United States or Dominican Republic ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Their 6 in. guns on Achi Baba could reach any part of the Peninsula they choose. The ground we stood on sloped gently up to the hill, pleasant arable land with here the remains of a farm and the trampled crops around it, there an olive grove and fig-trees or battered vineyard.
The line of communications that linked the Achi Baba position with Maidos and Gallipoli was to be cut by our forces operating from Suvla and Anzac, and the Narrows were to be opened to our fleet by the capture of Sari-Bair. The epic of the actual Suvla effort has been nobly told in both Sir Ian Hamilton's dispatches and Mr Masefield's Gallipoli.
"Oh, try not to be foolish, Captain Ray," returned Doe impatiently. "Have you been so long on this cursed Peninsula without knowing that we couldn't evacuate Suvla without being seen from Sari Bair, nor Helles without being seen from Achi Baba? And, directly the jolly old Turk saw us quitting, he, and the whole German army, and Ludendorff, would stream down and massacre us as we ran.
Elsewhere was scrub and, in those early months, sweet-smelling and aromatic plants and flowers round which bees hummed and butterflies hovered in the heat. The Peninsula was rent by three great ravines; the Gully with its precipitous banks on our left, and the Krithia and Achi Baba nullahs in the centre.
The sky above the shell-riddled ridge of Achi Baba was serene and purple in the glow of evening, but the fog of war was upon us. Suddenly, at 6.40 P.M., a message came that two of our Companies were required at once to help the Worcester Regiment, who had taken part in the assault about a mile to the north of where we were. The men were resting for the work planned for the next day.
As we neared our destination artillery were at work on Achi Baba, and the flashes of the explosion followed by the dull boom of the guns were to most of us our first glimpse of actual warfare.
In one of his earlier despatches, Sir Ian Hamilton very aptly likens the configuration of the Peninsula between Achi Baba and Cape Helles to the bowl of a huge spoon, with Achi Baba at the heel of the bowl and the Cape at its toe.
At 6.20 p.m. started back intending to see all snug at Gaba Tepe, but, picking up some Turkish guns as targets in Krithia and on the slopes of Achi Baba, we hove to off Cape Tekke and opened fire. We soon silenced these guns, though others, unseen, kept popping. At 6.50 we ceased fire. At 7, Admiral Guépratte came on board and tells us splendid news about Kum Kale.
A Turkish battleship joined in from the Hellespont, dropping about twenty 11.2-inch shells into our lines. At Helles, all night, the Turks blazed away from their trenches. At 4 a.m. they opened fire on our trenches and beaches with every gun they could bring to bear from Asia or Achi Baba. Their Asiatic Batteries alone fired 1,900 rounds, of which 700 fell on Lancashire Landing.
But I do object to the addition of news which is untrue, and which can surely be seen through by any reading public. If we can take trenches at our will, why are we still on this side of Achi Baba? "In compliance with Lord Kitchener's instructions I send a telegram to the Secretary of State for War and repeat it to Egypt; also to Australia and New Zealand if it affect these Dominions.
Word Of The Day