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British and French warships posted close inshore and in wireless touch with the troops opened an intense bombardment of the Chunuk Bair, Hill Q, and Koja Chemen. Then the whistles blew, the infantry leaped out of its shallow trenches and, with a yell that echoed and reechoed through the Gallipoli hills, charged up the precipitous slopes.
You can still smell the Dardanelles expedition, and tread in old footsteps which hardly have been worn away. It is an astonishing position, dominated by vast inaccessible ridges. Leaving the so-aptly named "Dead Man's Gully" on the left, you look up to the "Sphinx," that perfect position of the sniper, climb to "Battleship Hill," and then to Chunuk Bair.
The Turks so far suspect nothing, and Koja Chemen Tepe and Chunuk Bair, with all the intervening ridge, are still unentrenched and open to capture by a coup-de-main. Even if the naval objections to Bulair could be overcome, Sari Bair remains the better move of the two.
One composed of Australian troops, was based on Asma Dere, almost within touch of Suvla Bay. The Indian troops were within striking distance of Chunuk Bair, close to the towering peak of Koja Chemen, rising sharply to almost 1,000 feet, while the New Zealanders were within striking distance of Rhododendron Ridge.
It would take at least two days to re-embark you as Admiral Thursby will explain to you. Meanwhile, the Australian submarine has got up through the Narrows and has torpedoed a gunboat at Chunuk. Hunter-Weston despite his heavy losses will be advancing to-morrow which should divert pressure from you. Make a personal appeal to your men and Godley's to make a supreme effort to hold their ground.
We shall then give Birdwood what he wants, an extra division, and it will be a problem how to do so without letting the enemy smell a rat. Birdwood's Intelligence are certain that no trenches have been dug by the enemy along the high ridge from Chunuk Bair to Hill 305.
Birdwood seems to think we might dominate the Peninsula from the country round Chunuk. In his P.S. he suggests that anyway, if we are beaten off in our attempt to land on the Peninsula we may have this Asiatic scheme in our mind as a second string. Disembarkation plans already made would "probably be suitable anywhere with very slight modifications.
"The attack from Anzac after a series of desperately contested actions, was carried to the summit of Sari Bair and Chunuk Bair Ridge, which are the dominating positions on this area, but, owing to the fact that the attack from Suvla Bay did not make the progress which was counted upon, the troops from Anzac were not able to maintain their position in the actual crest, and after repeating counterattacks, were compelled to withdraw to positions close below it."
Sari Bair is the "keep" to the Narrows; Chunuk Bair and Hill 305 are its keys: i.e., from those points the Turkish trenches opposite Birdwood can be enfiladed: the land and sea communications of the enemy holding Maidos, Kilid Bahr and Krithia can be seen and shelled and, in fact, any strong force of Turks guarding the European side of the Narrows can then be starved out, whilst a weak force will not long resist Gouraud and Hunter-Weston.
In an hour or so you may walk all the way we ever got. And we did not need to have got much further than Chunuk Bair. Down below on the one hand is the sea where the men-of-war lay and thundered with their guns. But across and in front gleams in the sunlight what was the Promised Land, the roofs of Chanak and the purple narrows of the Hellespont.
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