IN THE TRENCHES AT GALLIPOLI

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2506, 6 July 1915, Page 6

IN THE TRENCHES AT GALLIPOLI

IN THE TRENCHES AT GALLIPOLI ■ ; —'■ A LANCE-CORPORAL'S STORY TOLD TO THE NEW ZEALAND i CORRESPONDENT (By Malcolm Ross, Official Correspondcnt with tho New Zealand Forces— Abridged.) . .. \ Cairo, May 20, 1915. Lance-Corporal Noel Ross, who is in hospital hero suffering from shock and an injured spine and leg, had ail extraordinary experience. A shell exploded near him whon ho was Tauge-finding on the Sunday, but ho weilt on fighting, and later—on tho Wednesday—collapsed on tho battlefield. After remaining unconscious for sixteen hours, ho eamo onto a hospital ship,' and it was an extraordinary coincidence that on. awakening he found that he had been ticketed by an old schoolfellow—-Dr. Aubrey Short. He - had also lost his hearing, apparently as tho result of an exploding shell, but this lie has now regained. Ho seems to have had a miraculous es;cjpe/;for. tlidre; was not even') a scratch on him. His memory up to' a' certain point is perfectly clear regarding incidents and operations in those first few terrible days,, -and. in various interviews he gave me ! the subjoined account of his own. observations and experiences. There, were, however, periods 011 the' Tuesday, and also late on Wednesday, about which he could not remember what had happened. His mind, so far as tlieso are concerned, is an absolute blank. . . . How We Helt} Our Cround. , After describing in detail' tho' arrival off Gallipoli Peninsula and the landing of, tho forces on' April 25, the narrator proceeded: "AH that day the..fjghtiug continued, and the broken sectors, un--able to communicate with each' other,' fought staunchly—Australians arid New Zealande'rs shoulder to - shoulder— against groat'odds, and in.many cases were, overwhelmed. But we held our ground in. spite of everj-thing. Every oattalion had readhed the firing-line iii disorder.; That was inevitable, owing to the nature of, the country and of the figjhting. _ Many of the' trenches wore filled: with miscellaneous squadsmad© up, of Australians and. New Zealanders,. Hitherto - not the . best of friends, the men .from the two colonies now fought together like'demons, help-, ed each other's wounded, shared .each .other's, water-bottles, and died together, till,'at the end ..of the day, those 'who had ,come through safely in strong terms expressed /thoir mutual 'admiration and vowed eternal friendship. ■ ''Night came at last, and as'the sun dipped beyond the Gulf of Saros the rifle fire slackened perceptibly and finally canio only in fitful bursts, ;these bursts, from, side they came,'' being due mostly to-'nerves.' Then as was their wont on this and the succeeding ; nights,' th 6' Turks istarted a violent shrapnel fire. Theii;' shells, however, wqro bursting high and their, effect for this reason was considerably minimised. At.the,.same, time the enemy, observa-tion:'"was.'-.well : and tlieir better, firo was well placed by some observers', who in the daytime must have ..been;able to .see the whole of our base, .on tho beach, and all our trenches." 1 ' "The Big Lizzie." - / • "All that night wo got no sleep, about B,o'clock a fine but chilling rain began to fall. .Added to this most of us were. moist with 'a clammy dampness as tho result of our drenching" in the salt water in- the early morning. Wo lay down as we wero without blankets. .Throughout the night rifle fire continued .fitfully, bullets falling all around. By this, t-inie, however, we wero_ quite -used; to this. At first'you are.'inclined., to duck when you hear a bullet-whistling overhead, but there is-no use. ducking, because before:.you could do jso the'bullet, would be either pist.you 'or..through you.-. With'a shell it is different. .' You hear its screech in time,; and duclc for any cover thero may bb in tho irrimediato vicinity. The whistle'of. the shrapnel bullets is perhaps more uncanny than tho noiso made b'v_ an approaching; shell. Tho Queen Elizabeth was firing shrapnel with biillets.about the sjze of small 'eggs." Somo few bullets fell over.! us,. we picked up- others in : the . abandoned -Turkish trenches,-as we advanced. 'S A'■ 15-inch shell 'from 'The Lizzie' contains 20,000 bullets, and as an 18-pouiider field gun cnn cover ail: area of '250 yards by 50 you can : imagino how. tnany acres of ground the shrapnel from the ■ new battleship can dust up with ono-shot. A Modlhr incident. ."I forgot to toll. you that on. the Sunday when I was using a range-finder I was the witness of a strange and Extraordinary .incident.' 'Tho j range-finder is iii_ itself .a powerful telescope. "Onour inimodiato'. froiit, that is on the left-of our whole position, thero we're two ship's boats ■on the beach.' In 0119 a dead man sat in a dejected attitude with iui arm,-thrown over the gunwale. 11l the other boat,.Jialf a mile from us, were a great many bodies—Australians. Altogether there were thirty' dead men there—-or at least, so 'wo thought at the time. ; As I looked through the.glass I could see tho body of an apparently dead isailor lying in a most, life-like attitude, his .white face, 1 turned as if hoi. wero gazing towards our position, his chin resting on his hand. I thought littlo more about this 'sad scene until the.'Monday, afternoon, when, about 3 o'clock, I had another look through tho glass. Then'l saw that the'.sailor had changed his'position and,, was'lying— his white cap'still on his head—with his white faco turned to the sky. Ten minutes later T was thrilled to see a figure detach itself. from tho ghastly heap and hobble along the beach only to collapse a few\ yards away. .The moment lie had moved a Turkish sniper' had opened firo. on him, and I could . see the splash of sevoral bullets in tho water after they had gone, past him. With four men I went , along the beach to try and get him out, but wo bad not got more than a hundred yards ; from our trench' when tho sand and stones near us began to rise in diist 'in response to a Turkish fusillade. . Other bullets :whizzedi past us into tho sea. .Wo then decided that it was best to go about our job more warily, so running from .cover to cover we got within hailing distance of tho man I had seen. Ho was shot through both knees , and was cheery, but almost done. There were four others, ho said, out there.'in the'heap', still alive. The night before there had been eight, but four of these had not lasted till dawfi. AH this time we had teen drawing the fire of tho Turks, audi wo dared not approach tho wounded man, who was lying 'right in tho open, for fear of attracting tho further attention of tho Turks to, him.' By degrees 110 managed to crawl to cover and we got him back. Such incidents were happening -every few minutes. There wero scarcely enough can■non within' our- lines during those first fow days when the l Australian and Now Zealand Army Corps stormed and held the heights of Gaba Tepe. "Evory fivo minutes deeds were performed that were worthy.ot the highest decoration known to military authorities. Looking back onithoso first days .one has nightmarc-liko visions out o£ which stand clear some of tho most consummately cool performances. Colonial Sang-froid. "Toiling up, a slope in the early hours of the morning wo cnmte across a wounded Australian officer. Ho, was shot through the jaw and had halted to have a rest half-way from tin firing line to the dressing station. He was a ghastly ibjiot aa. fcLNft

of a grin on his poor shattered face, but ho had all his wits aliont him, and he told as in detail whero we were most wanted, what to do when we got there, and, then ho mercifully fainted just as a stretcher party came up to receive him. Everywhere it was the same, and one got positively blaso about such incidents. Surely thero coul;i not ho a better example of pure coolness than the following incident, which I myself witnessed. A New Zoalander was carrying fl large biscuit-till full of water to the firing-line, and he had to pass over a very open space where 'the bullets were positively raising tho dust. One bullet neatly puctured a hole in the water tin which he was carrying on bis shoulder. Now an ordinary man would at least havo taken cover. Instead he put. both hands up and stopped the holes where the water was going to waste. He continued his advance and reached us with almost all the precious fluid. "Every evening the Turks energetically shelled' the beach where wo had our ambulance dressing stations. Consequently the wounded wer*> subjected to a fierce shrapnel fire as the stretcher parties went along the foreshore. This was too much of a good thing, and it was remedied by' a strenuous staff officer (Colonel Chaytor), who got together a fatigue party and, himself armed with a shovel, built a well-constructed path under cover of the sheltering sandhills near the beach. : "On Wednesday, all through the big attack the word kept coming back for more ammunition, mere water, and more reinforcements. As the fresli men made their way up the steep slopes they mot an interminable* string of wounded coming down to the beach. And had tho sight been vouchsafed us a , few months before we would doubtless all have had the stuffing knocked .out of us for a moment or two at least. As it was, however, these cheerful cripples put now heart into the men, and they' went.into actiq\f<sl tlie more determined to make good. Ono man I saw shot through the groin pulling himself along in a sitting position, sliding, scuffling down a slope. 'That's pretty rough work,'. I'said, smiling, but his answer ,wa's- unexpected.''lt's damn bad for my pants,'' ho said' cheerfully. "At one stage a few hand grenades began, to arrive.in our trenches: They wore'of two varieties, and there was one kind that smelt vilely and seldom went. off., The other went off so quickly that one; didn't have time to know whether it smelt or not. One of this latter species landed in a treiich alongside a corporal of the Wellington Battalion (A. H.' Piper). It had still an inch of fuse to burn, so he held it quiotly until it was almost gone—and then 'threw,, it back. Grenade-throwing' at that sector stopped from that moment. 'That's what's meant by surprise effect,' said the corporal, as he resumed his. rifle. . ' "Men do queer things when under excitement. Once . I ,saw. an 'Australian dadi out after a Turk with the bayonet. Ere got him,, too, but ho tickled him with it first by way of preparation! ','Over on tho right on the Sunday a panting; bluejacket (now in khaki) iflung himself down beside me, whispering, 'Give us a smack at. 'om,' Tommy, afore I_ goes,back'to mo boat.': And he emptied two of my clips at the green bushes opjjosite' bofqr.e' he went hack ; to explain why he had kept the cutter waiting for him." ■ . Dealing With the Snipers. -'' Lance-Corporal Boss paid a tribute to tho brave , work performed 'by tho stretcher-bearers and to the part played by the warships' guns. Proceeding, he said: "On the Monday men were still being rushed ashore,_ and as thoy 'camo they went straight into the firing line. Our position was gradually consolidated'. Water and ammunition were to.bo had in plenty, and our .communications were restored. Snipers were still responsible for many of tho casualties, and I saw one qiieer incident. A-sniper had been - worrying us' during the morning, and two Australians , vowed in lurid language that they would stalk the beggar, and stalk him they did. They left the trench and crawled on all fours. into the bush and disappeared. Presently they reappeared, one of them wearing a .Turkish cap. They .were lugging somothing through the bushes, and. they pushed it gently-over-.the, steep cliff. This was tho' sniper. 'Did you got him all right?' we asked when'they came back to tho trench. .'Oil, yes, we got him,' they replied, 'an'' wo : didn't hold no bloomin' post-mortemi either. He kicked as he.went oyer the cliff!'. At. an-' other stagojof' tho fighting I saw , two snipers who had boen -dislodged from their hiding place rush, .down towards our. lines in the direction of one of tho dressing stations.- Tho first was wounded and collapsed some yards, short of it. The second had gone Berseck,- and displayed'all tho bravery of fanaticism. An Australian stuck him with a sheathknife, and so stopped his onward rush.

A'Tremendous Attack.' "Regarding Tuesday—though: I must have gone all through the lighting on that day— my, mind is no\y, a- blank. On Wednesday tliero was a tremendous attack. Tlio enemy tried to turn our loft'.flank. They had .received rein-: forcomerits tho night-before,'and about 9 a.m.. the fire became terrific. Our. right was comparatively- safe, - but on the', left about half a mile , froin the, beach tlio enemy launched company after - company, battalion after battalion,' at our position, till we" must have been opposed, by >at least from two to threo brigades.' Machine-guns played an important part in tlio operations. -Tlio Turks were led by. Germans, and had a stiffening of German soldiers. They, frequently used flat-nosed and explosive bullets. A captured German ' officer liatl the night before promised us somo hot gun fire, and sure enough we now began to get it. Their shrapnel began to be most effective, arid on several occasions tliey found and maintained the range on our, howitzer gun emplacement on , the beach. .They seemed to liavo brought at least- threo six-gun bat-, teries into action against our one, howitzer battery of four guns, which was under the personal supervision of tho Brigadier of the Field Artillery, Colonel G. N. Johnston. Tlius Brigade Headquarters and' indeed Army Headquarters wore subjected to shrapnel fire, and the harassed staff had no placo to go where in quiet' and safety they could work out their tactical schemes. Not only was this so, but on occasions at night the Turkish snipers * penetrated our lines, and took pot shots at the place where the staff -was supposed to be. ,Our howitzer fire in default of a better'target was /used'mainly against the infantry immediately opposed to us, and often the shells burst just in front of our own trenches, and uncomfortably' close. At times it was possible to see men blown from the opposing trench or others hastily leaving their position. With their secondary armament the ships must have played havoc with tho Turkish reserves, and reinforcements as they came up.