couldn’t get a ship to take him from Lemnos to Mitylene, a distance of 70 miles, where the 31st Brigade (and half the 30th) was stationed, to convey those orders to Hill. Unable to communicate his instructions personally he attempted to do so by cypher telegram. His efforts failed. ‘When Hill arrived with 6,000 men under his command,’ wrote John Hargrave,
he not only had no idea what the operation was in which he and his troops were supposed to take part – he did not even know where he was! He could see, as we all could, a landing was in progress, but it might have been at Walvis Bay or Botany Bay for all the information he had been given. He had no map of Suvla, had never seen a map of Suvla, did not know where Suvla was, and had no instructions what to do now that he was there!25
A much quoted anecdote which illustrates the fog of ignorance among senior officers of even their destination, let alone what was expected of them when they arrived, involved Lt Col F.A. Greer, Commanding Officer of the 6th Royal Irish Fusiliers. On board the destroyer taking them to Gallipoli he was informed by the ship’s Commander that he was prohibited from giving the Colonel any information about his destination until midnight. ‘At twelve midnight’, according to Greer, ‘I went up again to the bridge and repeated my request. He said, “I have orders to put you ashore at Beach C.” I said, “Where on earth’s that?” “Suvla Bay”, he said. “Where on earth’s that?” I asked. He showed me a chart.’26
At 6.00 am on the morning of 7 August, Brigadier General Hill, commanding the 31st Division reported to Stopford on board the Jonquil. The original plan had been for the entire 10th Division to take the heights of the Kiretch Tepe Sirt. This would have meant landing on the most northerly of the beaches, within Suvla Bay itself, designated A Beach. But, according to John Hargrave ‘near panic’ overtook the naval transport authorities.
Having had enough of A Beach and finding themselves faced by the fearful hazards of landing troops there in broad daylight, they decided to put Hill’s 6,000 10th Division troops ashore at C Beach, below Nibrunesi Point – on the wrong side of the bay. This was fatal.27
Hargrave blames the Navy for not finding an alternative to A beach which was closer to Kiretch Tepe Sirt. They finally did so but only after sending one and a half brigades miles out of their way. They discovered a safer landing place, closer to Suvla Point and called it ‘A West’. It was on that beach that the last of the 10th’s battalions, the 5th Inniskillings, came ashore. Stopford’s instructions to Hill were that, as he was going to have to land near the troops of General Hammersley’s 11th Division, he might as well put his men under Hammersley’s command ‘until the arrival of his own divisional general’. Mahon had, in fact, already arived from Mudros but Stopford was not aware of this. When Mahon did announce his presence he was given three battalions to take Kiretch Tepe Sirt instead of an entire Division. He is reported to have ‘nearly resigned his command there and then’.28 By the end of the day his previously unified command had been scattered across three different battle zones.
Though abetted by the Navy in fouling up the actual landings the subsequent displays of incompetence by the Mediterranean military hierarchy was all its own work. Chronic delays and indecision followed the arrival of the troops. Much of the procrastination had its origins in the lassitude and ineffectual leadership of the Generals but some was undoubtedly due to the change in military culture brought about by almost a year of static trench warfare on the Western Front. Historian Martin Gilbert puts it thus:
The generals hesitated: surprised by such a swift advance. Their minds, fashioned by the warfare on the Western Front, were attuned to ‘victories’ of a hundred yards. A virtually unopposed advance of half a mile bewildered them. The hesitation was decisive and disastrous. The bulk of the force stayed close to the beach, where many men enjoyed an unexpected and relaxing swim. These aquatic pursuits could be seen from Anzac Cove. The tired and dirty Australian and New Zealand troops were not impressed.29
It was this dilly-dallying which, according to the German commander in Gallipoli, Liman van Sanders, proved crucial in the campaign that followed. Even juniors officers on the ground, like Lieutenant Noel Drury of the 6th Dublins could not understand the delay in moving inland.
There has been no fighting all day and the Turks haven’t fired a shot, and are probably rushing up reinforcements and digging new trenches. The men are all talking about the waste of valuable time. We have quite a lot of old soldiers who know a good deal about this sort of war and they are all grousing like blazes, saying we are throwing away any chance and will pay for it later.30
Drury’s assessment was unerringly accurate. The Turks were, indeed, rushing reinforcements to Suvla where, on the day of the landing the British had a numerical superiority of at least 10:1. British inertia began right at the top. Stopford, on the evidence available, was (understandably) delighted that most of his troops had got ashore without mishap. He doesn’t seem to have addressed himself sufficently energetically to what they should do once the beachhead had been established. As John Hargrave observed ‘forty-one hours after the landing the troops had not reached the hills – but they were ashore. The Corps commander himself had not ventured as far as that.’31
They were indeed ashore and doing what came naturally on the Western Front, digging in. Their commanding officers (at various levels) decided to strengthen positions which were under no obvious threat of attack from the retreating Turks. In the following days, when it was already too late, attacks would be pressed home but in clearly inadequate numbers by parched troops against reinforced defenses. During the course of that first day orders had been issued at the top of the hour, countermanded on the half hour and then reinstated at the top of the next hour to the confused and thirsty troops on the beaches. Finally a move was made against Chocolate Hill (though the aptly named Brigadier General Sitwell, of the 11th Division, declined to allow his troops to participate). The 7th Dublins, the 6th Inniskillings and the 5th Irish Fusiliers, were despatched to join the assault, with the 6th Dublins in reserve. However, their landing on C beach meant they were forced to undertake a ridiculous trek around the northern perimeter of the Salt Lake before they could get into position for the attack. They were instructed to ditch their heavy packs after a mile or so. ‘We never saw them again, and of all the possessions we had so anxiously packed in Basingstoke there now remained to us only what we had in our haversacks and pockets.’32 Most of the march was over exposed terrain where they were subjected to shelling. This was at its worst around the area known as ‘The Cut’ where the sea entered the lake itself.
Capt Paddy Tobin was a popular young officer with D Company of the 7th Dublin Fusiliers. In a letter to his father he described the experience of running hard through heavy sand before reaching
a little sheltered bank like the Alps at Dollymount, only not so high, where we rested. Here were collected great numbers of troops huddled together. Well across that neck of land I expected every minute to fall … Shrapnel and high explosives were bursting as frequently as the tick of a clock … I found myself under the bank in a paroxysm of fear, and chattering my prayers between my teeth.33
The CO of the 7th Dublins, Colonel Downing, led by example, frequently exposing himself to shell and shrapnel fire while ushering men across the ‘Cut’. The relative lack of Turkish artillery came to their aid. The Turks did not have enough guns to maintain a constant barrage on one particular spot for any length of time. The shelling settled into a predictable rhythm, a measurable interval elapsing between blasts. Taking advantage of this the men were sent scurrying across in the gap between shell bursts. Some of the Dublin troops, in blackly humourous vein, unofficially renamed the area. ‘Owing to the many casualties this spot was cheerfully dubbed “Dunphy’s Corner” after the place of that name in Dublin where the many funerals of old and young pass on their way to Glasnevin.’34
The bottleneck at ‘Dunphy’s Corner’ had caused a major delay in the movement of the three Irish battalions earmarked for the assault on Chocolate Hill. The hold-up did little to enchance the state of mind of tired, hungry, thirsty
