You should have seen how they hugged and kissed each other for about
fifteen minutes. All this time the rest of the boys were trying to make
out the Arabs. They were visitors, looking at us with open mouths.
We had our drill on a desert and with a broiling sun on us all the
time. We left Alexandria the latter end of March, 1915, and arrived
at Lemnos, a Greek Island, later used as a hospital base. After we
left Lemnos in a convoy of about fifteen ships we arrived at our
destination, the Dardanelles. All that we could see in front of us was
a great big hill. Later we found out they called it Kemara Hill. The
spirit of everyone was good. We were issued 200 rounds of ammunition
and carried our packs on our backs. All that I could hear from the boys
was:
"We will take that hill by the morning."
Little did we know what was in store for us. Orders came to disembark,
so we all helped to lower the life boats, and climbed down the rope
ladders into them. I was all settled down with the rest of the boys to
make a clean landing without the Turks knowing. Up came a tug boat and
took about ten small boats in tow.
Just at that moment we were under fire. The big battleships opened up,
and it was some bombardment. The 15-inch guns on the _Queen Elizabeth_
let go with the rest. We were about twenty yards off the beach when,
before my eyes, I saw my comrades fall in the water, boats capsizing,
rifles in the air, and arms and legs flying around. On seeing this our
tug turned toward Cape Hellos, on the right of West Beach, and every
man made for the water. Some managed to get on land. You see, the
Turks, mastered by German officers, put barbed wire entanglements into
the water. They knew we could only land in small boats as the water was
not deep enough for a liner to get close. As the life boats turned,
they got tangled in the wire and overturned. Some of the boys tried to
grasp hold of the wire, but had to let go, as it cut their hands, and
of course they were drowned. We lost an awful number of men before the
real scrap began, and I will say it was some landing. I did not believe
I could come through this bit of a scrap. When I landed I looked to
see if I was all there. The Turks had trenches right up to the water's
edge, and, God bless those Australians, they drove the Turks out of the
first line and gave us a chance to land. I asked a chap next to me what
he thought of it and how he liked it. Well, he gave me a look enough
to kill me, and said, "Well, the first five years is the worst. After
that I suppose we will get used to it."
I was five days on land when I began to feel the strain of not having
enough food or water. Water was scarce and my mouth was all blistered,
it was so hot. We were getting a little supply of water and biscuits
from the ships. They came in gasoline cans that had not been washed out
properly, but we were so thirsty that we did not bother about the taste.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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