Part 5
It comes from the brook that I had passed, and from there I go towards what I think is Pink Farm, but find that it is a collection of the pack-mules under Phillips, and I unload my feelings in horribly bad language. Then Phillips gives me a packet of cigarettes, which I am entirely without. I am wet through now to the skin, and dog-tired; my pocket is full of iron-ration biscuits, and between puffs of my cigarettes I munch them. Not a sound of a shot, not a flash of a gun. Old John Turk has had a nasty knock and is over a thousand yards away. Nothing but the sound of the hiss of the gently falling rain. I follow the farmer’s track up to Pink Farm and tell my troubles to Colonel Beadon. Colonel Williams, who had distinguished himself at Sed-el-Bahr, is there without a coat, and soaked to the skin as I am. I am instructed to take the remaining mules back to “W” Beach, link any which I pass, that are on the way up, on to my convoy, and also pick up any which are starting off from “W” Beach, make one convoy, take stock and make a note of it, and take the whole through Sed-el-Bahr up to the spot Thomson had pointed out to me in the afternoon. I think of the tale of the odd-job man who had been given every imaginable job in the world by his old lady mistress, and who asked her if her house was built on clay, as he would very much like to make bricks in his spare time. I go back to Phillips; the convoy is turned round and off we trek, I at the head, Phillips in the rear. I meet Davy on the way up with a convoy of his, and accordingly instruct him to join on to my convoy. He says, “Look here, Gillam, old boy; you’re fagged out and are making a mess of things; go back to bed, old boy. I know all about it, and we have to take these mules to Pink Farm.” I wish Pink Farm elsewhere, express my feelings to him in forcible language, and finally convince him under protest. However, we are soon friends again, and his convoy links up in rear of mine. We hear three reports of a rifle ring out on our right. A sniper, still undiscovered, at work. We arrive at “W” Beach, arresting the start of another convoy, which in turn also becomes part of ours, and I go to find O’Hara. Having found him, I told him my tale of woe; he says he will come with me to the 88th Brigade; and after taking stock and tacking a watercart on to the rear of the column, we trek off to Hill 138. Stopping there, O’Hara has a chat with the A.P.M., who has been to the 88th H.Q. and assures us that we are on the right track. On through the ruined village of Sed-el-Bahr we go, down through a poplar grove enclosing a Turkish cemetery, when we overtake the C.R.A., riding alone with an orderly. We are on the white road that I noticed in the afternoon, and the C.R.A. takes the lead, as he states that a part of the road further up is rumoured to be mined. Krithia lies ahead on our left in flames, a wonderful sight.
It has stopped raining; we pass several brooks, and from them comes the clamouring noise of loudly croaking bull-frogs. We pass one after the other four white pillars of stone, about a hundred feet in height. On my right I can see dimly the waters of the Dardanelles. Dawn is just developing. The C.R.A. raises his hand and we stop. He rides cautiously forward with his orderly, and after a minute returns and orders us to follow him. He turns sharply to the left, makes a wide circuit, we following, and comes out on the white road once more farther up. He then leaves us and disappears. We continue for three hundred yards, when I come to the conclusion that we are very near our destination, tell O’Hara so, and the command is given “Halt!” O’Hara and I walk on up the road. Not a sound is heard—no shells, no rifle fire whatsoever. I can see no one about. I look to my right, where Brigade H.Q. should be, and find nothing but some shallow dugouts. We go off the road to the right amongst bushes, and trip over a few poor dead Tommies. We come back to the road. O’Hara thinks I am wrong. Good Lord! supposing that I am wrong after all this!
We walk up the road further, and suddenly come to a sentry standing in a trench on our right. I look to the left and see another trench and a sentry a little way on, on guard. The road goes on into darkness. I am smoking a cigarette, and am ordered peremptorily by the sentry on my right to put it out. We question him, and find that we have arrived at our front line. Every man of four is on guard, the other three sound asleep in the bottom of the trench. The sentry tells us that the Turkish line is a good way ahead, and that he has seen or heard nothing from there since he has been on guard. He is shivering with cold, though muffled in his coat, but for all that looks a fine type of fellow. But he is “pukkah” and 29th as well. Finest troops in the world, bar none. The finished type of a disciplined British Tommy. Oh! for six more Divisions of this quality: Achi Baba would have been ours this day. He directs us to Brigade H.Q. Following his direction, we turn back down the road and come back to the shallow dugouts.
During our absence Thomas, of the Essex, and a Naval officer, smoking a huge pipe and muffled to his ears in his white muffler and blue overcoat, had arrived. They tell us the dugouts are the 88th Brigade H.Q. We inquire for Thomson and the rest, and are told that they have gone to 86th to confer. One by one the little patient mules are unloaded, and proceed down the road, to wait, and the boxes, rations, ammunition, and water are spread singly amongst the thick gorse off the road, so as not to be seen by the enemy in the morning. While this goes on I talk to the Naval officer, and learn from him that he is an observing officer for the ships’ guns; he appears a very cool customer. He tells me that he is a very unlucky man to talk to; that an officer yesterday was wounded while talking to him, and another killed last night under the same circumstances. I wish him “Good-night and good luck,” and go back to the mules, and help to hasten their unloading by helping myself. Colonel Patterson, O.C. Mule Corps, keeps on urging upon us the importance of not losing the ropes, as when lost they are difficult to replace. The last mule being unloaded, we search for the watercart, but it is nowhere to be found; but tins of water are up now, and we hear that a well has been found, the water pure and not poisoned, as we had feared. And so we start to trek back. A short way back and O’Hara shouts “Halt!” Then he says to me, “Gillam, where’s that —— mine we’ve heard so much about?” I answer, “Great Scott!” Somebody behind us gives a muffled cough, and a Tommy, one of the armed escort, steps forward and in a Tommy’s polite manner says, “Begging your pardon, sir, but we are standing on it.” O’Hara shouts “Walk—march!” and we move at a good four miles an hour until we arrive at the white pillars and the friendly sound of the croaking frogs; we realize at any rate that we are safe from land mines. Evidently this mine is a false alarm. Permission to smoke is given, and the Syrian boys exchange ration cigarettes and chatter to each other in Russian. Up to now they had been almost entirely silent. We pass many French troops sleeping in little hastily made camps, and we pass some Zouaves, looking picturesque in the early morning light in their quaint Oriental uniforms. And so through the silent cemetery and poplar-trees, through Sed-el-Bahr, now a large French camp, back past Hill 138 and home to “W” Beach. I give O’Hara a few of my iron-ration biscuits and almost stagger to my Supply depot, for I am hardly able to walk any further, and lie down on my valise, that my servant has thoughtfully laid out for me, beside the S.S.O. and Colonel Beadon, falling off to sleep with the satisfaction that to-morrow at any rate the 88th will have their rations.
_April 29th._
I wake at eight, but am given permission to sleep all the morning. I have breakfast. Getting fed-up with biscuit. My servant rigs me up a “bivvy” and I roll up and go fast asleep. Lord, what a gorgeous sleep it was! I slept till one, and then had lunch, and after, a shave and a wash. I did little all day but watch the Fleet firing and the transports unloading everything imaginable necessary for an army. We have now rigged up a nice little mess with some ration boxes and a tarpaulin, and have quite a nice dinner at night with a boiled ham, bully beef rissoles, and biscuit pancakes. Our chef is “some” chef. A Naval officer at night, after dinner, is continually shouting “Any more for the _Arcadian_?” where G.H.Q. is. Reminds me of “Any more for the _Skylark_?” at Brighton. It is pleasant going to sleep at night with the sound of the swish of waves breaking on the shore in one’s ears. The Fleet guns roar away consistently all day.
_April 30th._
To-day we have some shells on the beach, but not very terrible ones. Many of them go “fut” in the ground without exploding. If this is all the artillery they can put up against us, Lord help them! They must be having hell from the Fleet.
Go up to Brigade H.Q. via Sed-el-Bahr this morning with a rifle and dressed as a Tommy. All go up dressed like that now, for snipers are still about. On past the white pillars to Brigade H.Q., we pass the bodies, still unburied, of Turks and British—fallen heroes lying broken amidst wild flowers. I call and see Major Gibbon at his observation post, but from there can see nothing of the enemy. Before me is a simple, lovely summer scene; yet amidst the nullahs and the olive groves, the flowers and barley, Death lurks, alert to claim his toll. It is a long walk back to “W” Beach via Sed-el-Bahr. Snipers are still at large, which is remarkable, and we are warned not to walk across country, though to do so would be much quicker. I pass two snipers as we arrive back at the white pillars, prisoners in the hands of the French. One prisoner is limping badly from a wound in the foot. The French appear to have made themselves very much at home in Sed-el-Bahr. I pass an officers’ mess and lunch is on. I am surprised at the delicacies on the table, including many bottles of white wine. We are still on bare rations, and bully and biscuits at that, but they appear to have bread, probably from Tenedos, and probably for officers’ messes only; and they all seem very bright, as if it was a huge joke. As we are about to enter Sed-el-Bahr a French sentry stops us, and warns us not to go through the village, as two men have just been sniped. We pass at the back of “V” Beach. The view from here of the Fleet is magnificent. Occasionally one sees a whiff of yellow smoke shoot from the side of a ship, and a few seconds after a deafening report follows. It takes some getting used to.
We pass a company of Senegalese manning a trench dug at the back of “V” Beach. They lie in it, peering over the top, looking inland intently, as if they expect the enemy, who is more than three miles away, to rush down on them at any moment.
I pass General D’Amade at the H.Q. at the back of “V” Beach, and stop to chat with the French officer who was on the _Arcadian_ with me, and also a French Naval officer who was on the _Southland_. The Naval officer inspects my rifle with interest, saying it is the first time that he has handled one of the short patterns. He tells me that he saw the fight from the _Andania_ on Sunday morning, and says that he thinks that it will stand out as the most magnificent fight of the war.
MAY
_May 1st._
A few shells, but none very terrible, come over; one, however, in our depot. Beautiful weather. Heavy rifle fire heard at night. Now and again a Turkish shell lands over from Achi. The rifle fire last night was Turkish; nothing happened. Probably “wind up” on their part. Letters arrive. While sitting on a box reading, a shell comes beastly near, but bursts in a not very frightening manner twenty yards away. But I and the few near me fall flat to the ground. I have been advised to do this by an officer who is an expert in shelling, and he tells me that by so doing, though a shell may burst ten yards from you, one should be safe. My servant rolls over and over, shouting “Oh!” and I rush to him, asking him if he was hit, but find that a stone had caught him on the forehead, and but for a nasty bruise he was none the worse. This afternoon I have a bathe off “W” Beach. Crowds are bathing. What a contrast to this time last week! Only a week ago we landed, and now “W” Beach is like a seaside resort as far as the bathing is concerned. I felt in holiday mood, and with that delightful refreshed feeling that one has after a dip, I strolled along the sand up to the depot for a cup of tea. But the scream of a shell overhead from Achi, which fell in the water beyond the bathers, brought my holiday mood to an abrupt end. The mouth of the Dardanelles and the sea at the end of the Isthmus is full of warships, from battleships to small destroyers and their necessary small craft, transports, hospital ships, trawlers, and lighters. Engineers, French and English, are working feverishly at the building of piers and finishing those already begun. Stores are being unloaded, and marquees for their storage are being erected.
The scene here is extraordinarily interesting. I have never seen such a motley gathering in my life. The beach is crowded with figures, all working for dear life. The sea is dotted with lighters, out of which are being poured all kinds of military stores—wood, sand-bags, wire-netting, galvanized iron, cooping, and the like; all these things are being conveyed to the piers and from there put ashore. On the shore itself parties are at work erecting tents and marquees, and other parties are hard at work making dugouts, plying picks and shovels with a will. Here they are erecting the signals station, a contraption of beams and sand-bags. Outside, wires are being laid, and so the work of the beach parties goes busily forward. Yet to my untutored gaze the scene is wonderful. The whole beach is a hopeless mix-up of French and English, with a good sprinkling of Naval men—presenting a kaleidoscopic effect, with the afternoon sun shining upon it, such as I have never seen before. It is of course quite an orderly mob really—but this is only recognized when one watches the work of one group at a time. Here is the real business of a military landing on a hostile shore, everybody knowing what to do and how to do it, and so the work goes on without a hitch.
At 7 p.m. I start off with a long convoy of pack-mules with rations for Brigade H.Q. via the Sed-el-Bahr–Krithia road. At present it is impossible to use vehicles, for the first line is served by but two roads, which are nothing but farmers’ tracks. An armed escort of the Essex Regiment accompanies us. The Padre of the 88th Brigade, who is just joining, comes along with me, intending to join the Worcesters in the trenches. Just entering Sed-el-Bahr we are halted by a French officer, and almost immediately my head feels as if it is blown off by four spouts of flame stabbing the darkness just a few yards away, followed almost instantaneously by four deafening reports. A French “75” battery is in action, and that means business. Almost immediately after No. 4 gun had fired, No. 1 fired, then No. 2, No. 3, and No. 4 again, and so on, shell after shell following each other in rapid succession into the night, towards Achi Baba. The gunners, crouching like cats by their guns, were lit up fitfully by each flash, disappearing again in the pause of a fraction of a second between each round. An officer in a dugout behind, with telephone glued to his ear, shouts incessantly directions as to range, elevation, and depression to an officer who is standing nonchalantly smoking a cigarette behind the battery, who in turn shouts orders to the guns. The guns reminded me of two couple of hounds held in leash at a coursing meeting, barking with eagerness to be let loose. Our little pack-mules are greatly concerned at first, but become surprisingly docile as the firing goes on. A sharp order is given by the French officer standing behind the weapons; the gunners relax their tense attitudes and begin attending to parts of the guns. The officer who had first stopped us most charmingly and politely apologizes in English for delaying us, and our convoy proceeds on its track. I chat to the Padre; find he is fifty-five years of age and before the war a peace-loving rector. What circumstances to find one’s self in after fifty-five years of peaceful life! I record him in my mind as a very gallant old gentleman. We pass through the French camp down through the trees to the poplar-grove cemetery, which always now fills me with a curious awe, so ghostly do the graves look in the moonlight, lying peacefully amidst the poplar-trees. It is a most beautiful sight, with the glimmering water of the Dardanelles beyond.
Ahead on our right the reflection of the bright beam of Chanak searchlight, swinging round from east to west across the Narrows, can be seen in the sky, searching for any of our ships, should they make a dart up the Straits. Past my friends the loudly croaking bull-frogs, past the stately white pillars, on up the white road that leads to Krithia and towards our dumping-ground—Brigade H.Q.—the little mules pad carefully and surely along, led by the Syrian mule-drivers, who chatter confidentially to each other in Russian, for they now are at home in their new life, and delight in the thought that they are doing their bit in the great cause.
We arrive at our destination, and lo and behold! no one is there. Phillips and I confer. I decide to go on with Smith, Q.M. of the Hants, to find H.Q. We take an orderly each from the armed guard. I take an Essex man. We follow the white road, and arriving at the front-line trenches are pulled up short by the “’Alt, who are you?” “Supply Officer.” “Advance to be recognized.” We advance. Smith asks where Battalion H.Q. are, and learns they are a hundred yards to our left. We find, a hundred yards along, a part of the trench dug back a bit to serve as Battalion H.Q. The trenches are deeper now; one can stand up in safety, but only just. Smith asks for Captain Reid, the Adjutant; he steps out to us. We express surprise at the quietness of things. There is absolutely no firing on our front, but we can hear desultory firing on our right from the French line. Reid offers us cigarettes and lights one himself. I remark to him that it is unwise to light a cigarette standing in the open, to which he replies that the enemy are a long way away. He directs me to Brigade H.Q., further along the line. I wish him “Good-night,” and with my orderly proceed cautiously in the direction he had pointed, for it is now pitch dark. I am challenged again and again, and find myself after a bit among the Royal Scots, and one of their officers kindly lends me an orderly, who takes me to Brigade H.Q., dug in a dry brook, some two hundred yards behind the front line. Thomson is asleep, and it is with regret that I have to wake him. He tells me to dump rations in the same place as the last night’s. I start to go back, steer my way by the front line once more and in the dark miss the direction, and find myself about to walk across a track which runs through our front line towards the enemy’s and an alert sentry bringing me to the halt with a sharp challenge, I find my mistake. I then leave myself in my orderly’s hands, who takes the lead and guides me back to the Brigade dump, when I find that Phillips had met Q.M.S. Leslie and had nearly finished the unloading of the pack-mules. I really believe that if I had not been challenged and had passed through our lines towards the enemy’s, my orderly, one of the “doesn’t reason why” breed, would have calmly followed me. Some one taps me on the shoulder, and a Tommy asks me, “Where’s your rifle, mate?” I reply that I haven’t one. He then says, “Ain’t you one of the ’Ants?” and wonderingly I reply that I am the Supply Officer, and the man brings himself erect with a sharp click, begging my pardon. The reason of his mistake then dawned on me; I have on a private’s tunic.
Our goods delivered, we trek back, and on arrival at Sed-el-Bahr the sound of heavy rifle fire breaks out, but by the sound it is from our own rifles. We wonder what is happening, and think ourselves fortunate that we had finished our job before this activity started. I am in rear of the column, walking with my orderly about fifty yards behind the last mule, when I have a bad nerve shock. I have had many during the past week, but this one takes the biscuit. Out of a hole in the side of a broken-down house there leaps a French soldier. He shouts something to me in French and points a rifle, with gleaming bayonet fixed, at my chest. In days long gone past, it has sometimes happened that one of my young sisters or a brother with a warped sense of humour would leap round from the corner of the landing in our early home, just as I might be passing along, and shout “Boo-h!” I used to go hot and cold with fright, and appeared to cause intense amusement by my state of nerves. When this boy sentry, who by his looks could not have been more than nineteen, jumps out from his hole in the wall, my heart seems to stand still, until it feels that it is never going to start its job again, and then with a bound it carries on its job at about ten times its normal speed. My mouth feels like dry blotting-paper, and all I say is, “Oh, hell!” at the same time throwing my hands well over my head. My orderly, who appears most unconcerned, comes to my rescue and says with a Cockney accent “Ongley,” and our gallant ally brings his rifle to the order and allows us to pass.
Previous to this incident I had been chatting to my orderly about his life in the Army in peace days, but now walk on in silence until we have overtaken the convoy, finding the mules halted. Suddenly the French battery that we had passed earlier in the evening opens a terrible fire. I go along to its position and find that half our convoy had passed earlier, but that, the battery being suddenly called into action, the rear half of our column had been ordered to stop. In the excitement two of the mules get adrift, and with good instinct trot off to their own lines, ignoring the cries in Russian from their drivers and the angry bark of the little “75’s.” A halt of ten minutes, and, again with polite apologies, the pleasant French gunner officers, wishing us “Bon soir,” allow us to proceed. Home to bed and a good night’s rest.
_May 2nd._
A Taube flies over and drops one bomb on our new aerodrome to the left of Hill 138. One of our machines which is up swings round, heading straight for it, and quickly drives it back. A couple of aircraft guns from one of the ships put in some good practice, little white puffs of shrapnel bursting perilously near. A few wounded come in from a little show last night, and amongst them are wounded Turkish prisoners.