AT SUVLA BAY.

Taranaki Daily News, 10 September 1915, Page 6

AT SUVLA BAY.

Tmamart Qp jxiBCES, EPiQCUEEdfi HM33BG Of MAOJKIS " MDTUM3. mm OF $ WAVE OERSYMAN. (from Captain C. E. W<. Bean, Official Press Representative witi the Anetn&fain Ebcpsditkrnaiy Forces), Gaba Tope, August SS4. On the afternoon of Saturday, August 21, the 'British, after a heavy bomSamlmeat of the Turkish positions in the plain, moved oat from Soria, advancing line upon line across the plain. Troops from Anzac moved out to meet bhem - that is to say, the extreme left of fee Ahzae left met the right of the Suvla farce in cultivated fields or the plain eaat of fJuvk, Bay. A force from tie 13th and 14th Battalions moved down the gully side under heavy fire, and hung on albout 100 yards from the Turkish trenches on the opposite slope. The Canterbury and Otago Mounted Rifles charged and took the Adjoining portion of this trench, which they still hold. Early on Sunday morning the 18th Battalion was ordered to charge the trenches to the left of the New Zealanders. By a fine oharge the 16th .took one trench, but, being unused to bomb warfare, were forced to retire before a bomb attack which the Turks kept up from a trench twenty yards distant. The British troops and the 19th Battalion extended their line to tin plain joining the Suvk force. WHERE HONE MET HASSAN, An extraordinary incident occurred before daylight on Sunday morning. Atoout 300 Turks, carrying rifles slung, with bayonets fixed, walked out of a dense scrub in front of the captured trenches, and stood there talking, whilst odd groups came forward to the edge of our trench (holdling up their hands. Our men pulled some into the trench, and signed to them to lay down their aims, an<fc then sent down back to the others to instruct them to lay down their arms and surrender. Men could be seen carrying on an animated conversation in the moonlight. Then a Turk advanced, with bayonet fixed, towards a machine-gun which the New Zealanders captured from the Turks, and which the Maoris were using, against the Turks. The Turk signed to ouir men to throw down their arms, as if he believed he was accepting their sunrender—not they his. The Turks were talking in a friendly manner to our men, neither understanding, but sometimes actually handshaking. Then I one attempted to pull a New Zealander j out of the trench. The New Zealander shook himself clear. The Turk did not fire, but this dearly showed the impossibility of carrying on the conversation, which, as the Turks had not laid down their arms, was broken off. , DEVOTED CLERGYMEN.

The clergy with the Australian forces have recently given magnificent proof of fheSir devotion to country and duty by sacrificing their lives. During Saturday's fight many of our wounded were in a position of the utmost peril, owing to their lying on a slope which was exposed to Turkish fire and owing to the approach of bush fires started by shells. One chaplain worked incessantly, withdrawing from peril all men whom it was possible to reach. Next morning, whilst waiiting to read the burial service, he heard a wounded British soldier lying in the danger zone crying out. He went forward immediately, and, taking two stretcher-bearers, one of whom was him. self a (Presbyterian minister, who enlisted in the Medical Corps, the three, crawling, reached the wounded man. The Chaplain had managed to drag him about one yard from a position directly facing the enemy's trenches, when a sharpshooter hit both clergymen. The chaplain died before reaching the hospital ship. The Presbyterian escaped with a wound. At least two clergymen were hit during the attack on Lonesome Pine. One, the Dean of Sydney, was saved by the buckle of his cholera belt, receiving only a light scratch when crossing to a captured trench. Another clergyman, serving as an officer of an infantry regiment, arriving that morning, insisted on going inTo action, and was fatally hit ♦ithin a minute after crossing the parapet.