TRAWLERS IN THE DARDANELLES
The work of the trawlers in the Dardanelles demands special mention.
The men running these vessels are in the majority of cases elderly,
and the ships themselves were never intended to come under fire; yet
these men have constantly been in very hot places, and have gone there
knowing what was in store for them.
The ships have been used for every conceivable kind of work. They have
carried stores, troops, mails and munitions. They have been engaged
in mine-sweeping, patrolling and towing nets. They have tackled the
elusive submarine; in fact, they have done everything that can be
thought of short of bombarding forts, and they would cheerfully take
this job on if required. Here is the typical day of a trawler during
general ferry work, on which I took passage.
We left Kephalo early in the morning, calling first at Anzac, then at
Helles; from there to Rabbit Island and Tenedos; back to Helles, and,
if required, to Anzac again. Generally from Helles this trawler would
go direct to Kephalo. The round is seventy odd miles. Every morning
on starting, the skipper knew the ship would come under shell-fire at
Anzac almost without fail, as the anchorage is commanded by the Turkish
guns, and any sign of movement, or of ships arriving or leaving,
invariably brought its accompaniment of shells. I gathered from him
that this had been his daily lot for four months.
He was a fine type of North Sea skipper, and took everything as it came
with a stoicism which was admirable. He didn't like it—nobody does; but
it was his job, and there was an end of it!
The day on which I took passage with him was typical of all the others.
We left Kephalo at seven in the morning, the sun well up and already
hot, blue sky, blue sea and a very light breeze. Anzac, our first port
of call, showed up clearly some twelve miles off, standing out, by
reason of its distinctive character, from the rest of the coast. Rising
between the flat sandy beaches—C beach and Brighton beach—it looked as
if the Sari Bair range had suddenly been chopped off or slipped into
the sea. Here were no foot-hills sloping gently to the coast, but
abrupt sandstone precipices looking very unfinished in the brilliant
morning light.
The fact that our reception, of which I had already been warned,
would be as usual, was borne out on nearing the coast. The Anzac
water-steamer, lying some 3000 yards out waiting for lighters to come
off, attracted the attention of the enemy. When we got fairly close
to her we heard a distant bang, which told us the Turks were awake.
Now a gun being fired at you is unmistakable and quite different from
one of your own guns, though the latter may be much louder. In this
case, although only a second or two intervened between the report and
the splash of the shell, it gave time for speculation as to what was
the enemy's objective. The shell fell about fifty yards short of the
water-boat, and was followed immediately by another which straddled
her, pitching about the same distance over. On this, she rapidly got
under weigh and stood out to sea, followed by a number of rounds which
were ineffective.
By this time we were close into Anzac beach, and had anchored
preparatory to a picket-boat coming off to take our mails, etc. Four
other trawlers lay close to us engaged on various duties. The Turks
being baulked of their first quarry, now turned their attention to
us, and it must be said that nothing is much more unpleasant than to
be confined in a very small vessel at anchor with no protection but
the thinnest sheet-iron. Their first shot at us was shrapnel, and the
range not bad. Shrapnel is, I think, the most spiteful sounding of all
shells. The sharp report of the shell burst, followed by a kind of
metallic whistle as the numerous bullets tear through space, being very
unpleasant. However, after this trial-shot the enemy turned to high
explosives, and one's feelings gravitated between hope that they would
not hit us and wonder that they didn't. Some of them were certainly
closer than I cared for, but having a camera and a feeling that, after
all, things were very much in the hands of Allah, I thought the moment
seemed opportune for a photograph. Being on the bridge at the time,
I held my camera ready and was almost immediately rewarded by a high
explosive pitching about thirty yards over us on the port side. There
was no time to look in the finder, as the column of water thrown up by
a shell subsides very quickly, so I simply pointed the camera at the
spot, in the hope that somewhere on the plate there might be a result.
By now we were under weigh again, after handing our mails over to the
shore-boat, and the other trawlers were heaving up their anchors. The
Turks, realising that little was to be achieved, ceased fire, except
for an occasional shrapnel to hurry us on our way.
Anzac, as we left it with the morning sun right overhead, looked a
most forbidding spot. The deep, gloomy shadows of the gullies were
accentuated by the brilliant sun lighting up each knife-edged ridge.
One could picture the scene on that morning of April 25, when the
gallant troops from Australia and New Zealand made their wonderful
landing on this inhospitable shore.
Our course, after standing well out to avoid the enemy's guns, now
lay to the southward, parallel to the shore, Helles being our next
calling-place. At this time the only parts of the peninsula occupied
by the Allies were Anzac and Helles. Seeing the great extent of
country held by the enemy, it was brought home to one what very small
holdings were ours after months of desperate fighting. Here and there
on the way were monitors and destroyers occasionally firing on enemy
gun positions, or on any movements of troops that could be seen.
Opportunities for the latter were rare, the nature of the ground
rendering it easy for the enemy to keep entirely out of sight. Nearer
the end of the peninsula was my own ship, the _Theseus_, one of the
flanking ships patrolling on the left of the troops at Helles. Shortly
after we rounded Cape Tekeh and anchored, where again a picket-boat
came alongside, bringing details for the island of Tenedos and taking
off the mails we had brought. Meanwhile, a certain number of shells
were falling on the base camp, and occasionally an "over" would drop
among the shipping; but nothing came near enough to worry us.
The base camp from the sea gave an impression of a burnt-up waste.
The long occupation had removed every sign of vegetation, and nothing
remained but yellow sand and clouds of dust driving seaward in the
freshening breeze.
The place was teeming with life, apparently oblivious of the falling
shells. The whole face of the sand-cliff was honeycombed with dug-outs
and roads cut for transport, and the beaches were covered with the
endless paraphernalia of a camp in war-time.
Our next place of call was Rabbit Island, to the south of Helles. As we
left the end of the peninsula, a wonderful panorama could be obtained
of the whole position. Achi Baba loomed over all, while to the right
Seddul Bahr, the entrance to the Dardanelles, and the Asiatic shore
showed clearly. It was here that the disastrous attack of April 18
took place, which showed us the futility of forcing the Narrows without
an adequate landing force acting in co-operation.
Our stay at Rabbit Island was short. Only one or two ships lay there.
The island itself is a barren hummock of very small extent, and of
little value except for the special use to which it is being put. Some
ships' boats came off for fleet letters and a few mails, after which we
took our departure for Tenedos.
Tenedos, one of the most flourishing of the islands in the vicinity of
the Dardanelles, is used by us and the French as an aeroplane base. The
picturesque harbour is surrounded by quaint buildings, with an ancient
fort dominating the whole. A short stay here completed our business.
The return journey to Helles and Kephalo was uneventful. True, our
reception at Helles was disturbed somewhat by a 6-inch shell, which
fell immediately astern of us as we were approaching our anchorage.
Fortunately, this was a solo, for, though we momentarily anticipated
the usual chorus, nothing further occurred to disturb our peace of
mind. None the less, I must say I looked forward to an early departure;
but this was disposed of temporarily by the arrival of a picket-boat
with orders to wait for two naval officers. However, this only delayed
us some twenty minutes, when we took our leave of Helles, arriving at
Kephalo at dusk.