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I filmed the scene, and as the car vanished over the brow of the hill, three more were called for the Prince of Wales. Hurriedly picking up my kit I chased away after them. On the way masses of Anzacs lined both sides of the road, and the cheers which greeted His Majesty must have been heard miles away. The scene made a most impressive picture for me.
It was at the foot of these steep and steel-swept bluffs that the Anzacs made their immortal landing; it is here, in earth soaked with their own blood, that they lie sleeping.
While the Australians and New Zealanders, or Anzacs as they are now generally known from the initials of the words Australian-New Zealand Army Corps, were fighting so gallantly at Gaba Tepe, the British troops were landing at the southern end of the Gallipoli Peninsula. The advance was slow and difficult. The Turk was pushed back, little by little, and the ground gained organized.
But other men, in Europe, thousands of miles way, were laying plans that meant death and the loss of hands and een for those braw laddies o' Australia and New Zealand that I saw those we came to ken sae weel as the gallant Anzacs. It makes you realize, seeing countries so far awa' frae a' the war, and yet suffering so there from, how dependent we all are upon one another.
Downs that night took out a patrol from the right, who explored the south-west corner of Pozières in spite of the extreme alertness of the Huns, and returned safely with the most valuable information for which the Anzacs, over whose attacking frontage the patrol had gone, were most grateful. Everyone was glad to have them on our flank, for they were splendid men, full of confidence and keenness.
Not a soul in England, outside the Ordnance, realizes, I believe, that barring the guns of the 29th Division and the few guns of the Anzacs, our field artillery consists of the old 15-prs., relics of South Africa, and of 5-inch hows., some of them Omdurman veterans.
They wanted to get to a place ahead. They would fight the devils of hell to get there. The New-Zealanders followed them, with rosy cheeks like English boys of Kent, and more gentle manners than the other "Anzacs," and the same courage. They went far, too, and set the pace awhile in the last lap. But that, in the summer of '16, was far away.
I sometimes speak of the Anzac troops or the Anzac guns." "Oh, that is all right Anzac troops there's no objection to that we are that," went on the grammarian with the elbow sling, "but there's no such thing as an Anzac the Anzacs it's nonsense." I remember that day well. It was the day before their first entry on the Somme.
Aeroplane reconnaissance showed that large bodies of Turkish infantry and cavalry were marching swiftly from Beersheba and Hereira, to the assistance of their comrades in Gaza, and we went forward to delay their advance. A squadron of Anzacs operating from the north-east fought with such dash that they found themselves at the outskirts of Gaza itself.
In the same way anyone who is in touch with them knows that to speak of the feats of "an Anzac" or of "the Anzacs" is unpopular with the men to whom it is applied. You will never hear the men refer to themselves as Anzacs. They call themselves simply Australians or New Zealanders. It is an interesting mental phase.
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