Gallipoli Diary, Volume 1

deck feeling a ton's weight of trouble weighing down upon my shoulders? Never till to-day has solicitude become painful. This is the fault of Birdwood, Hunter-Weston and Paris. I read their "appre

ts should they anchor off Morto Bay." "As I told you," he says, "after thinking it out thoroughly, I was convinced our best plan would be to go for the South of the Gallipoli Peninsula," but now he continues, he finds his Staff "all seem to be keen on a landing somewhere between Saros Bay and Enos. For this I have no use, as though I think we should doubtle

perstition of old Forts being stronger than new ships its quietus if only they can clear a passage through the minefield. There are forts and forts, ships and ships, no doubt. But from what we have done already the sailors know that our ships here can knock out those forts here. But first they must tackle the light guns which protect the minefield from the sweepers. Birdwood seems to think we might

taking the shortest, most direct

ons deny me the whole of that country when they lay down as a principle that "Th

n front from Rodosto; in flank from Adrianople; in rear from Bulair; whilst, as we advanced, we would lose touch with the Fleet.

te the Peninsula whereas the Kilid Bahr p

danelles in the first instance and to help the Russians to take Constantinople in the second. The War Office, the Admiralty, the Vice-

s through the Narrows to attack Constantinople. "The immediate object," he says, "of operations in the Dardanelles is to enable our warships, with the necessary

ag

the Fleet; and no operations should be commenced unless it is clear that their result will b

cannot do this withou

ement of th

mobile

Leon floa

onsider how far the Army can help, in

nts and by the landings carried out some time ago, has conc

hments covering the landing places, with concealed machine gun emplacements and land mines on the beach; and has pu

d from the Sea of Marmora and is not dependent on the Isthmus of Bulair. The passage of the

y expect to encounter, Hunter-Weston comes to the conclusion

se near C

e near Ca

ed fire on any Turks holding it. We, therefore, should be able to make sure of securing the Achi Baba position." Also,

are so short of ammunition and particularly of high explosive shell that there is every prospect of our getting tied up on an ex

ways. But when we play the game of death, things are our counters-guns, rivers, shells, bread, roads, for

ference on the 30th March with d'Amade and myself he never said or implied in any way that under conditions as he found them and as they

and disembarkation carefully worked out by the General Staff and the Naval War Staff, and if no bombardment or other warning had been given till the troops, landing gear, etc., were all ready and despatched, (

Dardanelles on 11th February and before that

ns have been poured into the Peninsula,-several lines of trenches have been dug,-every landing place has been trenched and mined, and all that clever

ess in this Expedit

ost hopeful method o

nd no risks too great if ther

chance of success. (The views are founded on the information available to the writer at the time of lea

nia and Greece in the wisdom of their neutrality, and will impair the power of our valuable friend M. Venezelos. It will be a

eas to attempt a landing and fail to secure a passage t

lies is evidently having consider

d to get our expedition properly equipped and organised for this difficult operation of war;

been carefully thought out in all its possibilities and det

er-Westo

To land would be difficult enough if surprise was possible but hazardous in the extreme under present conditions." He discusses Gaba Tepe as a landing place; also Smyrna, and Bulair. On the whole, he favours Sedd-el-Bahr as it "is the only place where transports could come in close and where th

that the landing is impossible. Well, we shall see, D.V., we shall see!! One thing is certain: we must work up our preparations

kfast went on board the Queen Elizabeth where Braithwaite and I worked for

putting our Fleet and Army precisely where it was at present on the map of the war world. Half that unique chance had already been muddled away by the lack of secrecy and swiftness in our methods. With check mate within our grasp we had given two moves to the enemy. Still, perhaps; nay, probably, there was time. Were we to prolong hesitation, or, were we, now that we had done the best we c

ing no knowledge of my opponent whereas the German General Staff is certain to have transferred the "life-like picture" Schr?der told me they had of me to Constantinople. Still, sea power and the mobility it confers is a great help, and we ought to be able to rattle the enemy however imperturbable may be his nature and whatever he knows about us if we throw every man we can carry in our small craft in one simultaneous rush against selected points, whilst using all the balance in feints against other likely place

ountain is our first point of attack, and the direct move against it will start from the beaches at Cape Helles and Sedd-el-Bahr. As it is believed that the Turks are there in some force to oppose us, envelopment will be attempted by landing detachments in Morto Bay and opposite Krithia village. At the same time, also, the A. and N.Z. Corps will land between Gaba Tepe and Fisherman's Hut to try and seize the high backbone of the Peninsula and cut the line of retreat of the enemy on the Kilid Bahr

roywards. The French are to land a Brigade at Kum Kale (perhaps a Regiment may do) so as, first, to draw the fire o

Liman von Sanders will not dare concentrate and that he will fight with his local troops only for the first forty-eight hours. But what is the number of these local troops? Alas, there is the doubtful point. We think forty thousand rifles and a hundred guns, but, if my scheme comes off, not a tenth of them should be South of Achi Ba

.V. on to Morto Bay because the transports will there be under fire from Asia unless the French succeed in silencing the guns about Troy or in diverting their aim. Whether then o

ost point. Some think these cliffs along that North-west coast unclimbable, but I am sure our fellows will manage to scramble up, and I think their losses should be less in doing so than in making the more easy seeming lodgment at Sedd-el-Bahr or Helles. The more broken and precipitous the glacis, the more the ground leading up to the obje

erman's Hut in the North round along the Upper Spurs of the high ridges and following them down to where they reach the sea, a little way above Gaba Tepe. If only Birdwood can seize this line and fix himself there for a bit, he shou

our guns. That is part of the hardness of the nut. The landings at Gaba Tepe and to the South will between them take up all our small craft and la

ite sure they could play their part in the programme. Their agreement is all the more precious. They (the Admirals and the Commodore) are also, I fancy, happier in their minds now that they know for sure what we soldiers are after. Rumours had been

sea; these elemental hazards alone would suffice to give a man grey hairs were we practising a man?uvre exercise on the peaceful Essex coast. So much thought; so much band-o-bast; so much dove-tailing and welding together of naval and military methods, signals, technical words, etc., and the worst punishment should any link in the composite chain give way. And then-t

n coming along in their transports

xe, dating from about the period of Charlemagne. The Admiral lives quite in the old style and is a delightful personage; very gay and very eager for a chance to measure himself against the enemy. Guépratte, though he knows nothing officially, believes that his Government are holding up their sleeve a second French D

ctly the excuse I wanted, so I have dropped this fly just in front of K.'s nose, telling him that "There are persistent rumours here amongst the French that General d'Amade's Command is to be joined by another French Division. Just in case there is truth in the report you should know that Mudros harbour is as full

One of our lumbering seaplanes went up after it like an owl in

ing in to let me take a second good look at the coast. Our studies were enlivened by an amusing incident. Nearing Cape Helles, the Queen Elizabeth went astern, so as to test her reverse turbines. The enemy, who must have been watching us like a mouse does a cat, had the ill-luck to select just this moment to salute us with a couple of shells. As they had been allowing for our speed they were ludicrously out of it, the shot striking the water half a mile ahead. We then lay off Cape Helles whilst a very careful survey of the whole of that section was being made. The Turks, disgusted by their own bad aim, did not fire again. On our way back w

at dawn-here in harbour-we found ourselves clean cut off from the shore. What a ticklish affair the great landing is going to be! Ho

control station had enabled me to see the lie of the land better than on my previous re

loss, but yet not clear loss; that's a sure thing. These niggy-wigs were as awkward as golly-wogs in the boats. Ever

hat it should be chronicled in deathless verse. But we gaze at the glass

ers; not even a newspaper! In India many, many years ago, we used to call Dick Burra dik haì, Hindustani for, it is a great worry. So he is only playing up to his sobriquet. The little ewe lamb is an epistle from Fitz giving me a lively sketch of the rumpus at the War Office when its pontiffs grasped for the first time the true bearing of their own orders. There was a rush to saddle poor us with t

heir minds by telling them the sea was rough and that, even if every one had been here with gaiter butt

s quarters on the Queen Elizabeth as one of the Admiralty authorised Press Correspondents, or rather, as the only authorised correspondent. In Manchuria he was known and his writing was well liked. When he had gone,

Australians and Senegalese gave us a good object lesson of the relative brain capacities of the two races. Next I went and inspected the Armoured Car Section of the Royal Naval Division under Lieutenant-Commander Wedgwood. He is

inspect the various landing places. His whole tone about the Expedition has been transformed. Now he has become the most sanguine of us all. H

e West of Krithia (where we are sending one Battalion), we should greatly better our chances. Also, a battery of field guns attached to the Morto Bay column, and a couple of mountain guns added to the Krithia column would add to our prospects of making a real big scoop. But we cannot spare the sea transport except by too much weakening and dela

clear and strong for daylight. There is a very strong current running round the point; the exact lie of the beaches is unknown and he thinks the confusion inseparable from any landing will be s

t is light enough to aim. He has no current to trouble him, it is true, but he is not landing on any surveye

nch Division was false. K. merely quotes the number of my question and adds, "The rumour is baseless." Well, "tant pis," as Guépratte would say with a shrug of his shoulders. Our fi

hantoms? Certainly, in some form or another, they ought to be brought into our scheme and, even if only at a distance, bring some pressure to bear upon the

es, also

n (Captain Kelly) at 9.30 this morning, where Admiral de Robeck

e are the very two men with whom I did my very first flight! On that never to be forgotten day Samson took up Winston and Davies took me. Like mallards we shot over the Medway and saw t

eyes trying to digest the honey brought back by our busy aeroplane bees from thei

f K.'s washing his hands of the Air is that the Admiralty run that element entirely. Samson is Boss. He has brought with him two Maurice Farmans and th

engines. He took them because they were new and the

these are absolutely useless

H.P. Canton en

es; very old and can't be used owi

rviceable aeroplanes for the Army. There are also some seaplanes with us but they are not under Samson, and are purely for

l an Air Corps. The dangerous shortage is that in two-seater aeroplanes as we want our Air Service now for spotting and reconnaissances. If, after that requirement had been met, we

terprise, is 30 good two-seater machines; 24 fighters; 40 pilots and 400 men. So equipped

t this; but I still feel it is wiser and better so; not only from the K. point of view but also from de Robeck's. He (de Robeck) might be quite glad I should write once to Winston on one subject but he would never be sure afterwards I was not writing on others. On the way back I spoke to the Admiral, but I don't know whether he will write himself or not. Ventured als

y are thoroughly imbued with the idea that the Sea Lords are at the best half-hearted; at the worst, actively antagonistic to us and to the whole of our enterprise. The photographs, etc., I have studied make it only too clear that the Turks have not let the grass gr

Lemnos abo

he first three fell fifty yards short of the ship; the fourth shell about twenty yards over her. The next three got home. One cut plumb through the bridge (where all my brains had been playing about two minutes previously) and burst on the deck just outside the conning tower. Some cordite cartridges were lying outside of it and these went off with a great flare. Another struck the funnel and the third came in on the waterline. Fifteen more shells were then fired with just a little bit too much elevation and passed over. Only two men were wounded,-fractured legs. Captain Fitzmaurice now

one excited, I with my aeroplane reports;

them grew very long; so long, in fact, that I feared he was afraid; for I own these photos are frightening. So I said, "You don't seem t

we only have to close it." Enver especially brags he will make very short work with us if we set foot so near to the heart of his Empire, and gives it out that the whole of us will be marching through the streets of Constantinople, not as conquerors, but as prisoners, within a week from the date of our making the attempt. All the same, despite this bragging, the Turks realise that if we were to get the Fleet through the Narrows; or, if it were to force its own way through whilst we absorb the attention of their mobile guns, the game would be up. So they are straining every nerve to be ready for anything. The moral of all these rather contradictory remarks is just what I have said time and again since South Africa. The fact that war has become a highly

ttle time with their Armies, I may say that the Balkan nations loathe and mistrust one another to so great a degree that it is sheer waste of time to think of roping them all in on our side, as Fitzmaurice and Napier seem to propose. We may get Greece to join us, and Russia may get Roumania to join her-if we win here-but then we make an enemy of Bulgaria, and vice versa. If they will unearth my 1909 report at the War Office they will see that, at that time, one Bulgarian

wireless came in saying the enemy had made a bad shot and only a few men had been drowned lowering the boats. Admiral Rosy Wemyss and Hope, the Flag-Captain, of the Q.E. were my guests and naturally they were greatly

came along and I had the be

le bits of beaches. At mid-day the Manitou steamed into harbour and Colonel Peel, Commander of the troops, came on board and reported fully to me about the attack by the Turkish torpedo boat. The Turks seem to have behaved quite decently giving our men time to get into their boats and steaming some distance off whi

tillery embark. Spoke to a lot of the men, some of whom

came to see me

e went over the landing at Kum Kale. He is in full sympathy and understands. Winter, Woodward and their administrative Staffs also arrived in the Southland and have taken up the

tte, Thursby, Wemyss, Phillimore, Vyvian, Dent, Loring), whereat the 23rd was fixed for our attack and the naval landing orders were read and fully threshed out. I did not attend as the meeting was rather for the purpose of going point by point into orders already approved in principle than of starting any fresh hares. Staff Officers who have only had to do with land operations would be surprised, I am sure, at the amount of original thinking and improvisation demanded by a landing operation. The Naval and Military Beach Per

hters. These Australians are shaping into Marines in double quick time and Cairo high jinks are wild oats sown and buried. Where eve

nant de la Borde. The first is a man of the world, with manners suave and distinguished; the second is a savant and knows the habits of obscure

Arcadian." Lemnos. A big

morning. No doubt he has been in some rotten hole in Alexandria and this i

s the wind blows, we hav

rs for his Kum Kale landing as well

ther time is in labour is so big that her pains are prodigious and prolonged out of all

terday our plans were but plans. To-day

Headqu

April

France and

comrades of the Fleet, we are about to force a landing upon an open beach

and the Navy; the positions will be stormed, and t

Commander, "Remember, once you set foot upon the Gallipol

ogress. Let us prove our selves worthy o

ilton,

y. Russian Military Attaché from Athens (Makalinsky) came to see me at 2.30 p.m. He cannot give me much idea of how th

with him a Captain Coddan, to be liais

sends his

IAL

Headqu

April

age has been received to-da

ery success, and you are constantly i

gorgeous day at last; fitting frame to the

ut through the other painted ships lying thick on the wonderful blue of the bay. The troops wild

llipoli's shore could never make good. They know that lie must pass for truth until they have become targets to guns, machine guns and rifles-huddled together in boats, helpless, plain to the enemy's s

a wireless to say that Rupert Brooke is very dangero

t to-day to get ready. Wemyss said good-bye

e landing at Kum Kale and also for the f

we got this m

ng messages at a propitious mom

h will undoubtedly have a momentous effect on the war. The task they have to perform will need all the grit Britishers have n

nd the Fleet. The Army knows they can rely on their energy and effe

s of our entire confidence that their courage an

message)-

ll be with you when

shadow fall dark upon the Germans and st

lowing from

Queen El

April,

ear G

ed and they are to take the necessary measures to have their com

will prevent our proceeding with the scheme. 'May hea

ys the delay has been useful, as we have

s sin

. M. de

sent

Arca

April

ear A

my own sentiments. The sooner we get to wor

s sin

Ian Ham

raightaway he will be bur

on when I told Eddie I would bespeak the boy

ed. Death grins at my elbow. I cannot get him out of my thoughts. He is fed up with the old and sick-only the flower of the flock will serv

world that was. War will smash, pulverise, sweep into the dustbins of eternity the whole fabric of

smallest of the heavenly Shiners. Our star burns dim as a corpse light: the huge black chas