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Updated: June 29, 2025
The haze of early morning dusk still held, blurring the mainland and water in misty outlines. Hawk and I had slept upon the deck. Now we got up and stretched our cramped limbs. Slowly we warped through the quiet seas. You must understand that we knew not where we were. We had never heard of Suvla Bay we didn't know what part of the Peninsula we had reached.
So together we made our way up a steep spur, and in two hours had traversed the first line trenches and taken in the lie of the land. Half way we met Generals Bridges and Godley, and had a talk with them, my first, with Bridges, since Duntroon days in Australia. From the heights we could look down on to the strip of sand running Northwards from Ari Burnu towards Suvla Bay.
The Chief Officer is put through it. And by way of a speech he says: "Suppose, instead of cheering me, you cheer the fellows who have landed at Suvla?" "Highland Honours!" yells a voice. And the seniors rise, stand upon their chairs, put one foot on the table amongst the plates, and, raising their glasses, join in the musical honours given to the new army at Suvla.
"They hardly mention the names of any regiments," he pointed out. But John Marsh had an answer for him. He produced a despatch written by a British admiral in which was narrated the story of the landing at Suvla Bay and the beaches about Gallipoli.
The high hills seemed still to be Turkish, for different bodies of white-patched troops made a rough line some distance below the summit, running down laterally towards Suvla Bay. Distant ridges lined by the same white-patched men showed that all the foothills had been taken; but Mac watched eagerly, though in vain, for the appearance of British troops on the higher ridges.
Indeed, as early as the big naval attempt to force the Dardanelles, rumors were heard of a shortage of ammunition in the Turkish forts, and in this connection it is interesting to print a report that gained currency at the time of the abandonment of the Anzac and Suvla Bay bases.
He worked hard at getting the equipment into the lighters, notwithstanding the fact that he was "three-parts canned." Every now and then he loomed up like some great khaki-clad gorilla, only to fade away again to the secret hiding-place of a bottle. And so at last we got aboard. It was still a profound secret. No one knew whither we were going, or why we were leaving the desolation of Suvla Bay.
"Exactly," agreed Monty; "it was the remark of an M.L.O." And he explained how, all along, he had conjectured that the pleasant creature on the Aragon had blundered in sending us to Suvla. "Well, why the devil did you come?" inquired the M.L.O.
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.
"It can't last long," they said. "We've only to climb one of them two hills either Sari Bair on the Suvla front, or old Achi Baba at Helles and the trick's done. From the top of either of 'em we shall look down upon the Narrows, and blow their forts to glory. Up'll go the Navy, and there y'are!" It would be over by Christmas, they believed; for Christmas was always the pivot of Tommy's time.
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