Major Fred Waite - THE NEW ZEALANDERS AT GALLIPOLI--An Account of the New Zealand Forces during the Gallipoli Campaign

The New Zealanders
at Gallipoli

BY

MAJOR FRED WAITE, D.S.O., N.Z.E.

Adjutant Divisional Engineers, N.Z. & A. Division, 1914-15

Chief Engineer Instructor, N.Z.E.F. Training Camps, 1916-18

Originally Printed and Published under the Authority of

the New Zealand Government

by
WHITCOMBE AND TOMBS LIMITED
AUCKLAND, CHRISTCHURCH, DUNEDIN AND WELLINGTON
[1921]

Resurrected by

ABELA PUBLISHING, LONDON

[2015]

Abela Publishing acknowledges the sacrifice of all those young men who bravely gave their lives on the beaches and in the trenches of Gallipoli.

We also acknowledge the mammoth work of compilation carried out by

Major Fred Waite, D.S.O., N.Z.E.

in a time well before electronic media

was available to assist in this Herculean task.

* * * * * * *

33% of the net profit from the sale of this book will be donated to

The New Zealand

Returned Servicemens Association

To the Memory of Our Glorious Dead.

They went with songs to the battle, they were young,
Straight of limb, true of eye, steady and aglow.
They were staunch to the end against odds uncounted,

They fell with their faces to the foe.

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old;
Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn,
At the going down of the sun and in the morning
We will remember them.

Laurence Binyon

Part of The New Zealand Popular History Series

The New Zealanders of Anzac

To My Old Comrades

The New Zealanders at Gallipoli

CHAPTER I. The Concentration of the Expeditionary Force

CHAPTER II. The Voyage to Egypt

CHAPTER III. Training in Egypt

CHAPTER IV. The Defence of the Suez Canal

CHAPTER V. The Rendezvous at Mudros

CHAPTER VI. The Anzac Landing

CHAPTER VII. The First Week

CHAPTER VIII. At the Head of Monash Gully

CHAPTER IX. The Battle of Krithia

CHAPTER X. The Arrival of the Mounteds.

CHAPTER XI. Supplying the Needs of the Army

CHAPTER XII. Midsummer at Anzac

CHAPTER XIII. The Preparations in July

CHAPTER XIV. The Battle of Sari Bair.

CHAPTER XV. The Battle of Kaiajik Aghala

CHAPTER XVI. Preparing for the End

CHAPTER XVII. The Evacuation

CHAPTER XVIII. The Return to Anzac

These popular histories of New Zealand's share in the Great War are designed to present to the people of New Zealand the inspiring record of the work of our sons and daughters overseas.

It was recognized that the Official History would necessitate considerable research, would take a long time to write, and then must be largely a study of strategy and tactics; but somethingthat would be concise and interesting, not expensive, and available at onceseemed desirable. It was decided to avoid the style of an Official History and select as writers soldiers who had themselves fought with the N.Z.E.F. through the several campaigns; soldiers recognized by their comrades as authorities on the campaigns with which they deal; soldiers who themselves have experienced the hopes and fears, the trials and the ultimate triumph of the men in the ranks.

The volumesof which this story of Anzac is the first publishedare four in number:

Vol. I. "The New Zealanders at Gallipoli," by Major Fred Waite, D.S.O., N.Z.E., who served with the Main Body and the N.Z. & A. Division as a Staff Officer of Engineers.

Vol. II. "The New Zealanders in France," by Colonel Hugh Stewart, C.M.G., D.S.O., M.C., who served through the campaigns in Gallipoli and France with the N.Z. Infantry.

Vol. III. "The New Zealanders in Palestine," by Lieut.-Colonel C. Guy Powles, C.M.G., D.S.O., who as a Staff Officer of the N.Z. Mounted Rifles served through the campaigns in Gallipoli and Palestine. The material for this volume was collected by Major A. Wilkie, W.M.R.

Vol. IV. "The War Effort of New Zealand," will deal with:

(a) The minor campaigns in which New Zealanders took part;

(b) Services which are not fully dealt with in the campaign volumes;

(c) The story of the work at the Basesthe efforts of our Women abroad and in New Zealand, our Hospitals, the raising and the training of the men.

Without rhetoric, without needless superlativesfor the stories do not need themthese volumes are placed before the people of New Zealand in the hope that a fuller realization of the difficulties encountered and eventually triumphed over will act as an inspiration to those of us who were not privileged to fight for the cause of Freedom on the battlefields of the World.

Minister of Defence.

Parliamentary Buildings,
Wellington,
1-12-19.

As I was on the point of starting to pay a long-promised visit to the Commander-in-Chief of our Army of the Rhine, a cabled message from the Government of New Zealand was put into my handsa message asking me to write a Preface to the Gallipoli volume of the History of New Zealand's Share in the Great War. This preface was to be written and posted to Wellington without loss of time, as the work had already gone to press.

When I set out for the Dardanelles on Friday, March 13, 1915, to command an unknown army against an unknown enemy, in an unknown country, that was an original undertaking. To write a preface to an unknown book being printed in another hemisphereto write it from memoryin the train and in a hurry, that also is an original undertaking, and it is necessary to begin by setting forth these facts in order that my many omissions and shortcomings may have a better chance of forgiveness.

Crossing the German frontier, with the edict of the New Zealand Government still in my pocket, I got out to stretch my legs at the first stop. The name of that railway station was Dren. Hardly had I alighted when my eyes fell upon the letters, "N.Z.M.R.," quite unmistakably affixed to the shoulder-strap of an officer also standing on that platform. Since the year 1915, this particular combination of capital letters has exercised upon me a certain fascinationI have to go right there. So I went, and asked the wearer of the shoulder-strap if he had been at the Dardanelles.

"I have, indeed," he said. "I am Lieut.-Colonel John Studholme. I served in the Dardanelles under you, and now I am the last New Zealander in Germany."

"You speak figuratively," said I. "You mean you are one of the last."

"Not so," he replied. "I am not one of the last; I am the last one."

Now here, thought I to myself, is a queer thing! I am told to write a preface to a history of an Army, and I meet the last item of that Army which did so much to win the Rhineland, in Rhineland; the last man of that superb band who were raised from a population of one million and lost fifteen thousand killed; whereas, to take other standards, the Belgians, justly famous as having fought so long and so valiantly for the freedom of Europe, lost thirteen thousand killed out of a population of seven millions. Once again, too, there came to me the thought of their losses at the Dardanelles: