ARTILLERY WATER-CARRIERS FROM THE SPRINGS AT CAPE HELLES.
HEADQUARTERS 1ST AUSTRALIAN ARTILLERY BRIGADE.
Dining-room cellar on the left, ten feet deep, and protected by iron and sandbags. Firing-line 600 yards distant.
To face p. 148.
It was not till the third day that the Australians went into the fight. This Saturday, 8th, had opened much as the other two days had done with intense bombardments, and then an advance by the infantry in short rushes, always driving the Turks before them, pressing them back to the village of Krithia and the foot slopes of Achi Baba. But by this time on the flanks the Turks had concealed a great many machine guns in the fir woods, and built redoubts, and such advances became terribly expensive. On the 7th the New Zealanders had moved away to the support of the 29th Division, and they lost heavily from these guns. At 10.30 on this morning they were ordered to go through the British lines and try to take the trenches on the left front of Krithia—now a village wrecked and shattered by the shells that burst in it and smouldering with fires that the artillery had started. Once I had seen it, a pretty little hamlet with white- and red-roofed dwellings snuggling down in the hollow of a hill, with the stern, flat-topped Achi Baba mound lying just to the east. On a ridge stood sentinel windmills, their long arms stark and bare, waving from the side of a curious round stone store, like a silo. They were the Turkish granaries, and made fine observation posts. The Wellington Battalion, under Lieut.-Colonel W. G. Malone, was on the left, the Auckland, under Lieut.-Colonel A. Plugge, in the centre, and Canterbury, under Lieut.-Colonel D. M. Stewart, on the right. The Otago, under Lieut.-Colonel T. W. McDonald, was in reserve. On the flanks the battalions, facing an awful fire, slowly moved up about 300 yards, but the centre battalion, a dense copse in front concealing a strong force of the enemy, were unable to go ahead. By 2.30 there was nothing left for the gallant New Zealand battalions to do but to dig in. The Otagos had been called to support and repair the fearful losses, but the advance was checked. However, it was determined that the New Zealanders should again attack just at dusk. Later on this order was changed to a general attack by the whole line. With but a few minutes' notice the Australians, till then in reserve, were ordered to prepare to form the front, or rather centre front, of the advancing line.
It had been bright and crisp all the morning, and the troops were in high fettle. At midday, General Paris, commanding the composite Division, had ordered the Australians to move up in support of the British centre, which they did, advancing due north about a mile. Their new position was in a broad dere (gully), and as fairly a protected and comfortable spot as such places go so near the firing-line. Colonel M'Cay, to reach it, had deployed his troops on lines best calculated to avoid searching shrapnel fire, moving them up in platoon columns, that is, in small bodies placed some 200 yards' distance from one another, which had the effect of almost neutralizing the shelling of the Turks. The 6th Battalion was in the lead, followed by the 7th, 5th, and 8th. The Turks, for some reason, did not open fire as the troops moved across the valley, though it was fully expected they would, and so they arrived at a position where there were trenches—some British, some Turkish—already dug, while the dere itself offered further cover. The men began to deepen and widen these trenches for their comfort. The 6th, under Lieut.-Colonel M'Nicol, was bivouacked on the steep sides of the stream; and opposite them on the left was the 8th, under Lieut.-Colonel Bolton. About 30 yards in rear of the 6th was brigade headquarters, just in line with Colonel Cox's Indian Brigade. Lieut.-Colonel Garside, commanding the 7th, was behind the 8th, and headquarters and the 5th, under Lieut.-Colonel Wanliss, behind the 8th. In the midst of taking in reinforcements and entrenching, the plan for the general attack was communicated to the Australian leaders.