—G. K. Chesterton.
Before continuing to describe the doings of the 30th and 31st Brigades after their withdrawal from the Kiretch Tepe Sirt, a word must be said about the units which were attached to them, the Pioneer Battalion, the Royal Engineers and the Field Ambulances. Details of the movements of these units are hard to obtain, but it would not be fair to overlook them.
The Pioneer Battalion, the 5th Royal Irish Regiment, was trained as an infantry unit but also received instruction in engineering work, especially in road-making. The majority of its men were miners or artificers and its function was to do the odd jobs of the Division and also to provide a guard for Divisional Headquarters. On the Peninsula, however, these duties soon fell into abeyance, since it was called on to fill up gaps in the line, and did so eagerly. It was an exceptionally fine battalion, formed by Lord Granard, whose ancestor, Sir Arthur Forbes, had first raised the 18th (Royal Irish) two hundred and thirty years before, and possessed an unusually large proportion of Regular officers. Fighting under difficult conditions, usually by detached companies, it did well wherever it was engaged, losing Lieutenants Costello and MacAndrew killed, and Major Fulda, Captain Morel, and half-a-dozen subalterns wounded.
The Engineers at Suvla, as everywhere, fully justified the splendid reputation of their corps. Few braver actions were noted in the Division than Lieutenant Waller’s rescue of three wounded men on the Kiretch Tepe Sirt, and throughout the campaign the Sappers defied danger and did their duty.
The 30th Field Ambulance, which disembarked at Suvla without its bearer section on the afternoon of the 7th, was, for the first ten days of the campaign, working single-handed. Then the 31st and 32nd arrived and the pressure became less, but all the ambulances were working under great difficulties. There was little room for them, they had been unable to bring all their stores with them, and, as will be told later, medical comforts were conspicuous by their absence. In spite of these handicaps, they had to deal, not only with a very large number of wounded, but with a never ceasing flow of sick. The doctors, however, did admirable work and everyone was loud in praise of the Ambulance stretcher-bearers who used regularly to go out under heavy fire across the plain to bring in the wounded.
After the close of the fighting on August 17th, what was left of the 30th and 31st Brigades was withdrawn to the rest-camp on the beach at Suvla. The fighting had reduced their strength terribly and nearly three-quarters of the officers and half the men who had landed ten days earlier, had fallen or been invalided. Worst of all, was the fact that, owing to so many senior N.C.O.’s having been hit, the internal organization of units had been practically destroyed. An extemporized Company Quartermaster-Sergeant, who possesses no previous knowledge of his work, will rarely be successful in promoting the comfort and efficiency of his men, however hard he may try. Matters were made even more serious by the continued sickness, which became worse and worse when units were withdrawn from the front line. Many who had been able to force their will power to keep them going on, while actually opposed to the enemy, now succumbed, and among them an officer, whose departure inflicted a serious loss on the Division as a whole and on the 31st Brigade in particular.
BRIGADIER-GENERAL J. G. KING-KING, D.S.O.
On August 22nd, General Hill, who had been in bad health ever since landing in Gallipoli, was invalided, suffering from acute dysentery. His departure was deeply regretted by his Brigade, who had learnt to admire his coolness and courage, and to appreciate his constant attention to their comfort. Though the Staff Captain of the Brigade, Captain T. J. D. Atkinson, had been wounded on the 16th, fortunately the Brigade-Major, Captain Cooke-Collis, still remained, and as the command was taken over by Colonel King-King the General Staff Officer (1) of the Division, officers and men did not feel that they had to deal with a stranger.
It was marvellous how many men who were in bad health, resisted the temptation to go sick and be sent on board the white hospital ships, where there was shade and ice and plenty to drink. No man was invalided who was not sick, but there were very few people doing duty in Gallipoli who did not from time to time possess a temperature, and none whose stomachs were not periodically out of order. The doctors did their utmost to retain men with their units, but all medical comforts were difficult to obtain, even condensed milk being precious, and to feed men sickening for dysentery on tinned meat, is to ask for trouble. Rice was a great stand-by, though the men did not much appreciate it unless it was boiled in milk. It was therefore inevitable that men reporting sick should be sent to the field ambulances, and since these were little better off than the regimental M.O.’s so far as provision for special diet was concerned, and since their resources were overtaxed, it followed that it was almost invariably necessary to send invalids away overseas. Though all ranks belonging to them showed the utmost devotion to duty, and worked till they were worn out, a field-ambulance at Suvla was not a place in which a quick recovery could be made. True, it had tents, and it is hard to appreciate the amount of solid comfort offered by a tent to one who has spent weeks in the open under a tropical sun. There were also a certain number of beds, and it was very pleasant to find doctors and orderlies taking an interest in you, and doing their best to make you comfortable.