All is worked out now and I do not quite see how we could improve upon our scheme with the means at our disposal. If these "means" included a larger number of boats and steam launches, then certainly, by strengthening our forces on either flank, viz., at Morto Bay (where we are sending only one Battalion) and at a landing under the cliffs a mile 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 delaying the landing at the point of the Peninsula; nor dare I leave myself without any reserve under my own hand. I am inclined, all the same, to squeeze one Marine Battalion out of the Naval Division to strengthen our threat to Krithia. Hunter-Weston will be in executive command of everything South of Achi Baba; Birdwood of everything to the North.
I went very closely with Hunter-Weston into the question of a day or night attack. My own leanings are in favour of the first boat-loads getting ashore before break of dawn, but Hunter-Weston is 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 so aggravated by attempting it in the dark that he had rather face the losses the men in boats must suffer from aimed fire. Executively he is responsible and he is backed by his naval associates.
Birdwood, on the other hand, is of one mind with me and is going to get his first boat-loads ashore before it is light enough to aim. He has no current to trouble him, it is true, but he is not landing on any surveyed beach and the opposition he will meet with is even more unknown than in the case of Helles and Sedd-el-Bahr.
When a sportsman goes shark fishing, he should beware lest he be mistaken for the bait. Gaily I cast my fly over K. and now he has snapped off my head. That story about a second French 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 first step won't have the weight behind it we had permitted ourselves for some hours to hope. Everywhere the first is the step that counts but nowhere more so than in an Oriental War.
Now that the French Division has been snuffed out, how about the Grand Duke Nicholas, General Istomine and their Russian Divisions? Are they also to prove phantoms? 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 Turks at the time of our opening move. I think my best way of getting into touch will be by wireless from de Robeck to the Russian Admiral in the Black Sea.
Dick dines, also Birdwood.
15th April, 1915. S.S. "Arcadian." Lemnos. Boarded H.M.S. Dublin (Captain Kelly) at 9.30 this morning, where Admiral de Robeck met me. Sailed at once and dropped anchor off Tenedos at noon.
Landed and made a close inspection of the Aerodrome where we were taken round by two young friends of mine, Commander Samson and Captain Davies, Naval Air Service. By a queer fluke these 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 the battleships as if they were little children's playthings far away down below us. Now the children are going to use their pretty toys and will make a nice noise with them in the world.
After lunch spent the best part of two hours in a small cottage with Samson and Keyes trying to digest the honey brought back by our busy aeroplane bees from their various flights over Gallipoli. The Admiral went off on some other naval quest.
Samson and Davies are fliers of the first water—and not only in the air. They carry the whole technique of their job at their finger tips. The result of 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 three B.E.2s. The Maurice Farmans with 100 H.P. Renaults; the B.E.2s with 70 Renaults. These five machines are good although one of the B.E.2s is dead old.