Gallipoli Diary Volume I Part 14

In writing K. I try to convey the truth in terms which will neither give him needless anxiety or undue confidence. The facts have been stated very simply, plus one brief general comment. I tell him that the Turks would be playing our game by these a.s.saults were it not that in the French section they break through the Senegalese and penetrate into the position. I add a word of special praise for the Naval Division, they have done so well, but I know there are people in the War Office who won't like to hear it. I say, "I hope the new French Division will not steam at economic, but full, speed"; and I sum up by the sentence, "The times are anxious, but I believe the enemy's cohesion should suffer more than ours by these repeated night attacks."

CHAPTER VII

Sh.e.l.lS

To-day, the 4th, sh.e.l.ls were falling from Asia on both "V" and "W"

Beaches. We have landed aeroplanes on the Peninsula. The Taube has been bothering us again, but wound up its manoeuvres very decently by killing some fish for our dinner. Approved an out-spoken cable from my Ordnance to the War Office. Heaven knows we have been close-fisted with our meagre stocks, but when the Turks are coming right on to the a.s.sault it is not possible to prevent a spurt of rapid fire from men who feel the knife at their throat. "Ammunition is becoming a very serious matter, owing to the ceaseless fighting since April 25th. The _Junia_ has not turned up and has but a small supply when she does. 18 pr. sh.e.l.l is vital necessity."

_5th May, 1915. H.M.T. "Arcadian."_ A wearing, nerve-racking, night-long fire by the Turks and the French 75's. They, at least, both of them, seem to have a good supply of sh.e.l.l. To the Jews, G.o.d showed Himself once as a pillar of fire by night; to the French soldier whose G.o.d is the 75 He reveals Himself in just the same way, safeguarding his flimsy trenches from the impact of the infidel horde. The curse of the method is its noise--let alone its cost. But last night it came off: no Turks got through anywhere on the French front and the men had not to stand to their arms or use their rifles. We British, worse luck, can't dream of these orgies of explosives. Our batteries last night did not fire a shot and the men had to drive back the enemy by rifle fire. They did it easily enough but the process is wearing.

An answer has come to my prayer for 18 pr. stuff: not the answer that turns away wrath, but the answer that provokes a plaster saint.

"We have under consideration your telegram of yesterday. The ammunition supply for your force, however, was never calculated on the basis of a prolonged occupation of the Gallipoli Peninsula, we will have to reconsider the position if, after the arrival of the reinforcements now on their way out to you, the enemy cannot be driven back and, in conjunction with the Fleet, the Forts barring the pa.s.sage of the Dardanelles cannot be reduced. It is important to push on."

Now von Donop is a kindly man despite that overbearing "von": yet, he speaks to us like this! The survivors of our half dead force are to "push on"; for, "it is important to push on" although Whitehall seems to have time and to spare to "consider" my cable and to "reconsider the position." Death first, diagnosis afterwards. Wherever is the use of reconsidering the position now? The position has taken charge. When a man has jumped off Westminster Bridge to save a drowning Russian his position has got beyond reconsideration: there is only one thing to do--as quickly as you can, as much help as you can--and if it comes to a choice between the _quick_ and the _much_: hark to your swimmer and hear him cry "Quick! Quick!! Quick!!!"

The War Office urge me to throw my brave troops yet once more against machine guns in redoubts; to do it on the cheap; to do it without asking for the sh.e.l.l that gives the attack a sporting chance. I don't say they are wrong in so saying; there may be no other way out of it; but I do say the War Office stand convicted of having gone hopelessly wrong in their estimates and preparations. For we must have been held up somewhere, surely; we must have fought _somewhere_. I suppose, even if we had forced the Straits--even if we had taken Constantinople without firing a shot, we must have fought somewhere! Otherwise, a child's box of tin soldiers sent by post would have been just the thing for the Dardanelles landing! No; it's not the advice that riles me: it's the fact that people who have made a mistake, and should be sorry, slur over my appeal for the stuff advances are made of and yet continue to urge us on as if we were hanging back.

A strong wind blows and h.e.l.les is smothered in dust. Hunter-Weston spent an hour with me this morning and an hour with the G.S. putting the final touches to the plan of attack discussed by us yesterday. The Lancas.h.i.+re Brigade of the 42nd Division has landed.

Hunter-Bunter stayed to lunch.

_Later_. In the afternoon went ash.o.r.e and inspected the Lancas.h.i.+re Brigade of the East Lancs. Division just landed; and a very fine lot of Officers and men they are. They are keen and ready for to-morrow. Yes, to-morrow we attack again: I have men enough now but very, very little sh.e.l.l. The Turks have given us three bad nights and they ought to be worn out. With our sea power we can s.h.i.+ft a couple of Brigades from Gaba Tepe to h.e.l.les or vice versa quicker than the Turks can march from the one theatre to the other. So the first question has been whether to reinforce Gaba Tepe from h.e.l.les or vice versa. For reasons too long to write here I have decided to attack in the South especially as I had a cable from K. himself yesterday in which he makes the suggestion:--

"I hope," he says, "the 5th" (that's to-day) "will see you strong enough to press on to Achi Baba anyway, as delay will allow the Turks to bring up more reinforcements and to make unpleasant preparations for your reception. The Australians and New Zealanders will have had reinforcements from Egypt by then, and, if they hold on to their trenches with the help of the Naval Division, could spare you a good many men for the advance."

Old K. is as right as rain here but a little bit after the shower. Had he and Maxwell tumbled to the real situation when I first saw with my own eyes the lie of the land instead of the lies on their maps; and had they let me have the Brigade of Gurkhas I asked for by my letters and by my cable of 24th March, and by word of mouth and telephone up to the last moment of my leaving Egypt, these homilies about the urgency of seizing Achi Baba would be beside the mark, seeing we should be sitting on the top of it.

In the matter of giving K. is built on the model of Pharaoh: nothing less than the firstborn of the nation will make him suffer his subjects to depart from Egypt; and Maxwell sees eye to eye with him--that is natural. No word of the bombs and trench mortars I asked for six weeks ago, but the "bayonets" are coming in liberally now.

Two of Birdwood's Brigades sail down to-night and join up with a Brigade from the Naval Division, thus making a new composite Division for the Southern theatre. The 29th, who have lost so very heavily, are being strengthened by the new Lancas.h.i.+re Fusilier Brigade, and c.o.x's Indian Brigade. By no manner the same thing, this, as getting drafts to fill up the ranks of the 29th. Always in war there is three times better value in filling up an old formation than in making up the total by bringing in a new formation. I have given the French the Naval Brigade; the new, Naval-Australian Division is to form my general reserve.

So there! To-morrow morning. We have men enough, and good men too, but we are short of pebbles for Goliath of Achi Baba. These three nights have made a big hole in our stocks. Hunter-Weston feels that all is in our favour but the artillery. In Flanders, he says, they would never attack with empty limbers behind them; they would wait till they were full up. But the West is not in its essence a time problem; there, they can wait--next week--next month. If we wait one week the Turks will have become twice as strong in their numbers, and twice as deep in their trenches, as they are to-day. Hunter-Weston and d'Amade see that perfectly. I hold the idea myself that it would be good tactics, seeing sh.e.l.l shortage is our weakness, to make use of the half hour before dawn to close with the enemy and then fight it out on their ground. To cross the danger zone, in fact, by night and overthrow the enemy in the grey dawn. But Hunter-Weston says that so many regimental officers have been lost he fears for the Company leading at night:--for that, most searching of military tests, nothing but the best will do.

Hard up as we are for sh.e.l.l he thinks it best to blaze it away freely before closing and to trust our bayonets when we get in. He and d'Amade have both of them their Western experience to guide them. I have agreed, subject only to the condition that we must keep some munitions in reserve until we hear for certain that more is on its way.

The enemy had trusted to their sh.o.r.e defences. There was no second line behind them--not this side of Achi Baba, at least. Now, i.e., ever since the failure of their grand attempt on the night of the 2nd-3rd May, they have been hard at work. Already their lines cover quite half the ground between the Aegean and the Straits; whilst, in rear again, we can see wired patches which we guess to be enfilading machine gun redoubts. We must resolutely and at all cost make progress and smash up these new spiders' webs of steel before they connect into elastic but unbreakable patterns.

_9th May, 1915. H.M.T. "Arcadian."_ Three days on the rack! Since the morning of the 6th not a word have I written barring one or two letters and one or two hasty sc.r.a.ps of cables. Now, D.V., there is the best part of a day at my disposal and it is worth an effort to put that story down.

First I had better fix the sequence of the munition cables, for upon them the whole attack has hung--or rather, hung fire.

On the 6th, the evening of the opening day, we received a postscript to the refusal already chronicled:--

"Until you can submit a return of the amount you have in hand to enable us to work out the rates of expenditure, it is difficult to decide about further supplies of ammunition."

When I read this I fell on my knees and prayed G.o.d to grant me patience.

Am I to check the number of rounds in the limbers; on the beaches and in transit during a battle? Two days after my S.O.S. the War Office begin to think about tables of averages!

I directed my answer to Lord K. himself:--

"With reference to your No. 4432 of 5th inst., please turn to my letter to you of 30th March,[14] wherein I have laid stress on the essential difference in the matter of ammunition supply between the Dardanelles and France. In France, where the factories are within 24 hours' distance from the firing line, it may be feasible to consider and reconsider situations, including ammunition supply. Here we are distant a fortnight. I consider that 4.5 inch, 18 pr. and other ammunition, especially Mark VII rifle ammunition, should instantly be despatched here _via_ Ma.r.s.eilles.

"Battle in progress. Advance being held up by stubborn opposition."

Within a few hours K.'s reply came in; he says:--

"It is difficult for me to judge the situation unless you can send me your expenditure of ammunition for which we have repeatedly asked. The question is not affected by the other considerations you mention." If s.p.a.ce and time have no bearing on strategy and tactics, then K. is right. If s.h.i.+ps sail over the sea as fast as railways run across the land; if h.e.l.les is nearer Woolwich than Calais; then he is right. I use the capital K. here impersonally, for I am sure the great man did not indite the message himself even though it may be headed from him to me.

Late that night came another cable from the Master General of the Ordnance saying he was sending out "in the next relief s.h.i.+p 10,000 rounds of 18 pr. shrapnel, and 1,000 rounds of 4.5 inch high explosive."

But why the next relief s.h.i.+p? It won't get here for another three weeks and by that time we should be, by all the laws of nature and of war, in Davy Jones's locker. True, we don't mean to be, whatever the Ordnance may do or leave undone but, so far as I can see, that won't be their fault. Neither I nor my Staff can make head or tail of these cables.

They seem so unlike K.; so unlike all the people. Here we are:--The Turks in front of us--too close: the deep sea behind us--too close. We beg them "instantly" to send us 4.5 inch and other ammunition; "instantly, _via_ Ma.r.s.eilles":--they tell us in reply that they will send 1,000 rounds of the vital stuff, the 4.5 high explosive, "_in the next relief s.h.i.+p_"!

Why, even in the South African War, before the siege of Ladysmith, one battery would fire five hundred rounds in a day. And this 1,000 rounds in the next relief s.h.i.+p (_via_ Alexandria) will take three weeks to get to us whereas stress was laid by me upon the Ma.r.s.eilles route.

Now, to-day, (the 9th), I have at last been able to send the Ordnance a statement (made under extreme difficulty) of our ammunition expenditure; up to the 5th May; i.e., before the three days' battle began. We were then nine million small arm still to the good having spent eleven million. We had shot away 23,000 shrapnel, 18 pr., and had 48,000 in hand. We had fired off 5,000 of that (most vital) 4.5 howitzer and had 1,800 remaining. A.P.S. has been added saying the amounts shown had been greatly reduced by the last two days' battle. Actually, they have fallen to less than half and, as I have said, we had, on the evening of the 7th, only 17,000 rounds of 18 pr. on hand for the whole Peninsula. Out of this we have fought the battle of the 8th and I believe we have run down now to under 10,000, some fear as low as 5,000.

Very well. Now for my last night's cable which, in the opinion of my Officers, summarises general result of lack of sh.e.l.l:--

"For the past three days we have fought our hardest for Achi Baba winding up with a bayonet charge by the whole force along the entire front, from sea to sea. Faced by a heavy artillery, machine gun and rifle fire our troops, French and British alike, made a fine effort; the French especially got well into the Turks with the bayonet, and all along, excepting on our extreme left, our line gained ground. I might represent the battle as a victory, as the enemy's advanced positions were driven in, but essentially the result has been failure, as the main object remains unachieved. The fortifications and their machine guns were too scientific and too strongly held to be rushed, although I had every available man in to-day. Our troops have done all that flesh and blood can do against semi-permanent works, and they are not able to carry them. More and more munitions will be needed to do so. I fear this is a very unpalatable conclusion, but I see no way out of it.

"I estimate that the Turks had about 40,000 opposed to our 25,000 rifles. There are 20,000 more in front of Australian-New Zealand Army Corps' 12,000 rifles at Gaba Tepe. By bringing men over from the Asiatic side and from Adrianople the Turks seem to be able to keep up their strength. I have only one more brigade of the Lancas.h.i.+re Territorial Division to come; not enough to make any real effect upon the situation as regards breaking through."

Hard must be the heart that is not wrung to think of all these brave boys making their effort; giving their lives; all that they had; it is too much; almost more than can be borne.

Now to go back and make my notes, day by day, of the battle:--

On the 6th instant we began at 11.30 after half an hour's bombardment,--we dared not run to more. A strong wind was blowing and it was hard to land or come aboard. Till 2 p.m. I remained glued to the telephone on board and then went ash.o.r.e and saw both Hunter-Weston and d'Amade in their posts of command. The live long day there were furious semi-detached fights by Battalions and Brigades, and we b.u.t.ted back the enemy for some 200 or 300 yards. So far so good. But we did not capture any of the main Turkish trenches. I still think we might have done as well at much less cost by creeping up these 200 or 300 yards by night.

However!

At 4.30 we dropped our high-vaulting Achi Baba aspirations and took to our spades.

The Hood Battalion of the Royal Naval Division had been roughly handled.

In the hospital clearing tent by the beach I saw and spoke to (amongst many others) young Asquith, shot through the knee, and Commander Wedgwood, who had been horribly hurt by shrapnel. Each in his own way was a calm hero; wrapped in the mantle bequeathed to English soldiers by Sir Philip Sidney. Coming back in the evening to the s.h.i.+p we watched the Manchester Brigade disembarking. I have never seen a better looking lot. The 6th Battalion would serve very well as picked specimens of our race; not so much in height or physique, but in the impression they gave of purity of race and distinction. Here are the best the old country can produce; the hope of the progress of the British ideal in the world; and half of them are going to swap lives with Turks whose relative value to the well-being of humanity is to theirs as is a locust to a honey-bee.

That night Bailloud, Commander of the new French Division, came to make his salaam. He is small, alert, brimful of jokes and of years; seventy they say, but he neither looks it nor acts it.

The 7th was stormy and the sea dangerously rough. At 10 a.m. the Lancas.h.i.+re Fusilier Brigade were to lead off on our left. They could not get a move on, it seemed, although we had hoped that the sh.e.l.ling from the s.h.i.+ps would have swept a clear lane for them.

The thought that "Y" Beach, which was holding up this brigade, was once in our hands, adds its sting to other reports coming from that part of the field. In France these reports would have been impersonal messages arriving from afar. In Asia or Africa I would have been letting off the steam by galloping to d'Amade or Hunter-Weston. Here I was neither one thing nor the other:--neither a new fangled Commander sitting cool and semi-detached in an office; nor an old fas.h.i.+oned Commander taking personal direction of the show. During so long drawn out a suspense I tried to ease the tension by dictation. From the carbons I select these two paragraphs: they occur in a letter fired off to Colonel Clive Wigram at "11.25 a.m., 7th May, 1915."

"I broke off there because I got a telephone message in from Hunter-Weston to say his centre was advancing, and that by a pretty piece of co-operation between Infantry and Artillery, he had driven the Turks out of one very troublesome trench. He cannot see what is on his left, or get any message from them. On his left are the Lancas.h.i.+re Fusiliers (Territorials). They are faced by a horrid redoubt held by machine guns, and they are to rush it with the bayonet.[15] It is a high thing to ask of Territorials but against an enemy who is fighting for his life, and for the existence of his country, we have to call upon every one for efforts which, under any other conditions, might be considered beyond their strength.