THE LANDING AT ANZAC
One bright morning in April, a group of young officers sat smoking on
the deck of a British destroyer lying amid a crowd of warships and
transport vessels in Mudros harbour, on the southern shore of the
Grecian island of Lemnos. They were clad in khaki, with sun helmets,
which marked them out as military, not naval officers. Seated in a rough
half-circle, some on chairs, some on the spotless deck, they appeared to
be specially interested in one of their number, at whom they were
throwing questions one after another.
"What's the Turkish for 'Give me some beer,' anyhow?" one had just
asked.
"_Bana bira ver_," replied the young subaltern. "But you won't easily
get it, you know. Moslems don't drink it."
"Do they grow grapes?" asked another.
"Oh yes; _yuzum_ 's the word."
"Don't they make 'em into wine, then?"
"They're not supposed to, but I daresay you might get some if you said
_Bana sharab ver_ very politely."
"You won't want it, Ted," said a third. "We've plenty of our own stuff.
Our Australian wine is as good as any."
"Besides," said the man they were questioning, "you won't get many
opportunities of making requisitions of that sort. There aren't any
inns in Gallipoli, you know."
"What's the Turkish for _inn_?"
"Khan."
"Say 'keep up your pecker' in Turkish: that'll stump you."
"Not at all. If you fancy your Turk is downhearted, say to him
'_Gheiret ileh_.'"
A subaltern, who had furtively taken from his pocket a booklet with a
buff-coloured paper cover, turned over the pages, replaced the book, and
bending forward said:
"Here's a poser for you. What's the Turkish for 'not to be able to be
made to love'?"
There was a gust of laughter.
"Tomlinson's thinking of the girl he left behind him," said one of his
comrades. "_Gheiret ileh_, Tommy."
"Stumped, Forester?"
"I'm sorry for Tomlinson; he'll have a mouthful to say.
_Sevderilehmemek_ meets the case, I think."
"By Jove!" gasped the last speaker. "Sounds like a bird twittering."
Tomlinson had taken out his book again.
"Forester's right," he said, examining a page. "What a language! How
in the world did you manage to learn it?"
"What have you got there?" some one asked.
"A remarkable production called 'Easy Turkish,'" Tomlinson replied. "If
that's easy! ... It's supposed to be a word-book for our chaps in
Turkey; but while it gives you the Turkish for 'not to be able to be
made to love'--as if any sane person would want to say that!--it doesn't
tell you how to say you're hungry or thirsty. Poof!"
He flung the book overboard.
"Bang goes sixpence!" he remarked. "You'd better compile something
decent, Forester."
"It's too late now," said Frank, smiling. "Pity; I might have made a few
honest pennies if I had started in time."
Frank had been taken in the hospital ship to Malta, where he found his
father. As he made a swift recovery from his wound, he grew more and
more eager to join the fighting forces, and was on the point of applying
for a commission when news came that a military expedition in Gallipoli
had been decided on, to retrieve the failure of the naval operations
which had been in progress for several months. With his father's
approval he hastened to Alexandria and applied for work in connection
with the expedition. His knowledge of Turkish and his recent
experiences in Gallipoli served him well. Interpreters were much
needed. He was attached as interpreter to the Australian contingent with
the rank of lieutenant, and accompanied the troops when they sailed for
the base in Mudros Bay.
"What sort of a place is this Gallipoli?" asked one of the young
Australians, who had heard something of Frank's adventures.
"A very hard nut to crack," Frank replied. "I don't know much about the
coast, which is mainly cliffs with very narrow beaches; but the interior
is all rocky hills and ravines, covered with scrub and dwarf oaks. You
couldn't imagine finer country for defence, and the Turks are best on
the defensive. They've had time for preparation, too. A couple of
months ago I saw them dragging a battery up the sides of Sari Bair, a
hill nearly 1000 feet high, and since then no doubt they've planted guns
all over the place."
"We're in for a hot time, then," remarked Tomlinson. "Well, I was fed
up with Egypt. That attack on the canal was a futile bit of stupidity,
and I was afraid they'd keep us there on the watch for another attack
which not even the Turks would be asses enough to make. If we're in for
the real thing now--well, I for one am delighted, I assure you."
At two o'clock on Saturday afternoon, April 24, the flagship took up her
position at the head of the line, and the warships passed down among the
slowly moving transports amid cheers from the men on the crowded decks.
Two hours later the troops were lined up with the ships' companies to
hear the captains read Admiral de Robeck's final order of the day, and
to join in the last solemn service conducted by the chaplains. Then the
vessels steamed slowly northward, towards the scene of what was to be
the most heroic enterprise in the long annals of our history.
All night the fleet made its slow way. On Frank's destroyer the naval
officers entertained the troops with their traditional hospitality, and
then the men--such of them as excitement did not keep awake--slept
through the remaining hours of darkness.
At one in the morning of Sunday the ships hove to, five miles from the
fatal shore. The men were aroused and served with a hot meal. The
stillness of night brooded over the decks, and the young soldiers,
browned, stalwart, eager, chatted in subdued tones. Twenty minutes
later came the signal from the flagship for lowering the boats, which
had been swinging all night from the davits. Silently the men moved to
their appointed places; the boats dropped gently to the water, and out
of the darkness glided the steam pinnaces that were to take them in tow.
Frank and his new acquaintances were to remain on the destroyer, which
would go close inshore and land them in boats after those towed by the
pinnaces had reached the beach.
It was still dark when the boats, each in charge of a young midshipman,
moved slowly and silently shoreward. The group of officers on the deck
of the destroyer followed them with their eyes until they were swallowed
up in the darkness. Their hearts were beating fast with suppressed
excitement. What was to be the fate of this great adventure? Could
their approach have been heard? Would the enemy be taken by surprise?
Had the shore at this spot been fortified in anticipation of attack?
Nothing was known. The dawn would show.
Three battleships had taken up position in line abreast to cover the
landing. The boats stole past them. Through the gloom the outline of
the cliffs was just faintly discernible. Frank gazed breathlessly
ahead. He could barely distinguish the foremost boats creeping in
towards the shore. All was silent; the brooding hush seemed ominous.
Suddenly a searchlight flashed from a point on the cliffs, showing up
the boats as it moved slowly over the water. Still not a shot was
fired. The destroyer, one of seven, began to move. It had barely got
under way when there was a long line of flashes at the level of the
beach, followed in a few seconds by a sharp crackle. The Turks had
opened rifle fire. Then came the faint sounds of a British cheer. The
first boats had reached the beach: dark forms could be seen leaping
forwards into a blaze of fire. Frank watched them with a quivering
impatience. His general instructions were to go ashore when the landing
had been made good and to hold himself in readiness to interpret so soon
as the first prisoners were brought in. But in his heart he longed to
be among the gallant fellows who were braving the perils of the assault;
why should he be passive when they were daring so much?
A light mist crept over the sea, almost blotting out the cliffs.
Presently the destroyer moved slowly shorewards; it stopped again, and
at the moment when rifle fire burst forth with greater intensity the
boats were lowered over the side. Frank sprang into the first,
throbbing with exultation as it pulled in. The rosy dawn was just
creeping over the hill-tops, the mist was dispersing, and he could now
clearly see the khaki figures swarming like cats up the shrub-covered
almost perpendicular face of the cliffs.
The boat touched shoal water. Frank leapt overboard with its company,
and rushed up the beach, strewn with prostrate forms and discarded
packs. Just as he reached the first trench, from which the Turks had
been hurled at the point of the bayonet, the man beside him reeled,
gasped, and fell against him. Frank laid him gently down; then, losing
all sense of his non-combatant capacity, he seized the man's rifle and
bandolier and sprinted after the others.
For a few moments he ran forward in a blind confusion of the senses.
The yellow sandstone crumbled beneath his feet: in front was what
appeared to be a green wall streaked with yellow. Bullets whistled
around. Here and there men lay huddled in extraordinary attitudes on
the slope; now and then he caught sight of a figure clambering up. On
he went, through shrubs that grew higher than his head, conscious only
of continuous flashes, until suddenly he came face to face with a dark
figure that seemed to have sprung up out of the earth. Instinctively he
thrust forward his rifle with a fierce lunge, and the next thing he knew
was that the Turk had sunk down before him, and that he was leaping into
a trench.
Close to his right he heard the murderous rattle of a machine gun. He
stumbled along the trench for a few yards, shouting he knew not what,
tripped over a man prone in the bottom of the trench, and before he
could pick himself up was kicked and trodden by a number of Australians
who had followed him. Struggling to his feet, he hurried on, to find
himself in a furious melee about the emplacement of the machine gun.
Two of the Australians were down, a third was at deadly grips with three
big bearded Turks. Frank rushed at the nearest of them, and disposed of
him with his bayonet. At the same moment the second fell to the bayonet
of the Australian, and the third turned, scrambled out of the trench,
and plunging into the scrub disappeared up the hill.
"Got the gun, sir," cried the Australian with a happy grin.
Frank, gasping, trembling, leant against the side of the trench.
"Take it down," he replied.
Another boat's load of men came rushing along the trench. There was no
officer among them. Gathering himself together, Frank put himself at
their head, and leapt up the hill, in pursuit of the Turks who had been
driven from the trench. The ground was broken by ridges, gullies, and
sand-pits, and the scrub grew so thickly that they could scarcely see a
yard in front of them. To keep a regular alignment was impossible. The
men separated, each forcing his own way. None of them had yet so much
as charged their magazines. The work had all been done with the cold
steel. Here one plunged his bayonet into the back of a fleeing Turk:
there another shouted with delight as he discovered that a swaying bush
was really a sniper who had tied branches about his body for
concealment. As they mounted, friend and foe became hopelessly
intermingled. Frank caught sight occasionally of a knot of Turks, then
of a group of Australians; next moment nothing was to be seen but scrub
and creeper intermingled with bright flowers of varied hue as in a rock
garden. Foot by foot he climbed up until presently he found himself at
the crest of the hill, and saw the Australians busy with their trenching
tools amid a furious rifle fire from the Turks in their main position.
His eye marked a steep gully which formed an almost perfect natural
trench. Shouting to the men nearest him, he was joined by a score or
so, who leapt into the gully beside him. And as the sun rose over the
hills on that Sunday morning, Frank, without being aware of it, was
within a few hundred yards of his old hiding-place, the sepulchre on
Sari Bair.