Trenching at Gallipoli: The personal narrative of a Newfoundlander with the ill-fated Dardanelles expedition — John Shaqi
Trenching at Gallipoli: The personal narrative of a Newfoundlander with the ill-fated Dardanelles expeditionGallishaw, John
History
Trenching at Gallipoli: The personal narrative of a Newfoundlander with the ill-fated Dardanelles expedition
Gallishaw, John
World War, 1914-1918 -- Campaigns -- Turkey -- Gallipoli Peninsula; World War, 1914-1918 -- Personal narratives, Canadian
In a short time we had all filed into the boats. There was no noise,
no excitement; just now and then a whispered command. I was in a tug
with about twenty others who formed the rear guard. The wind had
freshened considerably, and was now blowing so hard that our unwieldy
tug dared not risk a landing. We came in near enough to watch the
other boats. About twenty yards from shore they grounded. We could see
the boys jump over the side and wade ashore. Through the half darkness
we could barely distinguish them forming up on the beach. Soon they
were lost to sight.
During the Turkish summer, dawn comes early. We transhipped from our
tug to a lighter. When it grounded on the beach, day was just
breaking. Daylight disclosed a steeply sloping beach, scarred with
ravines. The place where we landed ran between sheer cliffs. A short
distance up the hill we could see our battalion digging themselves in.
To the left I could see the boats of another battalion. Even as I
watched, the enemy's artillery located them. It was the first shell I
had ever heard. It came over the hill close to me, screeching through
the air like an express train going over a bridge at night. Just over
the boat I was watching it exploded. A few of the soldiers slipped
quietly from their seats to the bottom of the boat. At first I did not
realize that anybody had been hit. There was no sign of anything
having happened out of the ordinary, no confusion. As soon as the boat
touched the beach, the wounded men were carried by their mates up the
hill to a temporary dressing station. The first shell was the
beginning of a bombardment. "Beachy Bill," a battery that we were to
become better acquainted with, was in excellent shape. Every few
minutes a shell burst close to us. Shrapnel bullets and fragments of
shell casing forced us to huddle under the baggage for protection. A
little to the left, some Australians were severely punished. Shell
after shell burst among them. A regiment of Sikh troops, mule drivers,
and transport men were caught half way up the beach. Above the din of
falling shrapnel and the shriek of flying shells rose the piercing
scream of wounded mules. The Newfoundlanders did not escape. That
morning "Beachy Bill's" gunners played no favorites. On all sides the
shrapnel came in a shower. Less often a cloud of thick black smoke,
and a hole twenty feet deep showed the landing place of a high
explosive shell. The most amazing thing was the coolness of the men.
The Newfoundlanders might have been practising trench digging in camp
in Scotland. When a man was hit, some one gave him first aid, directed
the stretcher bearers where to find him, and resumed digging.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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