Glorious Deeds of Australasians in the Great War

by E. C. Buley

"We always had too much bully beef, and when we left the firing line we had to dispose of the surplus and leave the trench in order for those who relieved us. This time we made up our minds to chuck the beef—there were three four-pound tins of it—across to old Fatty Burns. We did, and there was a terrible hullabaloo when it landed. I suppose they thought they were some new-fangled bombs. But an hour or so later some one threw a whole lot of fine dates into the trench, and we reckoned it was Fatty. Some one said they might be poisoned, but we risked that and enjoyed them fine.

"But that's not all. A day or two after we returned to the firing line we got one of our meat-tins back—with additions. I just had time to throw my overcoat down on it when it exploded. The overcoat was never any more good, and it wasn't Fatty Burns's fault that we were sound after the meat-tin came back. He had put in a stick of gelignite and filled up with the remains of an old clock and some spare scraps of iron and things. The clock-wheels fair murdered my overcoat. But what an old sport!

"There was a Maori up on Walker's Ridge who was a very fine swimmer and diver; he could stay under water longer than any man I ever saw. When he was spelling he would go in swimming, no matter what the shrapnel was like on the beach. And there was a Turkish sniper up on 'Baby 700' who was after his goat and used to fire at him all the time he was swimming. That made a bit of fun for Te Patara, who used to tantalize the sniper something cruel.

"But these Turks have a lot of time to think, and one day the sniper turned up with a pal and a loader as well. They made it very hot for the Maori gent, who found the bullets arriving two to the second in one long stream. He kept under water and breathed through his ears, or something. Anyhow, he got flustered and made a long dive for the shelter of an iron barge that was stranded on the beach. He got the cover all right and stood up behind the barge in about a foot of water. Abdullah and Co. up in the hills made up their minds to keep him there.

"I should say they got two rifles fixed on each end of the barge and fired them at irregular intervals. And every now and then they would bombard the barge, 'ping, ping,' just to let him know they were watching. It wasn't a particularly warm day; there was a cold sea breeze. Te Patara had no dressing-gown at all, and about two hundred of the boys were down on the beach under cover giving him advice. It was good enough advice, but it was dangerous to take it. He only got away after dark, and then he was the chilliest Maori I ever saw. He seemed to have lost some of his love for swimming, too.

"We reckoned the Turk would not stand up to the bayonet; and he certainly ran away from it a good many times. Then the First Brigade was sent out to take the trenches at Lonesome Pine, and got the surprise of their lives. A good deal of the fighting was in roofed-in trenches, where it was as dark as Jack Johnson. And there Bismillah stood up and fought with the bayonet. He wasn't a bit particular; if he couldn't use the point he used the butt, clubbing and hacking like a madman. That rough-house in the dark, through 150 yards of underground trenches, was one of the toughest fights of 1915. And the Turk took all the beating the First Brigade could give him. He died fighting, but he would not run.

"Between Anafarta Village and the big salt lake there was a wide valley of agricultural land; the maps do not show how big it is. Before the landing at Suvla Bay all this land was under cultivation, and we used to watch the Turkish farmers at work. They were old boys with big long beards, and we used to imagine them going about saying to one another, 'By the beard of the Prophet,' and things like that. But we decided they were quite harmless, and we let them get in their crops without touching them in any way. A good many of us were thinking of the crops ripening 8,000 miles away south, and us not there to help get them in. So we let these farmers do as they pleased.

"Then came the landing at Suvla; and do you know these old boys raked up great long Snider rifles from somewhere, that fired an expanding bullet big enough to kill an elephant. One of my mates was hit with one, and it blew the shoulder clean off him. And these old boys fought as bitter as poison. Then the Regular Turkish Army came there, and when the officers found out what these farmers were doing, they kicked up an awful row and took the old guns away from them. We noticed that they went out of use very suddenly, and a prisoner we took told us how it happened. But it shows that the Turks want to fight fair; and that was our experience always.

"This prisoner was a curious fellow. He spoke as good English as I did, and he told me that he used to serve coffee at a big London restaurant. He said he used to go round in a Turkish uniform with a sort of truck, and make special Turkish coffee for those who wanted it. Of course, I did not believe that; where's the sense of it? But he told me a lot of things about the Turks I never knew before, and put them in a new light to me. After all they are only fighting for their own country, and every man ought to do that.

"Whoever planned their defences was a master hand. Every trench is enfiladed from some other one, and the lines of defence fall back, each one endangered to the attacker by that behind it. Some of their trenches were nothing but deathtraps to anyone who might choose to occupy them, so skilfully were their machine-guns and snipers posted. I can tell you that we learned a lot about trench digging from our despised brother Bismillah before we had been a month at Gallipoli.