Transcriber's Note
"Books of Topical Interest" has been moved to the end of this ebook
Trooper Bluegum
at the
Dardanelles
DESCRIPTIVE NARRATIVES OF THE
MORE DESPERATE ENGAGEMENTS
ON THE GALLIPOLI PENINSULA
By
OLIVER HOGUE
(Second Light Horse Brigade)
Preface by the Hon. J. A. Hogue
"When cannons are roaring and bullets are flying,
The lad that seeks honour must never fear dying."
SECOND EDITION
LONDON: ANDREW MELROSE, LTD
3 YORK STREET, COVENT GARDEN, W.C
Printed June 1916
Reprinted August 1916
DEDICATED
TO
ALL THE BRAVES
Who fought for Australia and the Empire in the
GREAT WAR;
The Dead who yet live,
And the Living who bear their Battle scars
upon them, or, scatheless, thank God for
His Mercy.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The Author desires to thank the Proprietors of the Sydney Morning Herald for permission to incorporate in this book the "Trooper Bluegum" articles which originally appeared in that journal, and the Proprietors of the Passing Show for permission to reprint the verses "Anzac," by "Argent." He desires to thank many friends in Australia, previously unknown to him, for kind letters sent to him whilst fighting (and writing) in the trenches on Gallipoli; and also that little band of Red Cross workers in country towns of New South Wales who, in appreciation of his stories from the Front, knitted him socks and Balaclava caps and scarves to ward off the winter winds. Especially does he desire to thank his esteemed colleague on the Herald, Mr. Farmer Whyte, for valuable assistance, generously rendered, in the preparation and arrangement of the contents of this book for publication in their present form.
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PREFACE
Among the legacies, good and evil, tragic and inspiring, which the Great War of Nations is destined to hand down to posterity, one of the most valuable and permanent in its influence will be the Literature which this Armageddon will have brought forth. In that fountain of knowledge the world will have command of vast stores of intellectual treasure—History, Poetry, the Drama, Philosophy, Fiction—which will continue to fascinate, to appal, to instruct, so long as books are read and the crimes, the virtues, the calamities and follies of mankind are subjects of human interest.
Such a literature, sanctified by the blood of millions of heroes—the world's best manhood—and by sacrifices and sufferings that have literally staggered humanity, will comprehend and crystallize events, compared with which all former world-cataclysms will seem but passing ripples on the ocean of life.
While in its inception and progress this greatest breach of the world's peace has exhibited a section of mankind as hardly at all removed from fiends incarnate, it has also shown men inspired by the highest virtues and striving for the loftiest ideals; and it has produced women only a little lower than the angels. Thus we seem to see, in all its naked deformities as well as in its beauty and majesty, the very soul of nations.
Not to "the future historian," but to whole battalions of historians will it fall to relate the tragic story of this mighty conflict, to pass judgment on the guilty authors of it, while giving to valour and the champions of right their due. They will have ample material to work upon, and they should have little difficulty in sifting out from the mass of evidence before them that which is true from that which is false, certainly as to the real instigators of the rupture.
As to the conduct and prosecution of this war of big battles, the fighting over (and under) thousands of miles of land and ocean, and in the air, the work of the armies of war correspondents has been, on the whole, worthy of the highest traditions of that dangerous class of literary work. In many respects it has even surpassed that of the great war chroniclers of the past, from Russell and Forbes onwards, who have shed lustre on British and foreign journalism. The old race of war correspondents has passed away, but their spirit survives. A new school has been founded. They who graduate in it must accommodate themselves to new conditions of warfare, wherein the Censor plays his part.
To the work of these writers the historians of the war will be largely indebted for their material in relating the operations of the opposing hosts. The private letters of soldiers throw a clear light on minor phases of the engagements in which they took part. These provide intensely interesting reading, too often of a painfully absorbing kind, their authors the eyewitnesses of and actors in the scenes they describe.
The "Trooper Bluegum" contributions to the literature of the war were written for and have appeared in the Sydney Morning Herald. They are the work of a Sydney native, a trained journalist, who for the time gave up a responsible position on the literary staff of that journal to enlist as a trooper and serve at the front. As a military writer his reputation had been well on in the making when General Sir Ian Hamilton, a few years ago, came to Australia to inspect the Commonwealth Forces. Here came his chance as a military critic and descriptive writer on training operations. For his insight into the manœuvres and sham fight engagements of our troops, and his descriptions in the Sydney Morning Herald of the important movements under Sir Ian Hamilton's observation, the future "Trooper Bluegum" earned the special commendation of that distinguished British General. From the rank of trooper the author of these sketches speedily rose in the service, obtained a commission, and, as Second Lieutenant, was chosen orderly to Colonel (afterwards Brigadier-General) Ryrie, Commander of the Second Light Horse Brigade. Soon after landing at the scene of operations at Gallipoli, he was promoted to First Lieutenant.
It was just before Christmas, close on five months after war was declared, that the Expeditionary Force which included General Ryrie's Brigade sailed from Sydney. Nearly the whole of Trooper Bluegum's descriptions of the operations in the Anzac sphere were written in dugouts between intervals of the fighting, often with shells screaming overhead, shrapnel bursting, and bullets flying about him.
A feature of the descriptions in this book is the clear light thrown on the rollicking yet unconquerable spirit of the Australian soldier in action, on his never-failing good humour and love of fun even in the face of death in any form, his amenableness to discipline, his cheerful, patient endurance of hardship, and his fine contempt of danger whenever and wherever confronting him. Here is seen the Australian (his New Zealand brother in all respects his exact prototype) in the full integrity of his young manhood.
Whence came these qualities in a branch of an immortal race bred to peaceful pursuits? The
This book is a narrative, with sidelights and commentary, of the operations of the Australian Imperial Expeditionary Forces, from the training encampment at Holdsworthy to the time when, chastened but still unconquered, the heroic band of Australians, or rather the remnant that was left of them, returned from Anzac after the most glorious failure in the annals of war.
J. A. HOGUE.
Sydney,
December, 1915.
CONTENTS
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
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CHAPTER I
A SOLDIER OF THE KING
RIDING TESTS—THE SOLDIER'S OATH—SIR IAN HAMILTON—MOUNTED PARADE—BUSHMEN AND CITY MEN ON TRIAL—LIGHT HORSE WAR SONG
"Trooper Bluegum, you're next."
I stepped forward. A hundred volunteers had been marched down from Victoria Barracks, Sydney, and were undergoing the riding test prior to being drafted into the Australian Light Horse.
"Mount and ride," said the sergeant.
I leaped on the bare back of a hog-maned colt. Three other candidates were already mounted waiting for the signal. One was a Sydney "bushman" and was obviously nervous. The other two were bushmen from Riverina and the Hunter River and they grinned confidently.
"Cross this flat," continued the sergeant; "leap the bog, jump the sod wall, gallop to that marker, and return."
Some fool orderly gave my mount a crack over the back with a rope and away we galloped. The flat was easy, though I had not ridden bare-backed for some time. The bog offered no resistance and we leaped the sod wall neck and neck. Then the horses wanted to bolt and they took some stopping. Anyhow, the first half of the test was safely through.
The Sydney bushman was looking more at ease. The others grinned expansively. "That's dead easy," said the man from Narrandera. "Call that a riding test?"
The return signal was given, and the quartette started off. All went well till the water jump loomed ahead. Here half a dozen yelling orderlies were posted to spur on the chargers to the leap. The three bushmen cleared the obstacle with hardly a splash, but disaster was in store for the City bushman. Right on the brink the horse stopped dead and the hapless rider was shot with catapultic force head first into the bog, amid roars of merriment from the assembled army. We three countrymen "passed," were promptly marshalled with the horsemen, and marched to the doctor's for medical examination. The City bushman was sent to "the gravel-crushers."
In a huge marquee in Rosebery Park were a score of virile young Australians stripped for the fray. Sun-tanned bushmen they were for the most part, lean and wiry, with muscles rippling over their naked shoulders. Splendid specimens—strong but not too heavy, rarely topping thirteen stone, for all the heavier men had been sent to the infantry. But these were ideal Light Horsemen.
"Bluegum forward."
I stood, and the sergeant ran the tape over me: Weight, 11 stone; height, 5 feet ten; chest, 37, expanded 41; age 34; beauty spots and identification marks, none; eyes, brown; hair, brown; religion, Presbyterian.
Then the doctor got busy; tapping here, sounding there, finally with a word of approval sending me over to the sight specialist. There was a jumble of letters of various sizes set before me, and finally, with a score of others satisfactory in wind and limb, I was sent on to the adjutant. My name, age, occupation, next-of-kin, and other essential details were recorded. Then we were lined up to swear allegiance.
On the flat the volunteers were still doing the riding test, with hundreds of onlookers keenly enjoying it. Each time some luckless aspirant for fame and glory was precipitated into the bog the crowd roared with delight, and when he emerged, mud-bespattered and crestfallen, the hilarity of the bushmen knew no bounds. Pointed advice was hurled at the failures, and they were urged to join the "gravel-crushers," which most of them did.
For a couple of hours the fun continued, and with the end of the day another hundred rough-riders were drawn up, passed and enlisted ready for anything and everything. One by one we went forward and took the oath.
The sun was just setting over the western rim of dear old Sydney town when my turn came. The clouds were all gold and rose and amethyst, and the whole scene was as peaceful as could be. The First Light Horse Regiment—in fine fettle, ready at a moment's notice to sail for Europe—cantering gaily back to camp, reminded us that the nation was in a state of war, that the empire was engaged in a life and death struggle, and that on the issue of the great conflict depended the fate of Australia. And we of the Sixth Regiment were to make good the "wastage of war."
So, solemnly, I kissed the Book and swore this oath:
I was a Soldier of the King!
Once more we were lined up and marched away to the quartermaster. Each man was given a waterproof sheet, a pair of blankets, a knife, fork, spoon, tin plate, and pannikin. We were to form part of the Second Light Horse Brigade, and being minus tents we were relegated to the stables. We raided the straw store, made beds, and lay upon them.
It was not ours to go with the first lot of heroes to take part in the Great War. Most of us had waited till the Germans got within cannon shot of Paris. Then we "butted in." We were selected to supply the wastage—that was all. If we could not be the first in the firing-line, it was something to know that we would take the place of the men who were killed or wounded—all of us, the man from Narrandera, in Riverina, the man from Hunter River, the men from out-back everywhere, Trooper Bluegum among them, all whistling merrily "Soldiers of the King, my Boys!"
We of the Light Horse started with many things in our favour. We reckoned we could ride as well as, if not better than, any body of men in the world, for we could ride almost as soon as we could walk. Also, we were pretty good shots. Many were Rifle Club men. All had done a bit of shooting in the bush, for dingoes and kangaroos and wallabies are not yet extinct in Australia. So half of our lesson was learned before we started. The drill and the discipline only remained. We did not mind the drill, but the discipline was irksome.
It is a recognized flaw in our military make-up, this want of discipline. Sir Ian Hamilton, when he visited Australia in 1914, found the colonial compulsory trainees much more amenable to discipline than he expected. But the militia are caught young. We of the Expeditionary Force were a little bit too old to rid ourselves readily of the habits of the bush, and adapt ourselves to the rigid routine of military life. But perhaps it would come in time.
It is a strange world, my masters! I have before me as I write a copy of a Sydney newspaper, dated May 21, 1914, giving the report and recommendations made by General Sir Ian Hamilton in Australia, and it is headed "If War Came." And there I read of the Australian Infantry: "I have now seen the greater portion of the Australian Infantry, and I wish very much I could transplant 10,000 of these young soldiers to Salisbury Plain. They would do the croakers good and make them less frightened of other nations, who have no overseas children getting ready to lend them a hand. The majority of the non-commissioned officers and men are still very young, but they are full of intelligence and grit. On at least two occasions I have seen brigades tested severely, once by heat and heavy marching, the other time by floods and mud. In each case the men made light of their trying experiences, treating them as an excellent joke."
It was of the same men that the same man was to write but a few short months afterwards: "They have created for themselves an imperishable record of military virtue."
But it is a long, long way to ——. Day after day we performed the tiresome evolutions of troop and squadron drill on foot, for the horses were not yet ready. We mastered the mysteries of sections right, form troop, form squadron column; then day after day we engaged in rifle drill—"stand at ease," "attention," "slope arms," "present arms," till our arms ached. Then we fixed our bayonets, and in fancy bayoneted thousands of "kultured" Germans.
But it was not till the horses came that we really felt like Light Horsemen.
Or the blue waves' rippling laughter;
Let the soldier sing of the sabre swing
And the laurels of glory after;
A charm in the battle's thunder,
But sweeter than those the bushman knows
Is the bound of a good horse under.
It was not child's play tackling those horses. Some of the kind-hearted station folk in the backblocks had sent down some wild warrigals of the West; bucking brumbies that beat the band; old outlaws off the grass that the station hands could never master. But Colonel Cox ("Fighting Charlie" we called him) had in his command some of the crack rough-riders of Australia. And it was a joy to see these men tackle the outlaws. There were Crouch of Wagga, McDonald of Barrington, Whiteley of Wellington, Bullock of Melbourne, Sievewright of Gunnedah, Kennedy of Gloucester, Rex Moffatt of Goulburn, Harry Heath of Moree, and a score of others. Nearly every man in the regiment could sit a buck, or puff nonchalantly at his pipe while his mount pigrooted merrily. So when the wild horses were led forth there were hundreds volunteering for the honour of riding the rebels. One after another the horses were saddled up, and while the regiment cheered itself hoarse, there was enacted again and again the old-time struggle for mastery. There were plunging and reefing and rooting and sidling and rearing and bucking, as the panting chargers swung this way and that in vain endeavour to dislodge the riders. But the bush boys stuck to the saddles as the Old Man of the Sea stuck to Sindbad the Sailor, and one after another the bucking brumbies were broken and led away.
Then came the first mounted parade. A squadron of Scots Greys or Life Guards might have kept better line; they might probably have wheeled with more order and precision for each troop here had a few half-broken colts prancing and dancing all over the shop, but—well, somebody said that these troops would compare favourably with any body of mounted infantry in the world. Certain it is that when, one fine day, the officer commanding, Colonel Cox, accompanied by the Brigadier, Colonel Ryrie, made a careful inspection of the whole regiment, every one from the officer commanding down was satisfied. And certain it is that we sang the Australian Light Horse war song with unusual enthusiasm—
Let's sing another song,
Sing it with a spirit
That will send the troops along;
Sing it as we'll sing it
When we're twenty thousand strong,
When we go marching through Germany!
Hurrah! Hurrah! the A.L.H. are we!
We're rounding up the bushmen from the
Darling to the sea
And we'll go marching through Germany!
When they heard the joyful sound,
"'Fighting Charlie's' going to lead,
Australia wants another batch
Of bushmen to astound
Poor old Kaiser Bill of Germany!"
CHAPTER II
WE SAIL AWAY
CEYLON MISSED—LAND-HO—AT ADEN—BAKSHEESH—"THE TRANSPORT TRUMPETER"—A LITERARY COINCIDENCE—ON HISTORIC GROUND—THE PYRAMIDS—PAST AND PRESENT—AN EGYPTIAN HANDKERCHIEF—MA'ADI.
"Who's the Jonah?" That was mild.
"Curse our luck!" That was moderate.
But when Trooper Newman said, "To hell with the ship!" most of us felt that he showed a proper appreciation of the position.
For days and days we had ploughed our way across the Indian Ocean, and, as the long leagues in front joined their comrades behind, we felt that we were getting farther and farther from sunny New South Wales. But we were steering straight for Ceylon, and looking forward with keen anticipation to a few days of the picturesque Orient. Some of the impressionable young subalterns were singing "Cingalee, Cingalee, I have lost my heart to a Cingalee." All of us for the last day or two had been taking station on the forecastle-head, shading our eyes and gazing into the misty horizon for the first glimpse of the enchanted isle.
But alas for hopes unfulfilled! Ceylon's spicy breezes, after all, were not to fan our fevered brows, neither were Cingalese to minister to our need with "tea in the morning, tea in the evening, tea in the afternoon." Early in the morning of January 12 we got word that a special squadron of three ships was to be detached from the main fleet, and with Colonel Ryrie in command, steam straight to Aden. So we stood on deck and swore unrestrainedly.
However, there was still corn in Egypt, and we would be the first to get there. Besides, there was quite a chance that there was something doing—a Dervish expedition or an Arab raid might be on, and we would have the laugh at the other chaps if we could have first smack at the unspeakable Turk. So by the time the bugle sounded for the usual inspection, we were all in high good humour again. The three liners swung out from the convoy and, cheering a farewell, were soon steaming westward. One after another the transports dipped down under the horizon, and soon a few grey smudges on the rim of the ocean were all that remained to remind us of the fleet.
We had seen no land since leaving Australia. It seemed such a long time. So when, a couple of days later, somebody shouted "Land-ho," we rushed to the nearest post of advantage. Far away to eastward, like a green pimple on the blue face of the waters, was a tiny little island. In an hour we were abreast of it—Minikoi, surely one of the islands of the blessed; how green it looked after the everlasting blue of the Indian Ocean; from end to end it was covered with cocoa-nut palm. A long line of snow-white surf beat upon the sandy shore. Gleaming in the tropical sun was the lighthouse—a silent sentinel. And in the offing were a score of picturesque canoes, and dhows, with brown hempen sails, managed by gaudily-dressed islanders, who seemed rather annoyed that the transports did not stop and purchase their fruit-offerings.
Passing by the rugged Socotra, we soon sighted the mountainous southern coast of Arabia, and by midday on January 20 we were focussing our binoculars on the picturesque gate of the Indian Ocean, Aden. Curious it is how Britain has secured all the great strategical points of the world—Gibraltar, Suez, Aden, Singapore, Thursday Island, the Cape of Good Hope, and the rest. And one has only to see Aden, with its rocky peaks piercing the skyline, to realize how strong it is, and how futile would be any effort to capture it. For all the defences of Aden seem to be hewn out of solid granite.
No sooner had we got anchored in the harbour than the Suevic was surrounded by swarms of boats, in which were crowded Asiatics of all descriptions yelling like demons in wild anxiety to sell their wares. Then the colliers came alongside and proceeded to coal. Scores of thin, undersized, but wiry Arabs did the work, and as they loaded the bunkers they kept up a perpetual yelling and singing, and the weird cacophony lasted all through the night.
Aden is a curious mixture of the Orient and the Occident. In the streets silent Arabs stalk along with camels, and Europeans buzz around in automobiles. One section of the port belongs to the Asiatics; the other is all Western. Arab dhows float across the harbour and steam tugs scurry hither and yon. One section of the town has thatched roofs; the other is all galvanized iron. And one of the natives sang us "Songs of Araby." They yelled harshly for baksheesh all the while. Clad in their own coloured loin cloths, or in discarded khaki tunics from the Force, they were a motley tatterdemalion crowd. Here East and West met—but did not mingle.
We had had no word of news for weeks. So we eagerly searched for the newspapers, and demanded news of the outer world. The war was still on. The Allies were more than holding their own. Here was news indeed!—news such as The Transport Trumpeter (published aboard the Suevic) had never heard of. Yet we loved that little paper of ours on the transport—"a little thing, but our own." If it lacked news it did not lack reporters whose imagination made up for the deficiency. We were all reporters for The Transport Trumpeter. Even I. And I am wondering to this day about a certain curious coincidence connected with one of my painstaking efforts. I wrote on December 28, 1914, a skit on Lissauer's "Hymn of Hate," and Arthur Adam's reply to it—"My Friend, Remember." A month later I got the Sydney Bulletin, and there I saw almost exactly the same article with the same excerpts from each poem. They were probably written on the same day, a thousand miles or so apart. You who delve into the mysterious, will you explain?
Egypt! What memories! What life here! What a quest we have set out upon! What Alexanders are we!
I feel the blood coursing through my veins as I have never felt it before. I live in the present, but the past stands up before me. Dead kings and emperors pass in endless succession. Libyans and Ethiopians pass by, Assyrians and Macedonians, Babylonians and Persians, Romans, Arabs, Turks and Mamelukes—and French and British. Great names are sprinkled over the pages of Egypt, from Menes, the first king, and Rameses the Second, down to the present day. Nebuchadnezzar and Alexander the Great, Constantine, Saladin and Napoleon, Mohammed Ali and Kitchener have all left their mark on the Nile Delta. What history! and here are we—soldiers of King George V, from Australia—treading this historic ground, making new history. Nebuchadnezzar knew us not. Constantine never dreamed—and they used to dream dreams in those days—that from a land he knew not of would one day come armed men marching on the wonderful city he built.
Nor did I, nor did any of us, know it—well, not yet.
I know what it means to see the blush clouds beating the night shades back in the van of a golden morning, but there is a quality of richness about the sunrises of Egypt that Australia lacks. Egypt has the glint of gold, the cloud ridges of rosy red, the blaze of amethyst and opal. So also has the Australian sky. But Australia has no pyramids. The first beams of the sun in this land tip the cones of the age-old
Then, as the Pyramids of Gizeh were due west from Ma'adi, we always saw these giant triangles sharply silhouetted against the red horizon. They looked like little toy tents, yet when alongside them their magnitude staggered us.
The day was so hot that helmets were necessary. Some "went down" under the fierce rays of the sun, but there were some with us who said it was not hot at all. They spoke of the sun-baked Western Plains. They spoke of Bourke. They spoke of Northern Queensland. But they wore helmets, nevertheless.
Yet was Ma'adi, for all its heat, a joy to the senses. If we had the everlasting desert wilderness on one side, we also had the oasis of Ma'adi on the other. The irrigationist has caused the desert hereabout to blossom as the rose, and Ma'adi is like an English village, with gracious gardens and green, luscious fields and rippling canals.
I have spoken of the blue of the desert haze that is like that of the Blue Mountains. And here and there one finds other touches of old Australia. I went out one day to Sir Alexander Baird's beautiful mansion near Zeitoun, and there I saw some fine old gums and wattles; and it just felt like home.
And the people, how kind they all were! Even the shopkeepers did all they could to make us feel at home. "Special Australian Shop," "Australian Soldiers' Rendezvous"—signs like these met us at every turn. Especially grateful did we feel for the warning one Cairo shopkeeper gave us: "Don't go elsewhere to be cheated, Australians. Come here!" Nor shall we ever forget the laborious days and nights which that shopkeeper who put out the sign must have spent in mastering our language—"English and French spoken; Australian understood."
Truth to tell, the Australian soldiers were as a shower of gold to the thirsty Cairo traders. They all loved the Australians. We scattered money far and wide—till we had none left. We threw piastres to the winds—thinking nothing of them, they were such little coins—till we had none left. From morning till night we distributed largess. It was baksheesh everywhere and all the time. Whichever way we turned we found somebody dangling something in front of our eyes—ready to sacrifice it for our sake. Even Trooper Newman, who previously had expressed his best wishes to the ship, comes up to me with a gaudy handkerchief he has just bought for ten piastres. It has King George in one corner, Kitchener in another, French in another, Jellicoe in another, and generals and admirals and dukes and earls all round it. "It may be the only chance I'll get," says he, "of poking my nose into high society."