by Graham Seal
THE COLLECTIVE ANZAC hero is the ‘digger’, originally the volunteer citizen-soldier of the First AIF and the ANZAC Corps who saw the war as an unpleasant but necessary job that had to be done and so went and did it. The digger was impatient with official discipline, rank and drill and was more than a handful when on leave, but he fought fiercely and efficiently, if in an unorthodox style. This image of the Anzac hero, of course, leaves out nurses, sailors, aviators and a range of other brave people who saw it as a duty to serve their country. The digger is undoubtedly the idealised human symbol of Anzac but, as in the ancient mythologies of Greece, Rome and other cultures, Anzac has many individual heroes and heroines.
They just poured into the wards all day
Nurses arrived at the front during World War I by various routes—some through official military arrangements, some through charities and some by private means. With an ethos derived from Florence Nightingale’s ideals and teachings, developed through her Crimean War experience, nurses were ready to serve. Sister Tucker from Launceston in Tasmania wrote home about her time on hospital ship HMS Sicilia, the first to begin taking off the wounded from Gallipoli. She and the medical staff accompanying her had a relatively pleasant voyage from Alexandria in Egypt to Lemnos, though the situation changed dramatically soon after their arrival in Mudros harbour.
We see masts and funnels by the score all round, but do not know whether our troops are landed or are still on them. We had a very nice trip here, after waiting at Alexandria for three or four days for orders. Most of the crew are Indians—also the doctors, orderlies, dressers, waiters, and stewards. The colonel and medical officers are from India; but, of course, are Imperial men. Colonel Bird and his son are Australians, and we have 12 nurses. We have the honour to be the first hospital ship to enter the Dardanelles. We are equipped to take 400 patients. The boat is fitted with five large wards, with a couple of officers’ wards, special wards, and a nice little theatre. One night at sea was fairly rough; but everybody was able to appear at meals—of course, we were very keen to do so, as we were chosen on account of being good sailors. The French uniform is a pale blue flannel material, with long coats, and blue or scarlet caps. We do not think they look so nice as our men. Perhaps it’s conceit on our part, but we are so proud of being Australians when we see our troops marching by.
April 29—We returned to Alexandria yesterday, after three weeks. We spent the day unloading our patients, and are to sail again at 6 p.m. When waiting in the harbour at Lemnos, four of us nurses were ordered to transfer to the hospital ship Gascon. We left Lemnos on Saturday evening, and early on Sunday morning came to the Dardanelles. About 2 a.m. the first shot was fired. We were right up in the firing line—several gunboats were behind us, firing right over us. Several shots from the boats splashed very near to us. About 9 a.m. the first patients were brought on board. It was awful to see them, some with scarcely any clothes on, blood pouring in all directions, some limping . . . others with an arm bandaged. Several died as they came across in the boats to us. It was absolutely grand to see how ‘game’ they were. I felt just proud of being an Australian, and owning them. They just poured into the wards all day. My ward holds 96—and I was responsible for about 40 on deck. I had three orderlies and a sergeant-major to assist. The dock was just lined with patients lying on mattresses—530 patients—though our boat is only fitted up for 400. You can imagine how we all worked until we got to Alexandria again—early on Thursday morning. Now we are making bandages—dressing, splints, etc. ready for the next patients.
Landing the patients was a pathetic sight. Hardly any of them had shirts. They were so blood-stained and torn they had to be thrown overboard. Others had their coats and trousers split, and hurriedly sewn over. Some were minus a boot; very many minus socks. It took hours getting the stretcher cases off. We started at 9 a.m. The last was landed at 4.30. One day we had six to bury at sea; another day several . . .
After a few months medical supplies and water became scarce on Lemnos, as this doctor described to relatives in Adelaide.
I must say that the men we brought from Australia have turned out grand fellows, and one could not wish for better nursing orderlies, nor find more conscientious and hard-working fellows. I am helping to look after 1100 patients, as we have taken over No. 2 Australian Hospital. All the nurses have been ashore (from the transports) for three days, and have to sleep in tents, so it is rather rough on them. There is a limited supply of water, so I expect they find life rather rough and dirty, but it gives them an idea of how things are run in a camp hospital. One night I had to admit patients from 10.30 p.m. to 1 p.m., and as I had started at 5 o’clock and been on my feet all day I was rather tired. We start at 9 o’clock doing the cases, and generally finish about 10 p.m. We commence to operate at 7.30 p.m. For my first seven days at Mudros I had 60 patients to look after, and could generally manage to finish by lunch, as the greater number were suffering from diarrhoea. This complaint has been troublesome lately, three-fourths of our patients having been complaining of it. They are a jolly fine crowd, and are always ready to see a joke.
Mudros has altered beyond recognition since our first arrival. There are numerous hospitals around the bay . . . We are frightfully short of beds. Many of the men are accommodated on mattresses on the floors, and are as comfortable there as on beds, although the insect life is simply dreadful. I was showing a naval doctor around one day and he asked me about the livestock. I asked one patient, and when he pulled back the blankets to show how numerous they were, one of the Australian wits at the end of the ward cried out, ‘Company, form fours.’
The water problem has been solved to a certain extent. Water is brought to a certain spot every day in barges and thence carted by the two or three water-carts attached to each hospital. Unfortunately we have been unable to obtain reinforcements, and have had to take a man from the Evacuation depot at Mudros to help. Practically none had done any nursing or medical work, so you can understand our position. Still the raw material is turning out well, and without such assistance it would be impossible to carry on. We are also frightfully short of instruments, and have to do what we can with the few things we have. Of course, we have the instruments in the theatre, but one cannot send an orderly 250 yards every time, and, again, the instruments there are in use most of the day and evening. There is a disease prevalent here characterised by ‘tripexia,’ dirty tongue and loss of appetite. It is like typhoid, but certainly is not true typhoid fever.
The X-ray cases are all seen at night time, so we manage to look at these between the operations, and while the orderlies are cleaning the theatre. The majority of the operations are small, such as looking for and extracting bullets and pieces of shell and cartridge casings. These take more finding than one would imagine. We take off a fair number of fingers and extract numerous shrapnel bullets.
Everyone was as cheerful as possible
In July 1915, Dr Brennan wrote home, praising the heroism of the troops on Gallipoli, from the landings onwards. Brennan had been in the first wave of the landings and had himself performed acts of gallantry, which he does not mention in his letter, preferring to praise the men who served with him. The letter also records the moment at which the Anzacs realised that they were too far north of their prescribed landing point.
On the day of departure from the island (Saturday, April 24) half our battalion embarked on destroyers and were taken to H.M.S. London, and started out, all the battleships and cruisers in line, the transports (with the remainder of the troops) following, and the destroyers buzzing about like bees. The Queen Elizabeth went on ahead. We cruised about the Aegean Sea all the afternoon, and at dark started slowly up the Gulf of Saros. The officers of the London were awfully good to us; they gave up their beds to us and fed us up like fighting cocks. If you ever hear anyone saying anything derogatory about the Navy in future just plug him and explain it’s from me. They really are the finest lot of men I have ever met.
After a few hours slee
p we were called at 12.30 a.m., and had another feed. By this time we were just in sight of land, and the night was glorious; but as the moonlight was so bright we had to keep well away from the land. About 1.30 a.m. we embarked in boats which were towed by the battleships’ packet boats on the opposite side of the ships from the land, so that only the battleships could be seen, and then started slowly in diagonally towards the part of the shore where we were to land. Of course, there were no lights, and the silence was absolute, except for an occasional low-voiced order from a naval officer. By this time the moon had gone down, and we had just an hour before dawn. Then all at once the battleships stopped, and we turned half-right and started hell for leather for the shore—six packet boats (off three battleships), each towing four or five big pinnace launches and cutters. Our tow was on the extreme left. A few hundred yards behind us came seven or eight destroyers packed with the remaining companies of our battalions, which they had collected off the transports; then behind them again came the transports carrying the troops of the other brigades waiting until we were landed for the picket boats and destroyers to return and land them.
The land loomed closer and closer, and there was still no sign of the enemy having discovered us, but all at once it struck me that the look of the land ahead of us was distinctly different from what it should have been by the maps which were issued to us: the hills were steep right to the beach, instead of the ground gradually sloping as we were told. Evidently others made the same discovery, for presently I heard a navy chap say in a drawlly way ‘I believe we’re A Mile Too Far North.’ But it was too late to mend the error—dawn was just breaking—so after turning still further north for a couple of hundred yards about quite close to the shore we made straight on. Just as the picket boat cast off and we were lowering the oars to pull in the last 40 or 50 yards a single rifle shot rang out in the stillness, and everyone jumped about a foot off his seat. But we all soon got over the jumping business, as within about five seconds the fire opened from the whole hill in front of us, and then a machine gun opened fire.
I was in the second boat of the tow, and being a fairly light boat we ran well into the beach. The first boat of the tow was a big pinnace, and having 50 men on board she grounded a fair distance out, and when the troops got out they were up to their shoulders in water; we were only up to our waists. There were only a few casualties in our boats—the machine gun didn’t get into it—but there were more in others especially those who didn’t get rowing while they still had way on [forward motion] from the picket boat. As you can imagine, there was no time wasted in getting out of the boats and across the beach (only about 15 yards wide), to the shelter of the bank; but even there we found we were not safe, as they were enfilading us from a bit of a cape about 200 yards to the south, so we had to crawl round until we found a little depression in the bank. Of course, all this was a matter of seconds. Soon there were a good number of men ashore. I heard an officer sing out ‘Fix bayonets, lads and up we go’ and with a yell they started up the hill, which was very steep. They had to crawl up on hands and knees: more men were coming all the time, following the others up. Suddenly the shrapnel started. They were firing from a battery on the Gaba Tepe, a cape about 1½ miles south of us, and at once the battleships opened in return, and the din was tremendous. There seemed to be shrapnel bursting over and all round the boats. I was busy dressing all kinds of bullet wounds. An engineer was shot through the chest just beside me, and died in a few minutes. Suddenly there was a cheer from the top of the hill; our boys had captured the machine gun and driven the Turks out of their trenches. All this time there was not a rifle fired by our side. Coming ashore the rifles were not even loaded. I followed them up, dressing the wounded and leaving them to be picked up by bearers.
As soon as our fellows got the First Hill they got the Turks on the run and kept them going, down the other side of the hill they went, and up the next—very stiff climb; a hill or a ridge rather about 400ft. high. The whole country is covered with low scrub, and in the rush forward lots of the Turks lay down under bushes and sniped our men off after they had passed them. They crossed a plateau 100 yards wide, and followed down another dip into a big gully with a creek in it, where we found five tents, evidently having been occupied by supports for the trenches. There were a lot of wounded Turks about, but as there were so many of our wounded I hadn’t much time to look at them. Besides, they had no field dressings like our men carry. I gave some morphine to a few of them, but most of them spat it out.
Everyone was as cheerful as possible in spite of everything. Coming up the first hill I heard one fellow say (the bullets were very thick at the time), ‘If they’re not careful they’ll fire one shot too many, and the bullets will chock [collide] in the air’. On the plateau I met my A.M.C. sergeant, and it was very fortunate, as two can do better than one, especially with fractures and bad haemorrhage cases. We fixed a couple of shattered legs, and went on down into the big gully, along that for a bit, and then up on to the top of the main ridge which our fellows had just taken. The first wounded man up there that I struck was Peck, our adjutant; he had a bullet through the shoulder. It had just missed the bone.
Our men had gone on still further, but by this time (about 10 a.m.) the Turks were reinforced strongly. Although during the morning and early afternoon some of our sections got out more than a mile further, they had all eventually to fall back to the main ridge. During the later afternoon this position got very warm. We were on a knoll on the left of the centre of our line (which by this time was about 2½ miles long) overlooking the left flank. Then some Turks got round a ridge about 500 yards away on our left, from which they could get the back of the hill we were on, as well as the front, and we had to dig in as quickly as possible.
Of course, all the units were fearfully mixed up by this time. Major Denton was close to me and about half a dozen of our men; all the other men were a mixture of battalions. I found myself in a trench with some machine gun supports, and borrowed a bit of their trench to haul wounded into and dress there. My sergeant was a little further along the line. When darkness came you could move about a bit as long as you kept off the skyline, and I went and visited Denton and found Barnes, Brockman and Everett along the line with a mixed command. There were not so many casualties now, but every now and then a man would be wounded while digging trenches just over the hill. Altogether it was a very anxious time from the middle of the afternoon until next morning. The firing was continuous, and very heavy. The Turks are wonders at taking cover and would worm their way right up to within 10 yards of the trenches and pot at anything they saw move in the darkness. About midnight, to increase our discomfort, a drizzly rain started, and before long we were wet to the skin. The men in the trench with me had their bayonets fixed all night, and I had my revolver ready. I had already taken off my red cross, as it wasn’t much use in such a situation. We all had a few pots at apparently moving shadows during the night. The snipers from the hill opposite came round during the night, and our knoll and the left flank were surrounded, except along the ridge towards the centre. We were all very glad when morning dawned. Time after time during the night the enemy had come right up to the trenches, but they would not face the bayonets, and always retired.
The following five days saw continuous fighting, we holding the position on the top of the ridge, and they trying to break through. Of course, if they had broken through our line anywhere it would have meant that the whole line would have had to retire. An Indian mountain battery got busy on Sunday afternoon, and in spite of severe losses caused by the concentration of the enemy’s shrapnel on them, they did wonderful work. Then on Monday, as soon as our line was established, the battleships opened fire over our heads. The ‘Lizzie’s’ shells were a revelation; they would whistle over our heads, and the next, there would be a terrific explosion on the big hill on our left front and when the smoke and dust cleared the whole contour would be changed. Every time that the Turks massed in any spot the observers wo
uld pass along the word by field telephone, and the ship’s shells would be on them. Of course, they were not quiet either, and there was shrapnel bursting continuously over our trenches.
On Monday and Tuesday our batteries were landing and soon opened fire also. On Monday morning Denton, Everett and Selby formed an observation post on our knoll, a telephone was brought along to my dugout, and they got a dugout just over the hill 10 yards away. They could observe the whole left flank, and shouted messages down all day, which Denton sent on by telephone until he got wounded (not severely) on Tuesday afternoon, and then I sent them on after that. There was a fearful shortage of officers; one after another came over the hill wounded, and some were killed, including Charlie Barnes, while observing for a machine gun. Croly also got a severe wound through the elbow. Later Everett, Selby, and I were the only three left in our section of trenches with a couple of hundred men—all under the few N.C.O.s left. Everett and Selby were kept busy in their posts, and as the wounded were diminishing I took on a bit of army service business, sending down parties for water, food, rum, ammunition, etc., and sent their messages to the head quarters by telephone. Altogether we were going from morning till night, but after dark we could do a bit of a crawl round.
On Monday night I took a stroll down to the beach to get my pack, which I had dropped there as soon as we landed, and luckily found it, and got an overcoat and waterproof sheet out, and took them back. The greatest trouble we had in our part was the removal of the wounded. We could do practically nothing till dark, and even then there were snipers about. Many stretcher-bearers were wounded, and to make matters worse all day and part of the night the valley was swept by shrapnel—in fact, the valley was called ‘Shrapnel Valley.’ In the dugouts around me were my sergeant and a pioneer sergeant and two assistants looking after the ammunition supply. One of these last was a trick of a kid. He would duck down the hill to the valley to fetch up water and sometimes tea for us, and if a sniper got closer to him than usual he would put down whatever he was carrying, turn in the direction from which the bullet came, and put his fingers to his nose, and then come on again.
