Charles E W Bean, Diaries, AWM38 3DRL 606/3/1 - March - April 1915 - Part 7

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sort & a torpedo boat. We followed round up
the harbour entrance - & there inside we saw
some warships, some other ships & a village. On
the hillside near the village were some tents.
A fine the harbour opened up, larger and larger, as
we went in.
I knew from the moment I saw her that
the biggest warship ahead of us was the Queen
Elizabeth. There were several others that looked like
Dreadnoughts - one found afterwards what they were -
but this ship with but there was no mistaking
the compact clean lines of this ship. One could see
her forward guns in two pairs, one above & behind the
other very much as the Rhode Island carried them
when the American Fleet visited Sydney in 1908.
One could not realise the size of those guns - they
might have been anything from  9 inch upwards; there
was nothing else to compare them to. Indeed they
struck one as short, compact, almost snubnosed
like a bulldog. What struck me so greatly about
the ship was her extreme neatness & absence of
top hamper. The Agamemnon which was near her
with her hunched up bundle of upperworks tied on to
her like a soldiers pack, with two queer little funnels
stuck on top, was the greatest contrast in the world.
The great ship flagship was half as large ^& fast again
to xx twice and more than twice as powerful but she
 

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looked as compact as a flat iron gunboat. This
afternoon after she I watched her come back from a short trip
to the Dardanelles. She was heading N.W when first
we saw her. Within half a minute she had swung round
& was heading in almost exactly the opposite
direction. She turned as quickly as a
North Shore Ferry boat.
We found about twenty transports inside,
and ten supply ships; as we were coming up three
small exax Trench steamers passed us swept past us sailing out
one after the other; going I suppose, to sweep for mines.
There were plenty of these small craft in harbour, navy
lighters & floats or barges. This is the second third big concourse of ships
at which we have been present - not at all unlike the first,
only there is the in Albany six months ago. There are several old friends
present - the Suffolk which couldn't hear wireless; (By the bye, I hear
the Southern is sold to the Dutch - I expect thy she is carrying on
trade now for the Germans); a P & O ship which looks remarkably like
the Pera. They have painted the names out of most of them
& painted their funnels black. And the warships cant
be a named unless you happen to know the build of them -
The Queen Elizabeth went of for a sort of short
joy ride with the officers staff of our 3^rd Brigade & Col.
Rosenthal (3^rd Art. Brigade) aboard. She steamed
out in the morning with the Agamemnon. A little
later xxx two elderly cruisers came in. These old
 

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ships are having a great time. They were on the scrap
heap years ago - but they have been are just the ships
for this job They have been resurrected by the Admiralty
& are having the time of their lives. One ancient
battleship - the xxxx ^Implacable (two of them appear to have lost
half a mast) was in harbour has been bombarding
the Turks from the entrance. In one of their official
communiques the Turks called her th mentioned
that they had hit the Canopus (or some such ship) &
the Incapable! This was told to one of her snotties
the other day. At first be laughed at it as a good
joke. Then he blushed up: "Incapable ^is she?  well
she was capable enough/to knock down their old
lighthouse at Seltil Bahr the other day - she
fairly settled that."
The Navy indeed looks on the whole thing as
a huge joke. When the Queen Elizabeth was coming
back from her reconnaissance yesty in the
Gulf of Samos two shells plunged into the sea
exactly ahead of her. But it is not true that she had a
howitzer shell her wardroom^sofa or that she was hit seventeen
or eighteen times.  There came an inquiry
from below. “How ws that for range ? Oh pretty close
- right onto it" - ws the answer - "carry on!” I
I believe they had one Turkish aeroplane
I heard  xxx  two shots quite clearly at
 

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about 3.15 to 3.25 today. I suppose they were these two.
Lots of other people heard them also.
They say a Turkish aeroplane came over this place
and about five weeks ago. Some of our 3rd Brigade who were
then ashore heard saw it. They were laughed at at first. But
they it turned out afterwards that many others had seen it.
The day before yesterday another aeroplane came over. The
About half those whom I have heard mention it are under the
impression that it was a Turkish aeroplane; but it was one
of our own. The ships boats both here & at Alex have been manned
by soldiers. It gets them into the way of handling & managing boats.
Tuesday April 13. The first battalion was practiced at
getting into the ships boats & landing. I stopped aboard
writing. The drawing room on one side of the companion way
down to the saloon is used as the Army Corps Headquarters
[* xxx
xxxxx
xxxxx
xxxxx
xxxxx
xxxxx *]
office; and the lounge opposite to it is used as the divisional
headquarters office. In any case The lounge is full of little
tables with cane chairs upholstered in cherry coloured
Silk. Each little table is now ^ really a department
- the chief of staff working out the details of our landing
at his teatable in one corner; the colonel Hobbs &
his staff of the artillery crow bending over a their map on
another teatable working out artillery positions; Gellibrand
at his teatable drawing up some of the forms of the first
General Court martial; Colonel Patterson at his teatable
studying the map for the best corners from which to
 

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fetch wood & water; Griffiths military secretary, at
his table, putting the generals orders in form for
signalling, recording the letters that come in, seeing that
the signallers get the messages which we want to get
despatched- 
and therein ^ And in that last lies one obvious difficulty. From
the first when the force came from Australia we
have always felt the need of some swift means of
distributing dispatches - especially in harbour.
It is bad enough at sea in a fleet – where messages
(unless you can are wireless which you generally
maynt) have to be repeated down the line. We cd have
done with twice the number of signallers at any time
especially on these Headquarter ships - (The Arcadian,
by the bye, marked H, is the H.Q) but it is unfair N.Z. on the Lutzow 
messages shd be cut down to a minimum or the signallers
XXXXX   rapidly get far more work than they can
cope with. But the In harbour when a ship swings
you are apt to mistake her position altogether.
For example we were calling the Malda for an hour
and a half the other night & cdn't get an answer - I heard
our signallers complaining of it. Next day xxxxxx Col.
Maclagan came in & said that for an hour and a half
they could see our light working - they cd just see it faintly
although it ws pointing in another direction, & they
were answering it ^all the time but could not make us see. We must
have been watching another ship mistaking her for the
 

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Malda. The best way for distributing orders wd be
by a swift despatch boat - but these are never
available in the quantity that each Headquarters
wants. How many gives us  ^ We have now arranged for a despatch boat once
a day at least - at 6.30 a.m.  But it wd have
paid us again over & over again to have brought
one or two fast motor boats from Australia.
- The American Fleet brought one in 1908; but she was
a nuisance. The Admiral used her & he was
continually turning up at a ships gangway before
any one knew he was starting.

Wed. April 14. Maj. Villiers Stuart went off today
to make a reconnaissance by aeroplane;
& the staff - the General, White, Glasfurd,
Blamey, & General Birdwood  & some of the
Army Corps staff, went off in the battleship
Queen. They were  are to steam off tonight
up the Gulf of Saros; & back  tomorrow morning
they will be near the head of the Gulf &
will come back along the coast close in so
as to get a good view of the point where
we are to land. They will - those that
have them - go in blue uniforms, so that
th khaki clad officers may not be
noticed aboard the ship - which wd give
the Turks an idea of what they were doing.
 

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Thurs. April 15. The 1st Brigade practiced a landing
today. I went over to the Derfflinger - the
German prize which carries the 2nd & 3rd Bns.
Jock was there. I found he had already received
one of the many letters I sent him telling him
of Montague's wedding. He was looking very
fit - his head shaved like a round orange.
He had a fine little hospital on board; the drugs
were labelled with German names.
The landing was carried out by strings of
of seven steamla  seven ships boats drawn by
each string drawn by a naval boa steam
launch. Seven boats I believe are supposed
to land about a company - 38 in each boat.
In smooth water like this they will certainly
hold more. There were four or five ladders
over the side & the gangway. The problem
of disembarking has been very little practiced.
But it clearly But the object clearly should
be to see that all seven boats are being
evenly filled at the same time - that every
ladder & the gangway are always being
having an even flow of troo men down them.
I saw several boats standing half filled or
empty under some gangways of the ladders whilst other
boats were filling. When the latter were almost
 

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ready to start the others had just began to load,
& the full boats had to wait for some time after
they had been filled. This is an obvious waste of
time. It is only a matter of organisation to have
each ladder always fed with troops.
Sometimes, owing to no one being charged
with looking after the general navigation of
each boat, they missed hooking on the tow line
as the other boats passed - & the others had to
come back for them or else they had to row
out & tack on. When they got to the shore
& the string broke up into separate boats
the oars always had to be got out. It
is obviously much of  When the oars were wanted
the men were always sitting on them & they were
[* [shorthand]
[shorthand] *]
invariably hauled  resorted to as a sort of
after thought. It would be a good thing if every
man boat  to have its out oars ready to
put get out instantly.
This landing is clearly going to be
a tremendously difficult thing. A string of boats is
such an obvious mark & so vulnerable. One bo
Shrapnel shell exploded over any b one of a string
of boats would sink it & that throws 40 men into the
water. They may get rid of their packs - they have to loosen
shoulder straps & unfasten belts - but the whole of that
string of boats is thrown out by the of running by the breaking
 

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of one link in it. The unknown factor of course is the
fire with which the Navy will cover our landing. They will
bring a tremendous fire to bear, unquestionably. And
it may make the Turks keep their heads down &
silence most of their guns. That covering fire is our
defence - a sort of artificial xxx protective work
until we have got into position & dug ourselves
in. xxxxxx may It is not easy to aim straight with
the Queen Elizabeth bursting 1960 lb Shrapnel shells
just over your head. That may result in some crooked
shooting whilst the boats are on their way.
When we were as I went ashore with the
first brigade today . Some of the Dublin Fusiliers were
there. We came upon one They were bigger men than
the little Manchester Tommies in Cairo, but not
big men; they had determined looking faces, rather
freer & easier than the ordinary run of British Tommy
it seemed to me. Drill on active service is never I suppose less
smart than in peace time ; but our fourth regiment when
it turned upon the beach gave the points  it filed down to the beach from the hills gave them points, so it seemed to me
The island was simply beautiful after the
desert. It may  I went up the bed of a little
stream - a mere trickle in wet weather & practically
dry at ordinary times. Its banks were a mass of flowers
- tiny red bells, purple lupin, some little pink flower with
 

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petals like an 8-armed cross [drawing] ; a small yellow flower;
daisies. Some of our people in the hospital camp ashore
have planted little beds of these wild flowers in front of their
tents- which and made bright coloured little gardens - rather
like tiny rock gardens.
I climbed onto to the top of a hill about 2 miles
from the harbour; xxxx and as I came about out
on the top there opened out the beneath me the Eastern
& Northern shores of the island about a mile away - And there, on the
horizon eastwards was the long line of the coast of Asia Minor.
A short span of it, which seemed to be nearer than the rest, on
which through the telescope you could just make out the sun shining
on a low stretch of yellow cliff, must have been Tenedos. To the
North East were the high mountain masses rising from the sea - Imbros
& Samothrace;  & I believe one ought to have been able to see Athos
away to the N.W if only I had known. But I rested the telescope on the grey
granite rocks on the hilltop & looked carefully through it at the land. There
seemed to be a steamer south of Tenedos, just coming round the island; &
opposite off the coast to the north of it, a good deal nearer than the land, but still
well over the horizon, were the masts of two waiting warships. They
were the ships watching the Dardanelles.
I heard later that the Magnificent today was fired on by the big when off the land to the
north west coast of the Dardanelles was fired on by a 14 inch gun
from Maidos, which is on the other side of the peninsula. That
may mean that the transports will have to stand a good deal further out
than had been thoug  intended.