Anzac was divided into two parts by Shrapnel Gully, which ran from Hell Spit right up to the very apex of the position, at the junction of the ridge that the army held and the main ridge of Sari Bair. Thousands of men lost their lives in this great broad valley during the early days of the fighting, when the Turkish artillery burst shrapnel over it. That was how it got its name. It was there that General Bridges met his death, in this Valley of the Shadow of Death. In its upper course it merged into Monash Gully, called after the Brigadier of the 4th Brigade, that had held its steep sides at Pope's Hill—which was a knuckle—at Quinn's Post, and between the two the sharp depression on the edge of the ridge—"The Bloody Angle." A daring sniper might always reach the very head of the gully and shoot down the long Valley. Only, in time, the superiority and alertness of our sharpshooters overcame that menace. Few Turkish snipers that played that game returned alive.

I went without a guide round Anzac, because the paths were well worn when I trod them, though there were many twisted roads, but all leading upwards to the trenches winding round the edge of the ridge. One could not miss one's way very well by keeping on the path that led southward from the heart of Anzac round to the first point—Hell Spit (beyond, a machine gun played and chased any who approached, unless the Turks happened to be off duty, as they sometimes were), and there you found the broad, open mouth of the gully. Usually a party of men were coming up from bathing. They were sun-burned right down to their waists (for they never wore shirts if they could possibly avoid it, and looked more like Turks than the Turks themselves), and you found them squatting in a sap, the mouth of which gaped on to the beach, secure behind the angle of a hill. By their side were large Egyptian water-tins. The "coves" up above in the trenches were drinking this ration of water for their evening meal, but there was always time to have a chat with a comrade or mate from the northern side of Anzac, or with men who lived in the heart of the position. For the troops knew only their own section of the line, and had seen nothing of famed posts and positions captured and held. In fact, it was a sort of mutual understanding that these fatigue parties always stopped for the purpose of swapping stories about adventures with Turks.

"Had much fighting, Fred, down your way?" one would drawl.

"Bit of an attack, but the blighters would not face the —— bayonet."

"Was out doing a bit of scouting the other night from Russell Top," spoke another fine-featured man, "and only for a thunderstorm would have captured a bit of a ridge, but a blooming interpreter chap got the shivers, and we just got back without being nabbed."

It would make a book in itself to record all the conversations one dropped amongst, of scraps of fighting, of one section of the line and another. The men flattened themselves against the side of the sap to let a stretcher case pass, always asking, if the wounded man showed any signs of life, about the wound and his regiment. About July, in the saps one met men carrying large quantities of sheet-iron and beams of wood to form the terraces up along the sides of the hills. One sheet of iron could make a dugout magnificent, even luxurious; two was a home fit for a general. This sap wound backwards and forwards up the gully, just giving glimpses of the tops of the ridge, over which bullets came whizzing and embedding themselves against the hillside. That was the reason of the sap. The little graveyard you passed was full of these spent bullets: shells whined away over it to the beach.

You came out into the open again where the gully broadened out. Looking round, there were three or four wells visible, where the engineers were busily erecting pumps. Iron tanks, too, were being brought into use, part of the great reticulation scheme of Anzac, and round them were grouped the men who had come down from the hilltops. That water, blessed though it was, was thrice blessed by the men who once carried it on their shoulders, grown sore under the weight. Some men with 18-pounder shells tucked under their arms passed. "Heavy, lads?" "Too blooming heavy altogether; one's about enough up them hills!" Thus, by a stream of munition-carriers, was the artillery kept supplied with its ammunition. Shells were not too plentiful in those days, but the gunners were busy laying in supplies for the great artillery duel that all knew one day would be fought. Ammunition, it may be recorded, went by the beach at night, and so up to the very highest point of the gullies possible, on mules.

Just at this broadening of Shrapnel Gully on the right (south) was the Indian encampment. A mass of rags and tatters it looked, for it was exposed to the fierce sun, and when gay coloured blankets were not shielding the inmates of the dugouts, the newly washed turbans of the Sikhs and Mohamedans were always floating in the idle breeze. Their camp was always busy. They never ceased to cook. Though the wiry Indians could speak little English, they got on well with the Australians, who loved poking about amongst their camps hunting for curios, while the Indians collected what trophies they could from the Australians.

If you looked intently hereabouts, you might make out, smothered away in the shadow of a hill, the dark muzzle of a gun in a pit, with the gunners' camp beside it. He would have been a keen observer in an aeroplane who could have detected those guns and marked them on his maps. Sufficient proof of this might be found in the fact that nearly all these guns were brought away at the evacuation. One or two that I saw in the firing-line, or just behind it, had been battered.

Three ways lay open to you, now that you had crossed the broad bottom of the gully. You might turn to the right and continue on up the main gully till it joined with Monash Gully, and so go on a visit to the apex of the position. You might turn off slightly to the left and reach, by a rather tortuous track, the centre of the left flank (or by this route travel behind the firing-line along the western slopes of the hills to Lone Pine, and then reach the extreme left). A far shorter, and the third way, was to go round the Indian encampment, and either up White Gully or through a gap in another spur of the main ridge, and come out on to Shell Green. This patch of once cultivated land was a small plateau—the only cleared space on Anzac. The Turkish shells passed over it on their way to the beach from the olive-grove guns concealed 2 miles away. Sometimes, also, they dropped on it. You crossed at the northern end of it, and reached the artillery headquarters of Colonel Rosenthal's 3rd Brigade dug into the side of the hill. It was across the gully facing the southern edge of this green that the big 6-in. field gun, fired for the first time in August, was placed. I remember watching the huge pit that was dug for it, and the widening of the artillery roads that enabled it to be dragged into position. Directly above Shell Green—a very dirty patch of earth after very few weeks—was Artillery Lane, which was a track that had been cut in the side of the hill, and which also served as a terrace. Dugouts were easily accessible along this road, though it was subject to some shell fire, so lower down the hillside was preferable, even if the climb was steeper and the promenade more restricted. Brigadier-General Ryrie, commanding 2nd Light Horse Brigade, had his headquarters at this spot, and also the 3rd Infantry Brigade, under Brigadier-General Maclagan. Lieut.-Colonel Long too, with the Divisional Light Horsemen, also made his camp there. All of which troops were holding, in July, the section of the line that reached down to the sea on the extreme left.

It was a complicated position, for a series of small crests had had to be won before Chatham's Post was established and an uninterrupted view obtained of the Turkish huts along Pine Ridge and the plain where the olive-groves were. Down on the beach that led round from Gaba Tepe—the beach where the troops should have landed—were barbed-wire entanglements and a series of posts manned only at night. Along that beach a little way, the commander of the post, a Light Horseman, pointed out to me a broken boat. It was a snipers' nest, he explained, where the Turks sometimes lurked and waited. We now stood out in a cutting looking down on Gaba Tepe at the Turkish trenches that ran in parallel lines along the hills, till a bracket of bullets suggested the wisdom of drawing back to cover. Along a very deep sap (so narrow that in some places one had to squeeze one's way through) and down a hill brought one up to Chatham's Post, called so after a Queenslander, who captured it, of that name. Right on the crown of this knoll and along its western slope were a series of machine gun positions, striking at the heart of the left of the Turkish lines.

I was asked, "Like to see an old Turk we have been laying for, for some time?—a sergeant he is. The beggar doesn't care a jot for our shooting." Several rifles cracked as the observer made way for me to put my eye to a telescope. Very clearly I saw a fine big Turk moving along one of the enemy's communication-ways; it was apparent he was supervising and directing. He bore a sort of charmed life, that man. Eventually (some days later) he was shot. His name? Why, Abdul, of course—they all were. Our telescope was withdrawn just in time, and the iron flap dropped over the loophole as bullets splashed against it and the sandbag parapets above.

"Damn them and their snipers!" said a young bush-man, and began again his observation from another point. Up and down and through a long tunnel and we came back again to the rear of the main hill. When I saw where I had walked, set out on a map, it seemed very short after the miles of winding trenches that disappeared in all directions over and through the hill. Yet the troopers were still digging. Their troubles!

Brigadier-General Maclagan had a birthday—or he said it was about time he had—one day when I came in, and he celebrated it by cutting a new cake which his Brigade-Major, Major Ross, had obtained through the post.

"Luxury," began the Brigadier, with his mouth full of currants, "is only a matter of comparison. Look at my couch and my pigeon-holes, my secret earthen safes, and—bring another pannikin of tea."

Yes, it was comparison. "Ross, you will show the trenches—fine fellow, Ross," and the Brigadier cut another piece of cake.

Other officers dropped in and the cake slowly vanished. I wondered what Ross thought. "No use," he said to me later. "Better eat it now. Might not be here to eat it to-night. What about these trenches, now? You have a periscope? Right." As we started I felt his position was like that of the officer who, having received a hamper with some fine old whisky, found himself suddenly grown popular and received a great many visitors in one night. News spread quickly at Anzac!

It was the middle section of the right of the line that I was visiting, adjacent to the Light Horse position, just described. The Turks started shelling before we had fairly started, and I watched the shells bursting on Shell Green—harmlessly enough, but very thick. The Brigade-Major left word at the telephone switchboard where he was going, and, choosing one of three ways, dived into a sap on the hillside that was reached by a flight of steps. One had not gone far to be struck by the scrupulous cleanliness of this underground line. No tins, papers, or broken earthworks: everything spick and span. I was being told how the wheatfield had been taken at the time just as we were passing across it—through a sap and working up under cover on to the outer ridge. That day I seemed to do nothing else but grip hard brown hands and meet new faces. That splendid Staff officer had a word for all his men.

"Wish the beggars would only attack. We have everything nicely prepared for them," he began to explain as we walked through a tunnel and halted on the side of a hill. We stood behind some bushes in a machine-gun pit. "Never been fired," said the officer, and then smiled in a curious way. "Got four more all along the top of the gully in two tiers. We expect—that is our hope—the Turks will come up here to try and cut off that hill which we have taken. Let 'em."

It was the first time I had seen a real trap. God help any foe that entered that valley!

Did I want to see all the position? I did. It took two hours—two of the shortest, most amazing hours I spent at Anzac.

"We are going now to see the gallery trenches. Always believe in making things roomy below ground," the Major explained, "so that the men do not get any suggestion of being cramped." So we entered a fine, high, and broad gallery, lit by the holes that were opened at intervals along it and used as firing-steps. My guide chuckled as he came to a point where it was rather dark. He stopped before more manholes filled with barbed wire. On the firing-step a soldier was carefully handling his tin of stew. This was a mantrap—a small hole and a thin crust of earth and wide pit—prepared against the rushing of the position, one of dozens that were all round the front as a protecting screen.

It was rather a difficult matter getting round the galleries as the afternoon wore on, for the men had commenced their meals. They gathered in small groups, some one always on guard for his comrades. Rifles were ready, standing by the wall. It was not exactly a solemn meal, for plenty of curses accompanied the passing of some "clumsy devil" that knocked down earth into a tin of tea. The trenches were remarkably sweet. The Major drew one's attention to the fact with justifiable pride.

Of the Turks that were entrenched on the other side of the ridge one saw nothing. Through a periscope you could make out their earthworks. One stumbles on adventure in the firing-line. I was without my guide, proceeding along a trench, when I was advised it was not worth while. Quite recently it cut a Turkish trench, and now only a sandbag parapet divided the two lines. It really was not worth occupying, except when there was a fight on. It was too deadly a position for either side to remain long in!

How the line twisted! Turning back along an angle, I found we had got back again into the gully—the Valley of Despair I have heard it called—only much higher up. There was an interesting little group of men round a shaft. Major Ross explained: "Trying to get their own water supply. Down about 80 feet. Yes, all old miners. The Tasmanians have done most of this tunnelling work: must have dug out thousands of tons of earth. Perfectly wonderful chaps they are. Dug themselves to a shadow, and still fought like hell. Me thin? Oh, it does me good walking about these hills; I can't sit in a dugout." A messenger came up from the signal office. "You must excuse me. I have to go back to B. 11" (a junction of a trench and sap), and he dived into the trenches again.

Imagine, now, you have begun walking back along the firing-line, going from the extreme right to the left. Already two sections have been passed. Had you continued along from the last gallery trenches, you would have come out into the section opposite the Lone Pine trenches of the Turks. The enemy here was a more discreet distance of 80 to 200 yards away across a broad plateau. The ridge was higher at this point, and one might look back through a periscope (with great care) from certain sharp-angled look-out posts, raised slightly, according to the conformation of the ground, above the level of the ordinary trenches, down the back of the ridge, and on to the positions one had just left. They call this spot "The Pimple." Some of the posts were the observation posts for artillery, others for special sentry posts. As Lone Pine will form the subject of a separate chapter, the trenches will not be elaborated here. Sufficient to say that here, too, were gallery trenches, but lower and darker and less roomy; but, nevertheless, absolutely effective either for defensive or offensive purposes. You reached them by climbing to the end of Artillery Lane up through Browne's Dip.

It was on the second day that along this roadway the guns were dragged into the firing-line, when Major Bessell-Browne had a battery right on the crest of the ridge almost in the firing-line (the guns were actually in the infantry trenches for a time), until the Turks made it too warm for them. Now, this hilltop, which lay just behind the position held by the 1st Infantry Brigade and to the south-east of White Gully, was bare of any infantry trenches. It was, moreover, covered with furze and holly bushes. The trenches had been advanced to the edge of the plateau, on the other side of which the Turkish lines ran. With Colonel Johnston, Brigadier of the Victorian Artillery Brigade, I had climbed up here one morning to see the gun positions. One passed from Artillery Lane into an extremely narrow trench right amongst some bushes, and found oneself in a snug little position, completely concealed from observation. Out of the midst of these earthworks a gun pointed to the Turkish positions on Pine Ridge, Battleship Hill, and Scrubby Knoll. There was a telescope carefully laid through a loophole, the iron flap of which was discreetly dropped. It swept the Turkish ridges closely. A sergeant was in a "possy" (the soldier's term for his position in the firing-line and dugout) watching a party of Turks digging. He could just see their spades come up in the air. It was believed that they were making emplacements for new guns. Colonel Johnston let the enemy nearly finish and then blew them and their earthworks to pieces. It was what he called "stirring up a stunt," for not long after, sure enough, as he anticipated, the Turks commenced to reply, and shells began dropping in front of and over this post as the Turks searched for our guns. These little artillery duels lasted about half an hour, and when ammunition was plentiful (the daily limit was fixed for many weeks at two shells a day unless anything special occurred) two or three "stunts" might occur during a day. Sometimes word would come down from the infantry trenches that Turks were passing in certain gullies or could be seen working up on to Battleship Hill or up the side of Baby 700, and the guns would be laid accordingly. It would be difficult to estimate the number of targets that had been registered by the active artillerymen. They had them all tabulated, and could train their guns on to any spot during a night alarm in a moment. For from some point or other good views could be obtained of the Turkish positions: not in detail, of course, but sufficient, with the knowledge that aeroplane sketches and reconnaissance provided (Major Myles was one of the most successful of the artillery officers who went observing from the hangars at Tenedos), to cause great havoc amongst the Turkish supports and reserves.

But such shelling, whatever damage was done, never prevented the Turks from digging new firing-lines and communication and reserve trenches. Their industry in this respect was even greater than the Australians', who moved whole hills or honeycombed them with galleries until you might expect that a real heavy burst of shells or a downpour of rain would cause them to collapse. The Turks had mobilized digging battalions, units in which men who had conscientious objections to bear arms (many of them farmers) used to work. This was how Pine Ridge became such a huge mass of enemy trenches. Why, there were secret saps and ways all along from Kojadere right to Gaba Tepe Point. But sometimes the Turks were caught napping, as when the Australians captured an advanced spur or knoll on the plateau that gave a glimpse down a gully (for the other side of the plateau that sloped away down to Kojadere was just as cut by ravines as was the Anzac side), and after a few days' quiet preparations—the Turks being ignorant of our new advantage—our machine guns swept backwards and forwards along it, while the artillery drove the Turks into this hail of lead with shrapnel and high explosives.

With Colonel Johnston I went farther back towards the seashore along the back of one of the spurs, and round Majors Phillips', Caddy's, Burgess's guns, well dug into deep pits protected by solid banks of earth, covered with natural growth of bushes. It seemed to me unless a direct hit was obtained there was little chance of their being destroyed. Space was conserved in every way so as to leave as little opening as possible; magazines were dug into the cliff and dugouts as well. Yet several guns were knocked out. There was one gun crew amongst whom a shell had burst. Two men had been killed outright, and others badly wounded. When the stretcher-bearers rushed into the gun-pit they found a dying man trying to open the breech of the gun to load. His strength failed, and he fell back dead in a comrade's arms. Those men thought only of the gun and their mates after that explosion.

Little gaps occurred in the Anzac front where two gullies met on the razor-back crest of the hill. One was at the head of Wanliss Gully, between the 4th Battalion of the 1st Brigade and the 5th Battalion, holding the section opposite the German Officers' Trench. Here the crest of the hill had been so worn away, and the head of the gully was so steep, that no trenches could be connected. As a result, all the protection that could be given was to bend back the trenches on either side down the hill, and establish strong posts and make entanglements from side to side of the gully. It was a source of intense anxiety to Colonel Wanliss (commanding 5th Battalion), who was early responsible for its protection.

The 2nd Infantry Brigade held the section of trenches going to Quinn's Post during the greater part of four months: held them sometimes lightly, sometimes in great strength. Opposite were the Turks' most elaborate works, designated "German Officers' Trench" and "Johnston's Jolly." These series of Turkish trenches varied from 20 to 80 yards from the Australian lines. The origin of their names is interesting. German officers had been seen in the trench that bears their name, which offered sufficient reason, as there were not a great number of Hun officers on the peninsula. The other series of trenches had presented to Colonel Johnston's mind a good target, on which he always said he would have a "jolly good time" if his guns had only been howitzers and able to reach them, which, with his 18-pounders, he could not. The Turks had used huge beams many feet in thickness to fortify these trenches along this sector of the line. Probably it was because it led directly to the heart of the enemy's position (Mule Gully was beyond and Kojadere) that such measures were taken. No artillery bombardment had had much effect on these trenches. One day—it illustrates the spirit of the Turkish army—a Turkish officer was seen directing the erection of some overhead cover down a communication trench behind this position. A burst of shell had warned him that he was observed, and bullets from machine guns played round him. He paid little attention, and went on with the directing of his job. When complete it was blown down, and continued to be blown down as fast as it was constructed, until the Turks had to give it up in despair. That brave officer directing the operations, was killed.

Opposite the left front of "German Officers' Trench" came Steel's Post, and next to Steel's, Courtney's Post, both called after officers of the 4th Infantry Brigade, whose regiments had held the positions in the first awful fortnight's fighting. Really they might be more aptly termed by the number of the regiment—14th Battalion—and the fine men who composed it. The Turks' line drew very close at this point. A gully cut into the plateau from the Anzac side and formed the "Bloody Angle." On the north of it was Pope's Hill, and on the south was Quinn's—the famous post cleft in the hillside—a concave position, at the heart of which the Turkish rifles pointed from the north and south, for it was from the night of the landing a savage thorn pressed in their side. But the history of these posts needs a special chapter. By them Anzac held or fell.

Early I said Anzac was divided into two halves by Shrapnel Gully—the southern has just been travelled over. There remains to describe only those trenches that lay north of Shrapnel and Monash Gully, on the Nek, and back along Russell Top, the northern section of the famous position. It was mostly a New Zealand position; for New Zealanders and Maoris were largely responsible for its defence till the 3rd Light Horse Brigade, under General Hughes, took it over. Approached from the beach, the cliffs of Russell Top rise almost precipitously. The New Zealanders, mounted and dismounted troops, had had to set to work to cut a road up the face of this cliff to the top of the ridge. It was the isolated nature of the position—until a way was cut down the slopes into Monash Gully to the very foot of the hill—that caused so much difficulty in moving troops, and was responsible for more than one delay in getting men to required posts at given times. Russell's Top might be best described as the end of the main Sari Bair ridge. Southward from the ridge, and almost at right angles to it, ran the spur commencing with Plugge's Plateau, that formed the first ridge (Maclagan's ridge) stormed by the Australians. It overhung Anzac Cove. Incidentally it was the second line of our defence, the triangle within the triangle, and on it were the hastily formed trenches that the Australians had dug during the 25th, 26th, and 27th April, lest the Turkish attempts to "drive them into the sea" proved successful. Guns were hauled up these ridges by hundreds of men, just as the Italians were doing on the Gorizia front. Had this last position been carried the guns could never have been got away. They might certainly have been tumbled down into the gullies below and spiked.

Russell Top itself was a short section or series of trenches grouped on either side of the ridge, and ending at the Nek. They faced roughly north and south. They commanded Anzac position to the south, and all the series of our works described in the early part of the chapter. On the north they dominated (the impossibility of getting very heavy artillery right along the ridge, owing to its precipitous and exposed nature, limited severely that command) all the series of foothills that led up to Chunak Bair and Koja Chemin Tepe. In this direction short, sharp spurs, covered with dense bushes and undergrowth, branched out from the Sari Bair ridge. To name them, starting from the beach: The first in our possession was Walker's Ridge, and then Happy Valley, then Turks' Point, then Snipers' Nest, where the Turks had command of the beach to good effect, and from which it was found impossible, though many stealthy attacks were made and the destroyers plastered the spur with shell, to dislodge them. Beyond, stern above all these crooked steep hilltops, was Rhododendron Ridge. Now, just after Turks' Point the ridge narrowed and formed the Nek. I do not think it was more than 160 yards wide at the utmost, just a thin strip of land, with sheer gullies protecting it on either flank. From here, too, the Sari Bair ridge began to slope up, rising rapidly to Baby 700, Battleship Hill, Chunak Bair. Immediately in front of the Nek, adjacent to the head of Monash Gully, were the terrible Chessboard Trenches, so named because the newly dug exposed earth where the trenches ran, lay in almost exact squares across the ridge from one side to the other, like a chessboard.

The New Zealand trenches (afterwards manned by Australian Light Horse) were about 80 yards from the enemy's lines, though the Turks occupied somewhat higher ground, and consequently looked down on to our trenches. But such was the superiority of fire that our troops had obtained, that the enemy were never able to take full advantage of this position. To hold these few acres of ground against fearful attacks cost hundreds of lives. The trenches were mostly sandbagged, the earth being too crumbling to hold against the searching fire of "75's" which the Turks (they had captured them in the Balkan War from the Serbians) had, together with Krupp artillery. Our machine guns commanded Snipers' Nest and the angle of Rhododendron Ridge where it joined the main ridge. Traverses, therefore, became nothing but huge pillars of sand. The work entailed in keeping them clear and intact was very heavy indeed. A number of trench mortars concealed round the crown of Russell Top strengthened our position; while on the north flank many trenches existed amongst the undergrowth which the Turks were ignorant of. Still, through the possession of this ridge we had been able to fling out outpost stations along the beach towards Suvla Bay, and dig the sap which eventually was the connecting link with Anzac in the great operations at Suvla Bay on 7th August. But the Nek itself the Turks had mined and we had countermined, till beneath the narrow space between the trenches, was a series of mine tunnels with gaping craters above.

Only once had the Turks attempted an attack across this Nek, as I have described, but they so strengthened their position (and it was comparatively easy, owing to the configuration of the ground) that they were here probably more, what the Australians called "uppish and cheeky" than in any other part of the line. One day, while I was standing talking with General Hughes, a message weighted with a stone was flung at our feet from the enemy's line. It looked like a pamphlet. It was written in Turkish, and when taken to the interpreter's quarters and transcribed, proved to be Turkish boasts published in Constantinople.

Round the flank of our trenches was a favourite way for deserters to come in, which they did on many occasions. Once on a dark night the sentries were startled to hear a voice speaking even more perfect English, and certainly more correct, than one was accustomed to hear in the trenches, saying: "Will you please tell your men to cease firing, as I want to surrender?" Of course, the situation was rather difficult, as the Turks were fond of ruses, but eventually an Armenian officer jumped over the parapet and gave himself up. And very useful he proved, with the information he brought and gave during subsequent operations. But most difficult problem of all on this high plateau-top was the maintenance of supplies; not only of food and water, but of munitions. It was forty minutes' terrible climb to the top from the beach—a climb that needed every muscle strong to accomplish, even lightly laden. To fortify the position as it had been, was a magnificent achievement, and could only have been done by troops with the hearts of lions and the spirit of the Norsemen of old.

It might have been thought in the face of such difficulties, with the fevers of the Mediterranean eating into their bodies, that the spirit of the army would have failed. On the contrary, the Australasians accepted the position just as it was, bad as it was: the sweltering heat and the short rations of water; the terrible fatigues, absent from campaigns in other theatres of the war zone; and, above all, the constant exposure to shell fire and rifle fire week after week and month after month. But the spirit of the trenches was buoyant and reflective without becoming pessimistic. The men were heartily sick of inaction. They rejoiced in the prospects of a battle. It was the inertia that killed.