Chapter V: Part 5

_Tuesday, June 29, 1915._ _Anzac._ We have advanced 1,000 yards down at Helles, but no details yet. Many men shot here yesterday by the Anafarta gun. I should think this gun had as good a tale of killed and wounded as any gun in the war. Every day it gets its twenty odd on the beach. The Australians attacked on the right yesterday. Fifty killed and wounded; they think the Turks suffered more heavily. I went with the General to the extreme left. Terrific heat. We came to a valley filled with thyme and lavender, which the Maoris are to inhabit. The men were bathing beyond Shrapnel Point. They say the Turks let them. I had two letters--one two months old, a curious one to receive here, from an Englishwoman, wife of the ex-Grand Vizier of Afghanistan. He was a progressive man, and is therefore in an Afghan prison. She wants work for her son. Wants him to be a saddler, a job a lot of men here would like. All my stuff looted coming from Egypt.

Men are practising bomb-throwing, all over the place. They are mostly half-naked, and darker than Red Indians. It’s a day of blessed peace, but there’s a lot of feeling about the Anafarta gun, and bathing is stopped on the beach till night.

_Wednesday, June 30, 1915._ _Anzac._ Last night I went down to the hospital and was inoculated for cholera by C., a witty man. A trench had been blown in, and men were lying groaning on the floor, most of them suffering from shell-shock, not wounds, but some of the wounds horrible.... I asked C. why the wounded were not sent to Cyprus instead of Mudros. He said: “Because it’s a splendid climate and there is heaps of water.” The chief doctor at Mudros is useless, the second ---- (With regard to the second doctor I regret that the diary is libellous.) Anyway, what is certain is that the condition of the sick and wounded is awful. This morning it’s very rough, and I can’t get out to Jack at the hospital ship, as prisoners are coming in....

_July 1, 1915._ _Anzac._ I examined the prisoners, amongst them a tall Armenian lawyer, who talked some English. I asked him how he had surrendered. He said: “I saw two gentlemen with their looking-glasses, and came over to them.” By this he meant two officers with periscopes. He said that the psychology of the Turks is a curious thing. They do not fear death, yet are not brave....

No water came in yesterday. The storm wrecked the barges and the beach is covered with lighters. We got brackish water from the hill. I could not get to Jack for work.

At lunch I heard there were wounded crying on Walker’s Ridge, and went up there with Zachariades. We found a first-rate Australian, Major Reynell. We went through the trenches, dripping with sweat; it was a boiling day, and my head reeled from inoculation. We had to crawl through a secret sap over a number of dead Turks, some of whom were in a ghastly condition, headless and covered with flies. Then out from the darkness into another sap, with a dead Turk to walk over. The Turkish trenches were 30 yards off, and the dead lay between the two lines.

When I called I was answered at once by a Turk. He said he could not move.... I gave him a drink, and Reynell and I carried him in, stumbling over the dead among whom he lay. I went back for my water-bottle, but the Turks began shooting as a warning, and I had to go back into the trench.

An awful time getting the Turk through the very narrow trench. I got one other, unwounded, shamming dead. We threw him a rope, and in he came.

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The taking of the second Turk was a curious episode that perhaps deserves a little more description than is given by the diary. The process of catching Turks fascinated the Australians, and amongst them an R.A.M.C. doctor who came round on that occasion. This officer prided himself upon neatness and a smart appearance, when the dust and heat of the Dardanelles had turned every one else into scallywags. After he had attended to the first wounded man, he pointed out the second Turk lying between our trenches and the Turks’ and only a few yards from either. “You go out again, sir,” said the Australians; “it’s as good as a show.” I, however, took another view. I called out to the Turk: “Do you want any water?” “By God,” he whispered back, “I do, but I am afraid of my people.” We then threw him a rope and pulled him in. He told us that the night before he had lost direction in the attack. Fire seemed to be coming every way, and it had seemed to him the best plan to fall and lie still amongst his dead comrades. The doctor gave him some water, with which he rinsed his mouth, and I left him under the charge of the R.A.M.C. doctor. This is what happened subsequently. They had to crawl back through the secret sap, from which the bodies of the dead Turks had by that time been removed and left at the entrance. The Turk was blindfolded, but he was able to see under the handkerchief, and when he saw his dead comrades, over whose bodies he had to step, he leapt to the conclusion that it was our habit to bring our prisoners to one place and there to kill them. He gave one panic-stricken yell; he threw his arms round the neck of the well-dressed officer; they fell and rolled upon the corpses together, the Turk in convulsions of fear clinging to the neck of the doctor, pressing his face to the faces of the dead till he was covered with blood and dust and the ghastly remains of death, while the soldiers stood round saying to the Turk: “Now, don’t you carry on so.”

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_Diary._ _Friday, July 2._ _Anzac._ This morning I had a magnificent bathe with General Birdwood. At night a great storm blew up. The lightning played in splendid glares over Imbros and Samothrace. The sea roared, the thunder crashed and rain spouted down. After a time that stopped and a cloud, black as ink, came down upon us like a pall.

Yesterday mourning met the two Whittalls going to Helles with General de Lotbiniere and his periscopes.

I went off to the _Sicilia_ to see Jack, and had a lot of trouble about a pass. I saw Jack. He said they had re-bound his leg on the beach, but that it had not been looked at for eighteen hours on the boat. It had swelled to double its size. Then a doctor came and said the bandage had been done too tight, and there was a chance of his losing his leg. I felt absolutely savage.... Saw General House,[16] V.C., on shore and got him to promise to do what he could. We had a bad time going home. We were slung off the ship in wooden cases. It was very rough indeed, and when the wooden case hit the flat barge it bounced like anything. Then we were towed out on this flat barge, open to the great waves and shrapnel, to a lighter, and left off Anzac for a couple of hours. The Turks sent a few shells, absent-mindedly. Finally, a trawler brought us off, very angry.

S. dined, a scholarly fanatic, interesting about the next war, which he thinks will be with Russia, in fifteen years. A lot of people going sick.

I saw Cox to-night, who said that this is the worst storm we have had. We have only one day’s water supply. We could have had as much as we had wanted, but many of the cans stored on the beach are useless, as they have had holes knocked in them by the shrapnel. We are not as abstemious as the Turks, who had been lying for so many hours under the sun, and shall suffer from thirst badly.

_Saturday, July 3, 1915._ _Anzac._ Macaulay has come as our artillery officer. I dined with him and H. Woods last night. Yesterday it rained. Jack’s boat has gone. We are being badly shelled here. I shall have to change my dugout, if this goes on. The guide Katzangaris has been hit in the mouth.

_Sunday, July 4._ Saw the Maoris, who had just landed. General Godley made them a first-class speech. They danced a very fine Haka with tremendous enthusiasm in his honour when he had finished. They liked digging their dugouts, and seemed to like it when they came to human remains.... More people going sick. Doctor F. told me that he and another doctor had asked to be allowed to help on board the hospital ships where they have more wounded than they can deal with, short-handed as they are, but have been refused permission by the R.A.M.C.

There has been a great explosion at Achi Baba. Macaulay saw a transport of ours sunk this afternoon.... G. L. came ashore with depressing accounts of Russia. He is probably going to come on this beach. Hope he does. Went off and bathed with Macaulay. Saw Colonel Bauchop, who promised me a present of some fresh drinking-water to-morrow.

_Monday, July 5, 1915._ _Kaba Tepé._ A breathless, panting morning, still and blue and fiery hot, with not a ripple on the sea. Colonel Bauchop, commanding the Otago Mounted Rifles, was shot in the shoulder last night. This morning we have had an exhibition of “frightfulness” in the shape of vast shells. They burst with a tremendous roar that echoes to the sky and across the sea for more than a minute. Their case or bullets fall over the sea in a great area. They started by striking the sea and raising great columns of water. Now they burst and fall on land and sea.

It has had the great result of getting rid of Mr. Lock, the Socialist Czech, from the doorway of my dugout. He was an undergraduate at ---- and afterwards a Labour candidate. Now he is Colonel P.’s cook.

The transport that Macaulay saw go down was French. Six lives lost. The explosion down south was a French ammunition store. This shelling makes one’s head ache.

_Tuesday, July 6th._ _Kaba Tepé._ Yesterday I went to Quinn’s Post with General Godley in the morning. There was a fair amount of shelling. They had just hit thirteen men in Courtney’s before we got there. We went into a mine that was being dug towards and under the Turkish trenches. At the end of the sap the Turks were only six to eight feet away. We could hear them picking. The time for blowing in had very nearly come. These underground people take it all as a matter of course. I should hate fighting on my stomach in a passage two feet high, yards under the ground. The Turks were throwing bombs from the trenches, and these hit the ground over us, three of them, making it shudder. Down below they talk in whispers. We went round the trenches. Saw none so fine as last time, when we came to the Millionaires’ Sap, so called because it was made by six Australians, each the son of a millionaire.

In the afternoon I tried to sleep, but there was too much shelling. Kyumjiyan was hit, and has gone; S. B. was grazed. It was 11.2 shells filled with all kinds of stuff. We answered with a monitor whose terrific percussions shook my dugout, bringing down dust and stones. A submarine appeared, and all the destroyers were after her. Then two aeroplanes started a fight as the sun set down towards Helles, appearing and vanishing behind crimson clouds. Captain Buck, the Maori doctor and M.P., dined with us, to wind up an exciting day.

This morning is like yesterday. No breath of air, but the day is more clear, and Samothrace and Imbros look very peaceful. Early again the shelling began. As I was shaving outside three shells hit the beach just in front. I wasn’t watching the third, but suddenly heard a great burst of laughter. At the first shell a bather had rushed back to his dugout; the shell had come and knocked it in on the top of him, and he was dug out, naked and black, but smiling and none the worse. “Another blasted sniper,” he said, which made the men laugh.

Active preparations are being made to fight the gas, as the Intelligence says it is going to be used. Am going out with the General at 9.30. Was sent to get Colonel Parker, but found him sick, and under pretty heavy fire, having a new dugout built. Came back and stood with the General, Thoms and others outside Headquarters. A shell burst just by us, bruised the General in the ribs, and filled his eyes with dirt. Went out with Colonel Anthill and Poles. Talked of arranging a truce to bury the Turkish dead on our parapet. They said that otherwise our men must get cholera; the heat and sand and flies and smell is awful. We met Colonel Bauchop with his arm in a sling, but the bullet out of his shoulder, and Colonel White with his head still bandaged. The Australians very cheerful.

_Wednesday, July 7, 1915._ _Kaba Tepé._ A fierce, expectant dawn. We shelled furiously at 4.30 a.m. Now absolute peace on a glassy sea. Last night Bentinck, Jack Anderson and I bathed. I was at the end of the pier; as I was beginning to dress a shell burst very close, the smoke and powder in my face. I fled half dressed; Colonel P. rose like Venus from the sea and followed with nothing. A calm marine gave me my cigarette-holder.

One of the prisoners reported that on the occasion of the armistice Turkish Staff officers had put on Red Crescent clothes in order to have a look at our trenches.... No news of Jack.

The Turks put up five crosses yesterday, all of which we shot down. I first thought it was probably Greeks or Armenians who wanted to show they were Christians, wishing to surrender, and telephoned to Courtney’s to see if I could get into touch with them, but now I think it’s probably Turks who were anxious to make us shoot at the sign of our own religion. In this they succeeded.

Colonel Johnson, Commanding the New Zealand Infantry Brigade, gone sick. I persuaded the mess to get inoculated for cholera. Last night I dined with Woods and Macaulay. They told Eastern stories, and we had a very contented time, drinking mavrodaphne and looking at the sea.

The Turks shelled a little after eight, in answer to our tiresome provocative monitor fire. This morning Tahu arrived from Egypt with letters. The Turks are bombing something cruel from Kaba Tepé.... It’s a beautiful sight--a sea like lapis-lazuli and a burning sun, with columns of water like geysers where the shells hit. A good many men hit here to-day.

_Saturday, July 10, 1915._ _Kaba Tepé._ I went with General Godley to the _Triad_, and dined with Admiral de Robeck. Took the General’s things to put them on board the picket-boat, but as I got there a shell struck her and knocked a hole in her. There was another one, and we sat and waited uncomfortably in this till he came.... Found Alec Ramsay on board. Slept in Commodore Roger Keyes’ cabin. Very comfortable. He was very kind. Went to G.H.Q. and had lunch with L. and Bob Graves.

_Sunday, July 11th._ Felt much better. Went ashore and saw Colonel Hawker and the Turkish prisoners.... Came back late at night, after some very jolly days. Best week-end I ever spent. The Turks have asked for another armistice in the south. This has been refused. If they attack, they will have to do it across their dead, piled high, and this is not good for morale.

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By this time the persecutions of the interpreters had greatly diminished. They were still badly treated by a man called Ot, but to a large extent they had won the respect of the troops by their behaviour. The chief interpreter was an old Greek of some sixty-two or sixty-three years, Mr. Kyriakidis, who was given a medal for conspicuous gallantry at the bombardment of Alexandria and had served with General Stuart’s unfortunate expedition. He was a gentleman, and one of the straightest men I have met. His simplicity, courtesy and unfailing courage had gained him many friends. He was also endowed with considerable humour.

A relation had sent me a gas mask, at that time a rarity at Anzac. I did not believe that I should need it, and made a present of it to the first man I met, who happened to be Mr. Kyriakidis. He went down and played poker with the other interpreters on the beach. He put on my respirator as a poker mask, with much swagger. This put the fear of death into the interpreters, who sent a deputation to G.H.Q. Intelligence, insisting that they should also be provided with masks.

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_Monday, July 12, 1915._ _Kaba Tepé._ By the way, an unhappy shadow was shot yesterday, an interpreter of whom we none of us knew anything, and who was on no list. Things are not very comfortable. The fire is increasingly heavy. All the air is full of thudding and broken echoes. No one minds anything much, but high explosive.... The hospitals are being moved. They had too many casualties where they were before.

_Tuesday, July 13th._ _Kaba Tepé._ Tremendous fire round Achi Baba yesterday. French advanced 150 and we 200 yards. Don’t know what the losses were. I went with Macaulay and Woods to No. 3 Post, to Bauchop’s Fountain. They can snipe there very close, and killed a man a couple of days ago, two yards off under the olives, and wounded his mate, who crawled back into the sandy way. On both sides there is tall wild lavender and what M. calls pig’s parsley.

We crawled down a sandy path to the sea, M. rather sick. Met the General going back, who told us not to bathe. In the evening Tahu got out his gramophone and we had some good songs when the shooting was not too much.

Ramadan began to-day. George Lloyd arrived this afternoon and said they wanted to send me to Tenedos for a special job.

Yesterday evening General Godley went to Courtney’s Post. As he got there the Turks shelled with heavy stuff, killing and wounding about twenty men. Reynell came to see me. I like him very much indeed.

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_Diary. Sunday, July 18, 1915. Kaba Tepé._ They are now shelling the pier, and killed a doctor, cutting off both his legs, and several other people, when I was bathing from the pier. Everybody is again going sick. The situation is changing. Every night we are landing guns. The moon is young now and growing. It seems, therefore, reasonable to expect that we cannot land forces of men that take time before the nights are moonless; that is, in about a month’s time the preparations ought to be ready.

A few days ago we had an attack on Achi Baba, won about 400 yards and lost about 5,000 men. Two battalions got out of touch and were lost for a considerable time. The “Imbros Journal,” “Dardanelles Driveller,” or whatever it’s called, said “their return was as surprising as that of Jonah from the belly of the whale.” Good, happy author!

A German Taube over us throwing bombs and also heavy stuff, but not much damage lately. George Lloyd[17] was here this afternoon, and while we talked a shell burst and hit four men.

_Monday, July 19, 1915._ _Kaba Tepé._ My dugout has now become a centre for Australian and New Zealand officers, all good fellows. I had it made small on purpose, so that no one would offer to share it with me, and that makes it less convenient for the crowd that now sit in it. Two old friends come when the day’s work is over, and grow sentimental by moonlight; both ill and, I am afraid, getting worse. All the talk is now about gassing. It is thought that they will do it to us here. As usual, new troops are reported to be coming against us.

_Tuesday, July 20, 1915._ _Kaba Tepé._ There is always something fresh here. Now a lot of sharks are supposed to have come in. During the last two days there has been absolute silence, no shelling at all, nothing but the sound of crickets and at night a singsong chorus as the men drag up the great tanks prepared for water. S. B. yesterday worked out a theory to prove that the Turks were to attack us last night. (1) No gunfire yesterday; the reason being they (the Turks) were moving troops. They didn’t want us to fire at their troops, therefore didn’t draw fire by shooting at us. (2) Ulemas have come down. There must be a special reason for this. (3) 10,000 coming up. Gas being prepared. All this means an attack on Anzac. To wipe us out would be a great feather in their cap. I am inclined to doubt another great attack.... Tempers all a bit ruffled. General Birdwood is sick. The heat is fierce and the stillness absolute. This afternoon I heard from Dedez, who asked me to go to Tenedos for a time....

_Wednesday, July 21, 1915._ _Kaba Tepé._ There is something uncanny about this calm. No shots at all. News that the Italian Ambassador at Constantinople has gone nap. We have had very little news of Italy.... I wonder if the Turks are likely to attack on the eve of Constitution Day.

_Saturday, July 24, 1915._ _Imbros._ On Wednesday I went over to G.H.Q. and met old friends among the war correspondents. Met some of the New Zealanders who had come over for a rest, but were coming back for the expected attack. Meanwhile, they had been kept on fatigue most of the time, and were unutterably weary. At Imbros I was ordered to go to Tenedos and Mytilene.

_Thursday, July 22nd._ Came back to Anzac in the same boat with Ashmead Bartlett and Nevinson,[18] and got leave to take them round in the afternoon.

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Later on, during one of the worst days of the Suvla fighting, I met my friend Nevinson picking his way amongst the wounded on their stretchers under fire. “After this,” he said, decisively, “I shall confine myself strictly to revolutions.”

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_Diary._ _July 23rd._ Started for Imbros and went in the _Bacchante_ pinnace, which was leaking badly from a shell hole. There were six of us on deck, and one man was hit when we were about a hundred yards out. We put back and left him on shore.

_Saturday, July 24th._ _Imbros._ Went for a ride on a mule, and had a bathe.

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At this point in the campaign, though the morale was excellent, depression began to grow. There was a great deal of sickness, from which practically no one escaped, though it was less virulent in its form than later in the summer. I had been ill for some time, and was very anxious to avoid being invalided to Egypt, and was grateful for the chance of going to the islands for a change of climate and light work, for the few days that were sufficient to give another lease of health.

The feeling that invades almost every side-show, sooner or later, that the home authorities cared nothing and knew nothing about the Dardanelles, was abroad. The policy and the strategy of the expedition were bitterly criticized. I remember a friend of mine saying to me: “All this expedition is like one of Walter Scott’s novels, upside down.” Walter Scott generally put his hero at the top of a winding stair, where he comfortably disposed, one by one, of a hundred of his enemies. “Now,” he said, “what we have done was, first of all to warn the Turks that we were going to attack by having a naval bombardment. That made them fortify the Dardanelles, but still they were not completely ready. We then send a small force to attack, to tell them that we really are in earnest, and to ask them if they are quite ready. In fact, we have put the man who ought to be, not the hero, but the villain of the piece, at the top of the corkscrew stair, and we have given him so much notice that when the hero attacks the villain has more men at the top of the circular stair than the hero has at the bottom. It’s like throwing pebbles at a stone wall,” he said, mixing his metaphors.

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_Diary._ _Sunday, July 25, 1915._ _On the Sea._ I left for Tenedos; a most beautiful day. We have just been to Anzac, very burnt and wounded amongst the surrounding greenery. Pretty peaceful there, only a few bullets coming over.

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Perhaps the record of a sojourn in the Greek Islands on what was really sick-leave, as the work was of the lightest, should not be included in a war diary, but the writer looks back with amusement and pleasure to days that were not uneventful. They were passed with friends who were playing a difficult and most arduous part, and whose services, in many cases, have not received the recognition that was their due.

It was pleasant once again to be lord of the horizon, to have space through which to roam, and lovely hills and valleys to ride across in the careless, scented air of the Mediterranean summer, with the sea shining a peacock-blue through the pines. It is this space and liberty that men cramped in a siege desire, more than the freedom from the shelling of the enemy’s guns. There was much, too, that was _opéra bouffe_ in the Islands, that made a not unpleasant contrast to the general life at Anzac.

If there was spy mania on the Peninsula, it was multiplied tenfold, and quite reasonably, on the Islands, where part of the population were strongly pro-Ally, another part pro-German, while others were anti-British by an accidental kind of ricochet. These were the royalist followers of King Constantine, who hated Venizelos, and consequently the friends of Venizelos, Great Britain and France.

The situation on the Islands was one with which it was extremely hard to cope. We were very anxious to safeguard the lives of our men, and to prevent information going to the enemy, and, at the same time, not to pursue German methods. It was unceasing work, with a great strain of responsibility. There was an inevitable _va et vient_ between the Peninsula and Imbros. From Imbros boats could slip across to Tenedos, Mytilene or the mainland. The native caïques would drop in at evening, report, be ordered to stay till further notice, and would drift away like ghosts in the night. Men, and women, performed remarkable feats, in appearing and disappearing. They were like pictures on a film in their coming and their going. Watchers and watched, they thrust and parried, discovered and concealed, glowed on the picture and darkened.

Anatasio, a Serbian by birth, was one of our workers, conspicuous for his quickness and intelligence. At the outbreak of the war he had already been five months in an Austrian prison at Cattaro, but the prospect of battle stimulated his faculties, and he escaped. One day at luncheon I asked him where it was that he had learned Italian, which he did not talk very well. “While I was in prison at Smyrna,” said he. “What for?” said I. “For stabbing a Cretan,” said he, and added that he would rather be five years in prison in Turkey than one in Austria. Then there was Avani, one of the most vivid personalities that I have ever met. He was a poet and a clairvoyant, a mesmerist and a masseur, a specialist in rheumatism and the science of detection, once a member of General Chermside’s gendarmerie in Crete, and ex-chief of the Smyrna fire brigade. The stories of him are too many, and too flamboyant, to tell.

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_Diary._ Avani mesmerized the wife of the Armenian dragoman. Unfortunately it went wrong. Her obedience to his volition was delayed and she only obeyed his commands in the wrong company some hours after.

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He had given proof of rare courage, and also considerable indiscretion. On one occasion, armed to the teeth, he burst into a perfectly innocent house at night, and, revolver in hand, hunted a terrified inhabitant. His only evidence against this man was, that when he had been caught and hurled to the ground and sat upon, his heart had beaten very fast, which would not happen, insisted Avani, if he had not been guilty of some crime.

Amongst our opponents were the romantic but sinister Vassilaki family, two brothers and three lovely sisters. Talk about them in the Islands was almost as incessant as was talk about shelling on the Peninsula.

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_Diary._ _Monday, July 26, 1915._ _Tenedos._ Yesterday I was very ill, and again to-day, but was injected with something or other and feel better, but weak. Tried to sleep yesterday, but one of our monitors at Rabbit Island bombarded hugely, shaking the bugs down on me. This place is clean, but there are bugs and some lice. Last night I dined with the Governor, Colonel Mullins, and a jolly French doctor, and Thompson, who has fallen ill. Am carrying on for him at the moment.

_Tuesday, July 27, 1915._ _Tenedos._ Went to the trenches at Tenedos. They face the enemy. That is the most military thing about them. Thompson went out to see the inhabitants. I was going with him, but felt worse and went to rest. The Turks here are in a very bad way. We do not allow them to work. It’s inevitable. They mayn’t fish or work at the aerodrome.

_Wednesday, July 28, 1915._ _Tenedos._ Interpreted for the Governor of Tenedos, who, like Jupiter, rules with might, in the afternoon. In the evening I saw the Mufti, who had a list of starving, widows and indigent.... Last night the Cretan soldiers started ragging the Turks and singing, till I stopped them. They were quite good.

Still ill, but better. Had a beautiful walk in the evening, and a long talk with the Greek refugees working in the vines by the edge of the sea. The old patriarch addressed me all the time as “chorbaji”--that is, Possessor of the Soup, the Headman of the village.

_Thursday, July 29, 1915._ _Tenedos._ Yesterday I rode over to the French aerodrome, coming late for luncheon, but had coffee with about twenty French officers, all very jolly. Promised to let me fly over the Dardanelles. I went on to the Cretans in a pinewood. Their officer, a Frenchman, very keen on a show in Asia Minor.... The elder Vassilaki has been arrested. His brother saw him go by in a trawler. Am going to Mytilene, then return after three days, and leave here on Tuesday for Anzac. No news of anything happening. Tenedos is a beautiful town in its way, surrounded by windmills, with Mount Elias in the background. Its streets are narrow, picturesque and hung with vines that make them cool and shady. At the end of the town there is a very fine old Venetian fortress, but its magnificence is outside; inside it is furnished with round stone cannon-balls, ammunition for catapults. In the last war the Greeks took the island, but one day a Turkish destroyer popped her nose in. All the Greeks fled, and the Mufti and the Moslems went and pulled the Greek flag down. Then in came a Greek destroyer, and the Turkish one departed. The Mufti and the Turks were taken off to Mudros, where he and they were beaten. He narrowly missed being killed....

_Friday, July 30, 1915._ _Tenedos._ Slept very badly again. Had a letter from the O.C. Poor Onslow killed, lying on his bed by his dugout. A good fellow and a fine soldier. Aden nearly captured. I prophesied its capture in Egypt. I shall be recalled before anything happens.

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The radiant air of Tenedos gave health as it did in Homeric times, and I left with the desire that others should have the same chance as myself of using that beautiful island as a hospital; but all the pictures there were not bright. Under the windmills above the shining sea there were the motionless, dark-clad, desolate Moslem women, sitting without food or shelter. Their case, it is true, was no harder than that of the thousands of Greek refugees who had been driven from their homes, but these at any rate were living amongst kindred, while the unfortunate Moslems were without help or sympathy, except that which came from their enemies, the British.

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_Diary._ _Friday, July 30, 1915._ _Mytilene._ I left by the Greek boat yesterday. On the boat I met a man who might be useful as an interpreter, Anibal Miscu, Entrepreneur de Travaux Publiques, black as my hat, but talks English, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Turkish, Greek, Arabic, Bulgar, Russian and something else. The boat was stopped by our trawler, No. ----, and searched for contraband of war. The Greeks were furious. I landed at Mytilene, not having slept much and feeling bad. Avani said they had tried to bribe him to allow some raisins through, and kicked up the devil of a row. He seemed to think that the raisins were dynamite. He was left guarding the raisins, all night, I believe, with his revolver.

I was given a warm welcome by Compton Mackenzie in Mytilene. He, fortunately for me, had been sent there by G.H.Q. I found several old friends--Heathcote-Smith, the Consul, whose work it would be impertinent for me to praise, and Hadkinson, whom I had last seen at my own house in England, where he was staying with me when the Archduke Franz Ferdinand had been murdered. Hadkinson had passed most of his life on his property in Macedonia. Of the Eastern and Southern languages he talked Greek, Italian, Turkish, Bulgarian, Serbian and Albanian. His voice was as delightful as his knowledge of Balkan ballads was wide, and his friends made him sing the endless songs of the mountaineers. His personality had carried him through experiences that would have been disastrous to most men; battles decisive in European history had raged in front of his doors, while his house had remained untouched; brigands of most of the Balkan races had crossed his farm, rarely driving off his stock, and most of the local peasantry in their misfortunes had come to him for help, for advice, doctoring or intercession. Until the European war had crashed upon the world, Hadkinson had been a good example of the fact that minorities, even when they are a minority of one, do not always suffer.

The people of Mytilene, at that time, were very pro-English, though the officials were of the faction of King Constantine. The desire I frequently heard expressed was that Great Britain should take over Mytilene, as she did the Ionian Islands, and that when Mytilene had been put in order it should be restored to Greece.

_Diary._ _Friday, July 30, 1915._ _Mytilene._ ---- and Hadkinson have gone out with a motor-boat and a machine-gun. The Vassilakis, or some of them, have been deported, Vassilaki to Imbros and the beautiful sisters to Mudros.... It’s a blazing, burning day.

_Saturday, July 31, 1915._ _Mytilene._ A gaming-house. Moved from my first hotel to a larger and more disreputable one. Lunched with Hadkinson and Compton Mackenzie[19].... At Thasos the Greeks have arrested our agents under the orders of Gunaris. Have worked, and am feeling better.

_Later._ The three Miss Vassilakis have not gone to Mudros. They turned up this morning, and I was left to deal with them. Not as beautiful, except one, as I had been led to believe. They got Avani out of the room and wept and wept. I told them their brother would be all right.... They wanted to know who prevented them leaving. I said it was the Admiral. That good man is far away.

_Sunday, August 1, 1915._ _Mytilene._ Avani went off with the three Miss Vassilakis, in hysterics, last night. They were very angry with us. It seems probable that we shall have a landing on the mainland here to divert attention from the Peninsula. Sir Ian Hamilton is coming down to have a look. A good deal of friction over the blockade. The present system causes much inconvenience to all concerned.

* * * * *

They were enchanting days of golden light or starlit darkness, while one drank health almost in the concrete from the hot pine-scented air and the famous wine of Mytilene. The conditions of others was unfortunately less happy. There were some 80,000 Greek refugees from the mainland, for whom the Greek Government had done practically nothing, while the patriotic Greek communities of England and America had not had the opportunity of relieving their necessities. We all did what we could to help these people.

There was another question allied to this to be considered: whether a Greek Expeditionary Force, largely composed of these refugees, should be sent into Asia Minor. The danger of such a campaign to the native Greeks was obvious; mainly for this reason it was not undertaken. But while no expedition occurred, there was much talk about one. The fact that Sir Ian Hamilton had come was widely known. It was said that great preparations were being made, and these rumours probably troubled the Turks and kept troops of theirs in a non-combatant area.

* * * * *

_Diary._ _Sunday, August 1, 1915._ _Mytilene._ Lunched with Mavromati Bey. He was very heroic, saying he preferred to die rather than to live under the German yoke, but there were no signs of a funeral at luncheon, which was delicious.

Dined with Hadkinson, and was taken ill, but got all right and went off with him on the motor-boat _Omala_ after dinner. H. said that for a long time he had felt that I was coming, and had ordered a lamb for me to be executed the following day; told the cook, too, to get some special herbs.

The object of our journey was to find a wonderful woman, lithe as a leopard and strong as a horse, and put her somewhere near Aivali to gain information.

_Monday, August 2, 1915._ “_Omala._” _Off Moskonisi._ At dawn this morning we came to Moskonisi, luminous in the sea. A decrepit shepherd led a flock of sheep along the beach. His name is Panayotis and he has a Homeric past; he killed two Turkish guards who courted a beautiful sister-in-law before marriage. Then he killed two others for a pusillanimous brother-in-law after marriage, and he has also sent two other Turks to their rest, though H. does not know the reason for their death.

Hadkinson had collected a large band of Palikaris, but the motor-boat only held a few, the cream of them. He had English names for most of them--Little John, Robin Hood, etc. They were tall men, with very quick, clever eyes and lithe movements, picturesquely dressed. One of them had a cross glittering in his kalpak, and A. M. (for Asia Minor) on both sides of the cross. He said to me, pointing to Aivali: “There is my country; we are an orphan people. For 150 years we have shed our blood and given our best to Greece. Now in her hour of triumph and in our day of wretchedness she denies us help. May she ever be less!” Another Greek had been to Mecca as a soldier and stayed there and in the Yemen for some years. The Captain was a quiet man, but apparently very excitable. They were delighted with their army rifles. The woman, Angeliko Andriotis, did not turn up at Gymno, so we went on to Moskonisi, the men often playing on a plaintive flute, and sometimes singing low together. At breakfast, soon after dawn, we had a sort of orchestra.

We arrived opposite to Aivali. The Turks have sunk three mauna.... Hadkinson saw one of their submarines.

The situation at Aivali is curious. It lies at the head of a bay. Above it there are hills, not high hills, but high enough, the men said who were with us, to prevent its being bombarded by the Turks. They looked at it with longing eyes. Their families were there. They kept on cursing the “black dogs” and saying they would eat them. There were 35,000 people in Aivali, now only 25,000; 10,000 have left lately. The sword of Damocles hangs over the rest of them, for they might be sent off into the interior at any moment. We went on to the channel between Moskonisi and Pyrgos. There we found the child of the woman, who was sent with a note to her. Men were moving in the olives and the scrub some distance off, whom the Greeks said were their own compatriots.

The boy, who was thirteen, took the letter and put it under his saddle. He went off calmly to get past the Turks, without any air of adventure about him. The others realized the stage on which they were acting, and swaggered finely. I got off on Pyrgos with Hadkinson, and went to a small, rough chapel, where they were bringing the eikons back in triumph.

The beauty of it all was beyond words. I bathed on a silver sand in transparent water between the two islands. Moskonisi, by the way, doesn’t mean the Island of Perfume, but takes its name from a great brigand who practically held the island against the Turks about thirty years ago.

After a time the boy returned with a letter from his mother, and a peasant with binoculars. He and the peasant both said that they had seen a great oil-pool in Aivali Bay. We thought that this must be from a submarine, and dashed round there at full speed, but found nothing. Then we decided to come home. We picked up some of the men we had dropped en route; and they brought us presents of gran Turco, basilica and sweet-scented pinks. Then they played their flutes as the sun set, and Hadkinson sang Greek, Bulgarian and Turkish songs, singing the “Imam’s Call” beautifully and, to the horror of his Greek followers, reverently.

We might have bagged the twenty-five Turks, or whatever number there were, quite easily, but H. thought this would have produced reprisals. He was probably right.

_Tuesday, August 3, 1915._ _Mytilene._ We got back last night after dinner and heard that Sir Ian Hamilton, George Lloyd and George Brodrick had been here.... One of the poor Whittall boys very badly wounded. They were a fine pair.

_August 4, 1915._ _Mytilene._ Yesterday we heard that the Turks had sent the town-crier to the equivalent of the capital of Moskonisi to say that any Greek going beyond a certain line would be put to death. Miss Vassilaki turned up, and said that she and her sister would come with me to Tenedos. I said they couldn’t.

We dined with General Hill and his Staff and slept on the _Canopus_.... Mackenzie no better.... A good deal of friction in Tenedos. Athanasius Vassilaki has escaped, and every one is annoyed. Some men have been arrested for signalling.

_Thursday, August 5, 1915._ _Tenedos._ Most of the officers sick. I was asked to stay on at Tenedos, but felt I must get back at once. Christo says that it’s dull here, and Kaba Tepé is better than this house. Turkish guns have been firing at our trawlers. A couple of men wounded. Examined a man just escaped from Constantinople. Constantinople is quite cheery: theatres, carriages, boats, etc. The Germans say we can’t hold out on the Peninsula when the bad weather comes.

Then I examined a Lebanon French soldier who had arrested a child and an old man for signalling....

* * * * *

Here there are some pages of my diary missing, but the events that occurred are still vividly in my mind.

In company with other officers I went first to Imbros, hearing the thunder of the guns from Helles. In passionate haste we tried every means to get on to the Peninsula for the great battle. I left Christo to follow with my kit, if he could, with the future doubtful before him, and no certainty, except that of being arrested many times.

In the harbour at Imbros on that night there was a heavy sea, and in a small, dancing boat we quested through the darkness for any ship sailing to Anzac. One was found at last that was on the point of sailing, and off we went.

The instructions of my friend Ian Smith were to get to Suvla, and luck favoured him, for at dawn we lay off Suvla, and a trawler took him ashore.

Along the heights and down to the sea-shore the battle growled and raged, and it was difficult to know what was the mist of the morning or battle smoke. I got off at Anzac, which was calm, realizing that I had missed the first attack.

_Diary._ _Saturday, August 7, 1915._ _Kaba Tebé._ I went out to Headquarters, which are now beyond Colonel Bauchop’s old Headquarters. He, poor fellow, had just been hit and was said to be dying. Dix[20] again wounded in the leg and Cator killed when he had just been promoted. I saw the General; on the way out I met 300 Turkish prisoners and was ordered to return and embark them. We came to the pier on the beach, then three shells fell on and beside it; both S. B. and I thought we were going to have a very bad time, packed like sardines, with panicky prisoners. Embarking them took time; we were all very snappy, but we got them off. I was glad to find S. B. and Woods. All the dugouts here are desolate. I saw General Birdwood, who was very sad about Onslow.[21] He talked of the water difficulties. He was cheerful, as usual, and said he thought we should know which way things were going by 5 o’clock. S. was less cheerful.

I went back to Headquarters, a weary trudge of two hot, steaming miles, past masses of wounded. The saps were constantly blocked. Then back to Anzac for a few hours’ sleep, till I can get my kit.

_Sunday, August 8, 1915._ _Near Anafarta._ Slept badly last night at Anzac. The place was very desolate with every one away. I got up before a clear dawn and went out to the observation post, where I found General Godley and General Shaw. Our assault began. We saw our men in the growing light attack the Turks. It was a cruel and beautiful sight, for it was like a fight in fairyland; they went forward in parties through the beautiful light, with the clouds crimsoning over them. Sometimes a tiny, gallant figure would be in front, then a puff would come and they would be lying still. We got to within about forty yards of the Turks; later we lost ground. Meanwhile, men were streaming up, through awful heat. There were Irish troops cursing the Kaiser. At the observation post we were being badly shelled. The beauty of the place was extraordinary, and made it better than the baldness of Anzac, but we were on an unpropitious hillside, and beyond there were mules and men, clustered thickly.

Then I was sent back to Kaba Tepé, where I found a lot of wounded prisoners, who had not been attended to. I woke a doctor who had not slept for ages. He talked almost deliriously, but came along and worked like a real good man. I saw General House, V.C., and suggested attaching one doctor to the prisoners, so that we should not get contagious diseases.

Returned to Bauchop’s Post and examined a couple of Germans from the _Goeben_. Got a good deal of information. Then I was telephoned for to interrogate a wounded Greek, who had, however, got lost. I went back outside the hospital, where there were many wounded lying. I stumbled upon poor A. C. (a schoolfellow), who had been wounded about 3 a.m. the day before, and had lain in the sun on the sand all the previous day. He recognized me, and asked me to help him, but was light-headed. There were fifty-six others with him; M. and I counted. It was awful having to pass them. A lot of the men called out: “We are being murdered.” The smells were fearful.... I went down a sap to the north to find the Greek. Fierce shelling began. The sap was knocked down in front and behind.

I came to a field hospital, situated where the troops were going through. There no one knew where Taylor’s Hollow, the place where the Greek was supposed to be, was. While I was there shelling was bad. Several of the wounded hit again. One man was knocked in on the top of me, bleeding all over. I returned to meet Thoms, who said he knew the way. We ran the gauntlet....

I had a curious, beautiful walk, looking for the wounded Greek, going to nineteen hospitals. Many wounded everywhere. First I saw one of our fellows who had met ten Turks and had ten bayonet wounds. He was extremely cheerful. Then a couple of Turks in the shadow of some pines, one dying and groaning, really unconscious. I offered the other water from my bottle, but he refused because of his companion, using Philip Sidney’s words in Turkish.

Men were being hit everywhere. After going by fields and groves and lanes I came back to where the wounded were lying in hundreds, in the sap going to the sea, near Bauchop’s Fountain. There a man called to me in French. He was the Greek I was looking for, badly wounded. He talked a great deal. Said 200,000 reinforcements were expected from Gallipoli. No gas would be used here....

_Monday, August 9, 1915._ _No. 3 Outpost._ Slept uncomfortably on the ground. Went before the dawn to observation post; returned to examine prisoners. Had an unsuccessful expedition with Hastings to find some guns which he said had been lost between the lines.

Bullets came streaming down our valley, and we put up a small wall, of sacks, 3 feet high, behind which we slept. I was sitting at breakfast this morning listening to Colonel Manders[22] talking, when suddenly I saw Charlie B. put his hand to his own head and say: “By G----, he’s killed!” Manders fell back dead, with a bullet through his temple. He was a very good fellow.

Sir Ian Hamilton came ashore. I saw him for a moment. Then to Kaba Tepé; going and coming one passes a line of bodies, some dreadful, being carried for burial. Many still lying out. The last wounded have been more pitiful than anything I have seen. Cazalet is badly wounded; I hope he will recover; he is a good boy. Colonel Malone was killed last night and Jacky Hughes wounded. Lots of shelling.

Coming back I had to go outside the crowded sap, and got sniped. Thoms and I had a very lively time of it.

Came back for Manders’ funeral. I was very fond of him. General Godley read a few sentences with the help of my electric torch, which failed. Four others were buried with him. Later I saw a great shell strike the grave. A cemetery, or rather lots, growing up round us. There are dead buried or half buried in every gully.