The Gallipoli Letter (7 page)

I am of course only repeating what I have been told on all hands. But you will trust me when I say that the work of the general staff in Gallipoli has been deplorable. The general idea, that of getting astride the peninsula and cutting the line of communications connecting the southern Turkish army with its bases, was good. I understand it was Birdwood's scheme. The only criticism I have heard against it is that the great left flank movement from Anzac, which was directed against Hill 971 and Chunuk Bair while the Suvla Bay operations were in progress, was wasteful, inasmuch as the splendid Australasian troops, Gurkhas and Connaught Rangers broken to pieces in this advance could have been shipped to Suvla, and there used as the main wedge in the great effort to cross to Maidos. I discussed this criticism with our Australian staff, and found a decided opinion that the occupation of the heights assailed was essential to the success of the Suvla advance, owing to the dominating influence of Hill 971 and Chunuk Bair.

The 9th Army Corps reached Anafarta Hills, but could not maintain their position. Of the terrible manner of their retreat I need not tell you in this letter. One of our generals, who had his men trying desperately to hold on to the shoulders of 91 and Chunuk Bair (only a few Gurkhas really reached 971 and a few Australasians Chunuk Bair), was staggered to see the 9th and 10th Corps retreats, at the very time when their firm holding was essential. He was staggered by its manner, and principally by the obvious conflicts and confusions between British Generals, due I am told to the disinclination of two of them to accept orders from De Lisle, who though junior had been placed in command after the recall of General Stopford. At least two generals were recalled at once—Stopford, who had an army corps, and Hammersley, who suffered once from lapse of memory, but who was thought good enough by London for this work of supreme importance to the Empire. I am told that a second divisional commander was recalled. Diverse fates were in store for brigade commanders—at least one, Kenna, V.C., was killed in action.

The August 6-10 operations at Suvla left us holding a position which is nothing more than an embarrassment. We are about one mile and a half inland; but we do not hold a single commanding point nor one of real strategic value, and our one little eminence, Chocolate Hill, is I am assured by artillery officers, perilously unsafe. It is commanded by those crests on which masses of Turks are perched; and by screened artillery at which we cannot possibly get.

Perhaps this awful defeat of August 6-10, in which our Imperial armies lost 35 per cent. of their strength—fully 33,000 men—was due as much to inferior troops as to any other cause. But that cannot be said of the desperate effort made on August 21, after the Turks had had plenty of time in which to bring up strong reinforcements and to increase the natural strength of their positions, to take their positions by frontal assault. Some of the finest forces on the peninsula were used in this bloody battle. The glorious 29th Division, through which 40,000 men have passed, and which is now reduced to less than 5,000 men, were specially brought up from Helles, and the Mounted Division of Territorial Yeomanry were brought over from Egypt. They and other troops were dashed against the Turkish lines, and broken. They never had a chance of holding their positions when for one brief hour they pierced the Turks' first line; and the slaughter of fine youths was appalling. My criticism is that, as these troops were available, they should undoubtedly have been used in early August; and to fling them, without even the element of surprise, against such trenches as the Turks make, was murder.

One word more in this very sketchy and incomplete story of the August operations. It concerns the heroic advance of Australasian, Gurkha and Connaught Rangers troops from our left flank at Anzac. It was made from a New Zealand outpost, heroically held during the long summer months away to our left, and connected with our main position by a long sap. The N.Z. Rifles swept the hills of snipers, and were practically wiped out in doing so. Through them advanced the Wellington Brigade, other New Zealand forces, the Gurkhas and Irishmen, and our magnificent Fourth Brigade, brought up to a strength of far over 4000 for the event. The advance through broken, scrubby, impossible country in the night, despite mistakes by guides and constant bayonet fighting, was one of the most glorious efforts of the Dardanelles. There is a disposition to blame Monash for not pushing further in, but I have been over the country, through the gullies and over the hills, and I cannot see how even as much as he did could have been expected. Of course, our men did not hold even the shoulder of Chunuk Bair; but only a few hundred reached it, after most desperate hand to hand fighting, and they were swept off by an advance of more than 5000 Turks. We did not have enough men for the operation. It was a question of depth and weight; and it is sad to think that we gained our objective, all but the highest slopes; and that we had not sufficient reserves to stay there. Even if Anafarta Hills had been held in support of us, we could not have stayed on this vital Chunuk Bair with the forces at our disposal.

The heroic Fourth Brigade was reduced in three days' fighting to little more than 1000 strong. You will be glad to know that the men died well.

I must leave this story, scrappy as it is, of the operations, to tell you of the situation and the problems that face us. I will do so with the frankness you have always encouraged.

Winter is on us, and it brings grave dangers. We have about 105,000 men and some 25,000 animals—90 per cent. mules—on the Peninsula. About 25,000 of these are at Helles, 35,000 at Anzac, and the rest at Suvla. Suvla and Anzac are now joined, thanks to the brilliant Australasian work on the left flank; and it is important to remember that there are two retreats from Suvla, one to Anzac, the other by sea. These are all that remain of fully 260,000 men. Nowhere are we protected from Turkish shell. Our holdings are so small and narrow that we cannot hide from the Turks the positions of our guns, and repeatedly damage is done to them. On the other hand, the Turks have a vast country in which to select gun positions, they can change them with ease, and we cannot place them. You would marvel at the impossibility even of getting at the guns enfilading Anzac from the rights. These are hidden in an olive grove under Killid Bair plateau, and continuous efforts on the part of warships and our own finely operated artillery have been resultless. These guns have direct fire on our beaches, and frequently cause serious damage. All three positions are so exposed that one wonders why the Turks do not drive us out with artillery fire. Helles is the most secure of all; but Anzac and especially Suvla are very much exposed. Had the Turks sufficient modern artillery and shells they could make Suvla unbearable and Anzac an even worse hell than it is. Our staff has various opinions about the Turkish supply of shells, but it seems certain that there is an even greater shortage amongst the Turks than amongst us. Otherwise, the Turks are saving their shell for serious winter offensives. I must say that theory that the Turks are really short of shells did not impress me. I frequently watched them waste three shrapnel shells on the mere sport of making a trawler up-anchor and move out to sea. Of course, trawlers are occasionally hit; but the Turks cannot take such shell-fire seriously. I have seen as many as eight shells fired at two trawlers. One day recently 60 shells were placed by the right flank enfilading guns on the New Zealand beach. They caused damage and cost us 65 men; but they showed also that the Turks are not very short.

At the same time, one wonders whether the Turks are not merely playing with us, holding us there until they are helped by nature to drive us out. But that idea is discounted by the fact that the Turks have made many serious and costly efforts to get rid of us.

At Helles, the narrow cape gives some sort of protection from the waves, but it would be absurd to think that even this will permit of the landing of supplies in rough weather. Two steamships have been sunk to provide a breakwater, with the careless disregard of expense which has marked the whole of this unfortunate enterprise. These ships are even now, in the early days of autumn, rolling from side to side with the slight sea swell. At Anzac, there is only open anchorage. We have made three small wooden piers, each of them banked on one side with sand-bags as a protection for the men against shells. But against these the water barges are beginning to sway dangerously. At Suvla more ships are to be sunk. There can be no sort of safe landing place there either.

Can we keep the armies supplied with food, munitions and drafts? Many mariners and some naval men say no. I discussed this question with naval transport officers on the staff ship in Mudros, including a high and responsible official, and I am assured that the work can be done. It will mean great cost. The Navy says, in effect, that great reserves must be stored up in spells of calm weather, and that at times it may be necessary to get stuff ashore by running a supply ship on to the beach, from which the goods will have to be taken by the beach parties under the concentrated and accurate fire of the enemy's artillery.

I do not think, therefore, that the question of rough seas is vital. But certainly, should as I hope the Cabinet decide to hang on through the winter for another offensive, or for peace, we are faced with serious dangers from cold rain and snow on land. All our engineering work has been done with the idea that our positions would be evacuated by winter; and the roads are made in winter water-courses, the trenches are summer trenches, and the dug-outs mere protection against shrapnel, not against weather. All this means tremendous structural changes, and the immediate construction of good roads. And I fear that the decision has been left too late for such work to be thoroughly undertaken before the winter is upon us. No structural material had reached Anzac when I left. Nor had the food reserves amounted to more than 14 days' supplies.

Perhaps the most vital danger from weather is that, before the rains come to end all our water troubles, there will be a spell of bad weather at sea that will prevent us from getting water ashore, and our troops will have a grave water shortage added to their other trials. No water supply for a month would raise questions of the utmost gravity.

But we can overcome weather troubles at Helles and Anzac, and even at Suvla also, though General Byng asserts that he cannot keep his forces there when the Lake cuts his position in twain, unless he can bridge the immense width of this strange seasonal stretch

PLATE 7 A trench at Lone Pine after the battle, showing Australian and Turkish dead on the parapet. In the foreground is Captain Leslie Morshead (later Lieutenant General Sir Leslie Morshead) of the 2nd Battalion and on his right (standing facing camera) is 527 Private James (Jim) Brown Bryant, 8th Battalion, of Stawell, Victoria.

The fighting in the battle of Lone Pine was ferocious, conducted largely underground in the Turkish trenches across three days and nights. Seven Australians fighting there would be awarded the Victoria Cross, though none of these awards dated from the first hours of fighting: no officer survived to make a recommendation.
Photographer Phillip F.E. Schuler, AWM Neg. No. A02025

of water. What is more serious is the question of Turkish attacks during the cold, wet winter months.

They cannot drive us from Anzac. Of that I am sure. Australasian ingenuity and endurance have made the place a fortress, and it is inhabited and guarded by determined and dauntless men. But Suvla is more precarious. I am not prepared to say that Suvla can be held during winter. There is a grave possibility of a German army appearing on the scene. In any case, the arrival of a number of heavy German guns might be quite sufficient to finish our expedition off. Big German howitzers could batter our trenches to pieces, and we would have no reply. And remember that several of our vital positions, such as Quinn's Post, are only a few small yards of land on the top of a cliff—mere footholds on the cliffs. Whether the Germans get their guns through or not, we must make up our minds that the Turkish activity will be much greater in winter than ever before. The enemy will be able to concentrate his artillery, when he knows that we are no longer threatening any of his positions. He will be able to drag across great guns from his forts, and give any position of ours a terrible mauling. He will have great reinforcements within reach, unless the published stories, and the tales of travellers, of his large new levies are quite untrue.

We have to face not only this menace, but the frightful weakening effect of sickness. Already the flies are spreading dysentery to an alarming extent, and the sick rate would astonish you. It cannot be less than 600 a day. We must be evacuating fully 1000 sick and wounded men every day. When the autumn rains come and unbury our dead, now lying under a light soil in our trenches, sickness must increase. Even now the stench in many of our trenches is sickening. Alas, the good human stuff that there lies buried, the brave hearts still, the sorrows in our hard-hit Australian households.