Bair range, the coast continues its north-westerly trend till the sharp and rocky headland of Nibrunesi Point is reached. Inland, the plain naturally increases in area as the hills diverge towards the north-east. It is flat and open land, studded with low trees and bushes. Nearly all the surface is waste, but small farms, surrounded by larger trees and patches of cultivation, occur here and there, as at Kazlar Chair close to the Asmak, and Hetman Chair about a mile north of it (“Chair” meaning meadow). The soil becomes more and more marshy as one proceeds, and in winter the region nearest the Salt Lake is waterlogged. The bush also grows more dense, but is crossed by sheep tracks, and is nowhere impenetrable. The plain, as we have seen, forms the entrance to the broad and open valley of Biyuk (Big) Anafarta, the cypress groves of which are clearly visible about three and a half miles to the right.

Nibrunesi Point, or Kuchuk Kemikli, rises with steep cliffs on both sides, but steeper on the north, where they fall abruptly into Suvla Bay. It is the extremity of what was once a high ridge or chain of reddish conglomerate rock, hard but friable. The chain is now marked by a series of isolated knolls—first the low knolls upon the Point itself; then the broad-based rounded hill of Lala Baba, which rises to about 150 feet; then, beyond the southern end of the Salt Lake and a stretch of marsh and bushy plain, Yilghin Burnu (better known to us as “Chocolate Hill,” from its reddish-brown colour even before it was burnt), which is a similar but larger rounded hill, like an inverted bowl, rising about 160 feet; then, beyond a brief but steepish dip or saddle, Hill 50 or “Green Hill” (so called because the thick bush covering it was not burnt), rising to nearly equal height, but not so round or definite in shape; lastly, beyond a wide and distinctive break, the formidable mass of Ismail Oglu Tepe (known to us as “W Hill” from the waving outline of its crest, but more officially called “Hill 112” from its approximate height in metres). Ismail Oglu, thus rising about 330 feet, forms the rectangular corner of the high plateau on which Anafarta Sagir (Kuchuk or Little Anafarta) stands, and from the southern face it commands the Biyuk Anafarta valley and the hills across it at the foot of Sari Bair, while from the western face it commands Green and Chocolate Hills, almost the whole of the plain north of them, the Salt Lake, and the northern shores of Suvla Bay. It is, therefore, the most vital and dominating position, unless long-range guns were placed on the much loftier height of Tekke Tepe.

But of almost equal importance in the campaign was a rounded hill which projects sharply from the Anafarta ridge or plateau north of Ismail Oglu Tepe. Down the western front of this hill, which looks over the plain to the very centre of the Salt Lake, and to Suvla Bay beyond, runs a broad yellow “blaze” of bare ground, showing a marl and soft sandstone surface (the formation of this plateau being again of the same character as the Sari Bair range). This “blaze” appears from the sea to be shaped like a Gurkha’s “kukri” or an old-fashioned Turkish scimitar, and so the hill came to be called “Scimitar Hill.” But officially it was “Hill 70” from its height in metres (say 200 feet), and commonly the soldiers called it “Burnt Hill,” which was no distinction. It was connected, apparently without much break or dip, with the plateau behind it bearing the general name of Baka Baba, on which the windmills, the white minaret, and some of the houses of Little Anafarta could be distinctly seen from the beach. The minaret, however, was destroyed by the Turks on Sept. 6, as affording a sighting point for naval fire. This description covers the southern and south-east positions to be attacked in the Suvla district.

From Nibrunesi Point the coast-line curves sharply into a semicircular bay, the diameter of which is close upon two miles. The north side of the Point itself falls, as described, in steep cliffs to a narrow and rocky beach. The cliff continues till the foot of Lala Baba is passed, and then it suddenly ends in low dunes of soft and drifting sand. These in turn sink into a spit or isthmus, about 700 yards long, and some 200 yards across at its broadest part. It is all of loose sand, very tiring to walk on, though bent grass and patches of heath bind it together here and there. The shallow bay lies on the left; the large expanse of the Salt Lake on the right. The Salt Lake measures about a mile and a half at its greatest length and breadth each way, forming a kind of square with irregular sides. Its surface in summer is thinly crusted with salt deposit upon caked and fissured mud, fairly sound for walking or riding, though in places the foot sinks above the ankle, and on the south side above the knees. Consequently, the south side, thickly covered with high reeds and ending in the marshy plain, is always impassable for troops, though a track not far from the edge can be used in summer for carts and even guns.

At the end of the sandy spit is a channel, which in winter admits the sea into the lake under a strong west wind, and drains it out again. In summer, though sticky, it can be crossed on foot, but we bridged it. After crossing it, one continues upon loose and wearisome sand, the sandhills on the right combining to form a low, heathy plateau, at first mistaken for “Hill 10” (so called from its height in metres) about 1000 yards inland. The beach continues sandy, the sea shallow, and walking very tedious till nearly half-way round the northern side of the semicircle, when one strikes the rocky formation of the northern point. The coast-line then rises into rocky cliffs of no great height under a low hill called Ghazi Baba, and runs into rocky inlets or creeks. The sea becomes deeper, the land undulates and is thickly covered with heath and prickly bush. So it continues up to the final hill, where the bay ends in the jagged rocks of the extremity called by us Suvla Point, and by the Turks Biyuk Kemikli.

There the coast turns suddenly north-east, and forms the side of the Gulf of Xeros. The land rises into a steep razor-edge or whale-back of grey limestone, looking white in the sun, and bare but for shrubs and aromatic plants growing in the crannies between the rocks. This razor-edge is really continuous except for notches, knolls, and shallow scoops along the sky-line. But the Turks have given the ridge the separate names of Karakol Dagh (Coastguard Mountain) and Kiretch Tepe Sirt. This Tepe Sirt or Hill Summit rises to the height of 600 feet at the points which we afterwards called Jephson’s Post and the Pimple. Thence the ridge runs at a varying but lower level till it reaches Ejelmer Bay, where there is good anchorage and an opening into a central plain of the Peninsula. The distance from Suvla Point to Ejelmer Bay is nearly 7 miles.

The whole of this ridge is steep and rocky on the south side overlooking Suvla Bay, but is everywhere accessible by climbing, and admits of paths being cut obliquely or in zigzag. The northern side falls abruptly into the Gulf of Xeros, across which the opposite coast of Thrace, from the mouth of the Maritza eastward, can be distinctly seen. Near Suvla Point the cliffs are precipitous, and leave little or no beach. Farther along, the face of the ridge, though always very steep, becomes accessible, and spreads out at the bottom into a kind of “undercliff” above the shore, which is indented by a succession of miniature bays, like bathing coves. All this part of the slope is deeply scored by ravines, rocky, steep, and covered with thick bush. This face was commanded by the enemy’s guns only from Kartal Tepe, a barren promontory of fantastic cliffs, different in formation, and apparently of dark and slaty shale, which projects from the coast a mile or so beyond the farthest point reached by our lines.

Farther along the coast towards Ejelmer Bay the razor-edge meets almost at right angles with a mass of mountain running south towards the Anafarta plateau. The range rises rapidly to the conjoined heights of Kavak Tepe and Tekke Tepe (Saint’s Hill), each about 850 feet. It completely shuts in the Suvla region on the north-east side, presenting a steep, though not really a precipitous, western face towards the bay, and commanding the whole district from end to end. It is dark with thick scrub to the rounded summits, and always reminded me of the Wrekin’s western face, looking towards Shrewsbury, as seen from the site of Uriconium. At the southern end it falls by a similar steep slope to the Anafarta plateau, throwing up one little isolated hill above the plateau, like the spadeful of rocks which the devil dropped in his hurry to pile the Wrekin.

From these descriptions of the northern, eastern, and southern positions around Suvla, it will be seen that the heights, starting from Kiretch Tepe and running round over Kavak Tepe and Tekke Tepe to the elevated Anafarta plateau, Scimitar Hill, and Ismail Oglu Tepe, form an irregular semicircle, roughly corresponding to the regular semicircle of Suvla Bay, and commanding it from a wide circumference. This outer semicircle encloses a fairly open plain, cultivated in parts by ancient farms, such as Anafarta Ova (Plain) and Sulajik. Large trees, so rarely seen in the Near East, give that part of the plain the appearance of a park in one of the fatted counties of England. But most of it is bare except for heath and thin grass, until the foot of the hills is reached, when the prickly bush becomes thick as usual, interrupting any advance in line, effectively concealing numberless snipers, and impenetrable except by devious and isolating paths. Each farm has a well or fountain, and one of the watercourses, running into the north-east corner of the Salt Lake, contains water. There is a spring at the foot of the Karakol Dagh, not far from the bay. Two good running fountains, constructed with low bridges, stone spouts, and troughs, are to be found on the plain north-east of the Salt Lake among the large trees mentioned; and there is a smaller source just south-west of Chocolate Hill. But these wells and springs might easily be missed by troops advancing under fire across an unknown and almost pathless country.

Such was the district into which the IXth Army Corps was launched in the night of August 6–7. As has been mentioned, Lieut.-General Sir Frederick Stopford had arrived in the middle of July to take command, and for a short time had succeeded General Hunter-Weston in command of the VIIIth Army Corps at Helles, so as to gain experience in Peninsula warfare. He had entered the Grenadier Guards in the early “Seventies”; had seen the usual service of officers at the end of last century, in India, West Africa, and Egypt; during the South African War he was Military Secretary to General Buller, and entered Ladysmith with him at the relief. Since then he had occupied various military positions at home and was still on the Active List though a little over sixty. His reputation stood high as a student and teacher of military history, and long experience had given him an accurate knowledge of army routine. But he had never held high command in the field, and neither history nor routine in itself inspires to action; still less do years of official duty in the Metropolis. Rather they suppress the hopeful buoyancy of spirit and rapid fertility of resource essential for generalship, while they tend to accentuate the hesitating deliberation and cautious apprehension of risk which too often develop with increasing years. Habits mainly sedentary are also likely to reduce the enthusiasm for physical activity as middle age is passing.

At the same time it is fair to remember that the force now entrusted to General Stopford for this vital enterprise was an Army Corps only in name. Nominally it consisted of the 10th, 11th, and 13th Divisions, composed as we have seen. But the 13th Division (Major-General Shaw) had been deflected to Anzac for the assault against Sari Bair, together with the 29th Brigade (Brigadier-General Cooper) of the 10th Division. General Stopford was thus left with only the 11th (Northern) Division under Major-General Hammersley, and two brigades of the 10th (Irish) Division under Lieut.-General Sir Bryan Mahon. All the battalions in these Divisions were New Army men, and had never been in action before. Normally each Division should have possessed sixteen batteries of artillery (including the H.Q. Divisional Artillery), so that (allowing for the absence of the 13th Division and the 29th Brigade) the IXth Army Corps should have commanded twenty-eight batteries, or 112 guns; whereas, at the time of landing, it had only one Field Artillery battery and two Highland Mountain batteries of small calibre—old and useless for service—counting twelve guns in all.177 It is true that General Stopford could also command the support of naval guns, but by the nature of the case the guns had been unable to register for fear of thwarting the surprise, the maps were uncertain, and most of the Suvla plain was invisible from the sea owing to its flatness.

Of the Divisional Generals, Sir Bryan Mahon was fifty-three, was a cavalryman (8th Royal Irish Hussars), held a long record of service in India and Egypt, and had won distinction by the relief of Mafeking in 1900. Since then he had been Military Governor of Kordofan, and had commanded the Lucknow Division till the outbreak of the war. Possessing many of the fine Irish qualities, and some of the supposed Irish defects, he was regarded with patriotic affection by his Division; but, like most of our Generals, had seen no active service for fourteen or fifteen years, and then in wars unlike the present. Major-General Frederick Hammersley (Lancashire Fusiliers) had also served in India, Egypt, and South Africa, and on various Staff appointments; but owing to serious illness had recently held no military position.

As in the last chapter, on Sari Bair, it will be convenient to divide the Suvla fighting by days and nights, counting from evening to evening.

By the time darkness set in, Brigadier-General F. F. Hill was making up the Asiatic coast from Mitylene (120 miles) with his 31st Brigade and two battalions of the 30th (10th Division), which had been transhipped from their transports into ten trawlers and passenger steamers. Brigadier-General L. L. Nicol was on his way from Mudros (60 miles) with the remaining two battalions of his 30th Brigade and the 5th Royal Irish (Pioneers), accompanied by Sir Bryan Mahon and his Divisional Staff. At Imbros, the three brigades of the 11th Division (the 32nd, 33rd, and 34th, under Brigadier-Generals Haggard, Maxwell, and Sitwell) were embarked in destroyers and “beetles” (motor-lighters), about 500 men being packed in each destroyer and “beetle.” The “beetles” were under charge of Captain Unwin, the hero of the River Clyde. Three of each kind of vessel were allotted to each brigade, the destroyers towing the “beetles.” Two cruisers (“blister ships”) also carried 1000 men apiece, to be landed by the “beetles” as soon as their own contingents and those on the destroyers had been discharged. Behind the infantry followed trawlers towing horse-boats with horses and guns;178 and the sloop Aster with 500 men, presumably gunners, towing a lighter with eight mountain-guns, and four water-lighters specially provided by Brigadier-General Lotbinière, then Director of Works.

Each of the water-lighters carried about 50 or 60 tons, and was to be refilled from two water-ships, the Krene and Phido, each carrying 250 tons of water brought from Alexandria. The men embarked with full water-bottles, and each “beetle” and destroyer was supplied with water for refills on landing, and for the wants of beach-parties. It was also confidently expected that plentiful water would be discovered during the advance. But, though some water was there, it was not discovered, or was not accessible. Inexperienced soldiers might be expected to drain their water-bottles soon, and in the excitement and confusion of landing to neglect the precaution of refilling. So it happened, and to this natural carelessness must be added the absence of the Prah, an Elder Dempster vessel of 3000 tons, carefully equipped with water-pumps, hose, tanks, troughs, and the implements required for the development of wells or springs—exactly the stores which the experience of the April landings had proved essential to relieve the torture of thirst among men exhausted by the nervous excitement of battle, and by the heat, which in August had risen to glaring intensity. The danger of thirst had always been present in the minds of General Headquarters and the Administrative Staff. Petrol tins, milk cans, camel tanks, water-bags, and pakhals for mules had been provided in large quantities from India and Egypt. More than 4000 mules for carrying water as well as rations and ammunition were by this time collected for Anzac and Suvla, about 600 being allotted to Suvla alone for the first landing. Critics after the event suggested that the men should have carried half a dozen water-bottles apiece instead of their packs. But, as a matter of fact, the 11th Division, at all events, carried only their haversacks with two days’ iron rations, and left their packs at Imbros. As to carrying more water-bottles, no one could have foreseen the partial failure of the most elaborate precautions, partly owing to the inexperience of a New Army Staff.179

The naval side of the whole landing—the organisation of all transport until each detail came ashore—was in charge of Rear-Admiral Arthur Christian, on board the sloop Jonquil, together with General Stopford and his Chief of Staff, Brigadier-General H. L. Reed, V.C. Vice-Admiral de Robeck, with his Chief of Staff, Commodore Roger Keyes, was also present on the light cruiser Chatham, and on the light cruiser Talbot was Brigadier-General S. C. V. Smith, R.A., in command of the guns. Soon after 8 p.m. the flotilla began to glide northward through the winding narrows of the netted and buoyed passage from Kephalos Bay. The last of the vessels except the Prah and water-lighters cleared about 10 p.m. We heard the firing round the Vineyard at Helles, and the perpetual whisper and rumble of rifles and guns at Lone Pine. On our right front as we advanced past Anzac the New Zealanders were standing mustered for the great assault. The water was dead calm, which was a mercy for the soldiers crowded on the destroyers and “beetles.” No lights were shown. There was no light but the brilliant stars. No one except the Generals and Admirals knew our destination.

Sir Ian’s original design had been to land the whole of the 11th Division at the continuous beach just south of Nibrunesi Point. Here the shore is “steep to,” and the water comes up deep. A large part of the force would be concealed or sheltered by the cliffs and hills, but the beach itself is level and wide enough for mustering. The brigades, after capturing the Lala Baba promontory, could then have advanced in unison along the marshy but practicable ground south of the Salt Lake, or before dawn even over the centre of the Lake itself, to the assault upon Chocolate and W Hills. Meantime, we must suppose, Sir Ian had intended the two brigades of the 10th Division to land on the north side of the bay near Suvla Point and occupy the commanding razor-edge of Kiretch Tepe Sirt. Most unfortunately, as it turned out, against his better judgment he accepted General Stopford’s desire to land one brigade inside the bay itself, apparently with the intention of advancing across the plain on the north of the Salt Lake. Accordingly, the navy was directed to put the 34th Brigade (Sitwell’s) ashore on the sands of the north-east segment of the bay, while the 32nd (Haggard’s) and the 33rd (Maxwell’s) were to land on the beach south of Nibrunesi Point. This beach was divided into C (nearer the Point) for the artillery, and B for the infantry, but it was one and continuous. The navy originally chose the south-east arc of the bay for landing, hence called “Old A Beach.” Among the rocky creeks near Suvla Point, A East and A West were found on the 7th, and A West ultimately became the main landing-place. But the true A Beach on which the 34th Brigade was ordered to land was the long and sandy stretch just beside the entrance or “cut” into the Salt Lake; and there the 34th Brigade landed.

Together with the two brigades of the 10th Division the total number of all ranks and arms, including transport and supply, was from 25,000 to 27,000 to be landed. There was no wire entanglement along the shore; the entrenchments were few and slight; the Turkish force holding the district was estimated under 4000, apart from possible reserves behind Sari Bair; and the actual bay was guarded, as was believed, only by about 1000 gendarmes—700 on Lala Baba, 300 on Suvla Point. Sir Ian confidently expected, therefore, that the two Divisions, though short in numbers (showing a total of about 20,000 rifles or rather less), almost destitute of guns apart from the fleet, and unavoidably destitute of experience in actual war, would certainly be able to occupy the inner semicircle of the bay and the outer semicircle of the commanding heights, or at all events the vital points of Kiretch Tepe and W Hill, by the following morning.

But, like nearly every movement in war, the landing took longer than was expected, and the customary delay was increased by partial confusion. In the darkness of midnight the 32nd and 33rd Brigades approached the shore at B Beach south of Nibrunesi Point. The destroyers stopped and slipped the “beetles,” which crept ashore under their own power. Driving close in, they dropped their elevated drawbridges right on the beach itself, and the crowded men swarmed over them as over a landing-stage. The “beetles” then returned to the destroyers for their second load, and so the two brigades came to shore in good time and without mishap. As soon as the battalions were formed up, two from the 32nd Brigade (the 6th Yorkshire and the 9th West Yorkshire) were instructed to occupy Lala Baba. Advancing in that order along the beach and up the hills from the south, they stormed the trenches with the bayonet in the darkness, but the 6th Yorks lost heavily. Colonel Chapman, in command, was killed while cheering on his men. Fifteen officers fell and 250 men, but apart from that battalion the loss was not great, and the occupation of the Hill gave us command of the southern side of the bay.

With the 34th Brigade things did not go so smoothly. The navy brought up the destroyers with the “beetles” in time with the rest; but after the “beetles” had been cast off as they approached the shore in the middle of the bay, it was found that they could not make A Beach at all, but went aground with their weight on the sandy shallows. The disaster might have been anticipated even from the distant appearance of shelving shore, which possessed all the familiar features of a children’s bathing-place. Led by their officers, the men plunged into the water, which in places came up to their armpits, and struggled ashore. Dripping wet, they reached the sands well below the centre of the bay’s arc, and south of the entrance to the Salt Lake, considerably south of the appointed position. Both in the lighters and on shore they were exposed to considerable fire from Lala Baba (not yet occupied) and the rocky promontories towards Suvla Point. Many Turks even crept into their midst in the darkness, and at close quarters killed them unawares. Nearly the whole of the northern shore had also been sown with land-mines, exploding on contact and causing some casualties.

The delay and confusion due to the oversight of obvious shallows were serious. They were the first step in failure. For by the time the brigade got ashore and sorted itself out it was useless to think of reaching W Hill, or even Chocolate Hill, under cover of darkness. In fact, by the time the battalions were reorganised it was nearly dawn. To protect the left, one battalion (11th Manchester) was now sent up the rocky steep of Karakol Dagh, which it succeeded in clearing of the concealed parties of gendarmes. The Colonel was wounded, the second in command killed, and nearly half the strength put out of action.180 But its service in saving the rest of the brigade from enfilading fire was inestimable. The 5th Dorsets appears to have followed the Manchesters by mistake of direction.

About the same time another of the battalions (9th Lancashire Fusiliers) succeeded in the task of clearing the low eminence of heath-covered sandhill which stood close at hand to the left front of the landing beach, and was mistaken for Hill 10. The Turks had a strong outpost there, and the loss to this battalion was also considerable. In fact, the brigade stood in an isolated and unsatisfactory position when, just as the eastern sky began to show streaks of brown among the purple, the 32nd Brigade (Haggard’s) began to appear along the sandy spit, coming from Lala Baba, which it had seized and left in charge of the 33rd Brigade (Maxwell’s). As it approached it opened fire upon the low plateau, where confused fighting was still going on. The 9th West Yorks (32nd Brigade) also joined in the attack, and suffered considerable loss.

Brigadier-General Sitwell, as senior in command, had now two brigades, half of each still untouched by action. It was the moment for him, one would have thought, to advance at all hazards upon Chocolate and W Hills. Yet he hesitated. Perhaps he thought it went beyond his orders to cross the open plain now that daylight was increasing every minute. Perhaps he was deterred by a brief counter-attack which the Turks, noticing the confusion or supineness of the brigades, attempted against the plateau, though the 9th Lancashire Fusiliers again drove them off with the bayonet, compelling them to retreat through the low bushes on the north edge of the plain. Now that the sun was rising, shrapnel from the two Turkish batteries posted on the hills across the Salt Lake began to burst over his position, and the naval guns, attempting to harass the groups of enemy as they stole away, set fire to a large area of bush straight in his front and to the left.181 Perhaps he thought enough had been done by battalions already thirsty, tired after a sleepless night, and probably shaken by their first losses in battle. At all events he allowed at least one battalion to gather in crowds under the shelter of some high sand dunes along the shore north of the spit, and there for many hours they lay immovable. The second step in failure had been taken.

The third was already preparing. About an hour before dawn, the ten trawlers and steamers bringing Brigadier-General Hill’s six battalions from Mitylene punctually arrived off the bay. As they all belonged to Sir Bryan Mahon’s 10th Division, General Stopford had intended them to land near A Beach, to seize the whole length of the razor-edge on the north of the bay, to occupy the Kiretch Tepe Sirt, and advance as far as possible towards Ejelmer Bay, whence the great hills of Tekke Tepe could be turned. They were, of course, to be joined by Sir Bryan Mahon’s other three battalions on their arrival with their General from Mudros. But the General had not yet arrived: the navy had witnessed only too plainly the failure of A Beach as a landing-place owing to the shallows, and they had not yet discovered the practicable creeks among the rocks near Suvla Point. Accordingly, General Stopford was advised to land them at B Beach, and after the delay of more than two hours this was done.182 That is to say, five of the six battalions were landed there with Brigadier-General Hill; but before the 5th Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers (of Hill’s own 31st Brigade) had disembarked, Sir Bryan Mahon put into the bay from Mudros with the remaining three, and was landed in the creeks which the navy had now discovered among the rocks east of Suvla Point. Accordingly, the Inniskilling Fusiliers were counter-ordered to join him there. Thus the 10th Division was now divided into three entirely different parts: the 29th Brigade was at Anzac; three battalions of the 31st and two of the 30th were with Hill at B Beach; two battalions of the 30th, one of the 31st, and the 5th Royal Irish (Pioneers) were at Suvla Point, where the Divisional General landed with nothing of his Division left under his command except these four. Confusion of command and position was inevitable.183

Confusion immediately resulted. As Hill with his five battalions was landed in the sphere of the 11th Division on the right, instead of being with his own 10th Division on the extreme left, he was ordered by General Stopford to put himself under the command of Major-General Hammersley. His battalions did not begin to disembark till 5.30 a.m., when it was nearly full daylight. The enemy’s shrapnel was bursting over his boats and the beach. Two of our mountain-guns were hurried up into the Turkish trenches on Lala Baba, though the battery of Field Artillery did not come into action from behind the cover of that hill until evening. The ships also maintained a heavy but ineffectual fire upon invisible or unregistered positions. But the loss at the landing was considerable while Hill was away looking for the Divisional General and new orders. This was a long process. Finding at last that his orders were to combine with the 32nd and 34th Brigades, now under Sitwell’s command upon the dunes near Hill 10, and then to attack Chocolate Hill and advance to W Hill, he mustered the five battalions behind the slopes of Lala Baba, and ordered an advance along the sandy spit. The march round by Hill 10, and then along the north side of the Salt Lake, and again south-east to Chocolate Hill, would describe three parts of a circle. An advance from B Beach along the south side of the Salt Lake would have followed an almost straight line to Chocolate Hill; the ground, though marshy in places, was better going than loose sand, and the apprehended wire was afterwards found to be negligible. By this route General Hammersley could have brought these five battalions into action many hours earlier, could have occupied Chocolate Hill by noon, and pushed on to W Hill before night. It is true they would not then have co-operated with the brigades under Sitwell, but the value of that co-operation was not great.

As it was, owing to the delay of changed command, and to co-operation with a Brigadier in another Division, with whom Hill, having just come from Mitylene, was probably unacquainted, Hill’s column did not begin to leave Lala Baba for the sandy spit till noon. The march across that unprotected spit was a trying passage. The Irishmen (6th Inniskilling Fusiliers, 5th and 6th Royal Irish Fusiliers, of the 31st Brigade, and 6th and 7th Royal Dublin Fusiliers of the 30th Brigade) had started closely packed together for their long sea voyage on the previous afternoon; except for a cup of tea at 3 a.m. and a snatch of their rations after landing, they were empty of food; for some hours they had stood uncertain under a blazing sun and exposed for the first time to shrapnel, often fatal and continually unnerving. The Turkish guns on Anafarta and W Hills had carefully registered the sandy spit, and now swept it with shrapnel from end to end. For sleepless, hungry, and miserably thirsty men, loose sand is the worst of trials. They crossed in batches, or “by a section at a time rushing over.”184

As each battalion arrived after this ordeal, it formed up under the slight cover of the sand dunes about Hill 10, but it was 3 p.m. before all the five mustered there and Hill could organise the attack upon Chocolate Hill, which was to have been completed before dawn. Keeping only the 6th Dublin Fusiliers in reserve, he pushed the other four battalions forward across the dry bed of the Asmak on the north side of the Salt Lake, and began the difficult movement of wheeling the whole force southward through the open country round the lake shore. It was thus marching across the enemy’s front—an operation of proverbial risk. The farther it advanced, the more exposed the left flank became. Sitwell, as senior officer, was, as we have seen, in command of the 34th and 32nd Brigades, which had lain so many hours under the sand dunes. He was now, indeed, in sole command, since Haggard had been seriously wounded at noon. But he considered he was justified in sparing only two battalions in support (6th Lincolns and 6th Borders, which, however, belonged to the 33rd Brigade and must have been sent over from Lala Baba by their Brigadier-General Maxwell under General Hammersley’s order). Even these two appear to have been moved too late to protect the left flank, for Hill was compelled to defend it, as it was “in air,” by deploying the 5th Royal Irish Fusiliers (Colonel Pike, an excellent officer, who was with the regiment in Ladysmith) and advancing them so as to face half-left. An increasing gap was thus formed between left and right as the force slowly wheeled round the lake, and the 7th Dublins had to be brought up to fill it.

As the rough country in front of Anafarta plateau was thus being crossed, the line was continually harassed by an enfilading fire from swarms of snipers concealed in the bushes on the left, as well as by copious shrapnel and high explosives from the hills. Contact mines also exploded, and a Taube dropped a few bombs. Fortunately, about 4 p.m. a sudden squall and shower of rain swept over the bay and plain, obscuring the enemy’s view, and refreshing the troops, who were suffering greatly from the extreme heat and from thirst, though they were passing close to two excellent water-sources, had they but known it. Their Brigadier Hill, a man of almost excessive indifference to danger, as I observed on several occasions, did not follow them in person till midnight. By 5 p.m. they had reached a line within 300 yards of Chocolate Hill, and there they lay down while the ships and the few batteries on land bombarded.185

The moment the bombardment ceased, the men rose and charged up the steep and bushy slopes of that rounded hill with fixed bayonets. The two Royal Irish Fusilier battalions were on the left (the side of greatest danger), the Dublins in the centre, the Inniskillings on the right. The 6th Lincolns and 6th Borders then passed through the line, and were, in fact, first in the charge. The hill was fortified by an old trench which ran completely round the circumference some yards below the summit. One long communication trench afterwards ran down the saddle or neck connecting the hill with “Hill 50” or “Green Hill” beyond, and probably followed the line of an old excavation. The Turks poured rifle-fire from the parapets, and fought gallantly with bayonets. But they were at last all killed or chased away. Just as the sun set over the distant peaks of Samothrace, the summit was gained. If only it had been gained as that sun rose!

The battalions spent the night in sorting themselves out, burying the dead, trying to collect the wounded in the darkness, bringing up what supplies they could find on the beach (all of which had to be carried on men’s backs), and, above all, in the endeavour to bring up water. A certain amount was being distributed on the beach, more than 2 miles off by the nearest way, which probably no one could find in the dark. And every drop had to be carried by hand in camp kettles or even in ammunition boxes or in water-bottles strung by the dozen round one man’s neck. The night was thus occupied, but thirst was not appeased. Before sunrise the 6th Lincolns and the 6th Borderers were withdrawn to rejoin their own brigade, the 7th South Staffords replacing them.

To return to the remaining battalions of the 10th Division. As we have seen, the Divisional General, Sir Bryan Mahon, arrived from Mudros with only three battalions—the 6th and 7th Munster Fusiliers of the 30th Brigade (Brigadier-General L. L. Nicol), and the 5th Royal Irish (Pioneers). In addition he was able to retain the 5th Inniskilling Fusiliers (31st Brigade) before it disembarked with Hill’s force. Ordering it to follow, he landed soon after 11 a.m. with the three battalions among the rocks near Suvla Point, where his men suffered much from contact mines. He then proceeded to climb Karakol Dagh, and passed through the shattered companies of the 11th Manchesters, who had early occupied this part of the rocky razor-edge. Deploying the Munsters in two lines, he advanced to the attack on Kiretch Tepe Sirt, the more lofty but continuous edge beyond. The ground is very difficult, being a steep hillside broken into rocks and craggy ravines, the lower slopes covered with high bush. The enemy delayed the advance along the whole mountain-side by accurate and concealed fire, causing many wounds and deaths, especially among officers. It was past sunset when the attacking force of Munsters, supported by the Royal Irish, came within about 100 yards of the highest knoll, which the Turks held strongly. Here the battalions, wearied and tormented by thirst, like the whole army corps, lay for the night. But next morning (August 8), the 6th Munsters under Major Jephson took the knoll by assault. It was afterwards known as Jephson’s Post, was fortified, in spite of its rocky and exposed position, and, but for a few hours in the next week, remained the farthest point in our lines along the north side of the bay.

Thus, on the late evening of the 7th, we held the bay and both extremities, the Salt Lake, Hill 10, a point near Jephson’s Post on the north, and Chocolate Hill on the south-east. We had not even attempted W Hill, or Scimitar Hill, or the Anafarta plateau, or the Tekke Tepe mountain, and from all those points the bay was commanded. Except along the shore we had established no connection with Anzac, and could give no support at Sari Bair. Still, something had been gained. The landing had been effected punctually and with small loss. The 32nd and 34th Brigades had certainly lost much time in hanging about Hill 10, as though their work was done. The 31st Brigade had been hampered and delayed by confused commands and the varied positions allotted to it apart from its own Division. But the situation seemed fairly hopeful, and with energy and organisation all might be retrieved. Some battalions had lost heavily, but as a whole the loss was not great—for so large a movement. Only a little over 1000 wounded were taken off to the hospital ships.

So satisfied was General Stopford with the situation that he telegraphed to Sir Ian that in his opinion Major-General Hammersley and his troops deserved great credit for the result attained. Anxiously awaiting news in General Headquarters at Imbros, Sir Ian replied with congratulations to General Stopford, stating also how much was hoped from Hammersley’s bold and rapid advance. The message must have been prompted by Sir Ian’s inborn optimism or by official courtesy and a desire to encourage action. For even before the telegram was sent, tormenting doubts intruded. It was Sunday morning. The Wellingtons and 7th Gloucesters had climbed the shoulder of Chunuk Bair; the 4th Australian Brigade was advancing to the assault up Koja Chemen Tepe by way of Abdel Rahman Bair; at Lone Pine the battle still raged desperately. If ever help from Suvla was called for, it was now. But from Suvla came only silence. Hardly a gun could be heard. No further message arrived.

In Suvla Bay itself a Sabbath peace appeared to reign. No shells burst; no bullets whined. It was evident that the Turks had withdrawn both guns and infantry during the night. We could walk at leisure round the whole beach from Suvla Point to Lala Baba. We could examine the surface of the Salt Lake, or climb Karakol Dagh and view the calm prospect over the Gulf of Xeros with equal security. Men whom good fortune had stationed near the beaches enjoyed the enviable refreshment of bathing in the sandy shallows. No attempt was being made seriously to push forward the advance, although W Hill, the most vital point, could have been occupied by little more than marching, and the distance even from the beach was 4 miles at most. There was no Turk along the whole range of Tekke Tepe.

The Divisional Generals reported to the Corps Commander that they were unable to move owing to the exhaustion of their men.186 Undoubtedly the men were exhausted. The sea journey, the sleepless nights, the great heat, the excitement of their first battle, the toilsome marching upon loose sand, and the rations of hard biscuit and salt “bully” had exhausted them. The 11th Division from Imbros was also infected with the prevailing diarrhœa, and in a few cases with dysentery. But the worst exhaustion came from thirst. In spite of all those elaborate precautions, the water supply broke down. Plenty of water was there. The water-lighters had arrived on the 7th. One was at A West; one went aground at “Old A,” and men swam out to her; but Commodore Keyes towed her near enough ashore for the hose to reach the men that afternoon. A third was on C Beach, and probably the fourth, for the Krene had tugged in two, and was there herself, her stem on the shore. What was wanting was not water, but the troughs and receptacles for issuing and distribution. Men came with nothing but water-bottles, sometimes a dozen or more, slung round their necks, and went naked with them into the sea in hopes of drawing from the tanks. When a hose was attached, they pierced holes in the cover, and drank, then leaving the water to run waste. By Sunday morning a poor and leaking trough was stuck up at one point, but it would not hold water, and the men and mules crowding round it impeded distribution. The Prah (containing all the requisites for supply—troughs, hose, and implements for well-sinking), owing to some over-scrupulous observance of regulations, did not issue them till some days later. The anguish of thirst was intolerable. Up in the firing lines some went almost mad.187 The suffering of the men exposed to the glaring sun upon the rocks of Kiretch Tepe was most severe during Sunday, though it was afterwards (perhaps that night) relieved by the kindly generosity of a destroyer (some say the Grampus, but evidence is for the Foxhound), which was deputed always to patrol that Gulf of Xeros coast, and on this occasion cut her own water-tank loose and brought it ashore. Even on the beach, where fresh water was running to waste, men filled water-bottles from the sea. So serious were the reports from the front that General Stopford ordered the disembarkation of the artillery horses to be delayed till the mules for carrying up water had been landed.188 Thus one thing acted upon another, for it was want of artillery which finally induced the Corps Commander to believe that immediate advance was impossible. Brigades and even battalions were also much confused and scattered, as we have seen. But the ultimate cause of the confusion, and of the failure in water supply, and so of the lack of guns, was the decision to land part of the force inside the bay, and at a beach where any observer might have suspected shallows fit only for wading.189

Meantime Sir Ian, growing continually more impatient at the silence, resolved about noon to leave his central position at Imbros and investigate for himself the situation of his northern force. For some unexplained reason his destroyer, the Arno, instead of keeping steam always up, had just had her fires drawn, and could not start till 4 p.m. During those hours of maddening delay, Sir Ian’s worst suspicions were confirmed by a telegram from a General Staff Officer (Lieut.-Colonel Aspinall, a trustworthy judge of military affairs) “drawing attention to the inaction of our own troops, and to the fact that golden opportunities were being missed.”190 Arriving at Suvla at 5 p.m., Sir Ian at once visited General Stopford on board the Jonquil, where he still kept his headquarters so as to advise upon any action, if any action seemed advisable. There Sir Ian heard, as he dreaded to hear, that nothing could be done that day. The exhaustion of the men, the confusion of units, and other pleas mentioned above were given as reasons. But the deeper reason lay in comfortable satisfaction with present results, and in the absence of inspiring or remorseless energy. It is an old military principle that “A General who refuses to pursue a retreating enemy on the plea that his troops are tired, should be at once relieved of his command.” In Sir Ian’s own words: “Driving power was required, and even a certain ruthlessness, to brush aside pleas for respite for tired troops. The one fatal error was inertia. And inertia prevailed.”

Finding it so, Sir Ian, driven by the extremity of the crisis, took a step unusual in a Commander-in-Chief. He resolved to try what personal influence he could use upon the Divisional Commanders. The Corps Commander raised no objection, and, accompanied by Commodore Roger Keyes and Lieut.-Colonel Aspinall, Sir Ian hastened to Major-General Hammersley’s headquarters at the foot of Lala Baba. He pointed out that time above all price was slipping away unused; that “the sands were running out fast”; that information showed Turkish reinforcements already approaching. General Hammersley replied that his force was much scattered; it was impossible to get orders for a night attack round to the battalions; and that a general attack was arranged for the early morning. He admitted, however, that the 32nd Brigade (formerly under Haggard, who was wounded on the previous day, and now under Colonel Minogue) was more or less concentrated and could move. His General Staff Officer, Colonel Neil Malcolm, an experienced soldier, confirmed this opinion, and Sir Ian took the further unusual step of directly ordering this brigade or any force, even if it were only a company, to advance at once without waiting for the morning’s general attack. Their objective was to be the high ground rising towards Tekke Tepe on the north of Anafarta Sagir. They were to act as the advance guard to the attack.

It was now 6 p.m. In ignorance, Sir Ian had given an order destined to entail disaster. It appears almost certain that neither General Hammersley nor his Chief of Staff knew exactly where the battalions of the 32nd Brigade stood at the time. Otherwise they must have informed Sir Ian that, as a matter of fact, one of the battalions (the 6th East York Pioneers) had advanced that day, had occupied Hill 70 (Scimitar Hill), and were at that moment in position there—Scimitar Hill, next to W Hill the most vital of all the semicircle of heights overlooking the bay! Closely supported by the 7th South Staffords, the Pioneer Battalion was there only waiting for the brigade’s further advance upon W Hill or Anafarta Sagir, to both of which it is the key. Lieut.-Colonel Moore, in command of that battalion, had even sent out three officers’ patrols, one of which actually reached the top of Tekke Tepe, another the outskirts of Anafarta Sagir, the third a point near Abrikja, though unable to return till dark. But no one in high authority appears to have known of these movements. In consequence of this ignorance, the Divisional General, instead of leaving the selection of battalions to the Brigadier, named the 6th East York Pioneers as the battalion to lead the advance, believing it to be the freshest and least tried. Colonel Minogue obeyed and ordered the battalion to rejoin the brigade concentrated at Sulajik. Colonel Moore, commanding the 6th East Yorks, obeyed also, but did not receive the order till 3 a.m. of the 9th. He then withdrew his tired and sleepless battalion to Sulajik. Without a blow, Scimitar Hill was abandoned. It was one of those apparently casual misfortunes which throughout the campaign balked the fairest hopes just at the moment of victory, as though an evil and ironic destiny mocked at the best-laid schemes.

Having heard from General Hammersley that the water supply was now arranged and the troops rested, Sir Ian returned to the Arno and remained on board that night in the bay. Hearing no sound of fighting, he assumed that the brigade had accomplished its task and established itself on the slopes of Tekke Tepe overlooking Anafarta, without opposition.191

Unfortunately, Sir Ian’s assumption was groundless. The 32nd Brigade was far from being concentrated as was supposed by the Divisional General. One battalion, as we have just seen, was actually on Scimitar Hill. The 9th West Yorks were half-way up the Anafarta Ridge, and they tried to advance before dawn, but were overwhelmed by the enemy’s reinforcements, thus proving that the intended morning attack would have been dangerously late in any case.192 The remainder were among the trees near the farm Sulajik, where there was water. Verbal orders reached them at 7.30 p.m., but no definite written orders arrived till nearly 3 a.m. The mistakes were chiefly due to ignorance of location. Instead of beginning at eight on Sunday evening, as Sir Ian intended, the movement did not start till 4 a.m. on Monday. Then the brigade attacked the steep slope leading up to Anafarta. It is covered with thick and high bush, up which men can advance only in single file along the cattle-tracks. On their right, Scimitar Hill had been abandoned, its reverse slope being now occupied by swarms of Turkish snipers and troops in formation, which were coming up in strong reinforcement. On their left, one company of the 6th East Yorks (the selfsame battalion which had occupied Scimitar Hill) succeeded in reaching that isolated offshoot from Tekke Tepe above mentioned. But the brigade retired to the line of Sulajik. The losses were heavy, chiefly among the Royal Engineers, one company of whom (the 67th) accompanied the brigade. Colonel Moore of the 6th East Yorks (Pioneers), who had shown such grasp of the situation, was killed.

As day advanced, the position only grew worse. It was the morning when the party of Lancastrians and Gurkhas reached the summit near Hill Q and stared upon the Dardanelles below. As at Chunuk Bair, so at Suvla, the Turks were rushing up reinforcements. Three Divisions, starting from Bulair, were beginning to debouch along the valley between the two Anafartas, and to crowd the heights. Perceiving our inactivity or hesitation throughout the previous day (Sunday), they now brought back the guns they had removed on Saturday night, and increased the number. Hill’s 31st Brigade, and that General himself, were still on Chocolate Hill, but three battalions of Maxwell’s Brigade had now arrived there, and the orders for the attack devolved upon him. On the right he pushed forward those battalions of his own 33rd Brigade, which made fair progress. Some of the leading troops were reported as even reaching W Hill, but that appeared to me very doubtful, as I watched the movements all day from a machine-gun emplacement near the top of Chocolate Hill. In the centre Brigadier-General Maxwell ordered part of the 32nd Brigade to advance again, reinforced by two of the 10th Division battalions under Hill (6th Royal Irish Fusiliers and 6th Royal Dublin Fusiliers). Their objective was Scimitar Hill—that hill which had been quietly occupied and quietly abandoned only the day before! On the left the line was extended by the 6th Lincolns (33rd Brigade) and the whole of the 34th Brigade, which had moved from the sand dunes near Hill 10 at last, and arrived in two detachments. Beyond them were two battalions from the 53rd (Welsh) Division, which had been held by Sir Ian as part of his special reserve, and was being thrown into Suvla early that morning.

Partly owing to the mixture of brigades, the attack went to pieces. There was little combination, and no cohesion. Battalions advanced separately here and there, and separately came back. Two or three times one or other of them (especially the two battalions of Hill’s brigade) came close to the summit of Scimitar Hill. A fraction of the 7th South Staffords in the centre actually reached it. But every hour the enemy’s fire increased. Shrapnel burst low over us. The men of the 32nd Brigade were much shaken by their experience and heavy losses in the early morning. All were much exhausted. Fire broke out on the left side of the hill itself, and swept over the front and summit, consuming the dry scrub in sheets of flame. The wounded, both British and Turk, came creeping out on hands and knees to seek safety upon that yellow open space or “blaze” which, as I mentioned, gave the name of “Scimitar” to the hill. But many perished from suffocation and the extreme heat. Many also were burnt alive, being unable to move. Except a few isolated parties, which bravely endeavoured to hold their ground, the firing lines and supports came swarming back. It was no wonder. The situation was intolerable. The most hardened Regulars could not have endured it, and hardly any of these officers and men of the New Army had known fighting before. At length they were formed up into a confused line along the ditches and shallow trenches between the Sulajik and Green Hill. It was about noon.

From Chocolate Hill General Maxwell ordered the battalions to be reorganised at once for another attack, but reorganisation was impossible. One of the wells, which in the early morning I had found safe, was now exposed to almost continuous rifle-fire. The usual scenes of a battlefield added to the distress and alarm. The dead were lying about; the wounded crying for help; the hands and faces of hastily buried men protruded from the ground. The 6th Lincolns and 6th Borders, posted on either flank, were mentioned for “steady and gallant behaviour” during this ordeal. The 9th Sherwood Foresters (same Brigade) and the Herefords of the 159th were also mentioned. No further movement was attempted. Walking back to Lala Baba towards evening, I was asked to report to General Hammersley in his headquarters there, but could report little good. I found, however, that he had now three R.F.A. batteries in position behind the seaward slope of Lala Baba, and three batteries of mountain-guns ashore, some of the guns being close behind the summit of the hill. The warships were also firing at intervals upon W Hill and the farthest points of Kiretch Tepe Sirt.

Along that razor-edge or whale-back ridge, Sir Bryan Mahon had now firmly established himself with the few battalions left to his command out of the 10th Division. Near the sea-end of the ridge, about three-quarters of a mile from Suvla Point, General Stopford was engaged upon the construction of a permanent Corps Headquarters in a partially sheltered depression among the rocks. Having visited him there in the morning, Sir Ian climbed along the ridge to Mahon’s headquarters among the stones close behind his firing line. He found that General confident of carrying the whole summit of Kiretch Tepe, and it was probably whilst on that point of widely commanding view over the whole plain to Koja Chemen Tepe and the Anzac heights that Sir Ian resolved to press forward the attack upon the left, since the advance upon W Hill and Anafarta Sagir was obviously now impeded. If Mahon’s Division could fight its way along the ridge to Ejelmer Bay, and fresh troops could win the line from Ejelmer Bay over Kavak and Tekke Tepes to Anafarta Sagir, not only would Suvla remain safe from interference on that side, but the Turkish reinforcements on W Hill and Scimitar Hill would be paralysed by the threat from their right, and rendered incapable of advancing farther towards the sea.

In the afternoon Sir Ian went to Anzac with Commodore Keyes, and, after consultation with Generals Birdwood and Godley, telephoned to General Stopford, urging upon him the importance of immediately seizing Kavak Tepe and the rest of the Ejelmer-Anafarta line, which an aeroplane reported as still unoccupied and unentrenched. At the same time he determined to devote to this purpose the last of his own reserve—the 54th (East Anglian) Division, which, however, like the 53rd, consisted of infantry only, and those little over half strength. The battle to hold the summit just south of Chunuk Bair was raging at the time. It is possible that reinforcement by a new Division might have made all the difference there. But to supply water up those heights was difficult, as we noticed in the last chapter, and the Generals on the spot considered there was scarcely room for more troops in the ravines and up the ridges. So to Suvla the 54th Division was ordered to follow the 53rd, and Sir Ian was left without reserve. The new Division was to arrive on the next day but one, the 11th.

General Stopford, however, was naturally still anxious to retrieve the check suffered by General Hammersley’s command, and indeed W Hill was still the most vital and threatening point upon the encompassing heights. He, therefore, determined to renew the attack upon Scimitar Hill and the more open field country between it and W Hill, around the Abrikja farm. For this task he allotted nine battalions of the 53rd Division (Major-General Lindley), supported by two battalions of the 11th Division on each flank. The result was more lamentable even than the failure of the previous day. The troops of the 53rd Division set off about six a.m. across the Salt Lake. The Turkish shrapnel and rifle-fire poured upon them as they advanced, and only increased at the foot of Scimitar Hill. To watch parties of them attempting to steal up sheltered portions of the hill was a piteous sight. The cover was much reduced, because the ground was now black with burning, and most of the bushes gone. Many fell on all sides. The corner of a small wheatfield near Abrikja was fringed with dead who looked like a company lying down in the shade. One saw many deeds of courage among officers and men.

Backwards and forwards, the fighting went on all morning, but without result. In the evening the battalions were withdrawn to their original lines, only more confused, more disheartened, and fewer in numbers. Generals Maxwell and Hill remained on Chocolate Hill that day. Hill’s brigade was chiefly occupied in holding Green Hill just in front of the other, and we were much exposed to shrapnel there, as the trenches were incomplete. That evening, however, the withdrawal of Hill’s five battalions in turn began. They were allowed rest and the joy of bathing on the beach till the 13th (Friday), when they rejoined their own 10th Division upon Kiretch Tepe Sirt.193

On this day, the 10th, Chunuk Bair was lost, and the chance of advance from Suvla was almost gone. It was the saddest day in the record of the expedition. Sir Ian telegraphed to General Stopford, ordering him not to risk the proposed renewal of the attacks with tired and disintegrated troops, but to consolidate the line from the Asmak Dere past the front of Chocolate Hill through Sulajik to Kiretch Tepe Sirt.

It was indeed time that the line was consolidated. During the night and early morning, the 54th (East Anglian) Division was being landed on the new A Beaches near Suvla Point.194 They formed, as has been noticed, Sir Ian’s last reserve, and were commanded by Major-General F. S. Inglefield, a stalwart and experienced soldier, who had seen service in South Africa and had commanded this Territorial Division for two years, but was already sixty. As in the case of the 53rd (Welsh) Division, some of the best battalions had been taken for France, and others suddenly inserted without knowledge of him or of the other battalions, so that the essential bond of the Territorial spirit was severed. The landing of some 10,000 or 12,000 inexperienced Territorials ignorant of cohesion was inevitably a confused business, though only the infantry had been sent. But that would not have mattered if the confusion upon the front lines had not been far worse. There the condition was indeed deplorable. Along the most critical part of the line, between Green Hill and Sulajik, battalions and brigades were hopelessly mixed together. The men had lost sight of their officers and their units. They lay in any ditch or cover they could find. Here and there a party dug trenches or improved the trenches dug at night. But theirs was not the spirit of victory. One of the bridged fountains was now almost deserted, as it came under fire from snipers or from the troops on Scimitar Hill. But round the other, which was concealed among large trees, the men still swarmed. In consequence, there was much delay and much waste of the plentiful water, nor did any attempts to get them into file, so that each might take his turn, avail for long.

There was no help for it. The only thing to be done was to pull out the battalions gradually and reorganise. It was now Wednesday, and so far as action went the day was wasted, as Sunday had been, though there was better reason for the waste.

That evening Sir Ian again sailed over to Suvla with the object of urging forward his project for the occupation of the Kavak Tepe and Tekke Tepe heights before the Turkish reinforcements could arrive and entrench there. He had expected the 54th Division to start at once upon a night march, so as to make the ascent at dawn, while the 53rd Division stood in reserve. But General Stopford raised objections, foresaw difficulties, and asked for at least twenty-four hours’ delay. He hoped that by that time the 53rd Division would have been reorganised sufficiently to clear the way for the passage of the 54th through the jungly, tree-covered ground at the foot of the mountain.

Unfortunately, even this hope was disappointed. Though the 54th Division had not come under serious fire, the Brigadiers in both Divisions reported that they were not yet ready for the attack. General Inglefield, however, was able to send forward one brigade in advance. It was the 163rd (Brigadier-General F. F. W. Daniell), consisting of the 4th and 5th Norfolks and the 5th Suffolks and 8th Hants. The advance began in the afternoon, and the brigade reached the farm called Anafarta Ova, though the enemy’s opposition steadily increased as the forest and bush became thicker. Then occurred one of the minor but startling tragedies of the war. The 5th Norfolks, on the right of the brigade, were led by Colonel Sir Horace Beauchamp, a bold and self-confident cavalry officer, who had commanded the 20th Hussars, and seen hard service in Egypt, the Soudan, and South Africa. In the army he had been known as “The Bo’sun” owing to his love and knowledge of the sea.195 Perhaps inspired by old memories, perhaps hoping to inspire Territorials also with the tradition of Regulars, or to show the Generals what this Division could do under dashing leadership, he led his battalion rapidly forward in advance of the brigade. He was last seen among the scattered outbuildings of the farm, carrying a cane and encouraging his men to follow. They reached the rising ground from which the steep front of Tekke Tepe springs. Whether Colonel Beauchamp intended to carry the mountain unassisted, or to secure the edge of the Anafarta plateau to his right front, cannot be known. The bush grew thicker; the battalion lost formation; the enemy’s fire increased; many stragglers turned back and reached the Division during the night.

One cannot doubt that their bones lie among the trees and bushes at the foot of that dark and ominous hill, and the last real hope of Suvla Bay faded with their tragic disappearance.

In spite of all discouragement, Sir Ian’s mind was still set on securing a further advance by the occupation of Kavak and Tekke Tepes. He agreed to the postponement of attack for another twenty-four hours, and it was arranged for the night and morning of August 13–14. But on the afternoon of the 13th (Friday), on returning to Suvla with Major-General Braithwaite, his Chief of Staff, he found that General Stopford still raised objections. Two out of his four Divisional Generals despaired of success. The line, he considered, was already too long for his troops. Some of the brigades were still disorganised and shaken. Finding that this temper of uncertainty and depression prevailed, Sir Ian could do nothing but cancel the scheme of attack, and order the IXth Corps to reorganise and consolidate a line as far forward as possible.

One further effort was, however, made on Sunday, August 15, when General Stopford called upon the Irish 10th Division to advance along the Kiretch Tepe Sirt in the direction of Ejelmer Bay. The two brigades now under Sir Bryan Mahon advanced along the lofty ridge, part along the summit, the rest strung out down the steep slope towards the sea. The brigades were the 30th (Nicol’s) and 31st (Hill’s). On the reverse or southern slope the 162nd (De Winton’s) Brigade, 54th Division, advanced through thick bushes and deep ravines in support. An unusual amount of artillery was employed. The 15th Heavy Battery had arrived a few days before. The 58th Brigade R.F.A. (10th Division) had marched along the coast from Anzac with safety, and all these guns were engaged, besides a mountain battery, some machine-guns, and the guns of the destroyers Grampus and Foxhound, firing from the Gulf of Xeros. But in spite of this support the advance moved very slowly. It started about noon, and crept bit by bit along the “whale-back,” a good line being kept from the summit down to the sea, but halts frequent, and progress difficult. The ground was all rocky, and most of it covered with prickly scrub, burnt in parts. The summit was bare rock, and the distance to be traversed under fire about a mile and a half. A prisoner told us the Turks had six fresh battalions in line or in strongly fortified redoubts, each battalion provided with twelve machine-guns. That may be exaggerated, but the machine-guns were numerous and deadly. Soon after the beginning of the general advance, Major Jephson was mortally wounded upon the Post which he had originally won and which always bore his name.

Meantime, the 5th Inniskilling Fusiliers, supported by the 6th, had been extended over the southern slope in front of the 162nd Brigade. Here the difficulties of advance were even greater, owing to the tangle of very thick and lofty bush, the steep gullies, the inability of the naval guns to afford assistance, and the deadly fire from the long Turkish trench running down the slope in front, as well as from the guns on the Anafarta and W Hills. Having left the summit, I happened to be with this part of the attack soon after five o’clock, and found the men broken up into small groups by the impenetrable bush. Their loss, especially in officers, was very heavy. Again and again the groups attempted to combine and advance, but were driven back by the storm of fire. Progress on that side was impossible. Three battalions of the 162nd Brigade (10th and 11th London and 5th Beds) supported the attack upon these foothills, and gained their supposed objective, but suffered heavy loss.

Suddenly, hearing a yell of shouting on our left, I looked up to the summit, and saw a body of men charging along it with flashing bayonets. Others, standing up on higher ground behind them, were pouring out a rapid magazine fire. Two companies of the 6th Munsters and two of the 6th Dublins had worked half-way along the edge between Jephson’s Post and the Pimple. The remaining 250 yards they now covered with a charge, cheering as they ran. Some Turks met bayonet with bayonet, and died. Some threw up their hands. Most ran. One could see them scurrying back along the ridge and down the southern slope. The Irish pursued them through the Pimple redoubt and beyond. It was six o’clock.196

In the gathering darkness the men attempted to build small sangars of the rocks, but no real trenching was possible. They lay out in lines along the seaward slope just below the summit. Then the failure to win the southern slope was bitterly felt. Twice in the night the Turks counter-attacked, creeping along that landward side, and, for the first attack, rushing over the top, only to be cut down by rifle and bayonet. In the attack just before dawn they trusted chiefly to a deadly form of round bomb, which they lobbed over the crest in vast numbers. The Irish could only reply with improvised jam-pot bombs, and few of those. Sometimes, however, they caught the Turkish bombs and flung them back. Private Wilkin, of the 7th Dublins, flung back five, but was blown to pieces by the sixth.

So the harassing conflict continued. It continued all next day under the burning sun. The loss was extreme. Many of the very best officers fell. The 5th and 6th Royal Irish Fusiliers were almost exterminated. During the night of the 16th-17th the shattered brigades were withdrawn from the untenable position. It was never recovered. Jephson’s Post and the steep slopes leading down on either side, one to the sea, the other to the plain, remained the farthest points held by our lines along the Kiretch Tepe Sirt.

This attack of August 15 was General Stopford’s last order. That evening he gave up the command of the IXth Corps, and Major-General De Lisle took his place, awaiting the arrival of Major-General Julian Byng. Brigadier-General H. L. Reed, however, remained as Chief of Staff to the Corps. Meantime, in place of De Lisle, Major-General W. R. Marshall (87th Brigade) took command of the 29th Division. A few days later, Major-General Lindley (at his own request) gave up the command of the 53rd (Welsh) Division, and was appointed to the military command at Mudros. Major-General Hammersley retired from command of the 11th Division owing to serious illness. The same cause unfortunately removed Major-General F. C. Shaw from the 13th (Western) Division, which he had commanded with such skill and firmness during the assault on Sari Bair. Brigadier-General Sitwell was succeeded in command of the 34th Brigade by Brigadier-General J. Hill. Soon afterwards the command of the 31st Brigade was taken over by Lieut.-Colonel J. G. King-King in place of Brigadier-General F. F. Hill, who fell seriously ill. It became known that, besides General Julian Byng, Major-General E. A. Fanshawe and Major-General F. Stanley Maude (afterwards the hero of Bagdad) were coming out.

CHAPTER XIII THE LAST EFFORTS

The great assault of the second week in August, extending from Lone Pine to Kiretch Tepe Sirt, and having the mountain height of Chunuk Bair as the centre of its line, must be described as a failure. It failed of its objects—the objects of the whole military campaign—to open the Straits for the fleet, to secure the possession of Constantinople, to hold all the Balkan States steady for our Alliance, to complete the blockade of the Central Powers by land and sea, to divert any possible threat towards Egypt, or towards the Persian Gulf, and so to hasten the termination of the war. The aim of this fine strategical conception was not accomplished, and the causes of failure have been suggested in the narrative of the three preceding chapters. Incidents and accidents contributed—the gallant but hopeless attempt to cross the Nek in face of the Chessboard redoubt, the gallant but unsuccessful attempts to hold the summits at Chunuk Bair and “Hill Q,” the error of Baldwin’s brigade, the confusion of the landing inside Suvla Bay, the separation of the units in the 10th Division, the immobility of the 11th Division on August 7 and 8, the breakdown of the water supply through want of receptacles, the unwitting recall of a battalion from Scimitar Hill on the evening of Sunday the 8th, and the apparent failure of the Higher Command at Suvla to realise the vital necessity of speed and energy, no matter at what cost, during the four critical days from the morning of the 7th to the evening of the 10th.

But at the back of all these causes of failure lay the ultimate reason that many of the troops employed, especially at Suvla, were not strong or experienced enough for the difficult task of attacking an enemy posted in the most favourable positions for defence, over an unknown, complicated, and deserted country, and in unaccustomed conditions of intense heat and insatiable thirst. Few in the New Army or Territorial Divisions were acquainted with the realities of war; few had been exposed to its sudden and overwhelming perils. They had neither the traditions, nor the veteran experience, nor the disciplined self-confidence of the Regular Army. They had neither the physique, nor the adventurous spirit, nor the intense national bond of the Anzacs. What they might have done under more decisive or youthful or inspiring leadership we can judge only from their subsequent rapid improvement even upon the Peninsula, and from their excellent service in later campaigns—such service as was performed in Palestine by these Territorial Divisions. But in August 1915 their leadership was not conspicuously decisive, youthful, or inspiring. And so it came about that General Stopford suffered the worst fate which can befall a commanding officer in the field.

On the other hand, the gain had been considerable. The important, though not vital positions of the Vineyard at Helles, and Lone Pine on the right front at Anzac, had been won. In the centre, the Anzac Corps were relieved from an arduous, if not untenable, situation. It could now move freely over a widely extended ground; many points formerly harassed by the enemy’s guns and snipers were now secure; water-springs had been gained; and the lines were drawn three or four miles nearer the summits of Sari Bair. On the left, Suvla Bay afforded a more sheltered winter roadstead than Kephalos. The lofty ridge of Kiretch Tepe Sirt was ours to the summit, and the wide plain around the Salt Lake, including Chocolate and Green Hills, was ours also. We held the entrance of the broad valley leading up to Biyuk Anafarta, and, but for the risk from occasional snipers, communication with Anzac was freely open.197 To these great advantages must be added the heavy losses inflicted upon the Turks—losses, however, which were counterbalanced by our own, and could be more speedily replaced.

The immediate weakness of our position was due to the enemy’s continued occupation of the heights in the range of varied mountain and plateau from Ejelmer Bay to W Hill; for guns on those heights commanded the greater part of the Salt Lake plain and the positions round the bay, especially on the north side, where our main landing-places and headquarters were situated. Another weakness was the enemy’s occupation of Hill 60 (Kaiajik Aghala), which faces W Hill across the Biyuk Anafarta valley and commanded the approach to the upper reaches, as well as threatening the communication between Anzac and Suvla. Reckoning up the advantages gained, and refusing to be discouraged by the ill-success of his main design, Sir Ian resolved at once to remove these causes of weakness by a renewal of the combined attack. It was probable also that, if the reinforced Turkish Army were allowed to remain undisturbed, it would assume a violent offensive, especially directed against Suvla.

The losses during the second week in August had been serious—not less than 30,000 on all three fronts together. Sir Ian estimated his total force at 95,000 in the middle of August (40,000, including 17,000 French troops, at Helles; 25,000 at Anzac; under 30,000 at Suvla).198 But this was a sanguine estimate. The real fighting strength of the British and Anzac troops was probably not over 60,000, and of the French about 15,000. The British Divisions alone were short by nearly 1500 officers. On August 16 he telegraphed to Lord Kitchener stating that 45,000 rifles to fill up gaps in the British Divisions, and 50,000 rifles as fresh reinforcements, were essential for a quick and victorious decision.199 Unfortunately, as it now appears, the great strategic and political conception of the Dardanelles had now less support than ever in the Cabinet. The fall of Warsaw (August 4) had destroyed the last hope of Russian co-operation. The influence of the “Westerners” was supreme. The attempt to break through the German line at Loos in September was already in preparation, and all available forces were concentrated upon that. By various means, an increasingly despondent or hostile criticism of the Gallipoli campaign was insinuated throughout the country, and Sir Ian’s request for further assistance was refused. The hesitating Cabinet may have hoped that, if the Western offensive succeeded, the Dardanelles campaign, after remaining suspended for two or three months, might then be pushed forward again without loss of opportunity. If that was their expectation, they had forgotten Napoleon’s maxim, that war is like a woman in that, if once you miss your opportunity, you need never expect to find either war or woman the same again.

All the reinforcement allowed for the moment was the 2nd Mounted Division from Egypt, where it had been in training since April. This Division of four brigades, numbering just under 5000 men, was composed of Yeomanry regiments from the Midland and Southern counties. The men were of singularly fine physique, accustomed to hunting, and well trained in cavalry manœuvres. But, like all “mounted” forces on the Peninsula, they left their horses in Egypt and fought on foot. They were under the command of Major-General William Peyton, a cavalry officer, who had served with distinction in Egypt and South Africa, and was now about fifty.200 His Brigadiers and regimental officers were also cavalrymen of distinction, and, so far as its numbers allowed, the Division could be counted upon to strengthen any attack.201

But, however excellent in itself, the Mounted Division was not numerous enough to give stability to the Suvla Divisions, most of which were still fatigued and disheartened by the ill success of their first attempts at warfare.202 In the hope of affording the much-needed stiffening to the IXth Corps, Major-General De Lisle, accordingly, was instructed to bring the three brigades of his own 29th Division round from Helles by night, and land them at Suvla for the attack. They were under the command of their next senior officer, Major-General W. R. Marshall of the 87th Brigade. De Lisle himself, being in temporary command of the IXth Corps, directed the whole action. His scheme was very simple. On his right, the 11th Division was to assault the trenches which the Turks had now dug across the Biyuk Anafarta valley or plain, south and a little east of Chocolate and Green Hills, and so to protect the right flank until the moment came for a general attack upon W Hill, the ultimate objective of the whole movement. On his centre, the 29th Division was to storm Scimitar Hill, the possession of which, as before explained, was essential to any advance against W Hill itself. To his left, the long line from Sulajik Farm across the wooded plain up to the summit of Kiretch Tepe was held by the two Territorial Divisions, the 53rd and 54th, so as to check any attempt to turn the flank on that side by getting behind our attacking force. Chocolate Hill, 1000 yards from the summit of Scimitar Hill, was the centre of our advance, and on the night of August 20–21 the 29th Division entered the trenches close to the left of that hill, the 11th Division stretching down the slope and into the plain on the right.

The action was to open with the customary bombardment, intended to shatter the enemy’s trenches. For this purpose, two battleships and two cruisers were available, and on land the IXth Corps’ artillery now counted two R.F.A. Brigades (short of horses), two heavy batteries, two mountain batteries, and two batteries of 5-inch howitzers.203 For an Army Corps of nominally six Divisions the number of guns was absurdly small. But as the front to be attacked measured only a mile, it was hoped the bombardment would be effective. Unfortunately, even this hope was frustrated by a condition which could not be foreseen. Usually, in the afternoon, the prospect from Suvla towards the hills is brilliantly clear. The whole range stands visible in every detail. The westering sun appears to reveal every kink and cranny, every tree and mass of bush. Even as far away as Sari Bair, the rocks of Koja Chemen ravine, the “chimney” down the face of Chunuk Bair, and the yellow patch of the Farm are distinct in the clear air and sunlight. For this reason the afternoon had been chosen for attack, the sun being then behind us, but glaring, as might be hoped, in the enemy’s eyes. But that day it so happened that the whole country was covered with a thin grey mist, as on an October morning in England. From the sea, the hills were dim. From the front, all details were obscured. Sir Ian, who had come over from Imbros, wished to postpone the attack, and prudence might have been wise for once. But he tells us that “various reasons” which remain unknown, but were perhaps concerned with the presence of the 29th Division in the Suvla sphere, made postponement impossible.

Accordingly, at 2.45 a violent bombardment began, directed upon Scimitar and W Hills. It was a terrific sight. Our large shells flung up great spouts and fountains of earth and stones, so that the summits smoked with repeated eruption. At the same time, the air was full of the white balls of bursting shrapnel. But the Turks could answer now. At first they directed their shrapnel and high explosives upon Chocolate Hill, where we had twenty-eight machine-guns in position. Besides the guns on W Hill, the Turks now had guns concealed somewhere on the Anafarta plateau or on the foothills of Tekke Tepe, whence they could bring a converging fire to bear. Their bombardment of our position was very heavy. The shells tore at our parapets. The air above our trenches hissed with bullets and fragments. Many of us were struck. But at 3.15 our infantry began to advance.204

On the right the 34th Brigade (now under Brigadier-General J. Hill) advanced successfully across the narrow front of plain between the small farms of Hetman Chair and Aire Kavak (a quarter-mile south of Hetman). They took the trenches on the plain without great loss. But the 32nd Brigade (now under Lieut.-Colonel J. T. R. Wilson), which was to have kept in touch with them at Hetman Chair, and to have seized a long trench running thence towards W Hill, lost direction and kept edging off to their left or north-east, instead of due east. The plain is open but for a sprinkling of small trees, and the mist was not thick enough to confuse. They may have been attracted by the chance of cover among the slopes leading up to the hills on their left, and the fire from the long communication trench was certainly very severe. It was still more unfortunate that when the 33rd Brigade (Maxwell’s) was sent up to capture the trench at all costs, they “fell into precisely the same error,” as we are told. Some of the brigade followed the 32nd to the left; some edged away to their right in the direction of Susuk Kuyu, which must have taken them behind the 34th Brigade, almost into the Anzac country. But as we are further told that the 32nd, though without success, attempted to rectify the error by bravely attacking the trench from the north-east, the solution remains uncertain.205 The attack on that side did not develop further. After 4.30 p.m. one could perceive that the battalions were confused, and still suffering heavily both from that long and loopholed trench which ran across the open almost diagonally to their right flank, and from most formidable trenches which the Turks had now visibly constructed right across the sombre face of W Hill, against which they showed up as lines of whitish grey, loopholed also and roofed with head-cover. Parties tried to press forward here and there, and the dead lay scattered. Two stretcher-bearers I saw quietly going up a slope under very heavy fire, when both fell dead simultaneously, dropping on hands and knees, so that the stretcher remained supported on their shoulders after they were dead. But no individual courage could retrieve the error of direction.

The attack in the centre suffered from the mistake. The 29th Division now contained far less than half of the troops who landed in April. Few indeed of their original officers were left, few of the trusted sergeants and corporals whom they knew. They had been brought hurriedly into the midst of an unknown scene, and found themselves included between lines of unknown and untried battalions. Their former General was gone. His successor was compelled to remain in the Corps Headquarters far away on Karakol Dagh. The Division was commanded by the C.O. of a brigade. None the less, this indomitable Division, in this its last battle upon the Peninsula, displayed to the last the indomitable spirit habitual to its nature, and fought with the same proud self-sacrifice and confident enthusiasm as had distinguished it at the landing.

Between 3.30 and 4, the 87th Brigade (2nd South Wales Borderers, 1st K.O.S.B., 1st Royal Inniskilling Fusiliers, and 1st Border Regiment) advanced from our front trenches, and began working up through the bush on the left front of Scimitar Hill. At first they were partially concealed by the thickets or covered by dead ground in ravines. Reaching the top of the slope, they charged forward to the summit. The Inniskillings, who were leading, actually gained it. They drove the Turks back along the communication trenches towards Anafarta Sagir. They even pursued them down the reverse slope, which is not steep but runs without much fall toward the village plateau. For a few minutes the Hill was ours. But still stronger trenches had been constructed on the edge of the plateau beyond. They were invisible from the ascent to Scimitar Hill; but from Chocolate Hill we could see fire flashing from them, and Turks springing on to the parapets to pour bullets upon our scattered line as it advanced. At the same time the enemy’s guns on W Hill and on the concealed point near the foot of Tekke Tepe hurled a storm of incessant shrapnel over the summit of Scimitar Hill and all its slopes. The converging fire was intolerable. Unless help came speedily, the position could not be held. It is doubtful whether any help could have retained the hold. But none came.

On the right of the hill the 86th Brigade (2nd Royal Fusiliers, 1st Lancashire Fusiliers, 1st Munster Fusiliers, and 1st Dublin Fusiliers) was intended to storm the position in a similar manner from that side. But as they advanced they found their progress hindered by battalions of the 32nd and 33rd Brigades, which, as narrated above, had edged off to their left instead of keeping their direction straight forward and working on parallel lines with the 29th Division. Battalions in the three brigades thus converged and became confused. The men were mixed up in the shallow valley beyond Green Hill and upon the south-west slopes of Scimitar Hill. Instead of being covered by the 11th Division as intended, the right flank of the 29th Division was hampered and almost paralysed. Such battalions as got clear attempted to work up that side of the hill, turning north-east. But the confusion was increased by a raging fire, which with long tongues of flame consumed what was left of the bush around the base of the hill already called “Burnt,” and entirely shut off co-operation with the 87th Brigade on the left. Such parties as reached the broad bare patch of ravine from which the other name of “Scimitar” was derived, became at once exposed to the storm of shrapnel and rifle-fire. Sir Ian in his dispatch says, “The leading troops were simply swept off the top of the spur, and had to fall back to a ledge south-west of Scimitar Hill, where they found a little cover.” If the “top of the spur” means the summit of the hill, it is certain that none of this brigade ever reached it. The Inniskillings were the only men who occupied it even for a time.

About five o’clock the Yeomanry Division was ordered to advance from the cover of Lala Baba, where it had remained in reserve, and to take up its position under the slighter cover of Chocolate Hill. In extended order the small brigades, each numbering about 350, advanced with the steadiness and regularity of parade across the bare and fully exposed level of the Salt Lake. Some of the enemy’s guns diverted their fire from Scimitar Hill and showered shrapnel over the slowly moving lines. But their regularity was exactly maintained, and owing to the accurate distance kept in the intervals the loss was small. Only too eager to reach the firing line, they forced their way through the reserves of the 11th Division around the slopes on the left side of Chocolate Hill, and plunged into the brigades at the centre of the lines, already so much confused and embarrassed. There was much delay, and in places the crowding troops exposed themselves unnecessarily to heavy fire. But the 2nd South Midland Brigade (Bucks, Berks, and Dorsets) concentrated, as was intended, behind Chocolate Hill itself, and was at last able to advance with fair cohesion. Very slowly the men made their way across our trenches to the left front of the hill, and through the difficult and intricate ground beyond, still swept by the flames of the burning bushes, and encumbered by groups of men who had lost leadership. It was past seven by the time they reached the foot of the main ascent, and began to work their way up through fire and smoke and shrapnel.

At 7.30, through the gathering obscurity of mists and evening, we from the parapet in front of Chocolate Hill dimly discerned a crowd of khaki figures struggling at full speed up that broad, bare patch of the “Scimitar.” They seemed to gain the summit, and then darkness covered them. All thought the terrible position was won at last, and though there was no cheering, and hardly a word was said, all felt the joy of hope renewed. We did not know the hope was disappointed as soon as raised. The cross-fire of shrapnel, machine-guns, and rifles from the two hidden trenches beyond the summit, swept off the Yeomanry as it had swept off the 87th Brigade at an earlier hour. Hearing that the position was utterly untenable, General Marshall was compelled to order a withdrawal to the original line, and in the darkness the sorely tried and exhausted men came back. One regiment, working round the right of the hill later in the evening, gained a knoll between Scimitar and W Hills, apparently near the Abrikja Farm, and reported they had taken W Hill itself. When the mistake was discovered, they also were withdrawn, for in daylight they would have been exterminated there.206

This unsuccessful attempt to capture the hill so ominously known as “Scimitar,” and occupied, it may be remembered, without opposition by a single battalion on Sunday evening, August 8, cost little less than 6500 casualties. Most of the loss fell on the 29th Division, but the Yeomanry lost nearly 1000 of their small force, and among the killed were Brigadier-General F. A. Kenna, V.C. (formerly of the 21st Lancers), Brigadier-General the Earl of Longford (formerly of the 2nd Life Guards), whose body was never found, and Sir John Milbanke, V.C. (formerly of the 10th Hussars), commanding the Sherwood Rangers.207 The failure of the attempt had proved that even when acting in combination with the finest Regulars, inexperienced and untried brigades cannot be hurried into the firing lines of an important attack without risk of confusion or collapse. For neither in officers nor in men had the sense of leadership, confidence, or even of direction been trained into an instinct strong enough to bear the strain of the shocks and confused impressions inevitable to a violently opposed advance.

On the south or Anzac side of the broad valley leading up to Biyuk Anafarta, the action was far more successful. The main object in this region was to secure complete possession of the Kaiajik Aghala, that rough and intersected ridge partly occupied by the 4th Australian Infantry Brigade during the general attack upon Sari Bair a fortnight earlier. That brigade, reduced to some 1500 men, now held a position separated by a deep creek from the main ridge, the whole of which, and especially the broad and flattish eminence at the northern extremity, had been occupied by the Turks and strongly fortified. The white lines of their trenches were visible from Suvla and the whole district, the earth being whitish there, as though mixed with chalk. The eminence, which we knew as Hill 60, was chequered with these lines, and resembled the back of a large tortoise with the markings picked out in white. It was, indeed, converted into a fortress commanding the broad and flattish valley between it and W Hill about one and a half miles away. As before explained, the possession of Hill 60 was essential for the security of communication between Anzac and Suvla. If W Hill had been occupied, Biyuk Anafarta and the northern approaches to Koja Chemen Tepe would also have lain open.

Only a short distance west of Hill 60, just where the ridge begins to rise from the plain, two wells called Kabak (or Kaba) Kuyu are situated, equally desirable to the enemy and to ourselves. These also the Turks had strongly fortified, and our first stroke was to seize them. Major-General Sir Herbert Cox, who was in command of the whole movement, had at his disposal his own Indian Brigade, two regiments (Canterbury and Otago) of New Zealand Mounted Rifles, a mixed force of the 4th Australian Infantry Brigade, the 4th South Wales Borderers (40th Brigade, 13th Division), the 5th Connaught Rangers, and the 10th Hampshires (both of the 29th Brigade, 10th Division, now under Lieut.-Colonel Agnew).208 His guns were commanded by Brigadier-General Napier Johnston. He arranged his line so as to have the 5th Gurkhas in the open ground on his extreme left, guarding the communication with Suvla, the Connaught Rangers in the centre opposite the wells, the New Zealanders under Brigadier-General Russell to the right of them, the Hampshires in support of the Australians who attacked on the right, and the remainder in reserve. After a preliminary but insufficient bombardment, the advance began about 3.30 p.m. on August 21, almost exactly at the same time as the attack upon Scimitar Hill across the broad valley.

The moment the guns ceased, the Connaught Rangers, who were finely commanded throughout by Lieut.-Colonel Jourdain, issued from a ravine in the maze of Damakjelik Hill, where they had lain concealed all day. “With a yell like hounds breaking covert,” they dashed forward by platoons in line. They had nearly 400 yards to run, and the ground was open. A terrible fire from the parapets around the wells and from the slopes of Hill 60 itself met them at once. Without firing a shot in answer, they charged forward with bayonets level. It was a race which a young officer won—an International football player for Ireland. The Turks stood the wild onset, but not for long. In a few minutes they had died or escaped; the wells were ours, the communications cleared. A reserve company charged still farther forward to assist the New Zealanders at the foot of Hill 60, but was almost exterminated.209 The remainder became scattered in the confusion of the assault, lost direction, and were not re-formed till nightfall.

To the right of the Connaught Rangers, the New Zealanders issued at the same time from the almost inextricable gullies of the Damakjelik, but between them and Hill 60 ran a singularly deep ravine, one of the branches of the Kaiajik Dere. In climbing down the steep side of this ravine, entangled in prickly bushes, many fell to the bullets poured from the opposite trenches, and the bodies of many who fell there could not be recovered for burial. The only chance for safety was to rush down to the bottom of the ravine and shelter in the dead ground against the steep side of the hill itself. The New Zealanders made the rush, and some succeeded in climbing up the dead ground opposite and driving the enemy out from 50 yards of his lowest trench. Others remained clinging to the steep side, and there a few of the South Wales Borderers, who came between the New Zealanders and the Connaught Rangers, succeeded in joining them. Three hundred yards farther to their right, a party of the 4th Australian Brigade rushed across the ravine in the same manner, and the hundred who came over untouched also clung to the side of the hill just below the trench. So the night was passed, our men along the steep dead ground just holding their position, but exposed to repeated bombing from the trench above them. Fortunately, the Australian Brigade dug a deep zigzag right across the middle of the ravine as a communication trench, thus rendering the approach over the upper or southern reach of the Dere fairly secure. During the night also many wounded, lying on the exposed slope of the ravine, and drawing attention by their cries, were brought in. But the hours passed in great peril and discomfort.210

Next morning a new battalion (the 18th Australian) appeared. It had arrived at Anzac only the day before as the first instalment of the 2nd Australian Division, commanded by Major-General J. G. Legge, who had occupied various military positions in New South Wales, had served in South Africa, and represented Australia on the Imperial General Staff.211 Early on August 22 the 18th Battalion (Lieut.-Colonel A. E. Chapman) passed through the Gurkhas on our left, and charging across the open, fought their way up the northern end of the hill and captured another piece of the outer trench. Bombed and enfiladed there, most of them struggled along the trench to their right—a difficult task, for the Turks had dug it so deep and narrow that only one man at a time could squeeze along it. Thus they linked up with the New Zealanders, still in the same position where they had passed the night. The trench, in fact, ran continuously all round the oval of the hill, and for the next five days we could but cling on to the small segment gained. Meantime the Connaught Rangers were withdrawn for four days to rest. They had lost 12 officers and over 250 men.212 After the first attack, the 29th (British) Brigade under Colonel Agnew was employed by General Russell to dig a communication trench past Kaba Kuyu to Hill 60. They therefore had little rest.

The hill was not taken, but so important was the position considered that Major-General Cox was instructed to attack once more on August 27, three weeks after the beginning of the great battle of Suvla-Sari Bair. The fighting round Hill 60 had, in fact, been almost continuous since the 21st. The battalions were now worn so thin by losses and sickness (especially by dysentery) that definite numbers of men were allotted for action instead of units. On the right, 350 men were chosen from the 4th Australian Brigade; in the centre, 100 Maoris and 300 New Zealanders from the Mounted Rifles Brigade (Auckland, Canterbury, Wellington, and Otago), together with 100 of the new 18th Australian Battalion; on the left, 250 of the Connaught Rangers—only 1100 men in all.213 This attacking party was under the direct command of Brigadier-General Russell.

The action began at 4 p.m. with the usual, as it was the last, bombardment. Sir Ian describes it as “the heaviest we could afford,” and certainly it appeared sufficient to flatten out any trenches. None the less, as was usual from first to last in this campaign, its terrors were deceptive, and the moment that the assaulting parties advanced they were met by overwhelming fire. The Australians on the right were swept back by a whole battery of machine-guns. The Connaught Rangers on the left, though much enfeebled by dysentery, charged upon the northern trenches with their accustomed enthusiasm. Torn by accurate shrapnel as they ran forward, they still fought their way into the first narrow trench, and occupied it by 6 p.m. But all that evening and night, by the light of the crescent moon, the Turks stormed down upon them in successive waves, shouting their battle-cry of “Allah! Allah!” At 10.30 p.m. they bombed and shot the Rangers out of the northern extremity, and drove them along the trench upon the centre. It was in vain that their own reserves (forty-four sick men!) came up to reinforce, and the 9th Light Horse (3rd Australian Light Horse Brigade) attempted about midnight to recapture the position. Only in the centre were the New Zealanders able to cling tight to the 150 yards they had by this time already won.

All next day (August 28) the Turkish attacks upon that position continued with repeated violence. The shattered remnants of the Connaught Rangers were withdrawn, but still the New Zealanders held on through the long hours and the next night, until at 1 a.m. on the 29th all that remained of the 10th Light Horse, after their wild assault upon the Nek three weeks before, formed up in the trenches occupied by the New Zealanders, and stormed across the centre of the fortified hill, driving the enemy sheer off the circumference of the western semicircle. The eastern side of the hill was never taken, but our line was advanced till it ran across the summit, and there consolidated. Our loss was about 1000. The Turkish loss was roughly estimated at 5000, and we captured 46 prisoners and a considerable quantity of rifles and ammunition, besides three trench-mortars and three machine-guns. It was not a great action judged by the standard of the battles in the war elsewhere. But it was an action worthy of the persistence, courage, and endurance displayed throughout by Anzacs, Irish, and British upon the Peninsula; and it was the last.

The whole of the Anzac force, which had never left the fighting zone since the landing in April, was now gradually withdrawn by battalions (only 200 or 300 men in each) to rest in Mudros, their places being filled in turn by the newly arrived 2nd Australian Division, which, however, was not completely settled upon that hard-won ground till after the first week in September.214 The 54th (East Anglian) Division was also brought round from Suvla, Major-General Inglefield’s headquarters being dug upon the Aghyl Dere, and his Division extended north over the ravines of Damakjelik up to the confines of Hill 60 itself. But the 13th Division, now under Major-General F. Stanley Maude, was returned to the IXth Corps at Suvla, so that Anzac did not gain.

CHAPTER XIV SIR IAN’S RECALL

Upon the Peninsula, it was difficult to estimate the general spirit of the army during the six weeks which followed the valiant but only partially successful efforts of August. They were a period of enforced inactivity seldom interrupted, and the usual effect of inactivity upon an army, as upon civilians, is depression. During the campaign it was often observed that in most Divisions the prospect of action, however perilous, at once reduced the sickness, as though to prove tedium more unwholesome than death. But in September tedium supervened, and the diseases of dysentery and diarrhœa, always prevalent since June, spread like a plague. The average of serious cases rose to 1000 a day, and though by far the greater number of the patients returned to duty, the percentage of “casualties” from sickness alone was in some weeks calculated at 300 per annum of the total force, so that large drafts were required to maintain the army even at its shrunken strength. It must also be remembered that both these diseases have a peculiarly depressing effect upon the spirit, weakening the will equally with the bodily powers. Certainly it was expected that the approach of winter would compel the perilous germs to hibernate in torpor, and would reduce the multitude of flies which now enjoyed a livelihood so rich and unexpected upon that desert land. But in other respects the prospect of a winter campaign was not exhilarating.

The Indians stood the climate far better than the British or Australians, either as vegetarians or as habituated to the sun and protected by their colour, whereas the Australians and many of the British sought to avoid heat by going naked, and so exposed their white skins to the unaccustomed and baleful rays. Life in the bazaar or jungle had also rendered Indians immune to diseases against which our civilisation stands unprotected, and flies did not pursue the cleanly food of Hindus and Sikhs with the same persistent avidity. If some of the British troops upon the Peninsula had been exchanged for the Indian troops serving in France and Flanders, both armies would have gained in health. But perhaps a greater cause of disease than sun or flies or infection was the monotony of the diet, as mentioned before. Sir Ian’s appeals for canteens remained unheard till August 30, when a canteen-ship actually appeared at Anzac. Deputed purchasers from every unit hurried down to buy. Bursting with money, they stood in queues, but none received more than one-sixth of what he asked, and, as in a starving town, scarcity laughed at cash. But after the arrival of that one shipload of variety, the numbers of sick suddenly fell, and ultimately ten shiploads came. Allowance must also be made for the arrival of the 2nd Australian Division, which raised the average of health, until the infection spread among its members also; and that was soon.

But more disheartening even than inactivity or disease was the disappearance of the dead and wounded. During August some 40,000—about one-third of the whole force—had gone. Entirely sufficient provision had now been made for the wounded alike in the largely increased number of hospital ships running to Alexandria, and in the hospital camps established near Suvla A Beach (too near the Hill 10 batteries) and on two positions along the Suvla promontory (also disturbed by shells owing to the proximity of store depôts, landing-places, and Corps Headquarters); at well-sheltered points along the Ocean Beach, near Anzac; upon the flats at the end of Kephalos Bay, in Imbros; and especially on the breezy rising ground overlooking Mudros harbour on the opposite side to Mudros town. The dead either lay beyond reach, gradually shrinking to dust on “No Man’s Land,” or were buried in carefully tended little cemeteries, their graves marked with wooden crosses and decorated with shell-cases or white stones arranged in patterns. Brief as regret and lamentation must be in war, it is melancholy to return to familiar dug-outs and find that the familiar occupants have gone, leaving possessions which they will not need again, and perhaps a written notice to warn off intruders from the deserted habitation. The sense of loss was especially poignant at Anzac, where, united by the bonds of adventure and nationality, the men had lived as in a crowded community of fellowship.

Drafts came, but though the drafts were small they sometimes overwhelmed the original battalions, and, partly owing to the unavoidable suspension of drill, they were long in imbibing a good battalion’s spirit.215 Even more serious was the necessity of hurrying new drafts at once into advanced positions. In a note written at Helles on August 30, after visiting the lines before Krithia, I observed:

Interrupted by only few cool and rainy days, the heat continued through September, and the victims to dysentery increased. The shadow of approaching winter also lay upon the army, and its horrors were exaggerated, partly through the classic reputation of inhospitable Thrace, partly by the inexperience of the Anzacs, who had never seen snow or endured cold. More serious than cold was the anticipated downpour of rain, which would convert our roads along ravines into torrents, and fill the dusty communication trenches with mud. Unhappily, owing to the steep ascent to such positions as Quinn’s Post, and the far longer climb to the Apex, where we still clung to a scarcely tenable position overhanging the Farm below the summit of Chunuk Bair, the chief hardships of winter were likely to fall upon Anzac, where the men were least accustomed to resist them. In a note during the first week of September I observed:

Gangs of Egyptian labourers were, in fact, brought to Imbros and set to work upon the main road through the camps there.

As to numbers, at the end of August we had 83,000, including 15,000 French troops, on the Peninsula, as against an estimate of 100,000 Turks there, with 25,000 in reserve. During September, a few small but serviceable units arrived, such as the Scottish Horse (about 3000 men unmounted) under their commandant, the Marquis of Tullibardine; the 1st and 2nd Regiments of “Lovat’s Scouts,” under Lord Lovat, between whose force and Lord Tullibardine’s a rivalry as of old Highland clans persists; a brigade of East and West Kent and Sussex Yeomanry (Brigadier-General Clifton-Browne); a South-Western Mounted Brigade of North Devons, Royal 1st Devons, and West Somersets; and the 1st Newfoundlanders’ Battalion (Colonel Burton) attached to the 29th Division. These units, together with drafts, brought the forces upon the Peninsula up to about half their nominal strength at the end of September. In the beginning of that month, two brigades of the 10th Division’s artillery also arrived at last. The 55th was stationed at Helles, the 56th at Suvla.216 But even so, on September 10, there were only 60 guns at Suvla in place of the full complement of 340.

None the less, in spite of inactivity, sickness, and the discouragement of decreasing strength, the Divisions continued to improve. The improvement was most marked in the 53rd Division (now under Major-General Marshall), the 54th (still under Major-General Inglefield), and the 11th (now under Major-General E. A. Fanshawe). The 13th Division, which had done so well at Anzac under Major-General Shaw, was sure only to increase its reputation under so fine and ardent a commandant as Major-General Stanley Maude. Finally, there was Major-General Sir Julian Byng, who arrived from his cavalry command in France together with Generals Maude and Fanshawe on August 23. He took over the command of the IXth Corps at Suvla from Major-General De Lisle, who returned to his 29th Division, which was retained at Suvla, except that the brigades went separately to the rest camp on Imbros.

Every one expected the order for fresh advance so soon as the new Generals had thoroughly re-established confidence and the IXth Corps Staff had recovered a more sanguine temper. As is usual in times of inaction, rumours flew. The French, it was stated, were sending out new Divisions under General Sarrail. Another landing was to be made on the Asiatic coast, perhaps at Kum Kali, perhaps at Smyrna, more likely at Adramyti Bay, a scheme much favoured by authorities in Mitylene. Another very persistent rumour was for sending the fleet up the Dardanelles again, and hope rose high in the Navy, tired and irritated at their effective but subsidiary service to the military force. Meantime, the actual fighting was limited to the stationary trench warfare of bombing, casual bombardments, and local assault or defence on either side. It gradually became evident that the fate of the expedition depended no longer upon itself, but upon events and speculations far removed from the scene.217

On the Western Front, the Allied armies were occupied through September in preparing for the combined effort which culminated during the last week of the month in the prolonged battles known by the names of Loos and Champagne. As I before noticed, it was mainly for fear of weakening this effort that British reinforcements were refused to Sir Ian, and that the scheme of advancing on the Asiatic side of the Straits with new French Divisions was abandoned, if ever seriously intended by the High Command in France. The efforts so carefully prepared and gallantly carried out succeeded in gaining valuable positions for future advance, but were not sufficiently successful to break through the German line or to diminish the increasing peril of Near Eastern complications. It would be difficult to compute the exact proportion of the men and explosives thus expended without definite result in France which might have effected a decisive and permanent victory in the Dardanelles; but the proportion would not have been high, and how beneficent the issue for the world’s history! Successive disasters upon the Russian Front continued to encourage the military parties in the Balkan States which trusted to German victory for the furtherance of their national aggrandisement. In August the Russian armies were driven from Warsaw, Kovno, and Brest-Litovsk; in September from Grodno and Vilna. Although their skilful retirement won military praise, and although the exhausted German forces were unable to break the lines beyond their points of advance, or even to occupy Riga, it was evident that from Russia neither danger to her enemies nor assistance to her friends could be expected, even though her unmilitary and vacillating Autocrat assumed command. The encouraging effect of such events as the fall of Warsaw upon the Turkish moral was distinctly marked.

In the Balkan Peninsula, fate was supposed still to hang upon the decision of Bulgaria—a decision secretly taken two months before (July 17), although Ferdinand, with lachrymose solicitude, continued to profess the neutrality of a fox between two packs of hounds. From the first, both belligerents had rightly calculated that, in spite of the strong national sympathy with England and Russia inherited by the Bulgarian people, their Tsar, if not their representative Government, could be won by the highest bidder for alliance, and each side attempted to outbid the other with profuse offers of other people’s territory. But when, in mid-September, England and her Allies proposed the cession of Serbian territory at Monastir (a mainly Bulgarian district), Doiran and Ghevgheli (mainly Turkish in race), and part of the Dobrudja, then occupied by Roumania, they had been forestalled by more tempting promises from Turkey and the Central Powers. To the force of such temptation was added the animosity rankling in all Bulgarian hearts against the neighbouring states which two years before (August 1913), by the Treaty of Bucharest, had torn from their country the reward of her decisive victories over the Turk in 1912. Especially against Serbia was this animosity directed, and one might have supposed that even a slight acquaintance with the Balkan States would have warned the Allied Governments of Serbia’s extreme and imminent peril. Yet up to September 20 they continued to hope.

On that day, M. Radoslavoff announced that Bulgaria had signed a treaty with Turkey, but would maintain an armed neutrality for the protection of her frontiers. No one, except perhaps the British Government, was deceived as to the real intention. On September 19 a large German-Austrian army under Field-Marshal von Mackensen had renewed the attack upon Serbia’s capital, and Bulgaria after mobilising her 350,000 rifles could strike at Serbia’s exposed eastern flank almost without opposition from the exhausted Serbian army. Serbia’s one poor chance was to attack her hereditary enemy at once, before the Germans had crossed the rivers in the north. But from this course England discouraged her, and, with unfounded confidence, she awaited the assistance due from Greece according to her treaty of 1913. But Greece, always so justly apprehensive of warlike risks, was presented with a passable means of escape by her own warrior King, that “Bulgar-slayer” and “Napoleon of the East,” whose titles belied his earlier reputation as a leader of panic-stricken flight at Larissa in April 1897.

As a result of the Greek elections in June, when his supporters were returned to power by a two-thirds majority, Venizelos had resumed the Premiership in the middle of August. Clearly perceiving the enemy’s intention of overwhelming the relics of the Serbian forces by armies converging from the north and east, he imagined that Greece was bound by honour and treaty to hasten to her ally’s protection. Greece could nominally mobilise eighteen Divisions, but their fighting strength was probably not over 200,000, for the most part ill-equipped, ill-instructed, and averse from war. Of the Serbian army probably little over 100,000 organised and disciplined troops was left after the struggles of a year. The German-Austrian invaders were estimated at 200,000; the Bulgarians at 300,000, or perhaps not more than 250,000, since the Roumanian frontier needed watching. Attacked on two fronts, Serbia’s strategic position, in any case perilous, became desperate with such inferior numbers. In his zeal for the Serbian alliance, which he recognised as the ultimate defence of Greece herself, Venizelos called upon the Entente to furnish 150,000 men (September 21), and two days later induced King Constantine to mobilise.

On September 28 Sir Edward Grey spoke in the House of Commons, the most significant part of his speech being the sentence:

Our friends in the Balkans can only have been Serbia and Greece. The support most welcome to them was men, but arms, money, and equipment were welcome. To provide the men, Lord Kitchener asked Sir Ian if he could spare two British Divisions and one French for Salonika. Sir Ian replied by offering the 53rd (Welsh) and the 10th (Irish) Divisions. The French offered their 2nd Division on the Peninsula (156), and the veteran General Bailloud, anxious for fresh fields of youthful ambition, claimed command.

The 10th Division—perhaps the pick of the New Army troops on the Peninsula—being ordered to sail at once, embarked on September 30, and, though passing by way of Mudros, was able to land its first detachments at Salonika on October 5, finding two French Divisions already there.219 General Bailloud’s Division, leaving on October 3, began to reach the rendezvous on the same day. There the whole force soon came under the command of General Sarrail, who arrived on October 12, and it was shortly afterwards augmented by other French and British Divisions, two of which were believed to have left England as reinforcements for Sir Ian, but to have been diverted to the new scene of action upon their way.220

So far as the immediate protection of Serbia was concerned, the Allied force thus hurried over from Gallipoli—not more than 15,000 men221—was almost an absurdity, though its arrival caused futile rejoicing among the Serbian people. Its only possible service was to inspire some sort of confidence in a Greek army hastening to save the ally of Greece from destruction. But the Greek army did not hasten. On September 28 (the day of Sir Edward Grey’s speech) Venizelos announced the necessity of mobilisation. On October 3 Russia issued an ultimatum to Bulgaria warning her to break off relations with the Central Powers and dismiss their officers from Sofia. Two days later, the Entente withdrew their representatives, and Bulgaria entered the war as an ally of Germany, though England did not actually declare war upon her till October 15. But on the very day upon which Bulgaria’s intentions were declared, an unexpected blow, which might have been expected, fell. King Constantine informed Venizelos that he did not support the policy of intervention. “I do not wish to assist Serbia,” he said, “because Germany will be victorious, and I do not wish to be defeated.” After pleading the cause of honour and probable advantage, not for the first time in vain, Venizelos resigned, and M. Zaimis, a peaceful banker, formed a Government based on a neutrality of “complete and sincere benevolence” toward the Western Allies.222

It was in vain that on October 7 England again offered to cede Cyprus to Greece as a tempting inducement to fulfil the claims of honour. The King could only repeat his sentiment of “complete and sincere benevolence,” while, as for honour, he maintained a benevolent correspondence, at least equally complete and sincere, with the Court and General Staff in Berlin. He further soothed the conscientious scruples of his people—a task well within the limits of his capacity—by pointing out that the treaty with Serbia did indeed bind them to resist an attack upon her by Bulgaria, but not an invasion supported by other Powers. Once again the people of Greece had cause to congratulate themselves upon possessing a monarch resolute enough to resist the popular will, and adroit enough to interpret the code of honour in accordance with their interests and their conscience. It was true that the most complete and sincere benevolence, as practised by the Greek officers and officials at Salonika, was designed to hinder rather than assist the small and war-worn body of Allies now landing there. So far as saving Serbia went, their landing had now become a belated and unserviceable chivalry. But a King’s function is to further the interests of his own people, and Greeks might fairly hope to derive material advantage from the presence of a lavishly expensive foreign army in their port; and they derived it.223

As any one with some knowledge of Macedonia, Drama, and the Bulgarian frontier might have anticipated, the objects of the Salonika adventure were frustrated from the outset. Serbia was not saved; Bulgaria was not penetrated; the enemy’s communication with Sofia and Constantinople was not threatened. Salonika certainly was rescued from Austrian or Bulgarian occupation; the enemy was thwarted of its possible use as a submarine base (a dubious possibility, as many naval authorities thought); the Entente retained some hold, however small, upon the Balkan Peninsula, and could treat their position as a fulcrum for levering the Greek monarch from his throne. Those were the only advantages, and one may estimate them as considerable. But upon the far grander strategic conception of the Dardanelles, the Salonika project fell like a headsman’s blow. Little life was left beyond the subsiding spasms of a decapitated man. Balked of reinforcement, deprived of half the French contingent and one among his finest new Divisions, Sir Ian called up all his reserve of indomitable hopefulness—a General’s finest quality—for the support of himself and the army that still remained, however diminished. But the powers of darkness gathered round. In front lay the Turks, soon to be supplied with more German officers, more heavy guns, high explosives, and food. Close around him, and at the centre in London, unexpected figures could be discerned moving in obscurity, whispering despair, and suggesting disaster with the malign satisfaction of prophets whose gloomy forebodings fulfil their prognostications. It became evident that a General’s essential supports—the confidence and zealous co-operation of his own Government, never very enthusiastic in Sir Ian’s case—were melting away faster even than his army.

The Turks, on their side, evidently knew that the Irish and French Divisions were going and had gone; for the morning after the departure of the last detachments their aeroplanes dropped messages over the Indian encampments telling the Indians that they were being abandoned only to have their throats cut on the Peninsula. Otherwise, except for occasional air-raids to drop bombs upon the General Headquarters at Imbros, the impenetrable Turks remained quiescent, perhaps already calculating that the Peninsula would be relieved of invaders without their stir, or perhaps merely awaiting the supply of big guns and ammunition, soon to be so easily transmitted by way of Nish and Sofia. Their very silence was ominous; but more ominous still, for the moment, seemed a violent southerly gale which on the night of October 8–9 swept away the two landing-piers at Anzac, sank the valuable water-lighters there, and drove three of the motor-“beetles” ashore at Suvla. Happily, the Australians had recently constructed a new pier in the bay north of Ari Burnu, sheltered from the south wind by that small promontory. There supplies could be landed in any weather both for Suvla and Anzac, but the storm presaged evil for the approaching winter.

Two days later (on October 11) Lord Kitchener telegraphed asking Sir Ian for an estimate of the losses which would be involved in an evacuation of the Peninsula. After consultation with Major-General Braithwaite, his Chief of Staff, and other members of the Staff, Sir Ian replied that the probable loss was estimated at 50 per cent. No estimate could be anything but a guess. All depended upon incalculable weather and incalculable Turks. Earlier in the campaign, General Gouraud had estimated a loss of two Divisions out of six in case of evacuation at Helles. In any case, Sir Ian replied on October 12 in terms showing that such a step as evacuation was to him unthinkable.224 Apart from losses, evacuation would release an army of the best Turkish troops for renewed attack in Mesopotamia or Egypt, to say nothing of the Caucasus and Persia. The risk to our position throughout Asia, dependent as it was upon prestige rather than power, had in such a case also to be gravely considered.

On October 16 Lord Kitchener again telegraphed, saying that the War Council wished to make a change in the command. As he afterwards informed Sir Ian, “the Government desired a fresh, unbiased opinion, from a responsible Commander, upon the question of early evacuation.”225 To supply this fresh, unbiased opinion they had appointed General Sir Charles Monro, with Major-General Lynden-Bell as his Chief of Staff. Until their arrival, General Birdwood was to assume command on the Peninsula.

During the morning of the 17th General Brulard, who had succeeded General Bailloud in command of the French contingent, came over to Imbros with his Staff to say good-bye. Generals Davies and Byng, with the Staffs of the VIIIth and IXth Corps, followed. To say good-bye to his own Staff, Sir Ian rode to the new Headquarters at the entrance of the main valley across the bay, whither he was himself to have removed that very afternoon. To the army he issued the following special order as farewell:

On the Triad he said good-bye to Admiral de Robeck, and to Commodore Roger Keyes, the Admiral’s Chief of Staff. He then embarked on the cruiser Chatham. As she passed down Kephalos Bay, each of the war vessels manned ship in salute. Cape Kephalos was rounded; Suvla, Anzac, and the Helles of the landings were seen by their Commander-in-Chief for the last time, and the Peninsula, which had been the dramatic stage of such high hopes, noble achievement, and bitter frustration, faded in the distance, as the living events there enacted were already fading into a story of the past.

CHAPTER XV THE FIFTH ACT

The departure of a Commander-in-Chief acts upon an army like sudden heart disease in a man, or the collapse of a ship’s steering-gear. All is at once bewilderment and uncertainty. A sense of loss and change and failure pervades all ranks. The daily routine appears hardly worth the trouble of accurate performance, and for enterprise no spirit is left. This is so, even when the General stands aloof and regards his men with small esteem, as was Wellington’s way; but the depression is increased when the recall removes one who is by nature tempted to companionship in action, and who, at the lowest ebb of fortune, stands always ready with the encouraging word and the outwardly serene aspect of hope.

In General Birdwood, it is true, such another leader was found. His adventurous and sunny spirit, always alert, free of intercourse, and incapable of depression, made him accepted as Sir Ian’s natural successor by all except the few whose minds were set immovably towards despair. Yet, in spite of this well-justified confidence, the mere fact of the change suggested speculation upon other changes, and the pulse of action flagged, as though paralysed by uncertainty. In this condition General Sir Charles Monro found the army when, after two days spent in the Headquarters at Imbros, he visited the Peninsula on October 30. He was a man of fifty-five, who before the war had performed the services usual to an officer of that period in South Africa, India, and at home. During the war he had won reputation in high command on the Western Front. The Government had sent him out with a view to obtaining the report of an unbiased opinion, and by appointing a General from the Western Front, and a man of opposite temperament to his predecessor’s, they had ensured themselves against any possible bias, at all events in one direction. His orders were to report upon the military situation; to give an opinion whether on purely military grounds the Peninsula should be evacuated; and, otherwise, to estimate the troops required (1) to carry the Peninsula, (2) to keep the Straits open, and (3) to take Constantinople.226

Upon all these points General Monro formed a rapid and decisive opinion. He represented the military situation as unique in history, and in every respect unfavourable. The Force, he maintained, held a line possessing every possible military defect. The position was without depth, the communications insecure and dependent on weather, the entrenchments dominated almost throughout by the enemy, the possible artillery positions insufficient and defective, whereas the enemy enjoyed full powers of observation, abundant artillery positions and opportunity to supplement the natural advantages by all the devices of engineering. For the troops, they could not be withdrawn to rest out of the shell-swept area, because every corner of the Peninsula was exposed; they were much enervated by the endemic diseases of the summer; there was a grave dearth of competent officers; and the Territorial Divisions had been augmented by makeshifts in the form of Yeomanry and Mounted Brigades. As to military objects, the Turks could hold the army in front with a small force; an advance could not be regarded as a reasonable operation to expect; and any idea of capturing Constantinople was quite out of the question. These considerations, in General Monro’s opinion, made it urgent to divert the troops locked up on the Peninsula to a more useful theatre, and convinced him that a complete evacuation was the only wise course to pursue.227

About that judgment there was, at all events, no hesitating ambiguity. Having condemned the whole expedition, root and branch, the General was obviously not called upon to discuss such minor details as reinforcements, or the reports of Turkish exhaustion and demoralisation, or the exact “theatre” in which the army would be likely to immobilise so large a Turkish force (Mr. Asquith estimated it as 200,000),228 and restrain them from co-operating in further assaults upon Mesopotamia or Egypt. To be sure, there was Salonika as a possible alternative; but Sir Charles Monro must have been aware that Serbia was by that time past saving, and that the transference of the Gallipoli army to Salonika would simply relieve Turkey of all anxiety and restraint. The probable loss of prestige and of men involved in the evacuation does not appear to have influenced his decision; and, indeed, as the event afterwards proved, the loss in both was vastly overestimated by the advocates of evacuation as well as by its opponents.

The report was, naturally, grateful to such of the Generals on the spot and such of Sir Ian’s former Staff as had already abandoned hope. Some, indeed, were now of opinion that the evacuation should have been ordered at midsummer or before. Still more welcome was the report to the party in England which had always distrusted the Dardanelles adventure, and had so largely contributed to its failure both by their depreciation and by their encouragement to irresponsible counsellors of despair. They kept their thoughts fixed upon the Western Front, since, by a law of human nature, interest varies directly with proximity, and some mental or imaginative effort is required to realise the importance of distant undertakings. Already (on October 14, two days before Sir Ian’s recall) Lord Milner had made the following statement in the House of Lords:

Lord Lansdowne, naturally, deprecated so public a suggestion; but Lord Milner found support in Lord Ribblesdale, who urged the Government to “get out of the unfortunate adventure.”229 A few days afterwards (October 18) Sir Edward Carson, the Attorney-General, resigned in protest against the Government’s hesitation to evacuate the Peninsula and concentrate upon Serbia’s protection, for which, however, any efforts would then have been at least a month too late. Thus impelled, Mr. Asquith’s Cabinet, in hopes of justifying their firm resolution to adopt one course or the other, decided upon another preliminary step. They commissioned Lord Kitchener to visit the Dardanelles in person and assume the responsibility of decision.

Lord Kitchener left England on November 5, and on reaching Mudros consulted with Sir Charles Monro, who meantime had visited Egypt and now returned in company with Sir H. McMahon, the High Commissioner, and Sir John Maxwell, Commanding the Forces in Egypt. On his part, Lord Kitchener was strongly opposed to evacuation. His military and political instinct showed him the advantage of maintaining this “thorn in the side” of Turkey, even if no farther advance were possible during the winter,—an advantage illustrated too late when Kut-el-Amara fell in the following April. Some of the most active spirits in the navy were also continually urging a renewed attempt to force the Narrows with the fleet now that ships were far more numerous, the position was better understood, and the army could at least effect a strong diversion on the Peninsula and protect the communications in case of success. To them, as to many of the Generals ashore, it seemed still possible to retrieve the situation and terminate the war from the Eastern side. But on the Aragon at Mudros Lord Kitchener was surrounded by advocates of evacuation. We know with what solicitous anxiety he always regarded any possible danger that might threaten Egypt, and the highest representatives of our authority there were present, always ready to urge the danger of a Turco-German invasion from the East, and trouble with the Senussi on the West. Sir Charles Monro was also present, and we have seen his opinion—an opinion decisively supported by his Staff. Support also came from one or two recently attached members of Sir Ian’s old Staff. As one among them said, “We brought Lord Kitchener round to our way of thinking.”230

This congenial task, perhaps less difficult than it might have proved ten years before, was no doubt rendered easier still by Lord Kitchener’s hurried visits to the main points on the Peninsula. At Helles the visit was little more than a call upon the Headquarters of the VIIIth Corps, and a walk among the remnant of the French force at Seddel Bahr. At Anzac (November 13), the Australians received Lord Kitchener with an enthusiasm due to his massive personality and his record of service. With resolute energy, outdistancing his retinue, he strode up the steep ascent of Walker’s Ridge to Russell’s Top, and penetrated the front trenches whence the assault upon the Nek had started to destruction. By coincidence, it was a day of singular calm, and not a shot or shell was fired. At Suvla, in the same way, he climbed up Karakol Dagh to a prominent cluster of rocks whence a wide view is obtained over the Salt Lake and the plain to the encompassing arc of heights still held by the enemy, and to the unassailed eminence of Koja Chemen Tepe and the fateful bastion of Chunuk Bair beyond. At the conclusion of a Special Order issued to the Anzac Corps (now under command of General Godley), General Birdwood wrote:

The passage, though apparently confident, was guarded. Upon a sudden and hurried visit to such scenes, even the shrewdest and most rapid mind would be likely to exaggerate the disadvantages of the unusual positions, without taking account of trenches and shelters rendered impenetrable, or of supplies stored in quantity to defy the weather on sea; and Lord Kitchener’s mind was deliberative and vasty rather than shrewdly alert to the moment. But ultimately it was the political situation, and especially the deflection of Bulgaria into open hostility, together with the stealthy neutrality of King Constantine, which compelled Lord Kitchener and even the most high-spirited of the Peninsula Generals reluctantly to assent to the surrender of hope.

While at Mudros, Lord Kitchener ordered General Monro to assume command of all British forces in the Mediterranean east of Malta, excluding Egypt. General Monro naturally divided these forces into the “Salonika Army,” under command of Lieut.-General Sir Bryan Mahon, and the “Dardanelles Army,” under command of Lieut.-General Sir William Birdwood. Part of the original Headquarters Staff of the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force was now transferred from Imbros to the Aragon in Mudros harbour, where Sir Charles Monro himself fixed his headquarters. For there he could keep closely in touch with General Altham, Inspector-General, Line of Communications, whose energy and accurate organisation continued to confront the perpetual or increasing difficulties caused by weather, submarines, and the absence of wharves and piers for transferring all ordnance and engineering stores from one ship to another. General Birdwood henceforward to the last retained command upon the Peninsula, and to him the main credit for the unexpected issue of the following weeks is due. He and his Staff occupied the newly constructed headquarters at the foot of the hills rather more than a mile from the chief landing-stage at Imbros, handing over his command at Anzac to General Godley, as has been mentioned.

Few events varied the monotony of trench warfare. The mine-sweeper Hythe was sunk in collision on October 28 and 155 men lost, including two military officers. The submarine E20 was sunk in the Sea of Marmora early in November, Lieut.-Commander Clyfford and nine others being rescued and made prisoner. On November 15 part of the 156th Brigade (52nd Division) captured nearly 300 yards of Turkish trench between the Vineyard and the Gully Ravine. Once or twice the Turks attempted half-hearted attacks both at Helles and Anzac, but were easily repulsed. For the rest, little was done, except bombing, mining, and preparing for the winter. Wooden beams and sheets of plate iron arrived in some quantity, and were especially needed at Anzac. The beaches were, as far as possible, cleared. Stores which had been piled up in the gullies were removed to higher positions. On the left, among the Anzac foothills, Brigadier-General Monash ordered vast caverns to be excavated as sheltered barracks for his 4th Brigade. Up at the “Apex,” long subterranean galleries were dug clean through the crest of Rhododendron Ridge, so as to command the deep ravines between it and Battleship Hill. On one occasion the fumes in an exploded mine tunnel caused several deaths. On another, an Anzac party was cut off in a gallery exploded by a Turkish mine, but dug themselves out and reappeared over the parapet after three days’ burial.231

To the end of November the weather remained fairly fine, except for heavy showers and occasional mists and frosts. The dust was laid, even at Helles and Suvla; flies almost disappeared, and the prevailing sickness was much reduced. But on November 27 and the following four days a natural disaster as deadly as a serious engagement befell the Peninsula. A heavy south-westerly gale brought with it a thunderstorm accompanied with torrents of rain, which poured down upon the Ægean and the Peninsula for nearly twenty-four hours. In half an hour the wind rose to a hurricane, lashing the sea to tempest. At Kephalos one of the ships forming a breakwater was sunk, and all the craft inside the little harbour were driven ashore. At Helles and Suvla the light piers and landing-stages were destroyed, and the shores strewn with wreck. A destroyer was driven ashore in Suvla Bay. At Anzac the trenches were filled with water, and streams roared down the gullies. The fate of Suvla was more terrible. Across a long and deep ravine leading obliquely down from the “whale-back” ridge of Kiretch Tepe Sirt, high parapets had been constructed by Turks and British alike. Against these parapets the water was dammed up, as in a reservoir. They gave way, as when a reservoir’s embankment bursts, and the weight of accumulated water swept down the ravine into the valley, and from the valley into the Salt Lake and the shore, bearing with it stores and equipment, and mule-carts and mules and the drowning bodies of Turks and Britons, united in vain struggles against the overwhelming power of nature. Along the other sections of the lines, the men stood miserably in the trenches, soaked to the skin, and in places up to their waists in water.

Then, of a sudden, the wind swung round to the north and fell upon the wrecked and inundated scene with icy blast. For nearly two days and nights snow descended in whirling blizzards, and two days and nights of bitter frost succeeded the snow. The surface of the pools and trenches froze thick. The men’s greatcoats, being soaked through with the rain, froze stiff upon them. Men staggered down from the lines numbed and bemused with the intensity of cold. They could neither hear nor speak, but stared about them like bewildered bullocks. The sentries and outposts in the advanced trenches could not pull the triggers of their rifles for cold. They saw the Turks standing up on their firing steps and gazing at them over the parapets, and still they did not fire. It was reported at the time that the General, knowing that the condition of the enemy was probably worse than ours, desired a general attack. But movement was hardly possible. Overcome by the common affliction, our men also stood up and gazed back at the Turks. Few can realise the suffering of those four days.

As though to test their power of endurance up to the very last, the full weight of misery fell upon the 29th Division, detained at Suvla since their final battle of August 21. Of that Division’s celebrated battalions, the 2nd Royal Fusiliers (86th Brigade) suffered most, their sentries standing immovable at their posts until they froze to death, and being found afterwards watching from the parapet, rifle in hand. The dead in the IXth Army Corps alone numbered over 200. From the Peninsula about 10,000 sick had to be removed. Many were “frost-bitten”; many lost their limbs; some, their reason. It is probable that the Turks suffered even worse; for prisoners said their men had no blankets, no covering at all except their thin uniforms and frozen greatcoats. But an enemy’s suffering is small consolation for one’s own; nor throughout the campaign was the element of vengeful hatred of the Turk ever one of the impelling motives among our fighting men, whether British, Irish, Anzac, or Hindu.232

This disastrous storm, though none raged again with such fury, may have hastened the approaching end; but the Cabinet’s decision was probably taken immediately after Lord Kitchener’s visit. On November 15, Mr. Winston Churchill, in resigning his office as Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster—an office, it is true, which afforded little scope for the activity of his restless interests—defended his conception of the Dardanelles Expedition in the House of Commons, and expressed a judgment which I believe will be the judgment of future time until the campaign fades from memory:

That was the natural and just lamentation over the decease of the fine conception of whose being Mr. Churchill was the author. But now nothing remained for it but decent burial. On November 30, having visited Salonika and Italy, Lord Kitchener returned. On December 8, Sir Charles Monro ordered General Birdwood to proceed with the evacuation of Suvla and Anzac. By him the whole scheme was designed, in co-operation with Rear-Admiral Rosslyn Wemyss, who was in command of the naval side owing to the temporary absence of Vice-Admiral de Robeck through illness.

To bring away an army from open beaches fully exposed to a resolute enemy has always been recognised as one of the most difficult military operations, involving risk of heavy loss if not disaster. On principle it is not to be undertaken except after a defeat of the enemy’s forces. But in this case there could be no question of defeat, and the enemy was nowhere more than 300 yards distant from our front, and at many points no more than 10 or 20 yards. At Anzac and Suvla alone, rather more than 83,000 men had to be embarked, together with nearly 5000 horses and mules, nearly 2000 carts, about 200 guns, and at each place thirty days’ supply at an average of 4 lb. per man, to say nothing of engineering and medical stores, and all the baggage of Staffs and officers.233

The highest estimate of the probable loss was 50 per cent.; the lowest (and this was the estimate I heard most commonly given by Staff officers just before the event) was 15 per cent. At Mudros preparation was made for 6000 to 10,000 wounded, and in case of such losses, many of the wounded must have been left ashore.234

The force of the enemy opposite Suvla and Anzac was roughly calculated at about 60,000, equally divided between the two positions, and consisting of Anatolians, Syrians, and Arabs. But, including reserves, it was thought there were 120,000 in all upon the Peninsula.235

They were engaged upon constructing new gun-positions with cement platforms, especially behind Kavak Tepe. It was reported that a battery of 12-inch howitzers and two or three batteries of 9-inch guns were on their way from Germany, and the violence of the shell-explosions upon our lines proved that superior ammunition had already arrived. For the rest, the Turks laboured continuously at deepening or multiplying their trenches, and up to the final evening we watched their spades throwing the earth over their parapets. To keep them thus occupied in improving their time, the army and navy employed many ingenious devices. Men who had been embarked at night, or under tarpaulins by day, were brought back again fully exposed to view, as in a stage army. The Indian muleteers were ordered to drive their carts continuously to and fro, making as much dust as possible. On the final days all ranks were ordered to maintain the immemorial British custom of showing themselves upon the sky-line and serving their country by walking where they could best be observed. Both at Anzac and Suvla the guns also had during the last few weeks been ordered not to fire a shot during certain intervals, which sometimes lasted three days together. At Anzac on one occasion, the Turks came creeping over towards our parapets, and even entered the galleries to see if we still were there; but they were so terribly received with rifles and bayonets that the question of our intentions appeared to them settled. Prisoners and deserters (who continued to come in up to the last hour) told us that, in consequence of these simple artifices, the Turks were even expecting a renewed attack. They also spread a persistent rumour that the Turks themselves contemplated evacuation. This report was probably due to the deserter’s natural exaggeration of his miseries; but since the tempest and snow the condition of the men in the Turkish trenches had, no doubt, been deplorable.

At Suvla, so soon as the order to evacuate arrived, our men began fortifying the points at each end of the bay, as positions where a last stand could be made. The front line extended for 11,000 yards, running from the shore of the Gulf of Xeros,236 over the lofty “whale-back” of Kiretch Tepe Sirt at Jephson’s Post, down the steep southern slope, across the tree-covered and partly cultivated plain through the farms of Anafarta Ova and Sulajik, in front of Green and Chocolate Hill, and out into the swampy level of the Biyuk Anafarta valley, till it joined up with the Anzac lines. Fortunately, the recent tempest had filled the Salt Lake with water to an average depth of 4 feet; so that in the centre of the Suvla position no further defence was required, and, on the right, only about 1000 yards of marshy and waterlogged plain had to be entrenched or covered by wire entanglement. The remaining positions were defended by three lines, wired and entrenched, barbed-wire gates ready to close being prepared at all openings of paths and roads.

The embarkation was carried out from the north and south points of Suvla Bay. At the extreme end of the north or Suvla Point a small harbour, capable of receiving rafts, “beetles,” and even trawlers, had been constructed, chiefly by the skill of the 5th Anglesey Company R.E. (Captain Glenn), who had blasted away the rock and built an oblong of low walls to serve as wharves. Near the narrow entrance of this small harbour a steamer was also run aground as a stage alongside of which larger transports could lie. Guns, horses, mules, and stores were taken off on rafts and “beetles” in the little harbour. The battalions embarked from the sunken steamer, usually also on “beetles” or trawlers. The 53rd Division went first. Of the old fighting 29th Division, the 86th Brigade followed, getting away on the night of December 14–15. There remained the 11th, 13th, and Mounted Divisions, together with the 88th Brigade of the 29th, and it was arranged that the 11th Division with the 88th Brigade and one brigade of the 13th should leave from the north point, and the other two brigades of the 13th, together with the “mounted” forces and 500 Gurkhas of the Indian Brigade from Anzac, from the south or Nibrunesi Point, where they could embark from the C and B Beaches of the original landing, under cover of Lala Baba and the cliffs. A new pier had also been constructed near the point on the inside of Suvla Bay, fairly sheltered, though exposed to observation and shell-fire from “The Pimple” and that part of Kiretch Tepe Sirt. In fact, on the very last day (December 19), while I was at General Maude’s 13th Division Headquarters overlooking the pier from the cliff, a 5·7-inch shell tore a large gap in the middle of it; but it was rapidly repaired by the Engineers. A similar pier had been constructed on the far or Xeros side of Suvla Point, below the cliff on which General Byng had now fixed the IXth Army Corps Headquarters. This was entirely sheltered and unobserved, but was only to be used for the withdrawal of the very last detachment. The naval part of the embarkation at Suvla Point was under the direction of Captain Unwin, who organised and conducted it with the same enthusiastic, not to say explosive, energy which he had displayed during the landing on V Beach from the River Clyde.

Night after night, and all night long, the anxious labour was resumed. Guns—the “heavies,” the howitzers, and the field-guns—were drawn down to the harbour, and pushed or pulled with ropes upon the rafts. Mules and horses were brought down, but gradually, lest the enemy should notice the emptiness of the horse-lines along the point.237 Stores were brought down, all that might have been needed only for summer or for a long campaign coming first. Then came the men, brigade by brigade, battalion by battalion, mustering at definite points about half a mile from the harbour, and in turn filing down to the transports. There was no confusion, no visible excitement. Silently the men took their places, and moved to quiet orders. Each carried full kit with pick and shovel or periscope.

As each night of the final week passed and the defences became weaker, the anxiety increased, though none was shown or mentioned. Apart from a general attack, danger lay in three points—the wind, the moon, and shelling by night. A south-west gale, or even a strong breeze arising in the last two days, would have stopped embarkation and left us almost defenceless. The moon was waxing, but a thin mist veiled it almost every night, and the half-obscured radiance helped to guide our men down the paths, and did not betray the meaning of the thin black lines which were just visible upon the twilit sea as trawlers, “beetles,” and rafts slid away. The Turks had the beaches exactly registered. At any hour of the night a dozen of their heavy shells would have reduced the little harbour to a bloody mash of animals and men. On the morning of December 16 they threw six 4·7-inch shells of improved bursting quality right into the middle of the embarkation beach, but it was almost empty then, and only one man was hurt. In the afternoon of the 17th they shelled A West Beach heavily for an hour. Such events showed their power for our destruction, but the nights remained undisturbed, except by our own ceaseless toil. An immense blaze of stores, lighted accidentally at Anzac before dawn on December 18, increased the peril of discovery, but the Turks remained indifferent to portents.

The last day came. It was Sunday, December 19. Little by little the forces at Suvla had been reduced to 12,000 men and 16 guns, whereas, to hold a front line the length of ours, 33,000 men would be required by regulation. The day was passed as usual, each man doing his utmost to give a crowded appearance to the scene. At sunset, the guns fired their parting salute and were withdrawn—the last at 9.30. The men were then brought away—rather more than 6000 to Suvla Point, rather less to Nibrunesi. A small party was left to keep up rifle-fire in the front trenches. Larger parties were left to hold the second and third lines. The rest embarked. Shortly before midnight the front line came in, leaving lighted candles which at irregular intervals burnt a string to discharge a rifle, so that a desultory fusillade was maintained for about an hour. The second and third lines followed in turn, only sappers remaining behind to close up the barbed-wire gates, to cut the telephone wires, and to set trip- and contact-mines at points of likely resort. A party of 200 (I think, 9th West Yorks) were to hold the fourth line to the last, and sacrifice themselves if the Turks attacked.

Intermittent outbursts of firing came from the Turks, and we could hear the rumbling explosions as they toiled at blasting new trenches—an interesting example of labour lost. Once an aeroplane whirred overhead, invisible until she dropped one green star, which blazed for a few seconds just below Saturn and showed her to be ours. On the earth a few fires burned where camps were once inhabited, but gradually they faded out. Two lights glimmered from deserted hospital tents along the curving shore; for our doctors had remained to the last in readiness for the deaths and wounds of disaster. But now even they had gone, leaving notes to thank the Turks for their consideration towards the Red Cross. Otherwise, only the sea and the moon showed light, and over the white surface of the water those thin black lines kept moving away.

From the little harbour arose the varied noise of screaming mules, rattling anchor chains, shouting megaphones, engines throbbing and steamers hooting low. Still the Turks gave no sign of hearing, though they lay almost visible in the moonlight across that familiar scene. At last the final lines of defenders began silently to steal down the paths of Karakol Dagh, leaving four A.S.C. officers under Col. Hodsoll to fire vast piles of abandoned stores—biscuits, bully-beef, and bacon. Officers of the beach party, which had accomplished such excellent and sleepless work, collected. At 4.30 a.m. of the 20th the defenders of the fourth line—about 200 in all—embarked from the concealed pier on the Gulf of Xeros side of the cliffs. And at the same time, General Byng, motioning Brigadier-General Reed, his Chief of Staff, to pass in front of him, left Suvla Point, being the last to leave.

From Nibrunesi Point, under the direction of General Maude, the evacuation was accomplished in the same manner and with the same success. The whole movement involved the loss of only two men, and those by accident. Hospital tents remained standing, and some provisions were burnt. Not a man or gun or cart or horse was left behind.

Those of us who had reached the Cornwallis in Captain Unwin’s pinnace at four in the morning, were roused at six by bugles sounding to action quarters. Dawn was just breaking, as on the day when we landed upon that shore four and a half months earlier. But it was still dark except for the glare of flames consuming the piles of stores on Suvla Point and Lala Baba, and the lesser flames of a wrecked hospital lighter ashore by the “cut” in the sandy spit. By seven it was almost daylight, and the Turks began pouring shells into the fires to deter us from putting them out. With the increasing light, they turned all their guns on to the empty beaches, trenches, and especially the positions on Hill 10, where a battery had stood. Meantime our picket-boats had searched the shores, but found no stragglers, not even an army medical, left behind. The Turkish guns were then directed against the battleships, but they fired wildly and without effect. The Cornwallis answered, her big guns throwing shells upon the slope of Kiretch Tepe Sirt, her lesser armament destroying the breakwaters, piers, and little harbour, so industriously constructed. At nine o’clock she turned and left the long-familiar scene, passing westward towards the mountains of Imbros over a tranquil and sunlit sea. The evacuation had been hurried forward by a day, and fortunate indeed was that anticipation. By nine o’clock next morning a south-west gale was raging, rain fell in deluge, and the sea roared upon the coast. What if the movement had been delayed for those few hours more?

At Anzac the withdrawal was carried out with equal daring and skill. The problem was slightly different, for the position extended in an irregular fan-shape, the centre being very short (only about 500 yards in direct line from the Nek to the Cove) but stretching northward on the left for rather over 3 miles to Hill 60 and the Biyuk Anafarta plain; and southward on the right for about 1½ miles to Chatham Post. The flanks had therefore to be brought in first, and no interior defences were made except a strong redoubt as a kind of “keep” within the Cove itself. It is probable that the withdrawal of the left flank, where the ground is comparatively open, could not have escaped observation but for the supposed presence of a large force at Suvla, and, in that sense, Suvla may be said to have been the salvation of Anzac. The embarkation was carried out partly from the new pier on Ocean Beach north of Ari Burnu, partly from the repaired piers in the Cove.

Of the 40,000 at Anzac, about 20,000 had been gradually taken off to Mudros by December 18. That night over 10,000 more were sent away. All but nine worn-out guns had gone, two being left close up to the firing line, where they had been stationed from the first. Aeroplanes kept watch all day, five being at times up together—a large number for Gallipoli—and no hostile plane was allowed to approach. On the morning of Sunday, 19th, the few guns kept up a brave show of bombardment, the Turks answering with their increased number of guns, no less than seventeen of which were now posted in the Olive Grove, commanding the main beach of embarkation. As at Suvla, the few remaining men (about 10,000 in all) were directed to show themselves freely, and many spent the morning in tending for the last time the graves of the 8000 comrades who there lay buried.

The 6000 stationed in the afternoon to guard the outer lines were divided into three groups—A, B, and C—of 2000 each, and there arose a violent competition to belong to the C group, known as “Die-hards,” because they were to be the last to leave. Group A came from the northern positions and included parties of the 1st and 3rd Light Horse Brigades, the 4th Australian Brigade, and the New Zealand Mounted Rifles with the Maoris (from Hill 60). They marched in absolute silence, magazines empty, no smoking allowed, footsteps deadened by sacking spread over the hard patches of ground and over the planks. By ten o’clock they had all embarked from Ocean Beach. At midnight Group B gathered in the Cove. Among them were New Zealand Infantry from the heights of Sari Bair, 20th Infantry from the Nek, 17th Infantry from Quinn’s, 23rd and 24th from Lone Pine, 6th Light Horse from Chatham’s Post far on the right. Thus the veteran 1st Australian Division of the Landing was now mingled with the 2nd Division, sent to uphold them and give them some opportunity for relief. Descending the diverse gullies from the fan-like extremities, each position bearing so fine a record during the eight months of struggle and endurance, they concentrated punctually and without confusion. The Navy held the transports ready, and they went.

Only 2000 men now remained to guard the long and devious lines from Chatham’s Post to the Apex and the Farm. About 1.30 a.m. of Monday the 20th, a bomb thrown from the “Apex” marked the abandonment of that hard-won and hard-held position. Thence New Zealanders came down: from Courtney’s and Pope’s, 18th and 19th Infantry; from Ouinn’s, the 17th. By 3 a.m. only 800 “Die-hards” were left in groups at points where the Turkish lines came within a few yards’ distance. By 3.30, Lone Pine, Quinn’s, and Pope’s were finally abandoned, and Anzacs rushed down White’s Valley and Shrapnel Gully for the last time. As they reached the Cove, a violent explosion, which seemed to shake even the ships at Suvla, thundered from the heights. Three and a half tons of amenol, laid by the 5th Company Australian Engineers, had blown a great chasm across the Nek, and that ready entrance to the deserted lines was blocked as by a moat and rampart. Rifles continued to fire from the old positions—fired by sand running from buckets. The Turks burst into one of their panic rages of fire against the empty trenches, from which they now expected a general assault. The naval guns pounded the hills. The last of the transports departed, and Anzac shore was nothing but a lasting name.

A few stragglers were taken off by picket-boats in the early morning. A few guns—four 18-pounders, two 5-inch howitzers, one 4·7 naval gun (said to have been in Ladysmith, and, in that case, called the “Lady Anne” or the “Bloody Mary”), one anti-aircraft, and two 3-pounder Hotchkiss guns had to be left, but were disabled. Some carts without wheels, and fifty-six mules were also left, and some stores burnt. The execution of the whole movement conferred just honour upon Major-General Sir Alexander Godley and Brigadier-General Cyril B. B. White, his Chief of Staff, not to mention other names well worthy of mention, and now regretfully to be parted with.238

Even after the evacuation of Suvla and Anzac, many hoped that Helles at least would be retained as a perpetual threat to the heart of the Turkish Empire. But being by this time deeply entangled at Salonika, where the French and English forces had lately been driven back from the edges of Serbia across the Greek frontier, the Cabinet resolved to wipe out the Dardanelles Expedition, as a gambler “cuts his losses,” and leave no trace or profit of all the army’s incomparable deeds. Certainly, it would have been difficult to remain at Helles now that heavy guns were being brought down from Suvla and Anzac; superior German shells had arrived, and German guns were on the way. Throughout the end of December the bombardment was at times very violent, reaching extreme intensity about 1 p.m. on December 24, when the right and centre of our line, from the front trenches to the sea, suffered the severest shelling experienced at Helles.239 With the help of the Navy, and by the construction of deeper trenches and solid shelter, it might have been possible to hold the position as a kind of Gibraltar guarding the Straits. But Imbros and Tenedos, for a naval Power, served that purpose with less risk, and since the glorious hope of advancing upon Constantinople was definitely abandoned, it was argued best to quit Helles and the whole Peninsula.

On Christmas Eve, General Birdwood was directed to prepare a scheme; four days later to complete the evacuation as quickly as possible.240 The problem was to bring away unnoticed rather more than 35,000 men, about 4000 animals, about 110 guns, and over 1000 tons of stores. Most of the remaining French Division had been gradually withdrawn during December, and the 4000 left at the end of the year were embarked on French warships during the night of January 1–2. By consent of General Brulard, however, the French guns were left under command of General Davies with the VIIIth Corps. The French lines were taken over by the Royal Naval Division—that military maid-of-all-work. Some have said that the soldier-sailors were dressed in French grey to deceive such of the enemy as could not hear or understand their language; but this was untrue.

The 42nd (East Lancashire) Division, which had throughout done such steady and persistent work under Major-General Douglas, was withdrawn for a much-needed rest,241 and the 13th (Major-General Stanley Maude), having been at Imbros since the Suvla evacuation, was transferred to Helles. The redoubtable 29th Division was also sent back to the scene of its early triumphs. The troops to go at the last belonged, therefore, to the 13th, 29th, 52nd, and Royal Naval Divisions.

During the days of preparation, little happened to break the appearance of routine. Almost the last assault from our side had been made on December 19, when, simply to distract attention from the evacuation in the north, parts of the 42nd and 52nd Divisions attacked beside the Krithia Nullah, and the 5th Highland Light Infantry (157th Brigade) especially distinguished themselves. Sir Charles Monro also mentions a successful attack by the 52nd Division on December 29. But, for the most part, on our side we beguiled the Turk by periods of complete silence, especially between 8 p.m. and 2 a.m., so as to habituate him to inattentive repose. For the last days, one British 6-inch gun and six old-fashioned French “heavies” alone were retained, to give a semblance of active hostility. On January 7, however, the very day before our departure, the enemy, possessed by one of his unaccountable moods, directed a terrible bombardment against the 13th Division on our left from Achi Baba, and a slighter fire against the R.N.D. on our right from Asia. It lasted all afternoon, and at 3.30 the Turks attempted an attack near Fusilier Bluff, between Gully Ravine and the sea. Officers were seen urging the men forward as in earlier days; but the men had no longer the spirit of earlier days, and since they were disinclined to move, the attack faded away. Fortunately, our want of artillery was compensated by a naval squadron off the west coast. None the less, we lost a hundred and six wounded and fifty-eight killed—the last to lay their bones upon the earth of that dedicated Peninsula. The 7th North Staffords were chiefly engaged.

Next morning (January 8) rose fair, with a light southerly breeze. The Turks kept unusually quiet, and it was resolved to accomplish the evacuation as arranged. Major-General Lawrence (C.O. 52nd Division) had been put in charge of the embarkation on the military side. Positions on all the beaches were fortified as redoubts for a small garrison to hold to the last. On Gully Beach, Major-General Maude selected the position and prepared the evacuation of his 13th Division. Specially selected officers superintended the W and V Beaches. The naval arrangements were carried out by Captain C. M. Staveley, R.N., assisted by naval officers at each point of embarkation. In addition to the three strongly wired lines of defence across the Peninsula, a fourth had been constructed from Gully Beach to De Tott’s Battery. Troops on the left naturally withdrew from Gully Beach or W (four piers); on the right from V Beach (three piers and the River Clyde).

On the afternoon of the final day the Divisions had only four battalions apiece remaining upon the Peninsula. They came away in three groups or trips, the first withdrawing soon after 7 p.m. and getting off in destroyers and “beetles” without difficulty. But at sunset the breeze freshened, and it began to blow hard from the south-west, the quarter to which W Beach was most exposed. The connecting platform between the shore and the hulks which served as wharves there was washed away by heavy seas. Still, the second group, and even guns, were safely taken off about midnight. On V Beach, while the second group was waiting at eleven o’clock, the Asiatic guns began to bombard, but fortunately all but two shells fell short into the sea, and only one man was wounded. Hardly, however, had fifty of the R.N.D. put off to the Prince George in a “beetle” at 11.30 and got under way for Mudros with 1500 others, when they felt the dull thud of a torpedo against the vessel’s side. The torpedo did not explode, but the presence of the submarine, known to the navy all the evening, added to the anxiety of the final hours. Starting from Gully Beach, a lighter also went aground after all had left, and the 160 men had to be landed again and marched over to W Beach for embarkation.

At 11.30 the final party or rearguard—about sixty men from each Division—withdrew from the front lines. With bombs and rifle-fire they had kept up as much noise as they could to conceal the movement of the rest. Now, leaving lights and devices by which dropping water filled tins and discharged rifles when the tins were full, they crept away under cover of officers’ patrols, who maintained a desultory fire, barred the gates, and connected the mines. About 2.30 all arrived at the beaches, to find a heavy surf dashing upon the shore. Nevertheless, though under great stress and peril, by 3.30 the beaches were cleared. The Military Transport Officer, coming off the River Clyde, was the last man to leave. Time fuses lighted the heaps of abandoned stores, and exploded masses of ammunition. In all, fourteen of our well-worn old 15-pounders, a 6-inch gun, and the six old French “heavies” were abandoned and destroyed. Far worse was the fate of 508 horses and mules, most of which were killed. All animals and stores might have been embarked, had it been safe to wait. But the rising storm of that night was a warning, and, as at Suvla, only by the barest luck in weather was disaster avoided. The Turks began shelling the beaches at the first sight of the fires, and continued that unprofitable expenditure till 6.30 a.m. of January 9. At Helles, as at Suvla and Anzac, those incalculable Orientals remained ignorant of our departure, though here expecting it. No doubt they were glad at our going; naturally, they were glad. And so, by the evacuation, our authorities, whether political or military, were acting contrary to Napoleon’s maxim of war: “Never do what you know your enemy wants you to do.”

So the episode of the Dardanelles Expedition, equal in splendour of conception, heroism, and tragedy, came to an end. During the eight and a half months of its continuance upon the Peninsula itself, the land forces, including the Royal Naval Division, but not counting the Navy or the French (whose losses are not published), suffered the following loss:

A large proportion of the missing must be counted as killed. The number of sick admitted to hospital between April 25 and December 11, 1915, was 96,683, of whom also a considerable proportion died. If we may take about one-quarter of the missing as killed, and about one-twentieth of the sick as having died, the total of lives lost amounts to about 36,000. The total losses of the Turks have been variously estimated between 400,000 and 500,000, but those estimates are conjectural.

The causes of our failure have been, as I hope, reasonably signified in the preceding account of the campaign. They may be summarised in relation either to the movements on the spot, or to the attitude of the home Government. On the spot, we failed chiefly owing to the premature naval attacks, which gave the enemy warning of our intention, and owing to the design of forcing the Straits with the Navy alone, which might indeed have been temporarily successful if persisted in, but in the end would have given us only a dubious advantage; for a fleet penetrating to the Sea of Marmora would have remained dangerously isolated so long as both sides of the Straits were strongly held by the enemy. The second initial error was the delay in concentrating the military forces for the land attack—a delay chiefly due to the retention of the 29th Division in England, and to the necessity of returning the transports from Mudros to Alexandria for the rearrangement of the military stores and munitions. As to the actual operations on land, it might be argued, in the light of wisdom after the event, that the first landing had better have been made by a combined force at Suvla Bay and on the Ocean Beach at Anzac, though, in that case, larger numbers than those allotted to the Expedition at the beginning must have been demanded. Again, with regard to the failure of the August operations, it might now be maintained that the forces at Anzac were dissipated by the assaults at Lone Pine and the Nek, and by the over-elaborate subdivision of the attacking forces upon our left. Even in spite of the natural intricacy of the ground, a concentration of all available troops into one main body (or at most into two) for a grand assault upon the Sari Bair range from Chunuk Bair to Koja Chemen Tepe might have given better results. As to the “inertia” which prevailed at Suvla on the critical day of August 8, and the confusion, delay, and fatal mistakes of the preceding and following days, thus precluding the support to the Anzac movement upon which the Commander-in-Chief had fairly calculated, no more need be said. Owing partly to the temperament of Generals, partly to the inexperience of their Staffs, and perhaps chiefly to the want of confidence between the poorly trained troops and their senior officers, the instrument to which he trusted broke in his hand.

The ultimate burden of failure, however, lies on the authorities at home. The Allies were presented with the most brilliant and promising strategical conception of the war up to the present time (spring, 1918). Success would have given them advantages already repeatedly enumerated: a passage would have been opened for the supply of grain from Russia, and a supply of munitions to that country; the enemy’s hope of advancing either towards Egypt or the Persian Gulf would have been frustrated; the Balkan States would, at worst, have remained neutral, or, calculating on future favours, would have joined our Alliance in hurried gratitude; Venizelos would have remained in power, and King Constantine’s military and domestic predilections have been suppressed; the belated attempt to rescue Serbia after her destruction was assured would not have been required; Tsar Ferdinand would have scented his own advantage on the side of Bulgaria’s natural sympathies; Roumania, relieved from apprehension on her southern frontier, could have watched the Transylvanian passes or crossed them at pleasure; Russia might possibly have retained her front lines intact, and, at the worst, would have immobilised large armies of the enemy. The Central Powers would then indeed have been surrounded with an “iron ring,” and peace secured in the spring of 1916. The main disadvantages of such a peace to the world would have been the probable occupation of Constantinople by Russia, the fortification of the Straits in her interest, and the continuance in power of the autocratic Tsardom, surrounded by its attendant supporters in bureaucrats, secret police, provocative agents, censors of public opinion, and all the other instruments of political and religious tyranny.

At that time the future of Russia could not be foretold, any more than it can be foretold now. But the advantages here recapitulated should have been too obvious even for insular statesmen to overlook. Mr. Winston Churchill was justified in the protest already quoted, that “if there were any operations in the history of the world which, having been begun, it was worth while to carry through with the utmost vigour and fury,” it was those. Far from displaying vigour, let alone fury, the Government appears to have regarded the Expedition rather as an overburdened father regards an illegitimate child put out to nurse in a distant village. It was a “by-blow,” a “side-show,” something apart from the normal and recognised order of things. A certain allowance had, unfortunately, to be apportioned for it, but if the person who superintended its welfare clamoured for more, that person must be kept in the proper place, or palmed off with gifts that were no gifts. Every breath of suspicion or detraction must be listened to, every chance of abandonment welcomed, and the news of a peaceful ending accepted with a sigh of relief.

For myself, in coming to the conclusion of this account—faithful as far as I could make it, but so inadequate to the tragic splendour of the theme—I feel again a mingled admiration and poignant sorrow, as when for the last time I watched the scene from the battered deck of the River Clyde and, under the dying brilliance of sunset, looked across the purple current of the Dardanelles to those deserted plains which long ago also rang with tragic battle. The time is fast approaching when the deserted Peninsula of Gallipoli looking across to Troy will be haunted by kindred memories. There the many men so beautiful had their habitation. There they knew the finest human joy—the joy of active companionship in a cause which they accounted noble. There they faced the utmost suffering of hardship and pain, the utmost terrors of death, and there they endured separation from those whom they most loved. The crowded caverns in which they made their dwelling-place are already falling in, except where some shepherd uses a Headquarters as more weatherproof than his hut, or as a sheltered pen for sheep. The trenches which they dug and held to the death have crumbled into furrows, covered with grass and flowers, or with crops more fertile for so deep a ploughing. The graves are obliterated, and the scattered bones that cost so much in the breeding have returned to earth. But in our history the Peninsula of the Dardanelles, the Straits, the surrounding seas, and the islands set among them will always remain as memorials recording, it is true, the disastrous and tragic disabilities of our race, but, on the other hand, its versatility, its fortitude, and its happy though silent welcome to any free sacrifice involving great issues for mankind.

FOOTNOTES

INDEX