Charles E W Bean, Diaries, AWM38 3DRL 606/6/1 - April - May 1915 - Part 2

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word they did good work here," they sd.  "The 2nd Bn
had made the trenches, they sd, but handed over before
they were finished.
An Australian had come up thro' / scrub a little
before, from / next trench & had lain down on / surface
outside their trench & started talking to them. They told him
it ws dangerous but he and he wd be killed, but he sd he'd
go in a minute, or something of that sort. He ws still 
there when a bullet hit him. Two stretcher bearers came along
/ trench, managed, by exposing themselves, to work 
him onto a water proof sheet, & carried him off.
I came down / trench again & on / way down
met Gen. Walker who asked me if I had bn all round, from
/ Australian position.  I sd I hadn't.  He ws very friendly
& ws standing there on a sort of ledge where his H.Q. were,
just where / ridge began to fall towards / sea, overlooking
/ sea. Out at sea a Gen. Walker ws anxious for any
news but I had very little except / point (Blamey
showed me - thro' the three 200s on the map) where /
British at Helles had got to. It didn't look far.
[Everyone was hungry for news in those days].
As I went down I saw tt / battleship wh
had bn bombarding / point had let down a picket
boat & 3 other boats apparently for a landing party -
but they were turning round in circles - it looked as if
/ p.boat was trying to pick up one o / rowing boats - &
didn't approach / land. [I dont think it was a landing
party]. Farther up / coast was coming down, from /
direction of Bulair, a line of ships. I guessed tt there
The evening sun ws glistening on their distant sides
like / light on a row of amber beads. I took it tt

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this must be / Naval Divn, wh had bn demonstrating
at Bulair, coming down to join us - we had heard they
were to.
On my way down all / way I met w a rumour
tt / Ghurkas had landed in Anzac. Some man coming
up from / beach had sd tt he saw them there. I ws sure
it ws wrong - in fact I thought it might quite likely be
another ruse. [of course it wasn't].
When I got back to / beach I found tt _^ some of the R.N.D.
were already landing & being drawn up along / beach.
They were standing there in two ranks , young chaps,
clearly, I thought, recruits for K.'s army. It ws a 
considerable relief to have them here - it will give
our men a rest from / trenches, I thought.
This night was very wet
Whilst the naval Divn ws landing our men o / 
3rd Bde & others who - but esp. the 3 Bde wh ws
resting - were bathing & / beach ws like Manly
without the neck to knee costumes. I wondered what
the Naval chaps must think of the scene they had
come to. One man ws killed in / water whilst
bathing off / S. part of our position by a "spent" 
bullet. These sort of rest camps formed for a day
or two will straighten / men up & allow them to
find out what / losses really are.
Little Plant, who had bn reported missing,
turned up on / beach at H.Q. today splendidly
fit. He showed us a brass fitting for a rifle end w
a small spring in it wh is sd to be a "silencer"-
several have bn found in their trenches. I

Two men who went out after snipers on our right last
night struck a Turk camp - & several deserted tents. They took /
overcoats they found there & as the night was wet they
were glad to wear them. Most of our mens overcoats
are in their packs wh are everywhere. The packs 
are being badly pillaged - they had to be left behind in /
rush up / hill & aren't properly guarded. It wd
pay an Australian divn over & over again 
to have 100 good police to see to this sort of thing.
[Next day they went down to / tent of the Turk
officer with / post & got hold of his bread - a tremendous
luxury even if it is sour - & I think an officer got some of
his tinned beef & found it not bad.]

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showed it to / general. Certainly the soft lisp of some
of these bullets down / gully makes you think they have
been silenced. I ws almost sure someone is sniping
the Generals & Col. Whites quarters at times.    
[This was pure inexperience - they were over 
bullets unquestionably.]

Thurs. April 29th.
Every morning regularly 4 or 5 great shells come 
whizzing over from Maidos or somewhere & fall out by
the transports.  [Drawing - see original text]  The offing looks like
a big harbour - transports & warships in a huge big crowd;
naval launches are constantly moving in and out. You
hear The steam whistle of a trawler or the whistle of a steam
launch just comes over to you exactly as if the whole place
were a big mercantile port - the rattle of anchor chains,
the hiss of escaping steam from trawlers in shore.
On the beach is everything that is needed for / support
of an army, supplies, transport, water, ambulances. There
are 4 jetties made by pontoons w floating bridges to / 
shore; laden barges - laden so tt they scarcely have any 
freeboard lift - out in / harbour lying at buoys; then a
line of trawlers anchored close to one another in a bunch.
Then far out / line o / big ships. On / beach are three wireless
stations, fenced off each two tall masts and a long wire
behind them, the masts fenced off by rope over wh you trip
at night. To the S. is one ambulance jetty.  Howes wont have
a big red cross up on his stn - its right in / middle of a lot
of stores, ordnance etc at wh / enemy may perfectly fairly
shoot & he says that he does not it is absurd to put a red cross
up on it. The N.Z. hosp at the other end of beach has one but

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ours (under Col. Giblin - really the _^ Tasmanian Casualty Clearing Hosp).
has only a little red cross sufficient to show the men where
to go to. There are lines of mules along / middle o / beach
both N. & S. of our D.H.Q. gully, huge stacks of biscuit boxes,
the kits of men who have thrown them down on their way
up to / hills on / first day - & Austin in / middle of his 
stacks of ammunition. Army Corps H.Q. is in / gully just
south of us dug into both banks.
All day long steamers are passing in & out of this busy
port. The only accident is shown sign of accident is
the masts & funnel of sunken trawlers on / spit to /
south of / beach. All day long there is flash flash from /
warships in / harbour or off it. The reverberation seems
to hit / hill as with a flat hand and shakes it - 
but you _^ simply dont notice it at all now - either / noise or /
earthquake.
All / while from / hills comes at our back comes
/ constant rattle of rifle fire - so close it sounds tt your
every newcomer believes it comes from tt hill itself. 
As a matter of fact it is one ridge over.
There is / occasional plomp of a bullet into /
x water. Now & then, especially at meal times - 
7, 1, & 6.30 or 7 - shrapnel comes down /
gully or over / ridge. Occasionally they fire a few
shells during / night. Every now and then some mule 
starts kicking & once a mule starts that performance
it is a very thoro' business - it continues to kick either
careering down / beach or turning circles, w its nose as / point centre
& its heels _^ punctuating as / circumference, until its load is on / sand however
long it takes to get rid of it. The men go into fits - At the next
Beyond / N. & S. end o / beach / concentration of our
3rd & 1st Bdes is going on - each battn finding out what
men & officers are here & which are lost. Even now there are
many in / Trenches, sandwiched in w other bns, wh

[Ashmead Bartlett tells me that on Tuesday he saw a party
of Australians dropping down from 971 itself into one o /
gullies on this side of it. He ws a long way off but he says says he is sure
they were Australians - abt 20 of them.
If this is right they must have bn a party cut off by /
enemy wh ever to lived on its ration for a few days & eventually
were killed or surrendered.
Gen. Maclagan says they wd prob. be a party of Turks
who came down this day in Australian uniform - abt
20 of them - from tt direction on Tuesday.

This story on / day of / armistice ws proved utterly
false.  Only one Larkins body ws found w many
bullet wounds in it as if shot by a machine gun but 
absolutely unscathed otherwise. Only one case of mutilation
has any evidence behind it that I have heard of.

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will turn up in a few days. What happened to / rest - those
who went are not here _^ & are not know to be k. or w. no one knows. They may have gone to
Alex. wounded - bec. in / first push it ws impossible to get keep /
names of all who were sent off - many went back _^ wounded in ships boats
as soon as they landed; or they may have bn wounded & taken prisoner
or killed by / Turks.
Up on / hill above / camp are a number of beach parties,
A.S.C. & other corps. Lots of people have put them down as stragglers
but they are stragglers are being pretty well dealt with now & the
average man really talks without knowledge.
Over opposite us as the afternoon turns to evening Imbros 
& Samothrace begin to show up grey agst / evening xx rose - the
scene is perfectly exquisite - rose pink on / horizon, the sun's track
broad upon / sea, the transports & their smoke haze, the black
shapes of the barges, the pinnaces dropping great creases across
the yellow satin surface - & all the time that lazy cricket
going on at your back. Last night ws wet & today Samothrace 
is covered w a cap of snow.
Today - Thursday - two destroyers rushed over to
the point _^ N. of us wh / Battleships were shelling yesty, &, I am told,
landed some men.  x
Turkish prisoners are brought each day into camp.
The Australians certainly look on prisoners w disfavour.
They have heard stories of mutilation - some of those who
came back from the advanced positions in / fight on
Sunday night brought stories of comrades whom they had
passed, mutilated. The case almost everyone gives is that
of Sergt. Larkins of the 1st Bn - a member of Parlt in New
South Wales & a fine chap, w a fine influence amongst the
men. He used to sit down amongst them on / deck o /
Minnewaska & keep them cheerful - a real good sort I 
am told. He is supposed to have bn left wounded & found
later on mutilated.
Our men - the Australians - will not (for this reason)
if they can help it take prisoners. They tell stories

[The N.Z. men half consciously came to imitate
/ Australians. e.g. The Australian language was abt
5 times as strong as tt of the N.Zs - but / N.Zs began 
to adopt it. The N.Z.  Sydney men followed / Sydney
custom of trying to get their backs & skins as black brown
as possible thro sunbathing. The N.Zs followed them &
outdid them - they were often blacker than Turks &
blacker than Indians before / summer ws over.]

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themselves of prisoners having started from the lines on
their way down & not having arrived. The officers of xx 5^th battalion
some of them told me that the men of the battalion (5^th)
caught a sniper, sat in court martial on him, & shot him. 
I dont beleive it - but I was told it by 4 or 5 officers of the
5^th today. It is odds on tt it is just one of the yarns but
our people are foolish to talk in this way.
There is a clear & interesting difference between the
N.Zealander & the Australian. The Australian New Zealander
regards / Turk much more kindly than our men. "Kind 
hearted beggars, the N.Zealanders," sd one of our chaps /
other day; " a Turk snipes them & then they catch the
beggar & take him by the hand & lead him down to
the beach..." Both N.Zealanders & Australians have
told me tt they had orders from their subordinate officers
in some cases to take no prisoners in the first rush
at any rate & whilst things were bad. I dont believe
this either tho' it may be true. But undoubtedly /
N.Z fights more with his gloves on than / Australian;
the Australian when he fights, fights all in.
And / Turk knows it - he is sd to be afraid of us and
/ truth is tt there is no question (at least for operations
such as we have had) tt / Australian leaves / N.Zealanders
behind. There is no doubt on this subject amongst those
who have seen them fight here. The N.Z man is a good
trustworthy soldier; but he has not the devil of / Australian
in him & / result / wild pastoral independent life
of Australia, if it makes rather wild men, makes 
superb soldiers. The N.Zs are outspoken in their
praise o / way / Australians fought.  [A N.Z. boy told
me with pride that he a wounded Australian (at Helles
I think) had come up to a N.Z. trench wiping / blood

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out of his eyes w one hand. The Australians were
very particular of their mates down there - they
had seen not seen / French at their best & knew the
British only by the R.N.D. wh was (part of it) very 
much shaken. The Australian as he came up sd: 
"Are you boys Australians?" "No we're N.Zealanders"
ws / reply. "Oh, well you'll do me!" ws / reply. 
The N.Z. boy who told me tt ws very proud of it. The
truth was tt at this time _^ (Helles) the Australian ws very
much reluctant to fight alongside anybody except
other Australians who he knew wd stand to him - 
or New Zealanders. He strongly mistrusted both /
French & / British - the British Regts he had seen
were undoubtedly mostly bad - the Deal Bn of
R.M.L.I. for instance. They had bn smashed at
Antwerp & were most given to panic ever afterwards.]
The jealously tt existed between N.Z. & Australia
in Cairo vanished at one blow on / first day at 
Anzac - vanished utterly as far as the men were
concerned.
I went to M Cays again today & had a yarn 
w my good friend Chamberlain - Col, M'Cays batman
- & / others. Wallis had bn hit w shrapnel & Hasty
ws orderly officer. From there I went with Gellibrand and
along thro / scrub _^ on top & then under / northern edge of 400 to
the H.Q. of the 5^th Bn.  As we went we were certainly 
sniped at by some one either 1500 yrds away at the
head of shrapnel gully or else on a hillside nearer
our own lines. Getting Two shots went whisp - whisp
into / bank beside us. Gelly sd "Thats your
bat is doing tt.  Or else its our own people who

I corroborated it afterwards to some extent.

13
think we're / enemy" - wh, considering / numbers of
fools who didnt trouble to find out / position in those
days, very possibly it was.  How At the H.Q. of the
5^th Gelly stood up out on / path quite outside of cover
- I didn't like doing it but had more or less to follow
suit - whilst he talked to / officers there. Then he went
on to Maclagans H.Q. but I stayed. He gave me a fuse cap
he wanted taken back to Col. White to show what gun
had fired it, & the range. I stayed & / men there 
put my telescope onto / Turks creeping down thro' /
scrub on a big hillslope far to / North. You cd see in /
scrub a semicircular path - a little open ground, very
little - & a brown line of dead shrub.  xxxx x xxx
Occasionally some object in dark blue wd darken /
path a minute, moving quickly down it & getting into /
scrub on / left o / path. Presently it wd move thro /
scrub & disappear again. Then - 2 minutes later you
saw it move across / path just where / brown foliage was.
I saw several do this, one after / other , & I believe
there were quite a few of them in a hollow to / right
wh I couldnt see.
One o / officers there _^ Hooper [afterwards k. in Lone Pine] was clean worn out
& dead asleep. The one next him was worn out too,
but cdn't sleep. He sd he had had no sleep
since he arrived. His eyes had / heavy blurred
leaden look of a man's who has bn hit in /
head. But the story he told me of his first days
experience ws intensely interesting. It was as follows:
I started with 50 or 60 men (in my platoon?)
& everything went pretty well while we were crossing 
shrapnel valley.  We _^ were to reinforce / firing line - we 
never saw the firing line or / Turks, but as we

Rifle, m.g. fire
& shrapnel from 
this direction

2 gun batty. 
When 3rd bde
arrd. these were
just limbering up. One
gun got away - other
abandoned after knocking
sights off. There were some
Turk wounded in the
trench when Hooper 
got there & a Turk dead

[Sketch - see original text]
Turkish tent.
P l a i n
4^th

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got onto shr 400  plateau we began to get it very hot.
Till then the bullets were only "overs". Going over
plateau 400, trying we came in an endeavour to reach
our objective [i.e. Gun Ridge] we came under
shrap. machine gun & rifle fire, f mostly I think from
our left front. It was very heavy. We went 
down over the crest _^ - the scrub on / plateau ws waist high - & as we got down got into 
shelter. We thought these to rifle reports tt we
heard ahead were those of our own firing line - 
we cd see neither our own line nor / Turks. From
the edge of / hill I cd see a tent. A wounded man
o / 10 Bn. told me tt we were on / Turkish range
marks - he ws lying there & had bn noticing / bullets - &
advised me to get out of that spot. I made 3
rushes before we got to their dug out emplacement.
The emplacements were built up w pine logs &
banked w clay. We got into them & had to
keep into / corners o / emplacements but we
cd pick up / Turks hopping abt amongst / bushes
in / valley. We had w us water & 2 days
rations. Only 3 of us got to the emplacements
but more came. They cd hear our voices & 
then they wd rush to / place. By / finish
we had abt 15 men in / emplacements & /
communication trench, & 7 wounded. I 
started w A Coy o the 5^th. After dark Lts. Levy 
& Derham came up, & one o / officers o /
7 Bn. We had got there by about 1.30p.m.

We got a m.g. going w parts of 2 m.gs
one our own & / other Turkish - I believe.
We collected ammunition from / wounded
& filled / belts.

[Sketch - see original text]

[During these wild days: Maj. Saker was organising, getting shovels
& picks during the 2nd night working ceaselessly. He ws
hit in / leg early / first day; ws in / trenches all
night, limping. He was hit a 2nd time but went on; the
3rd time he was hit in / head or throat - in an advance on Mond.
or Tuesday - Three men say they saw him dead.
Lt Derham. ws hit thro' leg - 2 places in arm & shoulder - on
Sunday he cd not move but was still directing his men. PG S.
Ricketson dug him in (as MacDonell later did w Cass at Helles)- he
ws too weak to dig himself. He continued in / trench till Wed night &
never had his wounds touched. He ws a medical student someone saw 
him dressing his own wounds and so discovered their nature. All / staff
o / 5 Bn ws hit so he continued there for 3 days when / medical people 
forced him to go to / beach.
Capt Carter was smothered w shrap - 4 burst right over him - after 4^th he
didn't know what ws happening till he got to beach. [Maj Bennett 6Bn
ws wounded in front trench on rt (near _^ later 3 Bde HQ.) & ws sent to ship. found
ship ws leaving, so escaped back to beach] Carter ws sent to ship - found 
it was going to Alex so he too escaped.]
Maj. Lemaistre ws hit, Cane (?) ws hit; Feathers killed; Saker
hit; Flockhart hit on jaw w shrap. but held on till night.
Hooper hit thro' pince Nez [He went out & dug circular trench at night
abt end of 1st wk but ships searchlight flashed on him]. _^ Lt Newham hit on 
glasses aftwrds k.  One man had cigarette taken from his hand; PG Ricketson had
his entrenching tool knocked away - then hit thro' ear]

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The 3rd Bde had gone right forward & come back
before then. The gun in this emplacements was a
Hotchkiss with a drop breech. We tried to work it but
I cdnt f find / way to open it. There ws ammunition
- red & yellow shells - we buried 2 boxes of 
them. The dead within 20 yrds of us all had bombs.

[Sketch - see original text]
Trench
Turk ran thro
Trench

The Turks had a covered way w a cover
over it. The man at / entrance of our emplacement
shot one Turk coming up. Then another came
along, running through the emplacement. We
had bn very quiet - & / Turks had bn creeping up
all round. This Turk came running up after dark.
He stopped outside & then ran on through - the
moonlight gleaming on his bayonet. As he ran
thro between us someone shot him & he fell.
Well Derham came up & / others & w - our
line crept forwd after dark - & we had a circle
round the hill. But at 11.30 we were ordered
to retire. We came back carrying our wounded - 
all we cd find. Prob. some were left.