August 8/9 - Chunuk Bair

[christine liava'a]

Throughout the night of 8/9 August the tempo of the battle on the summit slackened off, although an attack came soon after midnight.

"At midnight the Turks began the general debate which always precedes a charge. As they were just beyond the crest we could hear all that was said. At length the cry of "Allah!" grew into a roar as they charged. All that we saw of them was a scattered flashing of rifles, ten yards or so above us which vanished under our "magazine rapid". Then out of the dark came staggering and shouting a wounded NZer who stopped one of own bullets before he established his identity....

Then a searchlight from a warship away below us turned full glare on us, and then the lyddite came. The shells came streaming by, plunged into the earth- whuff- and exploded...the bombardment was aimed at us! We crouched cursing into the bottom of the trench. The shells hit to our left and none of the men killed was in our platoon".

At first light on 9 August the Turks carried out their first serious attack of the day. The whole line withheld their fire until the Turks were only 15 yards distant, then they opened up a withering fire that cut the attack to shreds. The Turks quickly retired, re-grouped, and charged again and again.

The attack was among the fiercest of the day and resulted in many NZ casualties- about 1/2 those suffered on that day.

During the early morning the 6th Lancashires and a detachment of the 6th Gurkhas of the No 2 column reached a point near the top of the Sari Bair ridge in a saddle near Hill Q with the help of the Royal Navy and land based artillery, which pounded Turkish positions in the locality

The NZ trenches lay in a slight depression and ran parallel to the crest-line about 10 yards behind the summit. They were not ideal to defend as the Turks could bomb them at will from behind the crest-line....However one advantage of the trench placement was that any Turkish movement could easily be detected above the skyline.

The crestline proved a death trap for either side to appear on- very strict orders were passed along the line that no advance was to be made over the crest as the Turks had numerous machine guns in position to sweep the summit

During the long day the chain of command for the Otagos continually changed... The attrition of officers was so severe on Chunuk Bair that iot was reduced to the desperate situation where a lieutenant had command over a battalion during a critical battle.

Before noon on 9 August the Anzac and naval artillery seemed to get their range accurate and claimed heavy casualties among the Turks.The relief, the 6th Loyal North Lancashire Battalion arrived about 10.30 pm and the 5th Wiltshire Battalin arrived on top to reinforce the Lancashires about 2.30 am on 10 August.

Bloody Gallipoli- Richard Stowers

[christine liava'a]

On the evening of 9 August, with the Turks continually amassing beyond Sari Bair Ridge and with inexperienced British soldiers relieving Chunuk Bair Johnson and Godley may have had a premonition that a reversal was imminent. Because of general fatigue and with little or no support coming from the Suvla bay landings, leaving New Zealanders on Chunuk Bair would be an act of stupidity. The cost of NZ lives over the previous 3 days had long passed acceptable numbers, and another day on Chunuk Bair would more or less incapacitate New Zealand as fighting force on Gallipoli.

So they decided to systematically vacate all NZers off Chunuk Bair overnight.

The Auckland company, 5th Reinforcements, who were left on Rhodendron Spur, were then ordered up the slope to support those at the Apex.

L/C Hill describes it.

" The Turks located our dugouts and for an hour treated us to shrapnel in large doses. Adequate shelter was out of the question and we lost about 30 before the firing ceased. Later on in the day I was in the gully (Chailak Dere) again and saw 4 British regiments get cut up by shrapnel. They passed by only 60 yards distant and from a fairly safe spot under a cliff I saw them get merry hell. The shrapnel just mowed them down in dozens and by the time they reached shelter they had lost scores and scores of all ranks"

... " We were ordered into the support trenches and although we were tired out we had to file up the sap past the Wiltshires lying in support, past the remnants of the Gloucesters who had almost been wiped out, past the the wounded wanting removal, past the dressing station almost in the firing line and past the dead already becoming a menace to health and at last the trench, a miserable little drain 4ft 6in deep and 2ft 6in wide smelling vilely of dead Turk and alive with vermin. To put our head up was to court a bullet even though night had fallen... It was found our presence was not necessary and eventually we were told to crawl out under the brow of a hill and remain under cover till daylight."