Volume I Part 12 (1/2)

So noe stand on Turkish _terra firma_ The price has been paid for the first step and that is the step that counts Blood, sweat, fire; with these we have forged our master key and forced it into the lock of the hellespont, rusty and dusty with centuries of disuse Grant us, O Lord, tenacity to turn it; deterh that open door _Queen Elizabeth_ of England sails East for the Golden Horn!

When in far off ages es ripened in Mars the black superstitions and bloody es, still they will have to drain a glass to the ht here

CHAPTER VI

MAKING GOOD

_27th April, 1915 Getting on for ht HMS ”Queen Elizabeth”_ All sorts of questions and answers At 2 anal from Admiral Guepratte, ”Situation at kuave orders to re-eret it is not in ret it With just one ade at our backs ould have taken Yeni Shahr and kept our grip on kuuns froars can't be choosers The French are now free to land direct at Sedd-el-Bahr, or ”V,” instead of round by ”W”

During the s him Hunter-Weston could not attack Achi Baba yesterday as his troops orn out and some of his Battalions had lost a quarter of their effectives: also that ere already short of ammunition Also that ”Sedd-el-Bahr was a dreadful place to carry by open assault, being a labyrinth of rocks, galleries, ruins and entanglements” ”With all the devoted help of the Navy, it has taken us a day's hard fighting toAchi Baba Hill, only a cannon shot distant, will be attacked to- auns the _QE_ sailed at 7 am

for Gaba Tepe where we found Birdwood's base, the beach, being very severely shelled The fire seemed to drop from half the points of the compass towards that one small strip of sand, so marvellously well defiladed by nature that nine-tenths of the shot fell harunners had to chance hitting so shrapnel over the main cliff or one of the two arm-like promontories which embraced the little cove,--and usually they didn't! Yet even so the beach was hardly a seaside health resort and it was a co to and fro and handling packing cases with no e at Margate

At 755 we presented the Turks with some remarkable specimens of sea shells to reco our beaches They accepted our 6 inchers with a very good grace Often one of our HE hundred pounders seeun had been spotted:--and before our triule theain But the 15-inch shrapnel, with its 10,000 bullets, was amore than they could help Several times we silenced a whole battery by one of theseback into concealed positions where our shi+ps' guns will not be able to find them Still, even so, to-day and to-morrow are the two most ticklish days; after that, let the storm come--our troops will have rooted the to the sailors about gettingHE shell for the Mediterranean Squadron instead of the present armour piercers which break into only two or three pieces and are, therefore, in the open field,than deadly They don't see for special favours through routine channels Officialdoet at Winston hi red tape into the waste-paper basket; otheron't be met half way As for me, I am helpless I cannot write Winston--not on military business; least of all on Naval business I ae re rees that, especially in war time, no man can serve two masters There has been so much stiletto work about this war, and I have so often blamed others for their backstairs politics, that I h several of the Powers that Be have told me to keep theh principles won't obtain high explosives As to writing to the Army Council--apart froe reflections were jotted down between 10 and 1030 am, when I was clapped into solitary confinement under armour An aeroplane had reported that the _Goeben_ had come into the Narrows, presuuns There was no use arguing with the sailors; they treat me as if I were a mascot So I was duly shut up out of harm's way and out of their hilst they made ready to take on the shi+p, which is just as much the cause of our Iliad as was Helen that of Homer's Up went our captive balloon; in ten ot off the first shot which ht The eneh cliffs and I was let out oftroops Off flew the shell, seven miles it flew; over the Turkish Arain she let fly This tiic forh hardly able really to credit ourselves with so nificent a shot: but it was so: in twoby the stern! OK for us; UP with the Turks Sihastly affair Fancy that enor suddenly out of the blue on to a shi+p's deck swar with troops!

A wireless from Wemyss to say that the whole of Hunter-Weston's force has advanced two miles on a broad front and that the enemy made no resistance

At 6 pean was no place for flyers whether heavier or lighter than air All the Turkish guns we could spot from the shi+p had been knocked out or silenced, so Birdwood and hisWe cast anchor off Cape helles at about 630 pm

At 7 Hunter-Weston caood cheer _He never gave any order to evacuate ”Y”; he never was consulted; he does not knoho gave the order_ He does well to be proud of his men and of the way they played up to-day when he called upon them to press back the enemy He has had no losses to speak of and we are now on a fairly broad three-ht across the toe of the Peninsula; about two miles from the tip at helles Had our men not been so deadly weary, there was no reason we should not have taken Achi Baba froht at all But we have not got our , and carriage of stores, water and ht, so the men are still as tired as they were on the 26th, or ence hear that ene the Narrows So it is a pity we could not round whilst ere about it, but we had no fresh men to put in and the used Battalions were simply done to a turn

We did not talk much about the past at dinner, except--ah in to replace casualties,--a ulation and afforded to the BEF Just think of it To-day each Battalion of the 29th Division would have been joined by two keen Officers and one hundred keen iven would have been far, far greater than that which the mere numbers (1,200 for the Division) would seem to imply Hunter-Weston says that he would sooner have a pick-me-up in that for so, he says too little

Tired or not tired, we attack again to-morrow We et help from Asia or Constantinople

Are we to strike before or after daylight? Hunter-Weston is clear for day and we have made it so The hour is to be 8 aot at tea tie de Robeck has apparently sent hoarrison of Egypt you ive me ”any support” I ”may require”; otherwise, naturally, I'd have had the Gurkhas with me now: he has his own show to run: I have my own show to run: it is for K to split the differences K gavebefore I started I must not embroil hi him for more troops It was up to me to take the job on those terht be held to be outside this tacit covenant, but when I asked first, directly, for the Indian Brigade; secondly, for the Brigade or even for one Gurkha Battalion, I only got that chilliest of refusals--silence Since then, there has been soe in his attitude I do wish K would take me more into his confidence Never a word to ade, yet now it is on its way! Also, here co of the riddle is that troops ear-marked for the Western front are still taboo but that K finds hi, in a , therefore, to let us draw on Egypt He thinks, in a word, that as far as Egypt goes, we should try and get e can get

Said good-night with ood wishes, and have worked till now (1 a Winter and Woodward, who had coent administrative work Each see on: Winter is the quicker worker Wrote out also a second long cable to K (the first was operations) for leave to call upon Maxwell to sendthat Maxwell can have ht it fair to cable Maxwell also, asking him to hold the East Lancs handy K's cable coverswith his troops and Maxwell may play on one of the tenderest spots in K's adaered; still it is only right to give hier, has brought us our mails

_28th April, 1915 HMS ”Queen Elizabeth” Off Gallipoli_ At 9 aave , a brilliant piece of hich will add lustre even to the illustrious deeds of France I hope the French Govern stroke of d'A more solid than a thank you

At 940 General Paris and the Staff of the Naval Division also cas and their plans when the noise of the battle cut short the po The fire along the threeover fog signals

Clearly we are not going to gain ground so cheaply as yesterday

At 10 o'clock the _QE_ was stea slowly Northwards and had reached a point close to the old ”Y” landing place (wellkerosine tins) Suddenly, inland, a largedown a depression of the ground heading towards the coast We had two 15-inch guns loaded with 10,000 shrapnel bullets each, but there was an agony as to whether these were our fellows falling back or Turks advancing The Ad Captain ith us The thing hung on a hair but the horror of wiping out one of ades was too much for me: 20 to 1 they were Turkish reinforceh Krithia--50 to 1 they were Turks--and then--the ground seemed to s them from view Ten minutes later, they broke cover half a mile lower down the Peninsula and left us no doubt as to what they were, advancing as they did in a ainst some of our men who had their left flank on the cliffs above the sea