OCCUPYING THE LAND
The morning of April 26 found the Australasians occupying the cliff
top in a long semicircle, with its right resting on the sea at a
point opposite the hill of Gaba Tepe, and the left resting on high
ground above the coast at a place called Fisherman's Hut. The New
Zealanders were on the extreme left, with the 4th Australian Brigade
in support of them; next were the 1st Brigade from New South Wales,
next to them were the 2nd Brigade of men from Victoria, while on the
right were the 3rd Brigade, or what was left of it.
All night they had been fighting, the Turks making brave but
ineffectual attempts to dislodge them, and being quite unable to
prevent them from digging themselves in. The scattered groups of
pioneers were soon sorted out into their various battalions, missing
men turned up from all sorts of unexpected places, and order was
rapidly instituted among the ranks. This was a very necessary step,
for men had been fighting side by side with perfect strangers, a
state of things which afforded unlimited opportunities to the host
of spies and snipers who swarmed boldly among the Australians, and,
employing perfect English, did much to create confusion and loss
among them.
Some incidents that occurred during that temporary confusion are
evidence of the amazing audacity of these enemies, most of whom were
Germans. They were equipped with undeniable Australian uniforms, and
spoke with the same accent as the average Australian officer. One of
these fellows encountered Captain Macdonald and Lieutenant Elston,
of the 16th Battalion (West Australia), and professed to convey to
them orders from a superior officer that they should at once go to
a spot beyond a piece of rising ground. Unsuspectingly they went,
and fell into the hands of a band of Turks, who made them prisoners.
The same man delivered a similar message to Colonel Pope, also of
West Australia, but on his way to the rendezvous this officer saw
something which made him suspicious. He took a flying leap from the
rise on which he was walking into a patch of soft sand many feet
below, and just in time to save his life. The rise where this took
place was promptly christened Pope's Hill; it lies to the left of the
deep ravine mentioned in Sir Ian Hamilton's dispatch as being one of
the main features of the ground before the Australian line.
The enemy had also become acquainted with the Australian bugle
calls, and in the darkness the "Retire" was frequently sounded on
the bugle, loudly and insistently. But before landing the precaution
had been taken to announce that all bugles had been removed, and
that other signals had been substituted. Consequently no notice was
taken of this ruse on the part of the enemy, except that it made the
Australians profoundly suspicious. And when their suspicions were
aroused, the Australians were not easily duped, as many a bold spy
found to his cost.
One fellow, in the dress of an Australian officer, ventured to convey
some spurious orders to a small group of men who were holding a
detached position. He was heard with a show of respect, and then the
sergeant asked, "What battalion is yours, sir?" "The 22nd" was the
ready reply; a very good one, if there had been a 22nd battalion.
"And what ship did you cross on?" continued the questioner. "There
is no need to cross-examine your superior officer" was the answer,
delivered with the utmost coolness. Just then a rifle cracked, and
the supposed officer spun round and fell. "Bit sudden, aren't you?"
asked the sergeant of the gaunt Australian who strode forward.
"What?" said the shooter, "22nd battalion! Don't know what ship he
came on! Let's look at his papers." There was found plenty of proof
that the summary methods of the bush were fully justified; and the
example was a wholesome one for the audacious colleagues the spy
undoubtedly possessed, who had found their way among the temporarily
disorganized Australasians.
The snipers, with whom the hillsides were thick, showed in some
instances an equal audacity, leaving their prepared hiding places in
the scrub on the approach of the Australians, and joining with them
in the dusk, pretending to help them look for snipers. During the
first few days these marksmen accounted for many brave Australian
officers, and in some instances it has been established that an
Australian officer was killed by a shot fired from behind, the
sniper's lair being passed by the advancing line, though that line
contained many bushmen of great skill and experience.
On the other hand, a great number of these fellows were tracked to
their hiding places, where they thought themselves quite safe, and
got short shrift. The nature of the country made all these ruses
possible to the Turks and their German tutors. Most of it was covered
with a dense scrub of short, bushy trees, with branches growing right
down to the ground. Set very close together, these afforded excellent
cover to both sides, but the initial advantage lay, of course, with
the defenders, especially in the early days before the Australasians
had become familiar with the country. An instance of the density
of this scrub is given by an officer of high rank, who, on a tour
of inspection, found a group of some twenty soldiers advancing
cautiously through the thickest of it. On asking them how they were
progressing, he was told, with a great show of genuine sorrow, that
they were the survivors of over a hundred, the rest having been cut
off. He was able to tell the "survivors" that they were the third
group he had encountered in his tour, each believing that the others
were hopelessly cut off by the enemy.
In that first twenty-four hours of fighting the Australasian officers
set an example of cool courage and hardihood that might have spurred
men less daring than their own to deeds of the greatest courage. "The
officers were splendid" is the universal verdict of the men, who
are not easily moved to enthusiasm. But Australia and New Zealand
paid a heavy toll of their finest officers and most trusted leaders.
The first man out of the boats was Major Gordon, of Queensland,
who leaped into the water shoulder high, followed by a dozen brave
fellows in the same instant. But a bullet cut the gallant Major off
before he set foot on dry land, the first Australian officer to give
up his life in Gallipoli. In the very act of landing Major Robertson,
of Queensland, fell dead; Colonel Braund and Colonel Garside did not
long outlive him, nor did Colonel Clarke.
Next day saw the death of Colonel McLaurin, one of the leading
barristers at the Sydney bar, and a man whose high character was
renowned from one end to the other of Australia. "He was a man of
singularly high, noble and chivalrous mind," wrote one who knew him
well, when his death was announced. "No unworthy word ever passed
his lips; it was impossible to imagine any action of his that would
be other than generous and just; and there is no doubt that with his
remarkable abilities, his courage, and his charm of character, he
would have attained the highest position in his profession, or in the
profession of arms."
An equally high value was rightly placed by Australia and New Zealand
upon other of their brave citizen soldiers who perished gallantly in
that first day's fighting so far from home. With simple emotion a
sergeant tells of the death of the brave Colonel Clarke. "We stormed
the cliff, and the Turks did not wait for us. Halfway up I came
across our Colonel. He had his pack on. I asked him to throw it down,
but he said that he did not want to lose it, so I carried it for him.
We advanced about one mile and a half due east of our landing-place,
and found the Turks holding a ridge in great strength, so we lay down
and opened fire. I was alongside the Colonel, and had just given him
his pack and got down again, when _zip_--a bullet got him in the
body. He was dead in a minute. Major Elliott was sent for. He had
been there only two seconds when he was hit. Another officer came up
and he was hit, so we had got into a fairly hot place."
[Illustration: Roll-Call on Brighton Beach.
The sad scene after an engagement, when the wide gaps in the ranks
are disclosed by the failure of dead, wounded and missing to answer
to their names.]
The difficult country made it necessary that officers should take
great risks when making observations, and they took them cheerfully
and courageously. The casualty lists show what a heavy penalty was
paid in officers killed and wounded, but the success attending the
operations proves that the risk and the loss was not without fruit.
Those lives, so cheerfully risked and lost, were not wasted; they
were spent audaciously for the purpose in view. "You cannot lead your
men from the rear," was the motto of the Australasian officers at
Gaba Tepe, and disregarding the imploring counsel of the men beside
them they set an example that Australasia will ever mourn and cherish.
The rewards for distinguished service earned in that first day's
operations are so numerous as to testify the great gallantry and
ability shown in the actual onset. The D.S.O. was granted to Colonel
McNicoll, of Victoria, for his gallantry and skill in leading
his battalion into action; and to Colonel White, of the Garrison
Artillery, for the skill he displayed in the work of reorganization
after the necessary confusion of the landing. Colonel McNicoll was
afterwards severely wounded when leading his men forward in the great
charge at Krithia; and at the time of writing lies slowly recovering
in a London hospital. Major Brand, of Queensland, carried messages
personally under heavy fire on many emergency occasions, and gathered
groups of stragglers into a band which, under his command, attacked
and disabled three guns. He, and Major Denton, of West Australia, who
occupied an important trench with only twenty men, and held it in
face of repeated attacks for six days, both got the D.S.O.
Among recipients of the Military Cross was Lieutenant Derham, of
Victoria, who was severely wounded in the thigh, but continued to
do his duty for five days more in spite of his agony. He returned
to Great Britain with five wounds. Captain Richardson, of New South
Wales, led his men up the steep path of the cliff into two bayonet
charges against bands of Turks five times their number. The men on
either side of him were killed, and he had a bullet through his cap.
Finally, an expanding bullet struck him on the shoulder, inflicting
a terrible wound. Many other officers were rewarded for their grand
work on that first day; the instances given are only typical ones
that come to hand.
The non-commissioned officers and the rank and file displayed no
less bravery and devotion. There was Sergeant Ayling, of Western
Australia, who was one of a platoon which got too far forward in an
exposed position, and received the command to retire. The officer in
charge, Lieutenant Morgan was severely wounded with shrapnel while
this operation was in progress; and Ayling, with three volunteers,
returned and drove off the advancing Turks with bayonets, afterwards
carrying his wounded officer to safety. Then he reformed his platoon
and returned to the attack, holding an exposed position until
reinforcements came.
Private Robey, of Queensland, seeing a boat drifting away from the
landing-place with a wounded man as its sole occupant, plunged into
the water, swam out to the boat under heavy fire, and rescued the
comrade from a certain death. Sapper McKenzie, of the Engineers,
displayed a similar devotion in carrying a wounded sapper to a
departing boat, and pushing it off under heavy fire. He himself was
wounded while making for cover. These are only examples among scores
of acts of individual bravery displayed on that day of April 25. Some
of them have received official recognition; some escaped unrewarded;
many of the heroes of that day paid for their gallantry with their
lives.
Foremost in heroism on that Sunday were the doctors and
stretcher-bearers, of whom the men speak with eyes glowing with
enthusiasm. Private Howe, of West Australia, tells how Dr. Stewart,
who had wrenched his leg so badly that he had to be invalided,
nevertheless picked him up when wounded and carried him on his back
under heavy fire for half a mile to a place of safety. Major O'Neill,
of New Zealand, has also received the D.S.O. for his bravery and
resource in command of bearers.
The Red Cross men were glorious. Most of them worked for thirty-six
hours without cessation, and some of them fell down asleep in exposed
positions from sheer weariness, as they toiled about the steep
rough hillsides at their grand work of mercy. "Two of them saved my
life, and I don't even know who they were," said one convalescent
Australian. "I was wounded in an exposed trench, and was bleeding
quickly to death. My mate wouldn't stand for it; a good chap, but
a bit fussy. He signalled back that a man was dying for want of a
doctor, and these two chaps came out through the thick of the bullets
and carried me off at a sprint. I remember no more until I was on
a Hospital ship. They ought not to have come; they risked two good
lives to save a doubtful one; and I don't know even who they were and
can never thank them." Perhaps those two nameless heroes will see
these words one day, and know that their devotion is not forgotten by
its grateful object.
Their work was equally as dangerous as that of the fighting soldier,
for in those first days of fighting at Gaba Tepe, the Turks made
no attempt to respect the Red Cross, though their conduct in this
respect improved later on. To advance into the line of fire with a
stretcher, under the supposed protection of the Red Cross, was to
court a speedy death, and yet there are countless instances of this
being done.
One incident, for which a number of witnesses will vouch, shows that
this disregard of the Red Cross was part of their training at the
hands of their German tutors. A German officer who was lying badly
wounded in the firing line attracted the attention of an Australian
Red Cross man, who bent over him to render assistance. The return was
prompt; the wounded man drew his revolver and shot his benefactor.
With a roar of anger, an Australian soldier rushed forward and drove
his bayonet time after time through the body of the ungrateful wretch.
The Australian Engineers, who landed about midday on that momentous
Sunday, were soon busily at work under the heavy fire directed upon
the landing-place. As if by magic, practical paths appeared leading
up the cliffside, with sandbag protections; and thus a means of
conveying stores and ammunition to the trenches above was at once
improvised. The landing-place was improved, and means of getting
guns and heavy stores rapidly ashore were contrived with marvellous
rapidity. Soon Brighton Beach assumed the appearance of a busy little
port, with boats coming and going continually, while shrapnel burst
around them and threw up the sand in showers on the beach.
The Australasians completely lost their hearts to the sailormen, with
whom they were working here. "I was glad to get out of the blooming
boats," said one Australian when recounting his experiences; "but
those Jack Tars went to and fro under the shells and bullets as if
they never knew of them. You ought to have seen the little middies
in charge of the boats; young boys that might have been larking at
school. Just boys with round rosy faces, but so keen. When I have a
boy I mean to put him in the Australian navy. It makes fine men of
them."
The Australasians excited a corresponding admiration from their
British sailor friends, not only for the way they fought, but for
their whim of bathing under shell fire. Brighton Beach is an ideal
place for a swim, barring the small circumstance that several Turkish
batteries concealed in the broken ground had the range of the place,
and devoted a flattering attention to it. But this did not deter the
Australasians, when their time came for a rest, from trying the tonic
effect of a plunge in Gallipoli waters.
One man would be stationed on the shore, to give warning, and a score
would take to the water together. "Duck," the signalman would cry,
as the whining groan of shrapnel shell was heard. Down would go
their heads all together, and up their heels, to disappear under the
water just in time to avoid the spray of bullets that tore the smooth
surface into foam. Then the sailors, watching the fun through their
glasses, would roar with laughter; and the gasping Australians would
show their heads again, to take breath for the next plunge. It sounds
reckless, but the practice continued, though many men subsequently
lost their lives through it.
But these amusements were not possible in the few days that followed
the first landing. Within twenty-four hours of the appearance of
the first warship off Gaba Tepe, the enemy had brought an army of
25,000 men to hold the strongly-prepared positions that commanded the
heights above it, and to attempt to drive the Australasians from the
precarious footing they had obtained with so much daring. Furious
attacks were made all along the line, the object being to prevent
the invaders from digging in, and establishing themselves. The 3rd
Brigade, which had led the way up the cliffs, and suffered most
severely in the initial fighting, had a very hot time of it. They
stood firm against repeated bayonet attacks, as did the whole line;
and the work of entrenching went on steadily, in spite of the brave
fury with which the Turks repeated their attacks.
The warships gave splendid help, shelling the main bodies of the
defenders wherever they showed on the ridges. The _Queen Elizabeth_
was conspicuous in this work, standing off so far to sea that she
was hardly discernible, yet landing her gigantic shells with amazing
accuracy among the ranks of the Turks. The havoc played by one of
these shrapnel shells may be imagined when it is considered that
they weigh three-quarters of a ton, and contain 20,000 bullets.
Nothing impressed the Australasians more than the hideous din made by
the explosion of one of these gigantic shells, and the scar on the
hillside that showed after its bursting.
It was under the supporting fire of the warships that the Ninth and
Tenth Infantry made a most gallant bayonet charge on the 26th, to
drive the Turks from a ridge beyond Pope's Hill, which commanded the
whole Australian position, and permitted machine guns to enfilade the
landing-place. They advanced in open lines through the scrub, making
dashes of a hundred and fifty yards at a swift run, and then dropping
to take breath for another charge. Twice they drove the Turks from
the position, and were in turn driven back; the third time they
stayed there.
The 8th Battalion (Victoria) had to bear the brunt of repeated
charges by bodies of Turks who far outnumbered them and came charging
with shouts of "Allah! Allah!" The losses sustained by the enemy in
these charges were enormous. The 4th (New South Wales) made one
dashing bayonet charge that carried them right through the Turkish
camp, but beyond they came into an area commanded by machine guns,
and got off again, having lost heavily and fought most gallantly.
These are only some of the incidents detailed out of the confusion of
the second day's fighting. By the end of that day the Australasians
recognized that they were there to stay. A conversation in one of
the advanced trenches bears quaintly upon their certainty on this
point. One by one the men gazed through a periscope at the prospect
commanded from the height they occupied. "Fair country for stock,"
remarked one, as he yielded his place. "Take a lot of clearing,"
commented another. The third was a miner. "Here," he said after a
long inquisitive look around, "chuck me an entrenching tool; I'm
going to try for a prospect."
Yes, they were there to stay right enough; until their duty should
call them to fight the cause of right and freedom somewhere else.
Already a lamentably large number of them were there to stay until
the last trump shall sound the call to them to arise and receive the
reward the hereafter holds for brave and noble men, who have laid
down their lives that justice and goodness may not perish from the
face of the earth. But dead or alive, the Australasians were there
to stay, until such time as they should receive the command to retire.
Already they had made history after a fashion which is testified in a
letter written about that time by General Birdwood, who had charge of
the whole of the Gaba Tepe operations, to Sir George Reid, the High
Commissioner in London for Australia. The General wrote:--
"The capture of the position we at present hold will, I feel sure,
go down to history as a magnificent feat of the Australians and New
Zealanders. Our one chance of success was to hurl ourselves on the
position on a broad front, and just insist on taking it. That is just
what we succeeded in doing. We tried our best to effect a surprise
by landing at night, though this was necessarily a risky matter, but
our one great chance. Our surprise, I fear, was by no means complete,
as owing to the moon setting late, our ships were necessarily
silhouetted against it as we approached, and we were consequently
met with a heavy fire whilst still in the boats. Nothing, however,
would stop the men, who just raced ashore, and up and all over this
most difficult scrub-covered hill, of which we now hold a portion.
In their great zeal, I am sorry to say, some detachments advanced
too far, getting right away from the flanks, while the enemy held
the centre in strength, and there were, I fear, completely cut off,
which made our losses heavy. That, however, could not possibly be
avoided, for had commanding officers and brigadiers waited to form up
their commands as they normally would have done, we should probably
never have captured the position at all, which great dash alone was
able to take."
[Illustration: Sir George Reid, High Commissioner for the Australian
Commonwealth, 1914-15.]
POPE'S HILL AND GABA TEPE