The Best Gallipoli Yarns and Forgotten Stories

by Jim Haynes

  TROOPER BLUEGUM

  JIM HAYNES

  Oliver Hogue was born and raised in Glebe, in inner Sydney. It is a sign of a different age that this inner-city dweller was an excellent horseman. He enlisted at the outbreak of war and served as an officer in the 2nd Light Horse Brigade and, later, in the famous Camel Corps in Palestine, where he attained the rank of major.

  Hogue was a journalist in civilian life and an excellent writer with an eye for detail and mood. Having survived the war, he tragically died of pneumonia in England in 1919. He never returned to his beloved wife, ‘Bonnie Jean’, to whom he often signed his letters, ‘Yours, till the end of all things.’

  In 1916 Hogue, who wrote under the pseudonym of Trooper Bluegum, published a collection of his letters home. Love Letters of an Anzac is a beautifully written series of letters from Hogue to his wife at home in Sydney. He attempted only a thin veneer of fiction and the letters are, in effect, a wonderful series of short stories that trace the course of the campaign.

  He also wrote and published another account of his experiences at Gallipoli, Trooper Bluegum at the Dardanelles, and stories from that collection appear in this volume as well.

  MAY 19TH

  OLIVER HOGUE

  There is little to add about the attack on the 19th. The Turks charged all round our line from north to south. They advanced as the Germans taught them, in heavy columns, with marching tapes to keep them straight. But our rifles picked them off by scores and our machine-guns mowed them down by hundreds, while our artillery played havoc with their reserves and supports. Here and there they came in thick masses right up to our parapets, but the few who did get over were promptly bayoneted.

  Time and again they charged and time and again they were hurled back, decimated and cowed. The German officers forced them out of the trenches with revolvers, but it was all futile. They advanced, yelling ‘Allah, Allah,’ ‘Mahomet,’ ‘Allah,’ and crawled back moaning and groaning.

  Our supports sneaked right up to the firing line and offered bribes of tobacco and tins of milk to their pals just for the fun of swapping places for a few minutes. Others clamoured for a shot with exhortations, such as: ‘Come down, Bill, and give us a shot. I’m a miles better shot than you are.’ One chap, Sergeant Higginson, perched himself on the parapet and picked off the Turks one by one till he had twenty-nine. He wanted thirty, but it was getting very light, and the Turks started sniping again and then Higginson was killed. He never got the thirty.

  Our losses were only a few hundred. It would have been far less only our chaps with characteristic carelessness got on the parapets and exposed themselves to the Turkish snipers. Next day, when General Birdwood asked one of the lads if he had shot many Turks, the soldier replied proudly, ‘Miles of the cows.’

  THE HOLDING OF THE LINE

  TOM SKEYHILL

  You have heard about the landing and our deeds of gallantry,

  Of how we proved our British breed out on Gallipoli.

  We charged the cruel bayonets, we faced the cannons’ roar;

  We flinched not from the bullets, as through the air they tore.

  The storming of the hillside like the brightest stars will shine,

  But the grandest feat of all of them was The Holding of the Line.

  The foe, like demons, countered and the bullets poured like rain;

  But our orders were to ‘hold on’ or be numbered with the slain.

  When hot Australian temper could stand the strain no more,

  We leapt out from the trenches and drove the foe before.

  And now, when in Australia you hear this soldier’s rhyme,

  We know you’ll give us credit for The Holding of the Line.

  The Anzacs held the line against overwhelming odds, and he horrific losses on the Ottoman side led to a request for an armistice to bury the dead. This was granted on 24 May. Losses along the central area of the Anzac line were estimated as 160 Allied soldiers and more than 4000 Ottoman dead.

  The first story in this section is by Frederick Sydney Loch, one of the most accomplished writers to serve at Gallipoli. A jackaroo and Gippsland grazier before the war, Loch served as an aide-de-camp to Lieutenant Colonel Johnson in the 2nd Field Artillery Brigade. He chronicled his experiences, thinly disguised, in a quite masterly novel, The Straits Impregnable, which he wrote under the pseudonym of ‘Sydney de Loghe’. Loch appears as the central character ‘Lake’ in the novel.

  Loch was a writer by profession after the war. A freelance journalist, he wrote several other novels, including One Crowded Hour. After the war Loch lived in Europe and worked with refugees for many years with his wife, the writer Joice NanKivell Loch. Their life together is chronicled in her well-known autobiography, A Fringe of Blue.

  Here is his account of how the truce came to be part of the Anzac legend.

  A FLAG OF TRUCE

  FREDERICK LOCH

  I had taken stand among the B Battery men, beside their periscope, where the parapet was quite low, and it needed no effort to look over the top. I fell to debating whether to take the risk and see first-hand how matters went, and while yet I stayed uncertain something happened to decide me on the moment.

  There was a movement in the enemy’s trench beside the largest flag, and a man climbed over the parapet and dropped down on to the open ground. He stood still a moment in uneasy fashion, next took into his hands the big white flag with the red crescent, held it overhead, and came forward.

  I felt like crying out my admiration. Our snipers shot yet in scores, in hundreds maybe; and any moment a stray shot or the aimed shot of a fool might tumble him over where he stood. And no one knew the danger better than himself, for he bowed his head and upper body as does a man advancing in the teeth of a great wind, and came forward with deliberate steps, moving his wide flag in wider semi-circles. To the devil with caution, said I, and stood right up and looked across the open. ‘By Jove!’ I exclaimed out loud. ‘By Jove!’ Beside me was Mr Hay, and he looked round to know had I gone mad.

  News had travelled everywhere that something special was on hand, for cries went up and down: ‘Cease fire there! Cease fire!’ And the firing did die away, though unwillingly, lessening and returning again in gusts, like an April wind or a woman’s last word in an argument. Even when you might say the musketry had stopped, there was still a splutter and a cracking here and here, for there are ever fools who cannot help themselves.

  But all this while the man of peace continued on his way, at the same stride and in the same bent attitude. Maybe before starting on the journey he had delivered his soul into Allah’s safekeeping, for no shot touched him, and no quick fear turned him from the path. There was something that moved me deep down as I looked on his unhurried pace and the slow waving of his flag.

  It plucked my heartstrings to see him alone there, his life not worth a smoked-out cigarette. I stood right up, all my upper body above the parapet, so that the countryside was bared before me, and a draught of evening wind born of wide spaces came a-knocking at my nostrils. All my heart cried out to him. ‘My salute, friend, my salute! Do you hear me over there? It is Gunner Lake who calls. A brave man’s heart is crying out to a brave man! My salute, friend! In all honour I offer my salute!’

  When the man of peace had advanced halfway, the musketry fire of both sides was nearly silent, and there was a stir of uncertainty in our ranks. You heard some crying ‘Cease fire’ and others calling out against it, shouting there was no order, and what the devil was everyone about. But the firing did not start again, or only in short-lived bursts, and the men hung by the loopholes, waiting what might befall.

  There was a stir on our side now, near Clayton’s trench it seemed from here, and soon an officer came into the open, with a handkerchief tied on to a stick or rifle, I did not notice which. At the same time a couple of Turks hopped from their trenches, and another of our men went forward; and it seemed they would hold a parley then and there.

  They drew near enough for
me to see clearly their appearance, and it was plain they were men of different rank.

  The standard-bearer was a cut-throat looking fellow with a black moustache and a complexion scarce lighter. I doubted he was a pure Turk. He was small and well shaped; but there was that in his expression which made me fear for any dog of an unbeliever who might pass his way. He was dressed in the green uniform, with their strange pleated cap on his head. Through all the dealings he spoke no word.

  The man beside him, the empty-handed man, was quite otherwise. He was dressed as an officer, and proved to be a doctor. He was a man of manners, a man of civilisation, a gentleman. He came to the parley with French on his lips.

  The two men crossed the half-line boundary, and came so close in that the Colonel put up his hand to stop them, lest they should arrive on top of our trench works.

  The meeting was a meeting of dancing masters. They put their hands to their foreheads and bowed profoundly; they advanced and bowed once more; they smiled with utmost courtesy and bowed anew. Next they fell to talking loudly, but in the accents of men who ask the other’s good health, and who rejoice at the fineness of the day. And while they talked, I picked out a seat on the mound before the parapet, and sat down to watch. It was so near evening one might sit at ease out in the sunlight.

  It was a sight you might seek in vain on many a summer’s day. There stood up the two great armies, the Turkish Army and the troops of Australasia, filling the mouths of the trenches, and staring one another in the face. Men that had lived days on end between two narrow, sun-baked walls, men who had lifted heads above a certain level at risk of their lives, now looked over the great bare country, and widened their lungs with breezes new from the sea.

  The sky was filling with clear white clouds, the ground was sown with shadows; and endless heights and depths climbed up and tumbled away. And there were swift greens and blues and greys splashed over the picture, and earthy reds, and glistening patches of sand. And for background were the big hills leaning against the sky.

  And rank after rank, from foot to skyline, stood soldiers in their thousands. The reserves were countless. Look to the right hand, and look to the left, and you were met by our men, their heads lifted over the parapets, or themselves a-top swinging their legs. And between the armies lay the debatable land, pocked with dead men and broken rifles. Ye gods! It was a sight worth the looking.

  Where I sat the ground fell sharply away, and a few yards down the slope rested three of our dead, lying with heads close together. And look where you would, you would come on part of a man—a pair of boots pushed from a mound; a hand; an elbow; or maybe it was the flutter of a piece of coat. The burials had been by night—graves forced from hard ground, with few minutes to give to the building. The mounds had settled and betrayed their secrets.

  Of Turks fallen in the last attack there was no end: it was a day’s task to count them.

  There came down the line word that General Runner parleyed with the other group. I looked across. Several men stood together, but no more could I discover.

  It seemed the enemy asked for a truce for the burial of their dead.

  In course of time word arrived empowering the Colonel to announce the enemy might send a staff officer by way of Gaba Tepe next morning, when the matter would be discussed.

  It was all over presently. The men of truce agreed to take back the message, and fire would open again in a few minutes. Afresh they saluted, afresh they bowed: and our men came this way, and they turned that.

  The Colonel gathered up glasses and periscope; and we went off to tea and the firing broke out again in a great roll.

  Their staff officer rode into our lines next morning.

  Certain rules were framed. Parties of so many either side were allowed over so many yards, and neither party might penetrate beyond halfway. We would take their dead to them, and they would bring our dead to us.

  The day and the hour came round, and peace fell over the armies. The silence was very strange. About the middle of the morning the Colonel set off as usual for the trenches, and we started the rounds as on any other day from the B Battery observing station.

  No shot was to be heard, and the trenches were emptier of men than I had seen them. Without delay we passed to C Battery on the Pimple, and there joined Colonel Irons, Major Andrews, and Major Green.

  Behind C Battery and before A, the five of us climbed from the trenches on to open ground. The sun was out, but the day was cool; and it was pleasant to stand up at ease in the open. A great gathering had come about on the debatable land. It was like a day at the races, with a shabby crowd in attendance. The rule limiting the number of parties was slackly enforced, and anyone tying a white bandage to his arm to denote stretcher-bearer could go where he wanted.

  In this way there were numbers exploring on their own account, exchanging mementoes with the enemy, and seeing what was to be seen. The camera fiend was at large.

  PEACEABLE-LOOKING MEN

  JOSEPH BEESTON

  On 23 May anyone looking down the coast could see a man on Gaba Tepe waving a white flag. He was soon joined by another occupied in a like manner.

  Some officers came into the Ambulance and asked for the loan of some towels; we gave them two, which were pinned together with safety pins. White flags don’t form part of the equipment of Australia’s army.

  Seven mounted men had been observed coming down Gaba Tepe, and they were joined on the beach by our four. The upshot was that one was brought in blindfolded to General Birdwood. Shortly after, we heard it announced that a truce had been arranged for the following day in order to bury the dead.

  Major Millard and I started from our right and walked up and across the battlefield. It was a stretch of country between our lines and those of the Turks, and was designated No Man’s Land. At the extreme right there was a small farm; the owner’s house occupied part of it, and was just as the man had left it. Our guns had knocked it about a good deal.

  In close proximity was a field of wheat, in which there were scores of dead Turks. As these had been dead anything from a fortnight to three weeks their condition may be better imagined than described.

  One body I saw was lying with the leg shattered. He had crawled into a depression in the ground and lay with his greatcoat rolled up for a pillow; the stains on the ground showed that he had bled to death, and it can only be conjectured how long he lay there before death relieved him of his sufferings.

  Scores of the bodies were simply riddled with bullets. Midway between the trenches a line of Turkish sentries were posted. Each was in a natty blue uniform with gold braid, and top boots, and all were done ‘up to the nines’. Each stood by a white flag on a pole stuck in the ground. We buried all the dead on our side of this line and they performed a similar office for those on their side.

  Stretchers were used to carry the bodies, which were all placed in large trenches. The stench was awful, and many of our men wore handkerchiefs over their mouths in their endeavour to escape it. I counted 2000 dead Turks. One I judged to be an officer of rank, for the bearers carried him shoulder-high down a gully to the rear.

  The ground was absolutely covered with rifles and equipment of all kinds, shell-cases and caps, and ammunition clips. The rifles were all collected and the bolts removed to prevent their being used again. Some of the Turks were lying right on our trenches, almost in some of them.

  The Turkish sentries were peaceable-looking men, stolid in type and of the peasant class mostly. We fraternised with them and gave them cigarettes and tobacco.

  Some Germans were there, but they viewed us with malignant eyes. When I talked to Colonel Pope about it afterwards he said the Germans were a mean lot of beggars.

  ‘Why,’ said he most indignantly, ‘they came and had a look into my trenches.’

  I asked, ‘What did you do?’

  He replied, ‘Well, I had a look at theirs.’

  MAY 24TH

  OLIVER HOGUE

  On 24 May—Queen’s
birthday, Empire day—we granted the Turks an armistice to bury their dead, which lay thick all along the firing line, testifying both to the vigour of the attack and the marksmanship of the Australians. Their losses were at first estimated at 6000 but we helped to bury over 3000 of them, and hundreds more must have been brought into their lines during the past six nights. Now we reckon that their casualties must have been at least 12,000.

  I should mention that the Turks observed the terms of the armistice most chivalrously. Once, when a Turkish soldier picked up a grenade and ran with it to their lines, one of their officers ran after him, kicked him where a kick would do most good, took the grenade and returned it with a bow to Major Heane, who had charge of the arrangements for our side.

  AMEN

  FREDERICK LOCH

  The burial of the dead went forward in harmony if not in love. Our fellows were good-willed enough and eager with curiosity; but among the enemy were many glum countenances. Nor do I wonder, for it is but chilly amusement gazing into the faces of your own dead.

  There were many strange sights to be found in a few hundred yards’ marching; but I have not time to tell a tenth of them.

  At one place was a crater in the ground where a shell had burst; and round it, like chickens come to feed at a basin, lay eight dead men. It was the prettiest bit of shooting that you might wish to see. And not so very far away was a gully, maybe twenty yards long, half that wide, and half again that deep. The Turkish stretcher-bearers had gathered dead from everywhere, and tumbled them here—the place was a-choke with bodies. Hundreds were there. They lay a dozen deep. They made me catch my breath. But it was when we turned to go over to A Battery that we passed the scene it will take me longest to forget.

  Four of our own fellows lay on their backs in the grass, all within a few paces. They were of those who had fallen in the first rush on the first day, and had been overlooked. Their clothes were little stained, for no rains had touched them, and their hats were still cocked to one side in the jauntiest manner.