Fighting at the Dardanelles.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 5 July 1915, Page 2

Fighting at the Dardanelles.

1 More Stories from the trenches A CORPORAL'S STORY. (From Malcolm Ross, Official War Correspondent with the IV.Z. Forces). Cau-o, May 20, Lance-Corporal Noel Rose, who is o hospital here suffering trom shock and an injured spine and leg, liad an extraordinary experience. A shell exploded near him when he was rauge-finding on the Sunday, but lie went on fighting, and later—on the Wednesdaycollapsed, on the battlefield. Aftojr remaining unconscious for sixteen hours he came to on a hospital ship, and it iw-as an extraordinary coincidence that on awakening he found that lie had been ticketed by an old schoolfellow— Dr Aubrey Short. He also had lost his hearing, apparently as the result of an exploding shell, but this he has now regained. He seems to have had a miraculous escape, for there was not even a scratch on him. DAWN AND THE'BATTLEFIELD. "We were," he said awakened at an early hour on the morning of Sunday, the 25th April. A man came tumbling down the gangway into the hold of the troopship in which we were sleeping on the iron floor, and said' that he could hear the guns. There was an immediate rush for the deck, and sure enough we could hear the bombardment almost like a continuous roll of thunder. What made it the more uncanny was the fact that though we were only some five miles off shore a low flat mist was veiling both the ships and the land from our sight. As the 6un rose, however, and we drew near to the Gallipoli Peninsula, the features of the country became startlingly clear, and we saiw great .warships steaming up and down the coast while others were stationary shelling the Turkish positions. We went close inshore a mile or two from Gaba Tepe and steamed elowly along the coast. Presently, even 'without field glasses, one could see figures running about on the beach and in the fields back of the beach. The Australians had succeeded in landing their covering party, and, apparently, were- making some headway. Through the glasses the firing line became more and more distinct at one now well-known corner, marked on the map as the 'Fishermen's Hut, , the attack developed, and as the khaki line rushed acrces thf open fakl now and again a man would throw up his hands and tall heavily. The place was occupied in due course, and—as we t'ounl alt'iwards in our advance—the I'lrKe. ii.'d been driven from their adjacent con tours at the point of the bayonet, though most of them did rot wait for the actual 'inoculation.' Their retirement along the whole front, whether intentional or not, was a tactbal one. for Iby falling hack they) dro-v our men into the scrub-covered country on the hills above. "To realise the formation of the country, you must imagine a series }f hills starting abruptly from the beach, and the first one perhaps 200 feet high. These hills recede in parallels, each one higher than the other, until finally they attain a level of 700 feet above sea level. Thus it will be seen that the fight for us was an uphill one. As we took each ridge, the Turks from ji eminence higher still poured down a heavy fire upon us. Thus our Army Corps was visible to the Turks during almost our entire advance, Hvhereas ■they, iretreating, were generally invisible to us. THE LANDING OF THE NiEW ZEALANODERS. "To come 'back to our landing, all this time the thunder ot the guns continued ,and the rattle ol the rifle fire was incessant—like thousands of kettledrums beating ceaselessly. Every now and then the venomous spit of the Maxims would add its quota to the volume of the great battle chorus. Presently came the orders to disembark. Each man then drank Ins fill of water, taking as much as he could possibly hold, the idea being, of course, that they could last longer without drinking and so could save his •water bottle for a time wtieii it might be sorely needed. Even in such a tense situation the men were ready for a joke, and one member of our company said that if it had been beer instead oi water, with which they were making the experiment, lie could nave carried away twice as much. Water, he said, somewhat damped his ardour in .nis strange experiment. "In a little while a destroyer, grim and alert, glided alongside our ship, and a sailor on board asked if ire were 'ready for it.' 'it's pretty warm up there,' he added, 'but they've got 'em on the run.' The destroyer was towin large flat-bottomed punts. into these wo crowded, sitting as close together as it was possible to pack men. IN THE FIRING LINE. "We discarded our packs, and by a tortuous path scrambled up to fhe firing line. Then the difficulties of the operation became manifest. At thie I point the hills were covered with dwarf prickly holly and giant box shrubs ■making progress difficult and adequate communication almost impossible. Gradually we got nearer the enemy's rifle fire, and his shrapnel began to burstover us. So difficult was the matter of communication that when we actually reached our sector of line we had only about ten men left out of. a company of 240, the great majority of the others having missed the true line of aecent and reached another part of the front. In a little while 1 was separated from my commanding officer, and found myself in a Turkish trench with some Australians. Wβ got some excellent practice on a few Turks coming down the slope on one of the oppo-

i site bills. Away on oiir flank one of our machine guns was betraying itself by the incessant jet of steam that was arising from the over-heated water jacket. Shrapnel was beginning to burst about us thickly, and soon of the eleven men in the trench only four of us ,vere left, so we decided that it was getting a little too hot for comfort. Two of the others were only wounded and managed to make their way to .the rear We four then skipped turther along across a bare clay face. Half-way across it 1 missed my footing, and slid for perhaps a hundred feet on to a path below. A sergeant on the opposite side called to me, 'Don't come down there; it's mined!' Rather annoyed I replied, 'Well catch me as 1 go up again.' However 1 slid over the place in safety, and, somewhat fchalten, but still sound in wind and iimb. loomed my place in the firing lme. "All that day weird lighting continued, and the broken sec."tors unable to communicate with each ot'ier, lough ; staunchly—Australians and New /jealanders shoulder to shoulder - against great odds and in many cases were overwhelmed. But we held o.ir ground in spite of everything. Every battaW' ion had reached the firing line jih disorder. That was inevitable, mowing to the nature of the of the fighting. Many of the trenches werefilled with miscellaneous squads mad<3 up of Australians and iNew Zealandeis. Hitherto, not the 'best of friends the men from the two colonies now fought together like demons, helped each other's wounded, shared each other's water-bottles, and died together, . till at the end of the day those iwho had come through safely in strong terms expressed their mutual admiration and vowed eternal friendship. A SLEEPLESS NIGHT. "Night came at last, and as the sun dipped beyond the Gull of Saros the rifle fire slackened perceptibly and finally came only in fitful bursts, from whichever side they came, being due mostly to 'nerves.' Then as was their wont on this and the succeeding nights the Turks started a violent shrapnel fire. Their shells, however, were burst' ing high and their effect for this reason was considerably minimised. At the same time the enemy's observation was well conducted and their better fire was well placed by some observers, who in the day time must have been able to see the whole of the base on the beach and all our trenches. "All that night we got no sleep; about 8 o'clock a- line but chilling rain began to fall. Added to this most of us were still moist with a clammy dampness as the result of our drenching in the salt water in early morning. We lay down as we were without blankets. Throughout the night rifle fire continued fitfully, bullets falling all round. The Queen Elizabeth was firing shrapnel with bullets about the size of small eggs. Some tew bullets fell over us and (we picked up others in the abandoned Turkish trenches aa we advanced. A '15-inch shell from 'The Lizzy' contains 20,000 bullets, and as an 18 pounder field gun can cover an area of 250 yards by 50 you can imagine how many acres of land the shrapnel from the new battleship can dust up with one shot. A MOVING INCIDENT. "1 forgot to tell you that on Sunday when I was using a range-finder ) was the witness of a strange and extraordinary incident. The range-finder is in itself a powerful telescope. On our immediate front, that is on the left of our .whole position, there were two ship's boats oil the beach. In one a dead man sat in a dejected attitude with an arm thrown over the gunwale. In the other boat half a mile from us were a great many bodies—Australians. Altogether there were thirty dead men there—or at least so we thought at the time. As I looked through the glass I could see the body of an apparently dead sailor lying in a most life-like attitude, his white face turned as if he was gazing towards our position, his chin resting on his hand. I thought little more of this sad scene until the Monday afternoon, when about three o'clock I had another look through tho glass. Then I saw the sailor had changed his position and was lying—his white cap still on his head—with his face turned to the sky. . Ten minutes 1 later I was thrilled to see a figure detach itself from the ghastly heap and hobble along the beach only to collapse a few yards away. The moment he had moved a Turkish sniper had opened fire on him, and I could see tho splash of several bullets m the water after they had gone past him. With four men 1 went along tho beach to try and get him out, but we had not got more than 100 yards from our trench when the sand and stones near us began to rise in dust in response to a Turkish fusillade. Other bullets whizzed past us into the sea. We thea decided that it was best to go about our job more warily, so running from cover to cover we got within hailing distance of the man we had seen. He was shot through both knees and was cheery, hut almost done. There werj four others, ho said, out there in tho i heap still alive. Thq night before < there had been eight, but four had i not lasted till dawn. All this time had been drawing the fire of the Turky and we dare not approach the wounded man, who was lying right in the open, for fear of attracting the further attention of tho Turks to him. 13y degrees he managed ,to crawl to cover and we got him hack.'' Every five minutes deeds were per formed that were worthy of tho highest decoration known to military authorities. Lookng back, on these first days one has nightmare like visions out of which stand clear some of the most consummately cool performances.

Ytoiling up a slope in the early hours of) the morning we cam© across a wounded Australian officer. He was shot through the jaw and had halted to have a rest half-way from the tiring line to the dressing station. He was a ghastly object as he sat there with a caricature of a grin on nis poor shattered face, but he had all his wits about him, and he told us in detail where we were most wanted and what to do when we got there, and then he mercifully fainted just as a stretcher party came up to reoeive him. • Everywhere it Tvaa the same and one got positively blase about such incidents. Surely there oould not be a better examplo of pure, coolness than the following incident which I myself witnessed. A New Zealander was carrying a large biscuit-tin full of water to the firing line, and lie had to pass over a very open space where the bullets were positively raising the dust. One bullet neatly punctured a whole in the water tin which he m as carrying on his shoulder. Now an ordinary man would have at least 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 almost all the precious fluid. V^' Every Turks energetically shelled the beach where we had our ambulance dressing stations. Oonsequently'The wounded were 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 offi cer (Colonel Chaytor) who got. together a fatigue party and, himself armed witii a shovel, built a well-constructed path under cover of the sheltering sandhills

near the Leach. On Wednesday- all through the big attack the word kept coming 'back for more 'ammunition, more water, and more reinforcements. As the fresh men made their way up the steep slopes they met an interminable string of wounded coming down to the beach. One man I saw shot Eh rough the groin pulling himself along in a sitting position, sliding, scuffling down a slope. "That's pretty .rough work," I said, smihng, but his answer was unexpected. "-It's damn bad for my pants," he said cheerfully.

At one stage a few hand grenades began to arrive in our trenches. They were of two varieties, and there was one'kind that smelt vilely ana seldom went off. The other avent off eo quickly -that one didn't have time to know, whether it smelt or-not. One of this latter species landed in a trench along- • 6ide a conporal of the Wellington Battalion (A. H. Piper), it had still an inch of fuse to burn, so he hold it quietly until it had almost gone—and

ing at that sector stopped fi'om that moment. "That's what's meant by surprise effect," said the corporal, as then threw it hack. < Grenade-throw-he resumed his rifle. Men do queer things when under ex citement. Once 1 saw an Australian dash out after a Turk with the bayonet. He got him, too, but he tickled him with it first by way ol preparation 1 Over on the right on the Sunday <* panting bluejacket (now in khaki) flung himself down beside me, -whispering. "Give us a smack at 'em, Tommy, I aiore I goes baok to me boat." And he emptied' two of my; clips at the green bushes opposite before he went Iback to explain why he had kept the cutter waiting for him.

BRAVE STIIETOHER-B E A HER S. The stretcher-bearers alone did deeds of heroism that would have dono credit to any army in the world. 1 saw one chap climb out of a trench during heavy fire, and taking advantage of all the cover he could, get a wounded man under the aim and drag him back to the trench. iHalf-way back he was shot through the arm. He then hooked his sound hand through 'the man's collar and got him into the trench. And mind you, he did all this quite coolly and calmly. There was no mad dash about it. He used 1 his brain all thetime. Under all conditions the stret-cher-bearers were magnificent. Even as they were carrying the wounded STong~tlie beaoh to the base they drew the fire of the Turks. During the course of the afternoon they (brought the other fouir men that 1 told you about back from the heap ot dead. These men had been lying there from half-past four on Sunday morning until the same (hour on Monday, afternoon. I had better not give you tho details of their long vigil.

THE GUNS AT WORK We bivouacked in the trenches and in holes in the cliff, and. that evening the warships below us ibegan a terrific bombardment. Shells shrieked continuously overhead and burst' not far from U6. For a while the /Turkish, batteries Would be silenced, Uut in half an hour or bo they would begin again from an entirely different position. They methodically elielled our wounded as they were ibeing taken downto the dressing stations, and also the boats conveying the wounded to the hospital ships. 'Several of our men. slightly wounded; were killed on the beach after having been brought down, from "the firing line. The ships aeplied; but it was very difficult to locate the Turkish positions, well screened as they were in such difficult country. One oE our 'ships in particular was loosing off broadsides almost continuously. At one time when her fire> was tocuesed on. a ridge on our left frout I saw an object turning over and over in the air fifty feet up. It was a Turk's leg. I could see the boot, and a trail of unwinding iputlee. One would think that such fire must be utterly de moralising, but the enemy took a lot oi shifting. DEALING WSHTTHE SNIPERS, Snipers were stilt responsible for most of the casualties and 1 saw one queer 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 I him they did. They left the trench and crawled on all fours into the bu&ii and disappeared.; Presently tliey appeared one of them wearing a Turkish cap. They were lugging something through the bushes and they l pushed it gently, over the is-teep cliff/ This was the sniper. "Did you get him all right?" we asked when they came back to the trench. "Oh, yes, we got him," they replied, "and we didn't hold no bloomin' pofit-anortem either. He kicked ae he went over the cliff I"

THE SHIPS' AT "WORK. The Queett Elizabeth on one occasion, acting with aeroplane control, sank a Turkish transport in the strait of the Dardanelles seven miles away and oat of sight heyond, the 'hills on the mainland near {Jabai Tepe. This she did with her third diot striking the transport amidships- It was not known if there were "any . troops on board. This game, was not all on one side, for shi'apnell began to burst Eound about and oyer t)he transports and iwarships. ' - 'A ffREMENPOiUS ATTAOK. | Regarding Tuesday—though I naust I have gone through tHo fighting all t.hat d a y—my mind is now a blank. 4>n Wednesday there''was a. tremendous attack. The enoniy. fried" to turn tfoet left flank.. They hadi A received reinforcements the night beitore and about 9- a.m. the fire ibecame terrific. Oiar •right was comparatively safe, but eta the left about halt' a mile from "the TJ<JacSh the enemy launched company after company, battalion alter Battalion, at our positions tall we must have been opiposted by at least from two to three brigades. Macliane guns played ah imipartaht ipart in -the operations. The Turks were led toy Germans and had a stiffening of German soldiers. They frequently used flat-nosed and explosive bullets. THE SEAiPtUANES Away out in the offing between our | shore and the Island of Imbros . that j weird-looking slrip'the Ark Royal• lay j at anchor or moved up and down as oocaflion- iroq'flired.. iSEe" was> a etranjgelooking craft—the first' of hor kind— jitafc oibviously wonderfully ■ useful. Her , one mast and funnel are placed ' aft- so fhatb her forward deck is clear of all obstruction save for two large l steam- demcks. On .tliis spaJce- wavo jLthe hydroplanes that" she * mothered. a

it into tlfe water. Then presently we ■would-see the graceful machine skimming through the calm sea at perhaps 40 miles an hour before it "lifted" and soared aiway over our (position. The noise of the exhaust, no matter how high the -plane flew, was clearly audi- . ble. The two floats beneath the main planes looked for all-the world like the webbed feet of-some gigantic eea bird. Apparently the Turkish guns iwere particularly well handled and the observation .post wherever it was must have been a good one. Away on our left was a village marked on the map as Siveleh, and there we could see a mosque with a tall minaret. It was .well within range, and later casting all scruples aside it was laid, lowi and the village set on fire. This apparently mpset the calculations and the work of the Turkish gunners io eome extent, but only .temporarily.

A STRANGE BQRIAL. During lulls in the firing burial parties from our battalion were sent out, ' and Chaplain Taylor, of jNelson, (since wounded), managed "to give decent burj..x 10 soma 40 Australians who had ! fallen in the original landing. It was a pathetic scene. Down near the ' beach large graves liad been dug, and as the bodies were lowered into them the chaplain read the military burial scrvieo, his voice being drowned every now and then by burets ol shell or rifle ) lire. There on the far-away graves | -where these colonials are sleeping their last sleep small wooden crosses, some f them, appropriately enough, made out of the wood of ammunition boxes, tell how Private So-and-So laid down his life 6000 miles from his homo fighting a foe that a few days previously ne liad not the slightest interest in. These graves are pathetic in their loneliness. IThey will never be seen by tlie relatives of the men buried there, and all that a mother or a father in Australia or 'New Zealand will receive as a memento will be a pathetic little collection from the pockets of their son. The chaplain collected these relics—from one perhaps a pipe, from another a few lettens or the family p'hotographs, or from still another a man's pay-book, often as not stained with his own blood. The last tiling I remember is going ouit on a reconnaisance with Major Loach, afterwards severely wounded. He does not know what happened to me any more than I do. .When I regained consciousness after a long time I was quite deaf and with a spine that felt like a red-hot poker. On the ship I Ilofifc consciousness several times and , also in the hospital at Cairo. For five days and nights sleep waa impossible. I would not like to tell you about these nights on the hospital ship—this with tears in his' eyes—l cannot trust myself to speak of tliem ju6t yet. i At this stage a fine-looking young Auckander—off to a commission in the ! Black Watch—came up to tell us thai | a new list of casualties had come in. Amongst the killed was the name of the corporal's dearest friend. He got up and walked away. that was the end of his story. dMLuamyu——c