CHAPTER IX
THE ZION MULE CORPS LANDS IN GALLIPOLI
The beach, cliffs and Castle were now in our hands, and disembarkation for the remainder of the army was possible. While the great battle for the landing was going on, we had been fretting and fuming at being left so long idle spectators. Thinking that it was high time we should disembark, and finding that no orders came along for us, I felt that in order to get a move on I must make a personal effort. I therefore hailed a trawler which happened to be passing, and got it to take me over to the Cornwallis, on which I knew General Hunter-Weston, the Commander of the 29th Division, had his temporary headquarters.
The General was glad to see me, and said I had turned up just in the very nick of time, for my Zion men were urgently required ashore to take ammunition, food and water to the men in the firing line. He appealed to Admiral Wemyss, who was close by, to detail trawlers and lighters to get my Corps ashore as quickly as possible. The Admiral very kindly told off a naval officer to come with me, and he in his turn found a trawler and some horse boats which were soon alongside the Dundrennon.
From two to six o'clock P. M. we were busily employed loading up and sending mules and equipment ashore. I noticed that the officer in charge of our trawler was a bit of a bungler at his job; time after time he would fail in his judgment; when getting the barges alongside he had repeatedly to sail round and round the Dundrennon with his tow before he got near enough for a rope to be cast; he was not a regular naval man—just a "dug-out." How I longed then for my friend Murley!
I must say here that in my humble opinion the Navy failed us badly in the matter of tugs, lighters and horse boats; there were not nearly enough of these, and we could have done with three times the number. My Corps, which was most urgently wanted by the General, took three days to disembark, in spite of our most strenuous efforts to get ashore as quickly as possible. The delay was entirely due to the lack of tugs, for it was only now and then that a trawler could be spared to haul us inshore. We were sadly held up and kept waiting for hours after our boats had been loaded up, ready to be towed ashore.
Who was responsible for this shortage I do not know. It is, of course, quite possible that the Navy provided all the trawlers requisitioned for by the Army.
I had taken the precaution while on the ship to fill all my tins with fresh drinking water, and these had to be unloaded by hand from the lighters. To do this I arranged my men in a long line, stretching the whole length of the temporary pier from the lighters to the beach, and in this manner the cans of water were rapidly passed ashore from hand to hand.