Glorious Deeds of Australasians in the Great War

by E. C. Buley

The Australasians completely lost their hearts to the sailormen, with whom they were working here. "I was glad to get out of the blooming boats," said one Australian when recounting his experiences; "but those Jack Tars went to and fro under the shells and bullets as if they never knew of them. You ought to have seen the little middies in charge of the boats; young boys that might have been larking at school. Just boys with round rosy faces, but so keen. When I have a boy I mean to put him in the Australian navy. It makes fine men of them."

The Australasians excited a corresponding admiration from their British sailor friends, not only for the way they fought, but for their whim of bathing under shell fire. Brighton Beach is an ideal place for a swim, barring the small circumstance that several Turkish batteries concealed in the broken ground had the range of the place, and devoted a flattering attention to it. But this did not deter the Australasians, when their time came for a rest, from trying the tonic effect of a plunge in Gallipoli waters.

One man would be stationed on the shore, to give warning, and a score would take to the water together. "Duck," the signalman would cry, as the whining groan of shrapnel shell was heard. Down would go their heads all together, and up their heels, to disappear under the water just in time to avoid the spray of bullets that tore the smooth surface into foam. Then the sailors, watching the fun through their glasses, would roar with laughter; and the gasping Australians would show their heads again, to take breath for the next plunge. It sounds reckless, but the practice continued, though many men subsequently lost their lives through it.

But these amusements were not possible in the few days that followed the first landing. Within twenty-four hours of the appearance of the first warship off Gaba Tepe, the enemy had brought an army of 25,000 men to hold the strongly-prepared positions that commanded the heights above it, and to attempt to drive the Australasians from the precarious footing they had obtained with so much daring. Furious attacks were made all along the line, the object being to prevent the invaders from digging in, and establishing themselves. The 3rd Brigade, which had led the way up the cliffs, and suffered most severely in the initial fighting, had a very hot time of it. They stood firm against repeated bayonet attacks, as did the whole line; and the work of entrenching went on steadily, in spite of the brave fury with which the Turks repeated their attacks.

The warships gave splendid help, shelling the main bodies of the defenders wherever they showed on the ridges. The Queen Elizabeth was conspicuous in this work, standing off so far to sea that she was hardly discernible, yet landing her gigantic shells with amazing accuracy among the ranks of the Turks. The havoc played by one of these shrapnel shells may be imagined when it is considered that they weigh three-quarters of a ton, and contain 20,000 bullets. Nothing impressed the Australasians more than the hideous din made by the explosion of one of these gigantic shells, and the scar on the hillside that showed after its bursting.

It was under the supporting fire of the warships that the Ninth and Tenth Infantry made a most gallant bayonet charge on the 26th, to drive the Turks from a ridge beyond Pope's Hill, which commanded the whole Australian position, and permitted machine guns to enfilade the landing-place. They advanced in open lines through the scrub, making dashes of a hundred and fifty yards at a swift run, and then dropping to take breath for another charge. Twice they drove the Turks from the position, and were in turn driven back; the third time they stayed there.

The 8th Battalion (Victoria) had to bear the brunt of repeated charges by bodies of Turks who far outnumbered them and came charging with shouts of "Allah! Allah!" The losses sustained by the enemy in these charges were enormous. The 4th (New South Wales) made one dashing bayonet charge that carried them right through the Turkish camp, but beyond they came into an area commanded by machine guns, and got off again, having lost heavily and fought most gallantly.

These are only some of the incidents detailed out of the confusion of the second day's fighting. By the end of that day the Australasians recognized that they were there to stay. A conversation in one of the advanced trenches bears quaintly upon their certainty on this point. One by one the men gazed through a periscope at the prospect commanded from the height they occupied. "Fair country for stock," remarked one, as he yielded his place. "Take a lot of clearing," commented another. The third was a miner. "Here," he said after a long inquisitive look around, "chuck me an entrenching tool; I'm going to try for a prospect."

Yes, they were there to stay right enough; until their duty should call them to fight the cause of right and freedom somewhere else. Already a lamentably large number of them were there to stay until the last trump shall sound the call to them to arise and receive the reward the hereafter holds for brave and noble men, who have laid down their lives that justice and goodness may not perish from the face of the earth. But dead or alive, the Australasians were there to stay, until such time as they should receive the command to retire.

Already they had made history after a fashion which is testified in a letter written about that time by General Birdwood, who had charge of the whole of the Gaba Tepe operations, to Sir George Reid, the High Commissioner in London for Australia. The General wrote:—