Three shells from Asia pitched right into our hospital on the edge of the cliff on the left of “W” Beach looking seawards, killing two orderlies and wounding six, yet the doctors calmly went on with their work of bandaging and dressing. The hospital is on a bad site, for it is only divided by a road from the little village of marquees forming the Ordnance depot.
At 8.30 p.m. I go up to Brigade H.Q. with an orderly, and leave the horses at Pink Farm, and walk across that two hundred and fifty yards with bullets whistling more than usual, for to-night the Turks appear more energetic with rifle fire. It is an eerie sensation, walking across there in the dark when many bullets are about—walking very fast, almost counting one’s steps, and getting nearer and nearer to the little light on the side of the hill. Had a chat there for twenty minutes in the dugout with General Cayley and his Staff, and had a drink. Rather a nice picture, with the candles and the cheery officers sitting round; outside, the sound of bullets whistling continuously. I say good-night and go out, and find my orderly crouching pretty well down in a dugout, and he says he thinks we had better hurry out, as it is a bit hot, and as he says so, “ping” goes a bullet between us. But the bullets do not give me the fear that those horrible high explosive shells from Asia do. A moon is getting up, and so we are able to trot back smartly. The scene on the Krithia road at night is just what I imagined, in past life, war to be. The wagons trekking up to the trenches, with, of course, no lights, and troops of all kinds moving up and down. In the distance, star shells shooting up and sailing gently down, illuminating the country as light as day, and as one gets nearer to the firing-line the crackle of musketry gets louder and louder, and during the final walk of three hundred yards from Pink Farm to H.Q., the song of bullets flying past one makes one very much alive. Overhead, a perfect sky and myriads of stars looking down on a great tragedy with a certain amount of comic relief. These days we wish for more comic relief than we are getting.
June 18th.
This morning Asia’s guns have not worried us so far, but the batteries in front of Achi Baba are very active, and are worrying the troops in the valley very much. The sound of bursting shrapnel reminds me of the spit and snarls of angry cats. Our artillery is quiet. Rumour says that another enemy submarine has been accounted for, but the one that came in yesterday morning is still at large, and consequently our Fleet is unable to come and help us. At two o’clock H.M.S. Prince George is sighted off Imbros, surrounded by twelve destroyers and preceded by seventeen mine-sweepers. It was a very impressive sight to see—all these destroyers and sweepers jealously guarding the great ship from submarine attack.
She takes up a position opposite the Asiatic coast, well out from the mouth, and then opens fire with all big guns on the Turkish batteries on Asia in position opposite Morto Bay. We enjoy seeing the pasting that she gives them, her big guns rapidly roaring away and belching forth spurts of flame and buff-coloured smoke. Everybody imagines that every Turkish gun must be knocked out. After four hours, she leaves with her retinue of smaller ships. Half an hour after, one big gun on the Asiatic side opens fire on to “V” Beach, and simultaneously a heavy Turkish attack on our left starts, supported by a tremendous bombardment from Turkish artillery. The fight lasted all night, and ended about six in the morning. Their infantry left their trenches very half-heartedly, and our machine-guns accounted for a heavy toll of enemy casualties.
June 19th.
We gave way at a part of our line last night, but regained the ground later in the early morning, and our line is still intact, and as we were. We lost heavily, but Turkish losses were enormous.
Captain Usher, my Staff Captain, was killed this early morning in the trenches by shrapnel, and I feel his loss awfully. He was always so charming to me. It’s the “good-uns” that go, as Wilkie Bard says. I am sure this war is too terrible to last long; it is simply wholesale butchery, and humanity will cry out against it soon.
At 11.30 an exceptionally heavy shell came over from Asia (a high explosive) and fairly shook the earth. Two minutes after, two more came, and every living soul rushed for cover. Then for three hours they pasted us: over they came, one after the other, with terrific shrieks and deafening explosions, throwing chunks of hot jagged-edged metal whizzing in all directions. All the mules and horses, as far as possible, were got under cover, and men rushed to their dugouts. Carver, Way, Davy, Foley, Phillips, and I were under cover of the cliff in our “bivvy,” which cannot be called a dugout, as it is simply a wide platform cut in and built up on the side of the cliff and in the line of fire, between the 60-pounder battery, twenty-five yards to our west, and the Asiatic battery. The 60-pounders soon opened fire, and then a duel began; and after one or two have pitched first over our “bivvy” into the sea, and one or two just short, we get nervy and decide to quit. Phillips and Davy made the first dash down the cliff, and the others said they would wait for the next shell. It came shrieking along, burst, and I got up and made a dart down the slope. I was down to the bottom of that cliff in thirty seconds, and found myself with the Divisional Ammunition Column people, and all amongst boxes of high explosive. Ammunition Column Officers are there, but I begin to think it would have been safer up in the “bivvy,” where the others still were, for they did not follow me. After a lull in the firing, I went up to the cliff, and half-way up they popped off again, and I was fortunate in finding a very safe dugout belonging to Major Horton, and he invited me in with Major Huskisson, Major Shorto, Poole, and Weatherall. And while shells still come over, first bursting on the beach, then in the sea, then on the top of our cliff, and then on the high ground on the back of the beach, we have lunch.