EVACUATION OF ANZAC

Marlborough Express, Volume L, Issue 1, 3 January 1916, Page 6

EVACUATION OF ANZAC

lIKTUKXKD .SOL-DiEUS' VIEWS

"ONLY HAiV'OUli TEETH IK IT."

The news .that the New Zealanders and Australians hud been taken oif Arizac and S-uvla Bay ran like wildfire through, the transport Tahiti (says the •Otf»go Daily Tunes). ■ This was' the first" intimation the men had had of what had taken place on the peninsula which had been the home of most of,them tor many stirring weeks. TI:.o opinions expressed on the abandonment were varied, though the keen disappointment expressed by some was eased a little when it was explained that the Allies were still holding Cape Relies and Seddul Balir. Those soldiers who expressed the keenest regret at the abandonment dk| not do so on the feeling that the military decision was not a. correct one. It was the thought, ' rather, 'that hundreds of their comrades'—men who had fought side by side with them, and had fallen ir. the badle—were lying buried on,a. foreign strand. Some of the Tahiti men said they now seemed to feel that they had been guilty of deserting their dead comrades—-that though these were lying under the sod, they wore still, iv 'spirit, with those who wore, 'eft .to carry on the stern game of war; that their eyes, though asleep in death:' watched them; that, in fact, the 'dead heroes foiiiid in the living prosence their old-time comrades an actual companionship. . Others, again, frankly stated .that the abandonment; was a wise proceduie. One stalwart soldier from the West Coast, with his head bound up, put the position of the Anzacs in a phrase which should become historic—'

"We had only oux teeth in it, anyway." Another man, who has "cracked up," to use his own words, after being in the trenches from the flrst landing, when he heard the news excitedly called co his mate, lying in the next bunk —a brawny, smiling Maori—"What did .1 tell you?" and the Maori answered, still smiling, "You weie right. Jack." On the memorable advance on August 6, 7, and 8; when some of the New Zealanders pushed on to the top of Hill 071, and saw the Promised .Land lying beiK.-H. 4:}) ■their eyes—the Narrows, and Dardanelles, tin? Turkisll* ships sailing along-—and then looked back to Gaba Tepe beach and saw the boundary marking the Iwikiing of the Anaaes, they had it fully borne home to them, they ;;ay, that, of a truth, they had only "their teeth in it."

"A DANI/Y LITTLE HOME."

The roturncd men gave expression to the liveliest satisfactionwhen they were told that the abandonment had been carried out with only four men being wounded, and expressed wonderment as to how it had been done. Ono officer allowed himself to say—and then checked himself and . oniekly strode ay.ay—that he reckoner] that,three golden opportunities were lost of getting astride the peninsula. . At the landing on April 2. in the blu, ndva.net> on August 6.. 7.,. and 8. and again, a few days laten in. August, one would not think that, by any stretch of imagination, one could took on the. dug-outs on the hills :vt Anzae .as homes, and yet one soldier, discussing the abandonment, reigretfully remarked to a mate,, , "We Had a dandy little home there.'1 "Yes, «jim y we did," acquiesced-the mate. •:••:. THE TURKISH ATTACKS.

•'•■•A'soldier was asked if, when all was said and done, the Turks had" lost more men than the colonials in the vanoiis /mgngements, the U^ht of bactle gleamed in his eye. "I sliould ihink so.:' lie exclaimed emphatically. 'The Turks would come' on in a. kind 'of wave—-they were not keen on it, yon see, and sometimes we would let them come to within twenty yards before our rifles and machine-guns spoke and we could get -jap on the parapets and let them hnvo it. The Turkish charges were just dandy, I can tell you. In many cases you could sco by the wavering that the* Turks weie ■being driven on. They had their own machine guns i»ehind" them -to' 'encourage' them if they hesitated, and our. machine guns', to finish them off when they got handy. One. prisoner we iook had the calves of his legs badly pricked—a German officer's sword was responsible for this, lie informed us when we brought him in."