Jonathan King - Gallipoli Diaries: the Anzacs own story, day by day

Scribe Publications
GALLIPOLI DIARIES Award-winning historian Dr Jonathan King has been producing books and films about World War I since 1994. He leads battlefield tours to Gallipoli and the Western Front, and is a regular television and radio commentator, as well as a writer for newspapers. After lecturing at the University of Melbourne for many years, he has written more than 30 books and produced 20 documentaries. He is based in Sydney with his fellow adventurer and wife, Jane. They have four daughters and seven grandchildren. Scribe Publications
1820 Edward St, Brunswick, Victoria 3056, Australia
2 John St, Clerkenwell, London, WC1N 2ES, United Kingdom First published by Kangaroo Press, an imprint of Simon & Schuster (Australia), 2003
This revised edition published by Scribe 2014 Copyright Jonathan King 2003, 2014 All rights reserved.

Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publishers of this book. National Library of Australia
Cataloguing-in-Publication data King, Jonathan, 1942- author. Gallipoli Diaries: the Anzacs own story day by day / Jonathan King. New and updated edition. 9781922070913 (Australian edition)
9781922247896 (UK edition)
9781925113150 (e-book) 1. Army. Army.

Australian and New Zealand Army Corps. 2. SoldiersAustraliaDiaries. 3. SoldiersNew ZealandDiaries. 4.

World War, 1914-1918CampaignsTurkeyGallipoli PeninsulaPersonal narratives, Australian. 5. Gallipoli Peninsula (Turkey)History. 940.426 scribepublications.com.au
scribepublications.co.uk Contents Preface: Introduction: Prologue: Anzac Eve CHAPTER 1: 25 April CHAPTER 2: 2630 April CHAPTER 3: May CHAPTER 4: June CHAPTER 5: July CHAPTER 6: August CHAPTER 7: September CHAPTER 8: October CHAPTER 9: November CHAPTER 10: December Appendix 1: Appendix 2: Appendix 3: Appendix 4: if there is really military necessity for this awful ordeal, then I am sure the Australian troops will face it. Indeed, anxious though they are to leave the dreary and sombre scene of their wreckage, the Australian divisions would strongly resent the confession of failure that a withdrawal would entail. They are dispirited, they have been through such warfare as no army has seen in any part of the world, but they are game to the end.

KEITH MURDOCH, JOURNALIST, LETTER TO AUSTRALIAN PRIME MINISTER ANDREW FISHER, 23 SEPTEMBER 1915 At the landing, and here ever since. After eight months on the beach some of the Diggers had become real characters, with the most celebrated being those who had been there from day one. (Initially drawn at Gallipoli for the Anzac Book , 1916.) To the Anzacs: Those 8,709 brave Australian diggers who died fighting at Gallipoli and their 2,701 Kiwi cobbers, not to mention the Brits and their Allies who were killed in that bold but hopeless campaign. And not to forget the poor old Turks who lost more than anybody else an estimated 86,692 defending their homeland. The Anzac area, showing the main territory occupied by Anzac forces by December 1915, following their landing at Anzac Cove. The Gallipoli peninsula, 1915, showing the three main landing locations.

PREFACE The Eyewitnesses Reinstate Truth That First Casualty of War Nothing can alter what happened now. Anzac stood and still stands for reckless valour in a good cause, for enterprise, resourcefulness, fidelity, comradeship and endurance that will never admit defeat. CHARLES BEAN, COMMONWEALTH WAR CORRESPONDENT, WORLD WAR I G allipoli, for the average Australian, is the most famous battle our soldiers ever fought. From the start of the 100th anniversary commemorations, its legendary status grew larger than ever, dwarfing any other battles fought by Australians over that century, no matter how decisive they were. The national effort and expense put into the popular 2015 centennial program at Gallipoli only confirmed its overwhelming popularity in the publics eye. Right: As head of the British Admiralty, Winston Churchill (right) exerted a lot of influence in the 1915 decision to land British and Allied troops at Gallipoli. Right: As head of the British Admiralty, Winston Churchill (right) exerted a lot of influence in the 1915 decision to land British and Allied troops at Gallipoli.

AWM H 12243 It may have only lasted eight months after the 25 April 1915 landing, and it was only Australias opening campaign of World War I, yet Gallipoli has lodged in the nations psyche like no other battle. This is despite the fact that Australians not only lost that battle, but also the lives of 8,709 young men who were killed for no territorial gain. In fact, they were so badly knocked around by Turkish defenders that they were forced to retreat from the unscaleable cliffs in December 1915, with their tails between their legs. It was an ignominious withdrawal, but they had no alternative. Had they stayed, they may have been decimated by the increasingly determined Turks, who were defending their homeland with heavier artillery and ever more effective reinforcements. The winter rain and storms hitting the windswept beach would also have washed away many of their shelters, dugouts, and foxholes.

Even worse, the running waters would have increased the spreading of germs from the remains of thousands of unburied soldiers, and the open-pit toilets, which was already claiming hundreds of lives. In short, the whole affair was a shocking indictment of the incompetent British war cabinet and its Australian equivalent, both blindly following imperial orders into a battle that cost nearly 50,000 Allied lives, all for nothing. Australia lost at least 8,709 lives; New Zealand, 2,701; Britain, 21,255; France, 12,000; India, 1,558; and Canada (from the province of Newfoundland), 49. Meanwhile, the Turks lost 86,692 lives defending their homeland. A censored letter from Galipolie (sic) to his mother, the author was 16yearold Alec Campbell, who became the worlds last surviving Gallipoli veteran. Why then do we revere Gallipoli as if it was one of the defining moments in Australian history? The answer lies in the way this dreadful disaster was and is sold to the Australian people as a glorious achievement for the Empire.

Just as the failed Charge of the Light Horse Brigade in the 185356 Crimean War had, despite its high death toll, been sold to the British public as a heroic achievement, the landing at Gallipoli was sold as a heroic achievement despite also failing to achieve its objectives. Army officers ordered the official Commonwealth war correspondent, Charles Bean, to paint a rosy picture, and censored his stories. So he exaggerated the brave exploits, played down casualties, and hid defeats in battle, thereby boosting the morale of readers back home, inspiring more young men to enlist, and creating the Anzac legend. British poet John Masefield helped set the scene: They were the finest body of young men ever brought together in modern times. For physical beauty and nobility of bearing they surpassed any men I have ever seen; they walked and looked like the kings in old poems, and reminded me of the line in Shakespeare, Baited like eagles having lately bathed. But the first and most influential report actually came from British journalist Ellis Ashmead-Bartlett.