During the evening both of the Assaulting Columns were reinforced. The Right Column (Brigadier-General F. E. Johnston) received the Auckland Mounted Rifles and the Maori contingent from the Right Covering Force, together with two battalions (8th Welsh Pioneers and 7th Gloucesters) from the 13th Division in reserve. The Left Assaulting Column (Brigadier-General H. V. Cox) received three battalions from the 39th Brigade, 13th Division (9th R. Warwicks, 9th Worcesters, and 7th North Staffords, the 7th Gloucesters going to the Right Column, as above), together with the 6th South Lancashire (38th Brigade). The Right Column was to proceed with the attack on Chunuk Bair; the Left Column to assault “Hill Q” in the centre, and with its left to work round north-east to the steep ridge called Abdel Rahman Bair for an assault upon Koja Chemen Tepe.
THE SUMMIT OF RHODODENDRON RIDGE
Before daylight on Sunday, August 8, the edge of the heights from Battleship Hill to “Hill Q” was heavily bombarded by monitors and cruisers, together with the batteries on the flats. At the first dawn (4.15) a column, led by Lieut.-Colonel W. G. Malone, the hero of Quinn’s Post, with his accustomed enthusiasm, dashed up the steep and narrow slope to the summit of Rhododendron Ridge. Colonel Malone’s own Wellington Battalion went first. The 7th Gloucesters closely followed. The Auckland Mounted Rifles and Welsh Pioneers came in support. The Wellingtons reached the actual top of the ridge. They sprang into a long Turkish communication trench, which they found empty but for an isolated party with a machine-gun just arrived from Achi Baba. They spread out towards the right. Immediately on their left, two companies of the Gloucesters also reached the summit, and sprang into the trench. Against the sunrise their figures could be dimly discerned from the sea, and the hope of victory rose high. Two other Gloucester Companies swung slightly to the right and entrenched below the sky-line in rear of the Wellingtons. But during the rush the Gloucesters had been exposed to a terrible storm of shrapnel and rifle-fire coming from the higher ground northward on their left, and were already much reduced. As often happens in a charge, the supports came under a heavier fire than the first lines, and though the Auckland Mounted Rifles got through and joined the Wellingtons, it was not till the afternoon. The remainder appear to have been checked.[166]
In the meantime the position of the British and New Zealanders upon the summit was indeed terrible. Perceiving how small their numbers were, the Turks turned every kind of fire upon the trench. Large parties of them kept creeping up the trench itself from the right or southern end, and hurling bombs. So exposed was the position that Colonel Malone drew his men out of the trench, and marked out a fresh trench 15 yards in rear of it. Here they dug; but tools were short, bombs were short, and water had run out. The trench was less than a foot deep. On the left, the Gloucester companies were almost annihilated. Attack after attack swept up against them. Every officer was killed or wounded. In his dispatch, Sir Ian says that by midday the battalion (apparently the other two companies had by that time come into line) consisted of small groups of men commanded by junior non-commissioned officers or privates.
“Chapter and verse,” he adds, “may be quoted for the view that the rank and file of an army cannot long endure the strain of close hand-to-hand fighting unless they are given confidence by the example of good officers. Yet here is at least one instance where a battalion of the New Army fought right on, from midday till sunset, without any officers.”
In a few hours Colonel Malone was compelled to withdraw again to a new trench a few yards to the rear, because the trench recently dug was too full of dead and dying to give the slightest cover. He himself, as was told me by one present, carried a rifle pierced with bullets, which he said he was keeping as a trophy for his home. Whilst he was still carefully marking the completion of the new trench, sedulously cultivating the domestic virtues to the last, a terrific outburst of shrapnel showered down upon his devoted party, and he fell. It was about 4 p.m., just after the Auckland Mounted Rifles had succeeded in reaching the position. At 5 o’clock he died. Colonel Moore of the Otago Battalion succeeded him, but was wounded during the night while the dwindling force still clung to the position, and the south-west shoulder of Chunuk Bair was ours—was uncertainly ours.
In the centre, around the Farm at the foot of the precipitous front of Chunuk Bair, the remaining three battalions of the 39th Brigade attempted to advance up the mountain side by keeping to the right or south of the cultivated yellow patch and empty buildings. Similarly, on the left or north-east side, the three Gurkha battalions crept some distance up the spurs leading to the dip or saddle between Chunuk Bair and “Hill Q.” This advance served them well on the following day, but on the Sunday the proposed attack upon this section of the summit line came to nothing owing to the murderous fire poured upon both attempts.
ATTEMPT AT ABDEL RAHMAN
On the same Sunday (August 8) the extreme left of Brigadier-General Cox’s assaulting columns was under orders, as mentioned, to attack the dominating height of Koja Chemen Tepe itself by way of the precipitous northern ridge or spur called Abdel Rahman Bair. The advance began in darkness at 3 a.m. Leaving the 13th (New South Wales) Battalion to hold the ridge overlooking Asma Dere and now entrenched, Brigadier-General Monash placed the 15th (Queensland and Tasmania, under Lieut.-Colonel Cannan) Battalion of his 4th Australian Brigade in front, the 14th (Victoria, under Major Rankine) and the 16th (S. and W. Australia, under Lieut.-Colonel Pope) following closely. Sliding down the steep descent of sandstone rock from the top of their ridge, the men formed up into column in the valley of Asma Dere below, and cautiously advanced, avoiding a field of standing wheat lest the rustle should arouse the enemy. They had not gone far over the rough and pathless waste when a few shots and dimly discerned figures hastening away showed that they had struck into the enemy’s outposts. The 15th Battalion accordingly deployed, and threw a platoon forward as a screen. Thus the advance was continued for about half a mile, when the dark mass of Abdel Rahman was seen against the gradually increasing light, running like a vast barrier straight across their course. Hardly had their right touched the first slopes when an overwhelming machine-gun and rifle-fire burst upon them from the whole length of the front. All three battalions deployed into platoons, and attempted to continue the advance in spite of continuous loss. A screen was thrown out to protect the left flank, which hung “in air,” exposed to attack from Biyuk Anafarta valley and any guns there chanced to be on Ismail Oglu Tepe (“W Hill”) beyond it.[167] If only the Divisions landed at Suvla had seized that vital hill! Now if ever was their support called for. But no help came. The platoons struggled up the steep bastions of the ridge in their attempt to scale the height. But the fire was impenetrable: the deaths too numerous. It appears that the brigade had, in fact, fallen up against strong Turkish reinforcements coming from Biyuk Anafarta to the main range. Sir Ian’s dispatch describes the battalions as “virtually surrounded.” Overwhelmed, at all events, by numbers and forced into an untenable position, they had no choice but to hew their way back. Their loss was already 1000—more than a third of their force. Grimly they retired, bringing their wounded in. By 9 a.m. they were back behind the ridge they had entrenched the night before. There, though exhausted by heat, thirst, and the weariness of prolonged effort without sleep, they maintained themselves for the rest of the day against violent and repeated attacks.
That Sunday evening the Right Assaulting Column lay upon Rhododendron Ridge, the main body partially sheltered in the depression afterwards called the Apex, and the relics of three battalions clinging to the top where it reaches the summit of the Chunuk Bair right shoulder. The Left Assaulting Column was divided, part round the Farm and high upon its north-east ridges, part entrenched but heavily attacked upon the ridge overlooking Asma Dere.