While the Australians' position at Anzac was being made secure, preparations were pushed forward at Cape Helles for the storming of the loaf-shaped hill of Achi Baba, on which the Turks had, after the fortnight's fighting, been forced to take up a defensive position. There they had strongly entrenched themselves behind line after line of trenches. Their actual first resisting line, however, was by this about 3 miles from the toe of the peninsula on the right, at a point near De Tots battery, the taking of which the French eventually accomplished with great gallantry. Later the Gurkhas on the opposite (the left) flank performed a magnificent feat in reaching a point south-west of Krithia village by storming and obtaining a footing on the slopes of the Great Dere, while the British line swung round before the southern angle of the Krithia village. The fresh "shove" was meant to take the village at the point of the bayonet and capture the slopes of Achi Baba. Whatever that fortress position may have become later (and the German officers captured boasted that it was a position that would never be taken by frontal assault), at that time there seemed every prospect of it falling into the hands of bold, determined troops. It was for this reason, to give impetus to the attack, to strengthen the British troops that held the central portion of the line, that the 2nd Australian Brigade, under Colonel (later Brigadier-General) M'Cay, were, on the night of 5th May, silently removed from the beach at Anzac, and, 3,000 strong, were landed at Cape Helles at six o'clock in the morning. Though this brigade had been through the thick of the landing and attack on Anzac, it had, perhaps, suffered least of all the brigades, and was now chosen suddenly for this fresh assault. The New Zealand Infantry Brigade, under Colonel F. E. Johnston, was also landed, and took up a position on the left flank of the Australians; their left flank in turn in touch with troops on the coast.
So much for the general situation. The embarkation orders for the brigade came suddenly, while the troops were resting after a week's fight. At 9 p.m. the brigade was assembled on the beach. Here the men suffered a bitter experience, exposed to considerable fire, for insufficient transports had been provided. Eventually they embarked from six wharves and slipped silently away. Twenty casualties had been suffered from what were called spent bullets, the Anzac firing-line being over 1,000 yards away. The men left the shore in rowing-boats and went out to the trawlers, and then to the destroyers and on to transports. They knew naught of their destination. A very few hours' steaming and they arrived off the British position. All disembarked at 6 a.m. at Seddul Bahr (near the River Clyde) under a heavy shell fire from the Asiatic batteries, where the wandering, disappearing gun, "Asiatic Algy," began to pour shells on the brigade. The jetties at this time were only of the roughest wood, joining barges moored alongside one another.
One is never likely to forget one's sensations upon landing on the end of the peninsula in the track of the victorious British armies. Thick masses of tangled Turkish barbed wire (wire so thick that ordinary shears would not sever it) were rolled round deserted trenches, guns lay dismounted from their concrete bases, houses had been torn down and lay shattered, with hardly a wall standing. There were 30,000 French troops now on the British right flank. All manner of stores, including great casks of their ration wine, had been landed, and lay piled in the sandy cove that stretched between two headlands, Seddul Bahr on the right, Helles fort on the left. The menacing walls of Seddul Bahr rose above it round the cliff, but no longer a fortress of the Turks. The village, in ruins, was buried behind.
MAJOR STEVENSON COMMANDING BATTERY 18-POUNDER GUNS AT CAPE HELLES.
Dugouts of the 29th Division on the sides of the Great Dere.
THE GREAT DERE, UP WHICH THE GURKHAS MADE SO BOLD AN ADVANCE.