THE LAST OF ANZAC

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2741, 8 April 1916, Page 14

THE LAST OF ANZAC

HOW THE NEW ZEALANDERS

GOT AWAY

THE FIRST PHASE

(From ifalcolm Eoss. Official War Correspondent with tho N.Z. Forces.)

The ovacuation of the New Zealand Infantry Brigade from Anzac was spread over some ten' days. To bogin with, tho Otago Infantry Battalion, which was iu rescrvo, together with all tho ' sick,, and feeble from tho other battalions, >as. assembled under cover of darkness and'shipped off from Walker's Pier, presumably to' a rest camp at Imbros. They found themselves next raortiing at Mudrosl The getting away of the'guns was a very clever bit of work.- llalf 'the guns and half the personnel"'of "all tlio New Zealand batteries disappeared in a night. If you had listened int-ently in your dug-out just bohind the old No. 2 Outpost you might Lave heard nineteen guns rumbling past iu the darkness. • Next day, if you wjro' strolling down to Auzac, you would- have seen them oil' "parked" under the ridge near the pier. The next day all the other guns wero turned on to Russell's Top, and were fired at twice their usual speed, to make the enemy believe that we still had-all our guns in position, and that we still meant business.' I watched the .'operation' with'the General from a convenient observation post. It was rather an amusing ' ! stunt.' because ono halfbattery that had been turned on had •never registered on those trenches, and ltsi shells kept dropping , into the ilex bushes at the head of a little gully, where thero was neither trench nor soldier. The .Turk must have thought that foronce British gunnery imagination was ■ a trick. .Another -gun -shot'dangerously near our own position; but many of the shells burst magnificently,. right in the Turkish fi-enches, smashing the works, and filling the air with smoke and debris. Shells : that were before hoarded as being .worth their . weight in gold were bow, like. Dukes iu Gilbert's libretto, .'.'.twp. a penny." ..-So' the gunners banged them' in for all they w'ero worth. It gave one cause for thought of alhjthat •might- have been. Meantime our aeroplanes had spotted tfie enemy making concrete emplacements for the big German and Austrian howitzer batteries that had come down through Serbia and Bulgaria. Great teams 'of' oxen' had been used to drag them aoross the rough Gallipoli country. They had arrived a day too late for the fair. One can imagine the chagrin of the German .gunners when they found tho birds had iiown, and that all the strenuous "labour.;connected with their -Heraulean task ■ was' in vain. At the very last they did get a" few shots in, but these guns_ remain innocent" death of a single Anzac soldier! ~ . ■ - ; Cod Save the King. ■ Sunday, December 12. .was rather a quiet;day; church'was held as usual hi the"open air:' Die impending departure seemed, to Vadd "solemnity to the words "of..,tho.lesson.'a'nd"to tlio singing of the National Ancthem , added a '.new; fervour. T V'.God-& , vveiTif ''gracious King, . .i'.SeSKL Kiffi'-'Hcloripus,' •.. •) and.'glorious,. ■ ;; Long;to ' reign over, us,. ' ' .God save our Kiiig! ■ One listened with pent-up feelings to the voices' of these war-worn soldiers .from'-the.Antipodes raised in the'grand anthem borne on the breeze across t-Ke hills-und-"dales of Gallipoli for the last time"X.Durihe ..the day two field ambuorder?; to pack up • and get •rejftyjoor, the-Rest The' Best 'Cmpl : was-becoming r iather- a joke.-. 1 We asked "ffie" Artillery Brigadier-General when lie was sending liis next -lot of puns into the Best Camp. The quesproduced only an inscrutable smile frcm the General. A sarcastic remark that. his...guns were so ; tired that .they neoded'a rest was not any more successful in, producing an answer. But, as Harry Lauder.6ays, we knew; and he knew that we-knew. It is too long a story to" tell in d'etail, but every New Zealand gun was got off.. A team of horses was left behind to gallop the, . last, gun; in.on. the last night when daTk;ness*;:had *;ma(le'- effective .shooting no : longer-'possible. Even the; horses, which we had reckoned upon killing, were got off. - .On the Monday, some.'- members. of the Battery, who had been ordered to leave for. the Rest Camp, came in to say thoy did not .want to v j»; They would rather remain on tho Peninsula. In the afternoon, after, some shelling, I. went round the deserted hospital, hadCheon the scene _of memorable afld.',stirring, .though sad, incidents. The empty bivouacs stared at one like soc-ieties!?-eyes. The deserted tents, with their litter of odds and ends and. their , sides flapjihg idly in the wind, seemed : strangely.forlorn.; Onei imagined them peopled-only with the ghosts of the • From under thait Hanping canvas. - many".' a. .brave and sorely-stricken . maa:had'j?et.;o.ut' i ;on..hi,s. final iourney— • ! the' 1 journey that' leads him down tho last sap into the Beautiful' Kingdom . where there are no trenches and where all is peace. The Turkish' artillery in our. immediate, zone was now-wonderfuly quiet-. "Wo could seo a.-few shells bursting over the Suvla position, and a small Turkish izuii was spraying the "Derc" and the little flat'- just below Headquarters with ■ Bhrapnel--that hurt nobody. On tba natli in front of my dug-out a man was ; spent bullet; The wound bled profusely, but did not appear, to bo That oveninp "there wero comfortable dug-outs around us "to let."'- I slipned into one that had afl iron roof and pictures on the .walls. Musketry In the Dark. ...;..Units.and..details' for embarkation weje; assembled in the dark on the -• the deserted hospital, • and, -after- long ; ,waiting, marched off. The' Otagos. some of the Maoris, and a few Aucklanders spent nearly all the night in tho sap—a_ slow column creeping along, inch by inoh, yard by yard, like a- wounded worm —yet failed to gain their ohjectivo. Wo had t-nly one ■ motor-barge' and one water-barge—th( "former" lioMihg 400 troops and the latteT 200—"witlf 'Which to carry out the .embarkation. Tho men were packet! I like matches in a box, one man breathj ing into the next man's face or dowr | the back of his nock according to the | way in which lie was packed. Out ir ! the offing wero some dim, blurred shape; ( which we took to be ships. , The bargei \ -went anel came, gorging and disgorging ! till drt#u threatened, and all work wai J stopped. Their, the blurred, formles: J shaDes suddenly faded into the oute: j[ darkness. Sesretly ane] by stealth the; had stolen away on their journey. Be fore dawn they had disappeared com pletcly from' the face of tho waters. Bit next night, and on each of the succeed ing nights, the blurred shanes weri back in tho same place, awaiting tliei cargoes of khaki. In' time there were left only the fi fighting' men of the remaining threi battalions —Canterbury,' Wellington, am Aucklanel—holding the Apex, Clieshir Ridge to tho left, and a bit of tin " lidge on tho right. The strength i , rough!", amounted to 1-100 all told with fifteen machine-guns. About sevei ■ before the event the. cornmandini . officers .wero informed approximately o ■ the date of the evacuation. Thc.v wor not told what were .the last two nights . but wero told to be ready. All officers . .kit and' other impedimenta had to h ; sent down to the-beach-on the off chance of its being evacuated: F<verv thing-went well.-nii'l on Hi" AVerlnepda; the officers were informed that the las two days .would he the following Satur and'.Sunday. But pone could b

sure even of this. Jupiter Pluvius in the skies, tho British Navy on tho seas, tl and the Turk on the land—each and AJ all might yet tako a hand in the game and at any moment there might be a w halt or a breakdown. "Beach.y Bill" ai had been firing all night, evidently tl searching for tho jetties at Walker's a Uidgo anel not finding thorn. Ho fired et each time four shots at half-hour inter- ti vals throughout tho night. ti On tho Wednesday there was half a t! gale that prevented anything approach- ft ing or leaving the shore., The suspense grow. Had wo only been ablo to tako o advantage of those preceding calm five 01 days! - Were we about to be threaten- al ed with another storm Woulel tho J> Turks attack now! With these and simliar questions our minds became oh- !c sessed. Would the furies come howling w at out heels, or would Oberon take us u gently by the hand and lead us quietly ol and safely away? Time alone would T tell. Meantime "the wireless" was buz- b zing in our ears tho news of the war— if telling us how they had gained a yard at Hartmannßweilerkopf, or how tho enemy were dislodged froin _ a crater by a- counter-attack in the region of Ville- ti stir-Tourbe or some other place. It ti was always the same olel story I Paren- n thetically it also asked whore and how v; Bill Juries had died! It was busy with it matters of big import whieJh of course tl Were in code and with matters cf small o import which were not. It even began ci zzz-ing out something about ourselves, o There was "nothing new" in Gallipoli.- b Great Heavens! Nothing new in Galli- ol poli! That was all thoy knew about n it. and whioh was just as well. To- o wards the close £600 . worth of stores 1: tliat out artillery had paid for with t their own hard cash, and which they g had been anxiously awaiting for weeks, ti arrived. That was a bitter blow. Many tl others suffered in the same way.. Good n whisky,, formerly almost priceless, be- e came a drug in the market. Cabbages t< and potatoes rotted where they lay. a And how we had craved for those lux- d uries in the days of the pre-adamite li army biscuit and tho resilient bully beef. Yet none grumbled. The one r simply laughed at tho other's misfor- ii tune. It was all 'in the day's work. t: ."Normality.". ® By this time the minutest details of v the evacuation had been woriied out twith singular clarity and comprehension. All. notices or. guide marks ( likely to be f. of use to the enemy were to be destroyed on the second day. \ t . After the -first day the Divisional , v Commander removed to Anzac and as- (. sumed command of the Army Corps e Rearguard, v. three thousand strong. r Thirty, ambulance personnel from tho t whole corps wero to be left with the j brigades to assist regimental medical officers, but no attempt was to be made ~ to get off darge numbers of wounded on j the second day. _ An engineer; who,'.by ' , the.way, went with us to' Samoa, _was f to see to the erection of a cheval do frise j of barbed wire in one'of the deres at the very last to block the oncoming j Turk, should Jtie oorne on. The troops , were to embark with 150 rounds of , ammunition and two "iron" rations, j On the final night they wore not to be i hampered'with kits, blankets, oreven waterproof sheets. They were to carry j only' great-coats and -pack, with, _ of ( course, their rifles and ammunition, j Th'eso and a hundred other details had 1( been thought out and attended to. And . all the time the watchword was "Nor < mality." In the 'trenches care was ( taken to display nthe usual number of . periscopes, especially on the day of- the final niglit.' Men were even 6ent to ■ walk up and down the "deres." Fires were kept burning amongst' thfe deserted bivouacs. The Last Phase. The weather became fine again, and men and guns and mules were got away. We knew now that Saturday and Sunday were to be the 'last days." On i the Saturday; 600 men' of. tho New Zealand Infantry Brigade wenii off in three parties.. Thus on the last day we were holding the trenches with 800 picked men and fifteen machine-gunß. I have already written of the spirit of the men; it was magnificent. Praotically the whole brigade volunteered to stay, to the end, so that, after all, it fell-to the officers to detail; the men for the post , of honour. Sunday was a beautiful day The Turks shelled tho Apex for forty minutes with some new'guns from the directioh of Anafarta or iho W tHills. i In the forty minutes they dropped , about forty-five shells on the Apex posii lion. ' They were using high explosive of an excellent quality, yet not a single i man was scratched, so excellent were the trenches and the lindergrounei : cover provided. The new brigadier i general in command had for the past i five weeks been worrying his men to dig i and dig, and they had dug to some pur- .' pose. Thoy almost had an underJ ground village. Night, and day they , had dug.. Their work was beyond all ) praise. There was even an under- > ground kitchen, and all ammunition . and bombs were' stored 20ft.. under i ground. In thoso days of strenuous, t* digging the men, no doubt,,cursed their I brigadier, but-on this equally strenuous, i day of shelling ! they probably s him. The underground passages were conl nected with each so that the air. : force of a high explosive could escapo 3 right' through, thus minimising its eri feet, or if a shell burst at tlio mouth a of one tunnel and blocked it up the men could, escape by another elxit. The Can- - terbury Battalion, on Cheshire Ridge, . was the first to completo its underr grounel terraces. In this terrific bomi bardmcnt on the Sunday it was tho i Auckland Battalion that -would have l suffered most had it not been well dug 9 in underground. An _ Auckland jours nalist going back to his bivouac found a it obliterated and all his papers and - effects buried beyond rocall. 7. < It has often been said- that the colo--3 nial soldier is devoid of discipline.' In t regard to the mere outward signs and 0 observances of discipline, no doubt this is to some extent correct. But in au that pertains to the higher attributes n of discipline ho was a shining light. It o he wore told'to go forward and take I, an almost impregnable and impossible ; . position he wpuld do so, and he seldom, 3 came back from a position he had once e tkiken. No more trying test of ehscip- >- lino has .ever been made than' the at- [, tack on tho Nek by the Australian n Light Horse. They knew absolutely o that they wore going to certain death, e But thoy went. It was tho saino_ at e Lone Pine; the same on Chunuk Bair — 0 on more tlian one occasion. And now d in this matter of the evacuation,. ani- other great test in discipline was being n made. There wore no signs of shirke ing the test. On the contrary, the, n men displayed a pathotic eagerness to >s engage m it. While this very , bom•s bardment' that I speak of was at. its height, the cook of the Auckland ofiiis cers' mess entered the underground js vault, and calmly announced, "Lun>r cheon is now served, "gentlemen." A ,y few minutes later the shelling ceased »- as suddenly as it started. Probably l- the Turkish gunners had been told that it their luncheon also was ready. About :1- the same time Hill 60 was violently •o shelled for two hours. i: That evening the Brigade had 80u men and 15 machine-guns to get away., it They,were divided into'three parties of >e different strengths, called A, B, anel C. id At 5.30, p.m. tho A party, comprising re 340 of all ranks, moved out down tho ie Chailak. Dere and along the main, sap 1 to tho beach at Walker's Rielgo to ct:. 1 bark at 6 p.m. : Between 9 p.m. and ■n' 51.30 p.m. tho B' party, 300 strong, left ie along the same route witli Brigade of Headquarters. > This left the line, cx-i-e tending over 1135 yards, to he licld By s the "Diehards," numbering 160 with 7 s' machine-guns. • This party was comip posed as follows:— ft Auckland' 44 men v'l Wellington 67 men iv Oantorbury • '15 moil st Brigade Headquarters ... 4 men lei T0ta1.'.,.. I6Q men •

Every man of this party was to be thoroughly fit and carefully selected., Machine-gunners had to carry rifles. Tho idoa pervading the operations was to got away tho maximum number at tho oxpenso of tho few. Thero was, therefore, to be no question of fighting a rearguard actioiij or of maintaining covering positions m rear to protect troops in front as they withdrew. Thus troops in -roar were withdrawn before those in front, this plan giving more freedom of movement to thoso in front. Bandages, first-aid dressings, and other things necessary were left, not only with the doctors find officers, but also in the tents of tho abandoned hospitals. Tho doctors chosen to remain to the last wero those with a knowledge of French, so they CQuld'couveree with the Turks. This might have been necessary, in case tho complete removal of the wounded had becomo impossible. There is no doubt that if thero had been fighting they would have helped in attending to each other's wounded. The Skeleton Line. . ]f the skeleton line now left in tho trenches was to bo attacked before tho time ot departure, 1.50 a.m. on the night of Sundav-Monday the withdrawal was- still to continue, tho remaining men concentrating their fire on the threatened point. If attacked by an overwhelming forco there would of course bo no use in offering a strong opposition, and the whole force was to be ordered to withdraw. Tho colonel of the Canterbury Battalion was in command of "The Diehards," and his Staff officer was the adjutant of tho battalion, lit) took up his position at Brigade Headquarters, so that the former brigade communications were still maintained with the . Headquarters of the three infantry battalions, and four signallers fully armed and specially selected for their efficiency and ability wero to remain to tho ond. They were under a corporal, who had landed on the first day and had never been absent a single hour owing,to sickness! k t During the whole of this night.it was reported that the Turks wero improving their trenches and erecting additional obstacles, indicating liow secret our preparations and movements had been, and how much their intelligence, was at fault. They wero really under the impression that instead of evaouating we were landing two extra divisions for an attack I ■ Included in the 160 men who were to see it out, no matter what happened, wero 24 picked officers. To show the extraordinary forethought that had been exercised,-1 may mention that overy man of the 160 had a watch set to time that was checked every r t uarter of an hour day and night. The normality of the situation was maintained up to the very last, and to prevent the Turks from suspecting that anything unusual was happening, a big mortar was hred every half hour, and other mortars every, twenty minutes as usual. The men were numbered in groups of 1 2, 8, 4, all along the line. At ten minutes to 2 a.m. all the Nol s slipped quietly away with tho remaining seven machine guns—six of which were light Vickers guns. From beginning to end there was .no question of "Sauve qui peut," and every movement was earned out with the utmost coolness and calmness'. At 2 a.m. all tho No. 3's moved >off, and at 2.15 a.m. tho whole of the remaining numbers. Tho men were so distributed that they were able ■■ to.fire 60 that the enemy should think tho trenches wero still being held by their normal strength. After all had gone there were twenty automatic rifles still left behind to fir© at' intervals. These were worked by menns _ of dripping water, - and' candles burning till they severed a piece of string that dropped 1 av weight and pulled the trigger. Old disused rifles that would be of no value to the enemy wore requisitioned for, this i purpose. The eights and the magazines had been removed. By 3.30 a.m. the last man had got down to the pier, llio wholo movement, though caned out at night, went with the regulanty of a parade. Some detachments were even ahead of time. Tho officers knew every man of tho 160. ; Each _man as he arrived was. ticked off. Not a man was missing. , . ' ' Thus it was that from these heights from a position running into a sharp salient, 'and dominated by enemy positions on the right and loft ami in front, tho New Zealand Infantry Brigade 'got scathiess awav down the steep 'Deres and through the long winding sap to the sea. -