Embarkation Pier

[ZackNZ]

Does any pal have a location map of the precise whereabouts of Embarkation Pier please?

Zack

[Auimfo]

Zack,

Embarkation Pier is on the north side of the mouth of Chailak Dere, at the north end of Ocean Beach (or North Beach). i.e. between Anzac and Suvla. Embarkation Pier Cemetery is just behind the beach where the pier once was.

Cheers,

Tim L.

[AndyR]

Has anyone got a 1915 photograph of the pier? Seem to be plenty available of Walker's and Watson's Piers, but haven't seen any of Embarkation Pier.

Thanks

AndyR

[ZackNZ]

Tim

Great - many thanks Tim. Like Andy if anyone has a photo I'd love to see it.

Cheers

Zack

[Auimfo]

Did some searching and was very surprised to find that I couldn't locate a decent photo either!!

Now that's going to annoy me so I'll do a bit more digging.

Cheers,

Tim L.

[Jeff Pickerd]

Zack,

Cannot be 100% sure, but this may be Embarkation pier. As Tim has noted, there does not seem to a photograph or map of North Beach that shows the pier. This would suggest that it was not a substantial structure and the photograph could well be it.

Hope this works.

Jeff

[Krithia]

Hi Zack,

I think you could be right, the photograph is in the area of where Embarkation Pier would have been. Where did you find this photo, is it from a published source?

Steve

[Auimfo]

No doubt about it Jeff, that's Embarkation Pier. I checked some contemporary photos and maps and the location in this fits perfectly. I also noted the file name for the photo was 'wounded being evacuated' which would be correct because that's what the pier was specifically used for. As we know, Waldon Point is very close and that's where the 4th and 7th Field Ambulances had a hospital after the August offensives.

What I want to know is where you found the photo??

Cheers,

Tim L.

[ZackNZ]

Jeff

That's wonderful - many thanks!! As a matter of interest what is the photo source?

Zack

[Jeff Pickerd]

Zack, Tim & Steve,

The photograph is from the remarkable collection of No. 193 Signaller James Pinkerton CAMPBELL, "A" Troop, "B" Sqdn, 8th Light Horse Regiment.

Although the photo I have posted is from another source, you can find this also from the 'Collections data base', AWM, ID No. HO3118. If you run a 'Collections Search' using "James Pinkerton Campbell", the photograph can be found on page 4.

I might add, the AWM's photo is much sharper than the one I have posted.

Some back ground to this photograph.

When I first discovered this shot I was convinced it showed wounded men of the 8th LHR being evacuated the day after the charge at the Nek, seeing as Signaller Campbell was an 8th man. It was not until I had undertaken more study of Campbell's photographs, become aware of the albumn held by the National Library of Australia, Canberra, (183 photographs, but does not contain this photograph) and then given access to two other private collections, that the realization of this assumption being incorrect was revealed.

The AWM caption does not give all the details to this photo. From the other two collections, the captions reveal that it shows wounded from No. 2 Outpost being embarked after the advance on Sunday 8th August 1915. The date of embarkation is the 8/8/15.

If my memory serves me correctly, I have a feeling that I have another reference somewhere in the chaos I call my filing system, that indicates that the wounded are actually Gurkhas being carried onto the lighters, but I can't locate this at the moment, and it is quite some time since I last looked at it, seeing it was not directly relating to the 8th Light Horse.

After I made the post last night I remembered that I had seen another photograph that was remarkably similar to this one. I have now found where I had seen this, and Tim, you will find this one interesting, for it is definately the same Jetty/Pier.

Reference link:

"The New Zealanders at Gallipoli", Colonel Fred Waite. Chapter XIV, The Battle of Sari Bair, page 241.

http://www.nzetc.org/tm/scholarly/tei-WaiNewZ.html

I am pleased that you all have agreed with my first suspicion that this was a photograph of Embarkation Pier, for there is now no-doubt that it is.

Zack, it wasn't until you asked this question, that the penny dropped.

Jeff

[Auimfo]

Jeff,

The first photo is definitely Embarkation Pier. If the caption for it claims to be wounded from No. 2 Outpost then that makes sense because Embarkation Pier was almost directly adjacent to the outpost. (sorry the captions on the photo are a bit blurry but I had to reduce to fit within the 100k limit). I think it's still reasonably easy to make out 7th Field Amb Cemetery/Walden Point, Embarkation Pier Cemetery, Chaliak Dere and No. 2 Outpost.

However when I looked at the second picture you directed us to, I'd have to disagree and say it isn't the same pier. It appears quite evident that this second photo is of a pier much closer to Anzac and the scale of everything seems to support this. Although the distance from the camera to the pier is greater, the hills behind are far closer to the camera than in the first photo.

Cheers,

Tim L.

[Jeff Pickerd]

Tim,

Thanks for putting up the two photographs together. You are right, the NZ photo is definitely closer to Ari Burnu and therefore not the same jetty as the Campbell shot.

These jetties/piers were obviously not substantial structures and give the appearance of having been constructed in hast and through necessity.

I would assume that there may have been several constructed for the August offensive along North Beach, as per the NZ photograph, but it interesting that neither of these two piers appear to show up on later photographs or maps, and definately not shown on the Turkish 1916 maps.

The grounding of the old steamer "Milo" at North Beach, in the shelter of Ari Burnu, to form a breakwater on the 26th October, may account for the disappearance of one shown in the NZ shot, but the No. 2 Outpost "Embarkation Pier" should still have been needed.

One wonders when they disappeared? They were definitely there in August, but by November they are gone.

Jeff

[ZackNZ]

Jeff / Tim - fantastic!

Thank you!

Zack

[AndyR]

Can I add my thanks to everyone as well.

Seems likely that Embarkation Pier was closed fairly quickly as it was too dangerous:

"Embarkation Pier was made for the purpose of evacuating wounded from the Battle of Sari Bair, but it came under heavy rifle and shell fire and was abandoned after just two days." from http://www.anzacs.net/GRAVES/Cemeteries/Cemetery_i.htm

From the 13th CCS WD "the naval embarkation officer at the pier was shot dead and another officer wounded, besides several men killed and many wounded". For anyone interested, the naval officer killed was Lieut-Commander Thomas Greenshields. It also refers to the "small and flimsy pier close to No 2 Post" as being "reserved for evacuation of wounded and which flies a Red Cross flag", but "as, however, we have guns in position close by, it is not to be wondered at that the flag is not respected".

Seems that until a new pier was used (from the 13th?), walking and stretcher cases were evacuated a mile along the long sap, I guess to the area of Watsons/Walkers Piers.

AndyR

[Jeff Pickerd]

Andy,

Many thanks for this information, only goes to show, that if you don't look everywhere, you don't find.

This certainly does explain why the pier cannot be found in any of the maps or photographs, since it was only there for two days.

It is indeed good fortunate that Signaller Campbell managed to take this photograph, otherwise there was not much of a window of opportunity for it do be done.

Jeff

[Bryn]

From the Australian Medical History ('Embarkation Pier' is 'No. 3 Pier'):

Beaches, August 7-8

Here must be traced the cause of this deplorable damming back of the stream of casualties, whereby the wounded were retained near the beach under conditions which entailed terrible suffering and loss of life within a few hundred yards of the roadstead, where the hospital ships lay undisturbed. As at the Landing, failure to carry the heights involved in serious difficulty the services responsible for supplies and for evacuation. Beyond the foot-hills the open country and beach were by day continuously subjected to shell-fire and sniping, and in particular to a continuous rain of "overs”.

Food, water, and ammunition for the supply-dumps formed in the foot-hills had, from reasons of protection, to be landed chiefly at the cove, and, from a depot at Walker's Ridge, carried a mile and a half through the "long sap" by fatigues or on mules. But the wounded, the beach once reached, might have embarked direct to the roadstead, where "floating hospitals" could lie day and night and be reached in fifteen minutes. Unhappily this short cut to safety was made of little avail for the seriously wounded. In the first place, full advantage was not taken of the fact that the enemy, a signatory to the Geneva Convention (with crescent instead of cross for token), had shown himself willing to observe its obligations. No attempt was made to clear the wounded openly under the aegis of that convention. No special medical small craft, marked by Red Cross, had been provided.

No.3 trestle pier was apparently intended only for evacuation of wounded, and it was at first so used, a Red Cross flag being flown. But early on the 7th it was used-under protest from the medical side-by beach parties under combatant officers for landing stores: thereafter the flag was, rightly enough, not respected by the enemy.

Although at first, through his preoccupation, this fire was only intermittent, and was ignored by those conducting the evacuation, this advantage was offset by the fact that the pier was inaccessible to pinnaces and cutters, except at full tide,

and that no lighters or barges were available. At noon of the 7th, in the absence of a medical embarkation officer and beach party (which was to have been found by the casualty clearing station), parties from the "clearing stations" formed by the 4th Australian, New Zealand Mounted, and I08th Indian Field Ambulances, directed by a naval embarkation officer, cleared wounded from this pier to the roadstead by ships' boats, each boat taking two stretcher cases or twenty-five sitting. The situation at 11.30 p.m. is presented in a report to Colonel Manders by the officer-in-charge of the Australian party, a New Zealand dental officer attached to the 4th Field Ambulance. whose work gained high commendation:

The picket boats cannot get into the pier owing to tidal conditions: we are evacuating into two ships' boats. It is impossible to handle stretcher cases, motor-driven lighters the only means. . . . I would suggest that F. Ambs. hold cases, as there is no hope of evacuating those we have at the beach. In all to-day evacuations at this station 350, principally sitting. . . If 1st A.C.C.S. could clear, we could send along beach parties of bearers from units now round No. 3 Post.

During the night walking cases, and a few stretcher cases were in fact thus sent round. At No.2 pier, during this day, only the light horse casualties from Russell’s Top were cleared (by the Zealand Field Ambulance) under similar difficulties-except that the pier was safe. (Butler pp306-7).

Bryn

[Bryn]

There was a pier at the foot of Walker's Ridge and one to its south. From the New Zealand Medical History:

'It became necessary to evacuate by hand along the sap to the 16th CCS whose pier at Walker's Ridge was safe. For this purpose the 13th Division furnished large parties of infantrymen who carried through the whole night. After dark it was possible to resume work at No. 3 pier.' (10-11 August 1915) (Carberry p98).

This may be the pier referred to in Bean Vol 2 p834 as 'Williams' Pier'. It's stated there that another pier was built to its north, either later in August or sometime in September, and known as 'Walker's Pier' "apparently from its proximity to Walker's Ridge." So depending on when the photos were taken, they may be of either Williams' or 'Walker's pier. Williams' pier was apparently protected by the sunken breakwater ship 'Milo' (Bean Vol 2 p847). The 'Milo' is shown in photos and its remains can still be found in the water off North beach, as can that of a pier - when I was last at Anzac, I went diving there.

(Bean Vol 2 facing p866)

Bryn

[Bryn]

From the Aust Medical History (facing p316):

End of August 1915 - piers are marked in Anzac Cove and on North Beach.

Bryn

And another from p321:

Bryn

[Peter Bennett]

Taken last October

[Jeff Pickerd]

Bryn,

Once again you have come up with the goods, and again my many thanks, that is indeed the information I hoped for.

Brilliant,

Jeff

[Auimfo]

Excellent work Bryn. Any idea when the 'new pier' adjacent to Walden Point and north of 'Old No. 3 (Embarkation) Pier was built?

I would suggest that Jeff's second photo (closer to Anzac) would be of Williams Pier in it's infancy. If it were Walker's Pier built afterwards and to the north of Williams, we should be able to see a more substantial Williams Pier behind it - but we can't.

Cheers,

Tim L.

[Bryn]

Jeff,

Glad that helped you out.

Tim,

I agree that it's probably Williams' Pier for exactly the same reason.

I'll do a bit of closer reading, but it seems the other pier was built in time to handle the casualties from the Hill 60 fighting, so sometime around the middle of August would be my guess.

Bryn

[ZackNZ]

Hi All - absolutely fantastic information - many thanks! Now I know why I joined this forum!! Brilliant stuff!

Thank you

Zack