Embarking the stores at Suvla Bay, Gallipoli, two days before the British and French forces evacuated their positions at this part of the peninsula and removed the troops to Salonica.
The following morning May 7, 1915, the allied warships opened a furious bombardment of the ground around Krithia. Every few feet of the difficult country was searched out by the destroying lyddite of the Allies' shells, until it seemed that not a living creature could have survived. But when the Lancashire Fusiliers Brigade moved out to the attack a few minutes later it soon became apparent that the naval bombardment had by no means exterminated or demoralized the Turks.
The British troops were greeted by a perfect hurricane of fire from rifles and machine guns. Hundreds of the men went down and, brave as the remainder were, they were compelled to abandon the attempt to cross the open ground that lay between the British front and Krithia. Some progress was made on the right, however, where a clump of fir trees which had been holding up the advance for some time was finally carried by the Fifth Royal Scots. Early in the afternoon the Turks recaptured the firs and such of the ground they had lost and shortly after four o'clock when Sir Ian Hamilton relieved the situation, the British were in the position of being absolutely "stuck." The British commander decided to make another desperate attempt, however, and called upon the French for cooperation. The whole allied line advanced to the attack just as evening was closing in but the Turks by this time had brought up some additional batteries and poured in on the French and the British a smothering fire of deadly shrapnel. So heavy was the punishment of the French that the line literally melted away and General d'Amade was compelled to throw his last reserve into the front line. At nightfall the allied attack subsided.
During the night, word came to Sir Ian Hamilton that heavy Turkish reenforcements were on their way and he decided to make one last attempt to carry Krithia and Achi Baba before they arrived in the morning. Accordingly, the Lancashire Fusiliers Brigade which had been particularly roughly handled was withdrawn from the line, and their places taken by the New Zealand Brigade. After another naval bombardment the New Zealanders were ordered forward shortly after 10 a. m. of May 8, 1915. By 1.30 they were two hundred yards closer to Krithia than any allied troops had been up to that time. There, however, they were heavily checked. Other units were unable to advance, and the French sent word that they were unable to go any farther unless the British line could move.
There was a long pause. Finally word was passed along the line that the final desperate effort was to be made—namely to carry Krithia and Achi Baba by a combined bayonet attack. Every man in the line was ordered to fix bayonets and not to stop short of the objectives. At 5.30 in the afternoon came the order to advance, after a bombardment by the fleet. Almost immediately all central control was lost, and each unit was fighting desperately for itself in the hills and gullies of that difficult, almost uncharted, country. Not for many hours afterward, indeed, in some cases not for days, was it possible to piece the story together.
The New Zealand troops got well past the Turkish machine guns without discovering them, with the consequence that their supports were mown down by a hail of fire from unexpected quarters. Nevertheless, they got within a few yards of the Turkish trenches and proceeded to dig themselves in. The Second Australian Infantry Brigade actually won about 400 yards of ground and stuck to it with a tenacity warmly praised by Sir Ian Hamilton. To the left the Eighty-seventh Brigade had suffered terribly from machine-gun fire while the French had been severely handled. The French troops were steady enough, but the Senegalese broke in. At one point General d'Amade rallied the troops in person.
Nightfall came and still Krithia and Achi Baba were far away. Thus ended the second battle of Krithia, the supreme attempt of the allied troops to carry the Turkish positions by a maneuver battle. Some little ground had been gained, but the losses had been all out of proportion to the advantage wrested from the brave and tenacious Ottoman troops. The only consolation found in the situation by the higher commands was in the assurance that the enemy had suffered equally heavy losses, but as they were largely on the defensive this statement is open to a very large measure of doubt.
While all this fighting was going on at the tip of the peninsula, the Anzacs, or that part of them left on the cliffs overlooking the cove, were having a hard time to maintain their positions. The Turks were aware of the withdrawal of the two brigades to assist in the second battle of Krithia, and they made a heavy demonstration to prevent the departure of any further troops. To understand how vital a matter this was one has only to read the dispatches of the period. Indeed, it has often since been pointed out by military writers that, had the troops landed from first to last at Anzac Cove been available at the tip of the peninsula, Krithia and Achi Baba would undoubtedly have been carried in the early days of the fighting, thus altering the whole course of the campaign. This dispersal of forces would appear to have been one of the major blunders of the Dardanelles campaign.
For five days, beginning May 6, 1915, the Anzacs were in almost constant action. The fortunes fluctuated, gains were made by both forces, but in the end, aside from heavy losses by both, there was practically no change in the relative positions. The allied troops still held a strip of land on the top of the cliffs, of a radius of about 1,100 yards. As illustrating the intense character of the combat at this period, it was calculated that during one bombardment no less than 1,400 Turkish shells fell on this small strip of land in one hour.