Part 15

An hour after midnight the poor old _Goliath_ was struck by three torpedoes, and sank. She had anchored only that afternoon, up beyond Sedd-el-Bahr and opposite a promontory known as "De Tott's Battery" to protect the left flank of the French army and she lay farther up the Straits and nearer to Chanak Fort--the big fort at the entrance to The Narrows--than any other ship. Beyond this fort a Turkish destroyer was known to be lying, just above The Narrows; and to prevent her making a sortie, four of our destroyers patrolled the waters between Chanak Fort and De Tott's Battery, dodging a very brilliant search-light on Chanak Fort which lighted up this area night after night.

Now the previous evening, just before sunset, a heavy and most unusual bank of fog had rolled slowly out of The Narrows, and made the night so dark that the look-outs on board the patrolling destroyers and on board the _Goliath_ could hardly see a cable's length in front of them. It was just the night that that Turkish destroyer would be waiting for; and when Chanak search-light was not switched on at all, and the Straits were shrouded in thick, ominous darkness, the _Goliath's_ people had a suspicion that "something" would happen, and kept a more ready watchfulness.

Shortly after one o'clock the "look-outs" on her bridge, and round the guns on the fore shelter-deck, sighted a dark mass on her starboard bow, and made it out to be a destroyer, drifting, stern first, with the current, towards the ship, just as our own patrolling destroyers had been accustomed to do. They used to steam towards Chanak and its search-light, stop engines, and drift back with the current which always flowed down through The Narrows, drift down until they were abreast De Tott's Battery, and then steam back again.

At first she was thought to be a British destroyer, but something roused suspicions, the "challenge" was flashed across; she flashed back, but incorrectly; and, realizing that she was an enemy, orders were given to open fire on her. Two shots blazed out, but they were too late; she let fly three torpedoes, one after the other, all of which struck "home"; and in four minutes the _Goliath_ had rolled over, taking down with her more than five hundred of her officers and men.

Those on deck in the _Achates_ had heard the muffled explosions, and seen the search-lights from the other battleships above Sedd-el-Bahr searching the surface of the water there; but not for some time did anyone know what had really happened--not until a signal flashed across to say that the _Goliath_ had been sunk, and to ask for steamboats to be sent to search for survivors.

The Orphan, who had only just returned from his long job of making all the obstinate transports and other ships "darken ship" properly, was immediately sent up to the scene of the catastrophe, and the Hun, with his steam pinnace, followed. They picked up and brought back one dead body and a mere handful of very much shaken men. As you know, everyone had turned in that night with "submarines on the brain"; so when Dr. Gordon went to the Fleet-Surgeon's cabin and woke him with "Get up, turn out, P.M.O., the _Goliath_ has been sunk, and our boats have gone for survivors!" you can imagine that the Fleet-Surgeon naturally thought that a submarine had done this, so was none too happy. "It'll be our turn next; rats in a trap! My God! I wish I'd never come to sea," he kept groaning as he slipped into his clothes, found his swimming-belt,[#] and hurried on deck.

[#] By this time the swimming-collars had been replaced by belts with greatly increased buoyancy.

The news, when it came at last, that she had been sunk by a destroyer came almost as a relief, because, in spite of the official signal to the contrary, everyone hoped, down at the back of his brain, that perhaps a mistake had been made, and that those submarines reported from Malta would turn out to be a myth.

In fact, next morning at breakfast, the Torpedo-Lieutenant was quite bright and cheery. He was a destroyer expert, and always pooh-poohed submarines as much overrated craft, so now never tired of saying "Destroyers are some good after all, you see," and seemed to take as much pride in the success of the Turkish destroyer, as if it had been an English one which had sunk a Turkish battleship.

Without a doubt, everyone admired the pluck and cunning of this destroyer and its German crew (it was known afterwards that the crew was German), however much--or little--the loss of the _Goliath_ affected him; and, truth to tell, it was not the loss of the ship nor of the men that affected most people, but the moral effect and the addition to the general feeling of depression and uneasiness--uneasiness which, it must be remembered, was not by any means chiefly caused by fear for the actual safety of the ships and themselves, but by the dread of what would happen to the Army when left unsupported in its very insecure position on the Peninsula, with the difficulties of supplying itself with stores and reinforcements so enormously increased. Those howitzers, too, might render the position untenable, especially as, given time, there was no reason why the Turks should not bring up more and still heavier guns.

Some of the surviving officers lived on board the _Achates_ for a few days, and slept in hammocks on the half-deck, close to the China Doll. He will never forget those nights when he turned in--always nervous of submarines, and with his swimming-belt all ready round his chest, in case of need--and then had to listen to them relating their gruesome experiences before and after the old ship rolled over and they had jumped into the water. They were suffering the after effects of their shock, and could talk of nothing else all day long, and most of the night as well.

The China Doll would hear, out of the dark, coming from one of them: "You remember when that second explosion came--you were standing close to me--in the battery--the one that shot up that column of water which cut the cutter in half--you remember--it fell on old Tompkins--it was old Tompkins, wasn't it?--it crushed him--don't you remember him howling?--just for a second--and then, not answering when you sung out to him."

Another voice--a big, gruff one--would "chip in": "I'd just said to the Gunner, 'That's not one of our destroyers--look at her funnels--you mark my word--that's not one of ours'--just before we fired that first shot--it didn't hit--I swear I heard a torpedo fired--the first one--the one that hit us under the bridge--and I'm certain I heard someone sing out: 'Gut! sehr gut!'--he must have been a German--he sang it out after each torpedo hit us."

Another voice out of the darkness, from a hammock close to the China Doll, broke in with: "My word! she did topple over--I could never have believed it I was in my cabin--just had time to rush up to the gangway--the water was pouring over the coaming--couldn't stand on the quarter-deck--I don't know how I got to the rails--I dragged myself up somehow, and crawled right round her--oh, my God! the cries inside her--men who couldn't get out."

The big, gruff voice, which had stopped to listen, interrupted again: "I got out through a gun-port, crawled along the side--when she turned over the bilge keel caught me and dragged me under--I never knew how I came up again--a man close to me--swimming in the water--had his face smashed in by a plank which shot up from below--I got hold of the plank--it kept me up till the _Lord Nelson's_ picket-boat found me."

It was not as if these disjointed remarks were made only once, but they were repeated over and over again; just as if the thoughts they expressed had been fixed so indelibly in their brains, to the exclusion of everything else, that when night and darkness came they were again so vivid that they had to be given utterance to.

The poor China Doll, with his swimming-belt round his chest, would listen, with hair on end, until he could stand it no longer; then he would jump out, and run up on deck and wait, perhaps for an hour, until they were silent. How grateful he was to wake up and see daylight coming through the gaps in the hatchway awning-cover, and to know that another night was over! A good many more were as thankful as he was.

Next day the early morning "air" reconnaissance--made by aeroplane--reported having seen five submarines travelling past Kephez Point.

"That puts the hat on it," moaned the Fleet-Surgeon when he heard of them; and everybody marvelled how they had managed to elude the scouting trawlers and destroyers. But most people felt a sense of relief that the days of waiting for their coming were now over, and that whatever was going to happen would do so soon. However, the evening "air reconnaissance" reported that these five submarines were still there, but had now turned out to be buoys which we ourselves had moored--so the grim tension was relieved for a little while.

On that day "Gallipoli Bill" burst very many high-explosive shells on "W" beach, apparently chiefly out of bravado, to express his glee at the sinking of the _Goliath_. Next day the _Agamemnon_, the _Swiftsure_, and the heavy batteries on shore "went" for him, but could not hit him. The "spotting" aeroplanes did their best to locate him and to direct the firing; but a dummy gun is so easily put somewhere, where it can be seen from above, and a real gun can so easily be shifted and hidden, where it cannot be seen, that quite possibly the ships and the shore batteries were never firing at the real gun. At any rate, directly they ceased fire, "Gallipoli Bill" threw half a dozen more shells along the ridge above "W" beach, and "pulled their legs" pretty thoroughly.

Things went on quietly for the next two or three days, although the howitzers did a lot of mischief on shore. Rumours came that a trawler had sighted a periscope off Imbros island, thirteen miles away, and it seemed definitely ascertained that two submarines had arrived at Smyrna.

On the 18th May the _Achates_ relieved the _Swiftsure_, and from this date, until driven away by submarines, she became a "bombarding" ship. She once more ceased to fly a flag; the Admiral left her, taking with him his two Assistant Clerks; best of all, the devouring host of strange snotties and their steamboats also departed, and quietness and peace reigned in the gun-room. But, like Old Mother Hubbard's cupboard, the gun-room store was bare--a fact which brought bitter grief to the Pimple and the China Doll.

There was another submarine scare that night. A trawler fired two Very's lights, which meant "have sighted a hostile submarine", and things "hummed" considerably until it turned out that she had mistaken E11, on her way up the Straits, from Mudros, for an enemy submarine.

Also, during that same night the Turks commenced their desperate thirty-six-hour attack on Anzac, and for all that period an almost incessant roar of heavy guns came down wind from there. This attack ended most disastrously for the enemy, who lost more than three thousand men killed. The Honourable Mess heard afterwards many yarns of this fight--yarns of the Turks pressing through gullies against the Australian and New Zealand trenches, pouring through in dense masses, shouting "Allah! Allah!" and never ceasing that cry, because they believed that no bullet would touch them with the sacred name on their lips, and being shot down in hundreds and hundreds, until, in fact, some of the Australians, who had clambered on top of their parapets the better to shoot, refused to shoot any longer. Pressed along by the masses behind them, the front ranks could not retreat--some, throwing away their rifles, ran towards the trenches with their hands above their heads, apparently demented, shouting "Allah! Allah!"

Perhaps they thought that God would give them victory over the "infidel" with their bare hands; perhaps they wanted to surrender; but none reached those trenches. In front of one maxim alone, 380 dead were counted when at last the attacks had melted away, and the Turks had obtained an armistice to bury their dead.

Now that she was "bombarding" ship, the _Achates_ had the job of looking after "Gallipoli Bill", and often an aeroplane would fly up to "spot" for her whilst she tried to knock him out.

Such a day's firing would be arranged and start something like this.

Perhaps Captain Macfarlane had been ashore the afternoon before, to stretch his long legs, and on coming back to the ship would send for the Gunnery-Lieutenant. "Oh, look here, I've been ashore this afternoon. That 6-inch howitzer is bothering everyone a good deal; it dropped one near me--it may not have known I was there--but I thought it distinctly rude; the Left Flank Observation Post--I was up there this afternoon--think they have spotted him--just to the left of that single tree near the windmills--you know it--the place where those dummy field-guns used to be; how about having a try for it in the morning?"

"Yes, sir! Certainly, sir! We had better ask for an aeroplane, I suppose," the very "strict-service" Gunnery-Lieutenant would suggest.

"Certainly! Certainly! Ask them to send a specially nice one this time, perhaps a white one with blue spots would look pretty."

The Gunnery-Lieutenant, who was absolutely devoid of all sense of humour, would look up startled, only to see the Captain thoughtfully tugging at his pointed yellow beard.

"I don't think there are any like that, sir. They have tried various colours, but none are invisible. I think they have none like that, sir."

"Oh! Very well, we must just take our chance. Perhaps they will send us one with pretty red, white, and blue rings," the Captain would reply gravely, without a tremor of an eyelid; and off would go the bewildered Gunnery-Lieutenant to write out a signal "requesting permission to bombard Target 159G7", or whatever was the dot on the military map nearest to "Gallipoli Bill", and wonder whether Captain Macfarlane was going "off his head". Whilst waiting a reply from the Admiral, he might run across the Fleet-Surgeon and tell him what the Captain had said. "I suppose there's nothing the matter with him, Doc.? You don't think the strain is telling on him?"

"Nothing the matter with him! Of course not," would snap Dr. O'Neill. "It's yourself, you fool; your silly noddle's so stuffed with wretched gunnery, you haven't room for a joke. He was pulling your leg."

"But where's the joke about 'white with blue spots'--I've never seen one like that?" and the Gunnery-Lieutenant would scratch his head.

"Oh! get out of it; you're hopeless!" Dr. O'Neill would growl.

Presently the signal would come that the proposed bombarding had been approved by the Admiral, who would make arrangements for a "spotting" aeroplane at ten o'clock.

Thus were details fixed for another attempt to destroy "Bill".

In the morning the Gunnery-Lieutenant waited to see how the current, or the breeze, or both together, made the ship swing. Perhaps that especial morning she swung with her stern inshore, so that "X" group of 6-inch guns--the group on the starboard side, aft--bore most easily. So, after breakfast, the Gunnery-Lieutenant sent for the War Baby--in charge of these guns--and showed him the exact spot on the map and, taking him up into the main-top, the special tree close to which "Bill" had last been seen--the tree on which he had to train his guns.

The aeroplane with its pilot, the "observer" and his wireless apparatus, started away from the "advanced" aerodrome near Helles lighthouse, commenced to climb up into the "blue", and, when ready, signalled "Ready to Commence".

By this time the Gunnery-Lieutenant in the fore-top, the Captain on the bridge, the War Baby in the sighting hood of X1, and the guns' crews in X1 and X2 beneath it, just abaft the gun-room, were all ready and waiting. "Ranging shot at eight--five--o--o, common shell," the Gunnery-Lieutenant sang down through his voice-pipe; and watched, as X1 fired, away along to the right of Krithia, between the last of the windmills and that single tree, where he hoped that the aeroplane could see "Bill", although he could not do so himself. Up went the cloud-burst, and in perhaps fifty seconds the voice-pipe from the "wireless" room called "Short 200"--the signal that had just come from the aeroplane.

Frequently, on these occasions, the enemy "wireless" stations would "block" the "wireless" signals from the aeroplane, or make "spotting" signals of their own, to confuse the annoyed Gunnery-Lieutenant. Always if the aeroplane ventured too near "Bill", the Turks burst shrapnel round her.

Sights were corrected, and another shot fired; out of the "blue" came the signal "Right, one hundred and fifty yards". That meant altering the training or, if the gun was kept on that single tree all the time, altering the deflection scale on the sight.

And so, for perhaps twenty rounds, firing went on. "Bill", wherever he was, had never spoken a word; the aeroplane signalled "O.K.", the interpretation of which being that, as far as she could see, the last shell had made a direct hit; and presently the Gunnery-Lieutenant, who generally had the idea that the aeroplane "spotter" didn't know his left hand from his right, or "overs" from "shorts", and also was as blind as any bat, thought it was about time to finish, and would climb down and ask the Captain if he should "pack-up".

The War Baby's guns' crews were then ordered to secure and "sponge out" their guns, and a searchlight signal was made to the aeroplane that the firing was finished. Down she would circle to her aerodrome, and if she had anything exciting to tell, would signal it across from the Naval Signal Station close at hand.

After such a proceeding it often happened that, almost before the aeroplane had come down to land, "Bill" would plump three or four high-explosive shells on "W" beach or in the soldiers' "rest" camp. He was a facetious fellow, very wanting in tact, and most elusive.

To understand the difficulties of hitting him, you must try and imagine yourself on the deck of an ordinary steamer, standing somewhere about twenty feet above the level of the water. The distance of the sea horizon is then just a little over five miles. If you now imagine that, instead of a continuous, uninterrupted curved line, the curve of the horizon is broken up by small gullies and ravines and depressions, in any one of which "Gallipoli Bill" may be concealed--in fact, _is_ absolutely hidden from you--and all you know is that he is supposed to be in line with, perhaps, a particular tree which you can see; that up above, there is an aeroplane quite possibly "spotting" on a dummy gun, and that only a direct hit will destroy "Bill", you obtain a good idea of the difficulties of hitting him from where you are--standing in your steamer.

One day, in order to reduce the range, the _Achates_ anchored in another billet, off "X" beach, farther along the "outside" coast of the Peninsula, and had hardly dropped her anchor before a cheeky battery of 4.1-inch guns began dropping their shells all round her. It was impossible to locate the battery, and there was no option but to shove off again, out of range. Again, you must bear in mind that the flashes these guns make when fired are very slight, and quite momentary, also that dummy flashes were also fired some distance away. The only sure proof that the actual position of the firing gun had been located was by observing the cloud of dust blown up from the ground in front of the gun. The size and density of this depends naturally upon the kind of ground, and also, of course, a position behind ground thickly covered with bushes is generally chosen to reduce the dust to a minimum; so that, at a range of five miles, what dust is thrown up is very, very seldom visible.

In the course of the campaign many of the Turks' guns were knocked out by the ships; but every shell must fall somewhere, and if you fire a sufficient number, sooner or later a lucky one may do the "trick" and fall on the exact spot required.

But a ship's magazines are not inexhaustible; with very little effort she could empty them in an hour, and be as useless as a Thames barge until they were refilled. If there had been an inexhaustible supply in the ammunition ships at Mudros, and if a ship had made full use of it, she would have worn out her guns in next to no time; accurate firing would be impossible, and the ship again practically useless.

Knowing all these things, you should now be able to realize the extraordinary difficulties of hitting a single gun from ships at those necessarily long ranges, and be able to understand their comparative failure to do so.

To return to the submarines. It was on a Saturday, the 22nd May, that the first German submarine actually made its appearance off the Peninsula. Just as the Honourable Mess had finished their meagre lunch, a signalman brought the Sub a signal, just received from the _Triumph_, at anchor off Anzac. The Sub read it aloud: "Hostile submarine sighted N.E. of Gaba Tepe".

"Well, it's a good thing to get the show over," the Sub said; and Uncle Podger remarked that "At any rate it will be pretty to watch." They all went on deck; and the sight of a long line of transports, store ships, and hospital ships hurrying across from Anzac to the little protected harbour of Kephalo, in the island of Imbros, made it certain that they evidently did not doubt that a submarine had been seen.

"They're in earnest, at any rate; there's a pretty picture for you," said Uncle Podger as he watched them, the smoke simply pouring out of their funnels as they made haste to get out of danger. All ships round Cape Helles--some forty or fifty ships of all kinds--were ordered to raise steam, and the _Achates_, shortening in her cable, waited for whatever would turn up. Close to her lay the _Swiftsure_; and both had to rely for protection on the keenness of their "look-outs" and the quickness of their guns' crews, because neither ship had torpedo-nets--the _Achates_ never possessed any; the _Swiftsure's_ were lying in a store-house in Bombay Dockyard, where she had left them a year before war broke out.

Everyone felt sure that "something" would happen shortly, and actually experienced a sense of relief to at last be faced with the danger which had so long threatened. Very many took good care--very good care--to secure their swimming-belts under their tunics, in readiness to blow them up should the necessity arise.

It was a glorious day, with a very slight "ruffle" on the sea; and, as Uncle Podger told the nervous China Doll: "My dear chap, you couldn't want a better day for a swim."

At half-past one the _Prince George_, in a new coat of paint, steamed under the _Achates'_ stern. She had returned from a twenty-four-hours "spell" up the Straits, looking after the Asiatic howitzers, and as she turned slowly into position, to anchor, she suddenly began to blaze away with her small guns, for'ard, and went full speed ahead. At the same moment the cruiser _Talbot_, about a mile away, hoisted the signal "hostile submarine in sight", and fired a blank charge to draw attention to it. "Close water-tight doors" was piped along the decks; the crew dashed down below; and the China Doll, trembling with excitement, made his way for'ard, and saw the splashes of the _Prince George's_ shells following and bursting all round what looked like the swirl and heave of water which a big fish would make when swimming just below the surface. One of the gun's crews near him shouted that he saw a periscope; another, an obvious liar, swore that he could see the tail rudders.