"I want you to convey to every man in the battalion that I consider that the safety of the right flank of the British section depended entirely on their staunchness after the disastrous day, November 1st. Those of them that were left have made history, and I can never thank them enough for the way in which they recovered themselves, and showed to the enemy that Irish Guards must be reckoned with, however hard hit."
"I want you to convey to every man in the battalion that I consider that the safety of the right flank of the British section depended entirely on their staunchness after the disastrous day, November 1st. Those of them that were left have made history, and I can never thank them enough for the way in which they recovered themselves, and showed to the enemy that Irish Guards must be reckoned with, however hard hit."
Lord Cavan, in a report dated November 7th, further states:—"On October 31st, November 1st and 6th, the Irish Guards lost 16 officers and 597 other ranks in disputing 200 yards of ground with superior forces." Private Stephen Shaughnessy supplies an account of the incidents of November 6th, when the Irish Guards were overwhelmed. He says:—"At this time the enemy's strength was two to one. We endeavoured to hold the enemy by machine-guns and rifle fire, until they succeeded in penetrating the French line about two or three miles on our right, and managed to come behind our rear line." Then he gives an instance of the desperate duels that were fought between the slowly retiring Irish and the hotly pressing Germans. "While retreating," he says, "Captain King-Harman was the only officer I saw alive. He was then standing up and firing with his revolver on the Germans, who were only 60 yards away. I, or anyone else in our battalion, did not see him alive afterwards." He adds:—"The only comrade I found within reasonable distance was Private Birmingham, of Clonmel, formerly of the Royal Irish Constabulary. We discussed the situation. He got over the trench to fall back to the troops reforming in our rear. As I was getting out of the trench, a rifle bullet came through my great coat, penetrated my cardigan jacket without touching my body. We formed up again, and were reinforced by the Life Guards, notwithstanding whichwe were unable to regain our lost territory. When darkness came, we were brought back a mile behind the line for a rest and refreshments. The roll was called, and only 47 of the battalion answered."
The worst was over; and Sir John French indirectly, at least, extols the Irish Guards for helping to avert a disaster, by his praise of their Brigade Commander, Lord Cavan. In his despatch on the Battle of Ypres-Armentières, the Field-Marshal says:—"The First Corps Commander (Sir Douglas Haig) informs me that on many occasions Brigadier-General the Earl of Cavan, commanding the 4th Guards Brigade, was conspicuous for the skill, coolness, and courage with which he led his troops, and for the successful manner in which he dealt with many critical situations."
Another Irish regiment to obtain one of these rare and therefore much coveted recognitions by a Commander of an Army Corps was the Royal Irish Rifles, who were fighting round the village of Neuve Chapelle, to the south, from October 25th to October 27th. "During an attack on the 7th Infantry Brigade," runs an order issued by Sir H. Smith-Dorrien, the Commander of the 2nd Corps, "the enemy came to close quarters with the Royal Irish Rifles, who repulsed them with great gallantry with the bayonet. The Commander wishes to compliment the regiment on its splendid feat, and directs that all battalions shall be informed of the circumstances of his high appreciation of the gallantry displayed." On October 27th the Germans gained possession of the northern part of the village, but towards evening the British had partially recovered the lost ground when fresh hostile reinforcements were brought up, and the entire village was captured by the enemy. The Germans would have made a bigger advance were it not for the gallant stand of the Irish Rifles against overwhelming odds.
A sergeant of the battalion supplies some details of the feat:—"One morning after we had had several days of awful shelling in the trenches the Germans came to attack us. They advanced into view through the rain and mist, and though they were ten times our strength we held our ground until the necessary dispositions could be made in other parts of the field to withstand their onslaught." As will be seen from many an incident in the course of this narrative the Irish fight best when it comes to the real crisis—the two antagonists engaged in close and relentless contest, man to man and bayonet to bayonet. At first it was furious smithing, gleaming thrust and parry, stab and hack, hack and stab, with the Irish in the trenches and the Germans above; and, in the end, it was the Germans running away and the Irish speeding their departure with rifle fire. "We did not think there was anything very wonderful about what we did," says the sergeant modestly, "but everyone went wild about it. One staff officer said we ought all to have two Victoria Crosses each, and we had the satisfaction of being splendidly praised by the General in Command."
"Nothing," says Napier in his "Peninsular War," "so startled the French soldiery as the wild yell with which the Irish regiments sprang to the charge." We are also told by Napier that at Barrosa and Bussaco the heroes of Marengo and Austerlitz reeled before the thunder shout ofFaugh-a-Ballagh("Clear the Way") raised by the Royal Irish Fusiliers and the Connaught Rangers. What is more likely is that the French gave way before the irresistible bayonet charge that swept like a flame in the thunder of that haughty battle-cry. The Great War shows that both these historic regiments maintain the ancient tradition of raising a wild, terrific yell when they dash forward, a yell which sends the creeps down the back, and impels the foeirresistibly to turn and fly for fear of what is to follow.
The Irish Fusiliers were the first to enter Armentières (on the occasion that the Leinsters impetuously pushed forward to Premesque), and they did so shouting their old Irish slogan,Faugh-a-Ballagh, and enforcing it by driving the enemy from their positions behind every tree and at every turn on the road leading into the town. Private H. Dawson, a West port boy in the 1st Connaught Rangers, tells how a company of the battalion frightened a big force of Germans out of their trenches, and out of their senses also, no doubt, by the blood-curdling yells they gave vent to as they advanced with the bayonet. It was on the night of November 4th, 1914, in the neighbourhood of Neuve Chapelle. The company was ordered to attack the German trenches, two platoons to do the fighting and the two others to follow after with shovels, to fill in the trenches, if they were taken. "At midnight," writes Private Dawson, "we moved forward with such cheers, shouts, and cries that the Germans, thinking that a whole brigade was advancing, evacuated the trenches and fled. The moon was shining, and when the Germans afterwards saw the handful of men that routed them they returned in greatly increased numbers and made a murderous onslaught on us."
They can sing, too, as they advance, these Connaught Rangers, as Private Robert McGregor of the Gordon Highlanders relates in a graphic letter to his father at Parkhead, Scotland. On December 26th, 1914, the Germans attacked the trenches in front of them at a particular point. The Gordons who held the trenches got out to meet the enemy as they came on in the open. There was a close fight with varying fortunes, but the Germans were reinforced, and as there were only about 170 of the Gordons left it seemed as if they were bound to be annihilated.
"But just at that moment," writes Private McGregor, "we heard the sound of singing, and the song was 'God Save Ireland.' It was the Connaught Rangers coming to our relief. Well, I have seen some reckless Irishmen in my time, but nothing to match the recklessness and daring of these gallant Rangers. They took the Germans on the left flank. The Germans now probably numbered about 2,000 against 800 Connaughts and 170 of us, but were they 50,000 I don't believe in my soul they could have stood before the Irish. The Connaughts simply were irresistible, and all the time they kept singing 'God Save Ireland.' One huge red-haired son of Erin having broken his rifle got possession of a German officer's sword, and everything that came in the way of this giant went down. I thought of Wallace. Four hundred and seventy Huns were killed and wounded, and we took 70 prisoners. Had it not been for the Irish I wouldn't be writing this, and when it comes to a hand-to-hand job there is nothing in the whole British Army to approach them. God save Ireland and Irishmen."
Many a desperate engagement has been fought from Ypres in the north to La Bassée in the south. Neuve Chapelle, St. Eloi, St. Julien, Festubert, Givenchy, Hooge—to mention a few of them—are places that will stand for all time in history as the scenes of most bloody and tragical battles. They do not all spell British victories; but every vowel of them represents British bravery, suffering, endurance, resolution; and linked with them in enduring fame are the Dublins, Munsters, Inniskillings, Leinsters, Connaughts, Irish Fusiliers, Irish Rifles, and the Irish Regiment. An Irish battalion of another kind makes a splendid entry into the history of the war at this stage—the Liverpool Irish. They all had to face the new and most infamous methods of fighting introduced by the Germans, clouds of asphyxiating gas and sheets of liquid fire, the opening, literally, of "the mouth of hell" in warfare. But these horrors were encountered and overcome by the Irish battalions with the same valour as had previously rendered vain the more legitimate weapons and methods of the enemy.
Neuve Chapelle is a rural village, with many enclosed gardens and orchards, four miles to the north of La Bassée, and on the road between Bethune and Armentières. Fierce engagements for its possession were fought in October and November, 1914. The Germans were driven out of it on October 16th. It was retaken by them at the beginning of November; and though strongly entrenched and barricaded by the enemy it was finally captured by the British on March 11th and 12th, 1915.
The 2nd Royal Irish Rifles took part in the severe fighting around the village at the end of October, 1914, and, as I have already stated, were highly praised by Smith-Dorrien for their valiancy in holding up a big German attack. They lost heavily on that occasion, but their dead were avenged by the help the battalion gave in inflicting so serious a defeat upon the enemy as the victorious reoccupation of Neuve Chapelle. The first glimpse we got of the Royal Irish Rifles in the battle is in a letter written by an officer of a battalion which was closely co-operating with them, Captain and Adjutant E.H. Impey, of the 2nd Lincoln Regiment. "The Irish Rifles came through us," he says, referring to proceedings on March 10th, "and we cheered them lustily. Lieutenant Graham was rallying his men round him with a French newsboy's horn, giving a 'view-hallo' occasionally just as a master collects his pack."
Captain Impey states that on the next day, March 11th, the Lincolns were ordered to support the Irish Rifles, "Owing to some mistake," he says, "the Irish Rifles attacked before their time, and so got no artillery support. They lost very heavily in officers and men." It was on this day that the battalion suffered the grievous loss of their commanding officer, Lieut.-Colonel George Brenton Laurie. On the firstday Colonel Laurie seemed to have had a charmed life. "He deliberately walked up and down, giving orders and cheering the men on amid a flood of fire," says Sergeant-Major Miller of the battalion. "He seemed unconscious of the fact that a great bombardment was taking place. It was a wonderful sight to see him there, his big military figure standing out boldly in presence of his soldiers." Colonel Laurie was killed by the terrific shell fire which the Germans poured on the advancing British. "It was brutal. We were lying in a wood. The bullets were whistling over us in millions, and the screeching of the shells was terrific," says Bugler Jack Leathem in a letter to his mother at Downpatrick. "The trees were flying about like chaff and the fellows getting blown to pieces. I do not know how some of us escaped. Someone must have been praying for us. You know I am not very nervous, but I was not sorry when it was over. It was four very hard days, fighting both day and night, with no sleep and no trenches to protect us, only the ones we dug ourselves with our entrenching tools. They saved us from the bullets, but it was impossible to get out of shell-fire."
"You would hardly credit it," adds Bugler Leathem, "but every time we lay down to take cover out came our pipes and 'fags.' You would have thought we were on a manœuvre parade at home instead of in one of the fiercest of battles." This was the spirit that brought the battalion to Neuve Chapelle. About one o'clock in the afternoon of March 11th the 2nd Lincolns proceeded up the road into the village, or, as Captain Impey says, "the ruins of what was once a very pretty village," and found the Irish Rifles there before them. "We lay in support in this village," Captain Impey writes, "while the Irish Rifles fought the enemy in front. A companywas sent in close support just behind them along a hedge."
One of the most interesting documents relating to the Irish regiments in the war is a letter written by Father Francis Gleeson, chaplain of the 2nd Munster Fusiliers. In it he states that each of the four companies of the 2nd Munsters carries a green flag with a golden harp in the corner, the Royal Tiger in the centre, and "Munster" inscribed underneath. "The Irish flags are being highly honoured," he says. "The French people are awfully kind to and fond of the Munsters, because they are so Irish and Catholic. It is really true to say that in us, the 'Munsters,' they recognise the children of the men who fought for them at Fontenoy and Landen. They know that we are old, old friends, indeed. Their histories tell of Ireland's brave sons having died for their country here." Moved by these memories of the Irish Catholic Brigade in the service of France from the fall of the Stuarts in England until the fall of the Bourbons in France—and regularly recruited for a hundred years from Ireland—the French people recognise the distinct and separate nationality of the Irish regiments. "We are 'Les Irlandais,' and not 'Les Anglais'" says Father Gleeson. "Our flags have done that." "The French priests are very fond of us," he goes on to relate, "and give us the use of their beautiful chapels. The people wept after the Munsters the other day when we left a village where we were billeted for a rest." He proudly adds, "On all sides the Munsters are being congratulated for their magnificent behaviour. This is due to the men's faith! They are the best conducted battalion of all the Armies engaged in this world-war, because they are the most Irish, the most Catholic, and the most pure."
The 2nd Munsters have been in the thick of thefighting ever since the outbreak of war. Of the men who landed in France in August, 1914, there are but few survivors. The bones of many are mouldering in the soil of France and Flanders. Others are prisoners at Limburg-an-Lahn in Germany, captured in the rearguard actions during the retreat from Mons. The gaps in the ranks have been filled up by other lads from Limerick, Cork, Kerry and Clare. Always uncertain are the chances of life, but how strange and fantastic they sometimes appear! Who of these boys ever imagined in 1914 that within a year they would be serving in the British Army, much less fighting against Germany on the Continent? Fresh from the towns and villages of Munster, and new to soldiering and warfare, their racial qualities were put to the test at Rue de Bois, close to Neuve Chapelle, on Sunday, May 9th, 1915, when the Third Infantry Brigade were ordered to attack the trenches that had been held by the Germans since October. The story of the fight brings out the services of the chaplain of the battalion; and the sustaining courage which the men derive from their religious observances and their green flags, the embodiment of that ancient Irish inspiration—"Faith and Fatherland." I have compiled my narrative from the accounts written by Mrs. Victor Rickard, widow of Colonel Rickard, the officer in command of the regiment, who was killed gallantly leading his men on that memorable day; and Sergeant-Major T.J. Leahy, of Monkstown, Co. Cork, who took part in the engagement. It is worthy of note that Sergeant-Major Leahy, in an earlier letter, mentions that he served Mass for the chaplain, and was known to Father Gleeson as his "altar boy." He corroborates what Father Gleeson has written of the high moral conduct of the battalion by saying, "Prayers more than anything else console me, and every fellow is the same, sothe war has been the cause of making us almost an army of saints."
In his description of the battle, Sergeant-Major Leahy states that on the preceding day, Saturday, May 8th, close on 800 men received Holy Communion at the hands of Father Gleeson, and wrote their names and home addresses in their hymn books. When evening came the regiment moved up to take their places in the trenches in front of Rue de Bois. "At the entrance to Rue de Bois," writes Mrs. Rickard, "there stands a broken shrine, and within the shrine a crucifix. When the Munsters came up the road, Major Rickard halted the battalion. The men were ranged in three sides of a square, their green flags—a gift from Lady Gordon—placed before each company. Father Gleeson mounted, Colonel Rickard and Captain Filgate, the Adjutant, on their chargers, were in the centre, and in that wonderful twilight Father Gleeson gave a General Absolution." Sergeant-Major Leahy supplies other particulars of that moving scene. "On the lonely, dark roadside," he says, "lit up now and then by flashes from our own or German flares, rose to heaven the voices of 800 men, singing that glorious hymn, 'Hail, Queen of Heaven.' There were no ribald jests or courage buoyed up with alcohol; none of the fanciful pictures which imagination conjures up of soldiers going to a desperate charge. No, there were brave hearts without fear; only hoping that God would bring them through, and if the end—well, only a little shortened of the allotted span. Every man had his rosary out, reciting the prayers, in response to Father Gleeson, just as if at the Confraternity at home, instead of having to face death in a thousand hideous forms the following morning." He mentions also that after the religious service Father Gleeson went down the ranks, saying words of comfort; bidding good-bye to the officers, andtelling the men to keep up the honour of the regiment.
At dawn the German position was bombarded for seven minutes in order to cut gaps in the barbed-wire entanglements through which the Munsters might pass to the enemy's trenches. Then, as Sergeant-Major Leahy relates, the order was given by the officers—"Are you ready, lads?" "Yes," came the response. "Then over the parapet, like one man, leaped 800 forms, the four green company flags leading." The intervening plain measured three hundred yards. It was swept by the close-range fire of the Germans, like rain from thunder-clouds. Hundreds of the Munsters fell in the charge; but "The green flag was raised on the parapet of the main German trench, and in they went," says Sergeant-Major Leahy. Mrs. Rickard states that the regiments on the left and right, being unable to get near the line where the Munsters were fighting, the position became that of a forlorn hope; and the battalion was ordered to retire. "You were the only battalion attacking to penetrate and storm the German trenches, although under a hellish fire," said the Commander of the Brigade, subsequently addressing the Munsters. "You have added another laurel to your noble deeds during the present campaign. I am proud to command such a gallant regiment." "So the Munsters came back after their day's work," writes Mrs. Rickard; "they formed up in the Rue de Bois, numbering 200 men and three officers." "It seems almost superfluous to make any further comment," she adds. Father Gleeson was in the trenches during the answering bombardment by the Germans. "It was terrible," said Private Danaher; "houses, trees, and bodies flying in the air. Still, Father Gleeson stuck to his post attending to the dying Munsters, and shells dropping all around him. Indeed,if anyone has earned the V.C., Father Gleeson has. He is a credit to the country he hails from, and has brought luck to the Munsters since he joined them."
The Liverpool Irish leaped into fame and glory at the first chance afforded them. That was at Festubert on June 16th, 1915. The battalion, then in reserve, was rushed up to the trenches. A big surprise movement by the French was arranged for that night, and the Liverpool Irish were to create a diversion by an assault on the enemy's trenches that fronted them, so as to attract reinforcements to the spot in the hope that the lines to be attacked by the French, away to the right, might thereby be weakened. It was what used to be called "a forlorn hope" in ancient warfare, such as the storming of a breach, from which the chance of a safe return was small, but which, if it did no other good, would weaken the arm of the enemy in encountering the main onslaught.
The detachment of the Liverpool Irish selected for this desperate enterprise had an ideal leader in Captain Herbert Finegan, dashing, combative, and resolute. The son of the late Dr. J.H. Finegan, a well-known Irish physician in Liverpool, he was educated at Stonyhurst, had a brilliant career at Liverpool University, and, with his uncommon gifts of mind and tongue, seemed destined for distinction in the law courts and the House of Commons, when war broke out and diverted him to a wholly different arena of activity. He was given charge of the attack. His company was the first over the parapets. "Come on, Irish. Show them what we can do!" he cried in his impetuous way as he thrust forward his head menacingly towards the German lines. When the men were out of the trenches, a sergeant of the companyexclaimed, "It's sure death, boys, but remember we are Irish." He was immediately blown to bits. The Germans, seeing the movement, met it by scourging the advancing lines with shell fire.
Lord Wolseley has said that almost every officer who has led a storming party across the open in full view of the enemy would acknowledge that his one anxiety from first to last was, "Will my men follow me?" Captain Finegan had no misgiving of the kind. He did not need to look over his shoulder to see if his men had rallied to his cry. They pressed round him as he ran across the open, these Liverpool Irish, most of whom had never seen Ireland, and yet were as eager to maintain her reputation for valour as the Irish Guards, the Munsters, the Dublins, or the Connaught Rangers, born and reared at home. Capt. Finegan was shot dead at the edge of the German trenches. Fired by this example, the men pressed onward, and did not stop or stay even when they had done what they had set out to do. "It was a job to make them come back when we got the order to retire," said one of the officers.
The forlorn hope had unexpectedly blossomed into a victory. The Liverpool Irish took a German trench for themselves, along with helping the French to make a rapid advance which resulted in the capture of three miles of trenches of the enemy's lines. They got congratulations on their achievement from the commander, Sir Henry Rawlinson. Many of them shared the fate of their gallant leader. It was a fate that Capt. Finegan had anticipated. "I will either go home with the Victoria Cross, or stay here with a wooden one," he once remarked to Sergeant MacCabe, of his company.
At Festubert also the 2nd Inniskilling Fusiliers carried through with complete success an enterprisenotable for wild daring and stern valour. One attack on the German trenches had failed. The ground between the opposing lines was strewn with the British dead. A second attack was ordered under cover of darkness. The 2nd Inniskillings were to lead the van in the principal sector. In spite of the pitchy blackness of the night, it was certain that the German machine-guns and rifles would take heavy toll before their trenches were reached. But the Inniskillings mix brains with their bravery. So soon as night fell, about 8 p.m., they crept over the parapet, one by one, and squirmed on their stomachs towards the German lines. Slowly and painfully they crawled through a sea of mud, from dead man to dead man, lying quite still whenever a star-shell lighted up that intervening stretch of 200 yards. By this method, platoon after platoon spread itself over the corpse-strewn field, until the leading files were within a few yards of the German trenches.
Then came the hardest task of all—to lie shoulder to shoulder with the dead until at midnight a flare gave the signal, "Up and into the German trenches." But the Inniskillings held on with steady nerves through all the alarums of the night. Occasionally bullets whistled across the waste, and some who had imitated death needed to pretend no longer. But the toll was not heavy. At least it was infinitesimal by comparison with the cost of an open tumultuous charge from their own trenches. When at last the flash blazed up the leading platoons were in the German trenches before the enemy had time to lift their rifles. The Inniskillings caught the Germans in many cases actually asleep. Many of the grey-coats woke up just in time to find British bayonets at their throats. The entire force was confused and demoralised by thissudden appearance in their trenches of khaki and the deadly bayonet, and were quickly overthrown. The Inniskillings paid less for the capture of the first and second lines of trenches than they might have done by an open attack for the first alone. They made it possible for the whole Division to sweep on and to score a victory where another Division had previously found defeat.
The most terrific thing in the bombardment of the southern end of Gallipoli by the British Fleet, from the Ægean Sea, on Sunday morning, April 25th, 1915, was the roar of theQueen Elizabeth—the mammoth vessel of the Navy and armed with the mightiest guns—sending forth at each bellow and flash a ton of high explosives. It inspired awe and dread to the uttermost, that concentration of fire from all the ships of the Fleet. What living being, or work of nature or man, could survive it? Those on the ships who were searching the peninsula with the most powerful telescopes could see no sign of life. Houses and walls disappeared, and clouds of sand and earth and smoke arose where the Turks were supposed to be entrenched. There was no reply to the cannonade, not even the crack of a rifle.
The allied Fleets of England and France had failed to batter open the gates of the Dardanelles from the sea in March; and now there was to be an attempt to invade Gallipoli by making a number of separate but simultaneous landings of British troops on thesouthern and western sides of the peninsula. The object was to seize the Turkish positions defending the Straits, which was to be followed, if all went well, by an advance to Constantinople by both land and sea, and the dictation of terms to the paralysed Ottoman Empire at St. Sophia. English, Scottish, Australian, New Zealand, and Indian troops, as well as Irish, were engaged in this grand enterprise. They all acquitted themselves nobly, especially the Lancashire regiments, with their very large Irish element; and the Dominion forces, in which Ireland was also well represented; but to the Irish regiments was allotted what proved to be the most desperate part of the invasion, as will be found fully admitted in the official despatches of Sir Ian Hamilton in command of the Army and Admiral de Robeck of the Navy. The British troops consisted of the 29th Division under Major-General Hunter-Weston. In it were battalions of three Irish regiments, 1st Dublin Fusiliers, 1st Munster Fusiliers, and 1st Inniskilling Fusiliers. They had been brought from India and Burma to England at the outbreak of the war, and having rested for some months in the Midlands, around Coventry, left Avonmouth for the Near East on St. Patrick's Day, 1915.
Along this western side of Gallipoli, washed by the Ægean Sea, the yellow cliffs of sandstone and clay, clothed in scrub, seem to rise, in an undeviating line, clear out of the waters to a height of from two to three hundred feet. But there are points where the line is really shoved back, as it were, and here and there, at these places, flat semicircles of sand lie between the water and the base of the cliffs. It was on half a dozen of these small beaches that the troops were to be landed under the cover of the bombardment by the Fleet. The Dublins and the Munsters were to land at "Beach V" immediately below the castle andvillage of Sedd-el-Bahr, strongest of the Turkish positions.
In this particular landing very remarkable use was made of a steamer called theRiver Clyde, turned into a troopship. She had about 2,500 troops on board, all Munsters and Dublins, save two companies of the Hampshire Regiment, who formed part of the same brigade, the 86th. So closely packed were the men that they could scarcely move. The plan was to run her ashore, full steam ahead, and when she was beached the troops were to emerge through openings cut in her sides, on the lower deck, and passing down narrow gangways make a dash for the shore over a bridge to be formed of some lighters which accompanied her. TheRiver Clydewas beached about 400 yards from the castle of Sedd-el-Bahr, which rose above the high ground to the right; and the bridge of lighters was also successfully run in towards the shore from the gangways jutting from the improvised doors in the port and starboard bow of the vessel.
While the preparations were in progress three companies of the Dublins were being brought ashore in open boats drawn by steam pinnaces, five or six boats in each tow, and over thirty men in every boat. No sign had yet been given that any of the enemy were about on the cliffs and hills, shrouded by the dust and smoke caused by the shells of the Fleet; and it looked almost as if the landing would be unopposed. But the enemy were there in their thousands, lying low with rifles and machine-guns. The Turks have shown on many a field of old their fine fighting qualities. They had been trained in all the newest tricks of warfare by German officers. They were animated also by two of the most powerful emotions—defence of their native land against unbelieving dogs of Christians; and the firm conviction that death in such a cause was but the opening of the gates to thesensuous delights of Paradise. So they were biding their time, and the hour for action struck when the boats crowded with the Dublins were about twenty yards from the shore. The furious reception they gave to the landing parties was astounding, having regard to the terrific preliminary bombardment by the Fleet which had lasted several hours. The Turks were as ready for the invaders as if the explosives of theQueen Elizabethhad gone wide of the mark, or else as if she had contented herself with pelting the entrenchments with boiled potatoes or roasted apples.
The scene of the landing was, in configuration, like an amphitheatre with the beach as a stage. The beach itself is a strip of powdery sand about three hundred yards long and ten or twelve yards wide. Behind it is a steep rising ground of sandstone and clay grown with prickly scrub. Sir Ian Hamilton calls it a "death trap." He could not have given it an uglier nor yet a truer name. Barbed wire entanglements were cunningly concealed in the shallows of the foreshore. The Turks were posted with artillery on the heights, and had sharpshooters and also machine-guns ensconced in holes made in the face of the cliff less than a dozen yards from the sea.
When the picket-boats, or steam pinnaces, got to within two hundred yards of the shore they cast off; and the cutters, with the Dublins, continued on their way towards a narrow strip of rock jutting out from the beach, which made a natural landing-place. Then it was that the Turks concentrated upon the boats a most destructive fire of rifles, and machine-guns from the amphitheatre, and shrapnel from the fort at Sedd-el-Bahr. The attacking party was practically wiped out. Only a few passed through this tornado of lead unscathed. Colonel Rooth, of the Dublins, theAdjutant, Captain Higginson, and the chaplain, Father Finn, were killed. Sergeant J. Colgan, who was in the boat with these officers, says:—"Only six of us got away alive out of a boat-load of thirty-two. One fellow's brains were shot into my mouth as I was shouting to them to jump for it. I dived into the sea. Then came the job to swim with my pack, and one leg useless. I managed to pull out the knife and cut the straps and swim ashore. All the time bullets were ripping around me." Here is another individual experience supplied by a private of the Dublins:—"I jumped into the sea with my gun, and made towards the shore. When I got up on the rocky place I had my first bullet in the side. I felt as if I was struck with an iron bar in the back. It knocked me down. I put up my right hand to my head with the pain, when I got a bullet through that also. I had thus two narrow escapes. The first bullet just missed my lung and spine; it made a big hole in my back. The second one just missed my head."
Extremely rare were such miraculous deliverances from death. Many of the Dublins who got safely out of the boats and attempted to swim or wade to the shore were entangled in the barbed wire and drowned. The few who reached the shore crawled on their stomachs, or ran, reeling and staggering, to the shelter of a narrow ridge of sand, about four feet high, which fortunately stretched across the beach not far from the cliff. Most of the boats were destroyed. Others, with their ghastly loads of dying and dead, drifted out to sea, where they were picked up by the Fleet. An officer of the Dublins who was in one of these boats says:—"Shrapnel burst above our heads and before I knew where I was I was covered with dead men. Not knowing they were dead, I was roaring at them to let me up, for I thought I was drowning. The guns still played on us till we gotback to a mine-sweeper. I was simply saturated all over with blood, and I could feel the hot blood all over me all the way across. When they pulled these poor fellows off me they were all dead, and the poor fellows under me were dead also. The boat was awful to look at, full of blood and water."
Meanwhile the landing of the Munsters from theRiver Clydewas about to commence. Three of the lighters were placed in position to serve as a pier from the vessel to the shore. They covered but a part of the distance. Then out of the holes cut in the sides of the steamer were thrust wooden gangways leading to the lighters.
The Munsters caught glimpses from the lower deck of the appalling scenes of tumult and slaughter attending the landing of the Dublins. They saw the boats drifting by loaded with the mangled bodies of their fellow-countrymen. They saw corpses floating on the sea. They saw the waters, as smooth as glass, turned from blue to crimson. As the Dublins set out for the shore they cannot have had any adequate conception of the withering tempest of lead that awaited them. The Munsters witnessed the whole horrid tragedy. The task before them was every whit as desperate, and fearsome, and knowledge of its nature added to its terrors. It was enough to make the blood curdle in the veins, and fear to clutch at the heart with an icy grip. Man clings to life tenaciously. Many of these hitherto gay and irresponsible young Munsters had become very serious, and their eyes had a deep, inward look as if they were pondering over some great thing. Were they sad for their shattered dreams of a safe return to Ireland; and of a peaceful home life with a girl of blue eyes, red lips, and black hair as its alluring central figure? An officer passed among them saying, "Our time has come, boys, and we must not falter. Remember weare Munsters; and, above all, remember Ireland." The men were thrilled by this double appeal to pride in their gallant regiment and love for their dear native land. At the words their spirits mounted high. So that when it was discovered that one of the gangways had been shot away by a shell, and a delay was suggested in order to see if it could not be rigged up again, and one of the officers stepped forward, and shouted, "Volunteers for the first dash," there was an instant response, "We are ready, sir." I am told one of the Munsters made the racy reply:—"Let us at them, sir; sure it's as aisy a job as we can strike." It is the way of the Irish to make light of troubles. "There's nothing so bad but it could be worse," runs one of their sayings. They will seek to pluck contentment from the most desperate of situations.
The officer stepped through the hole on to the gangway, with the men pressing close behind him. At the moment the bullets were rattling like diabolic hailstones against the steel sides by which the hull of the vessel were strengthened. What happened then is graphically described by Private Timothy Buckley, of Macroom, County Cork. Lying wounded in a military hospital in England, he said:—
"The captain of my company asked for 200 volunteers, and as I was in his company I volunteered. We got ready inside on the deck, and opened the buckles of our equipment, so that every man might have a chance of saving himself if he fell into the water. He gave the order to fix bayonets when we should get ashore. He then led the way, but fell immediately at the foot of the gangway. The next man jumped over him, and kept going until he fell on the pontoon bridge. Altogether 149 men were killed outright and 30 wounded. I was about the twenty-seventh man out. I stood counting them as they were going through. It was then I thought of peaceful Macroom, and wondered if I should ever see it again. When my turn came I was wiser than some of my comrades. The moment I stood on the gangway I jumped over the rope on to the pontoon. Two more did the same, and I was alreadyflat on the bridge. Those two chaps were at each side of me, but not for long, as the shrapnel was bursting all around. I was talking to the chap on my left, and saw a lump of lead enter his temple. I turned to the chap on my right. His name was Fitzgerald. He was from Cork, but soon he was over the border. The one piece of shrapnel had done the job for the two."
"The captain of my company asked for 200 volunteers, and as I was in his company I volunteered. We got ready inside on the deck, and opened the buckles of our equipment, so that every man might have a chance of saving himself if he fell into the water. He gave the order to fix bayonets when we should get ashore. He then led the way, but fell immediately at the foot of the gangway. The next man jumped over him, and kept going until he fell on the pontoon bridge. Altogether 149 men were killed outright and 30 wounded. I was about the twenty-seventh man out. I stood counting them as they were going through. It was then I thought of peaceful Macroom, and wondered if I should ever see it again. When my turn came I was wiser than some of my comrades. The moment I stood on the gangway I jumped over the rope on to the pontoon. Two more did the same, and I was alreadyflat on the bridge. Those two chaps were at each side of me, but not for long, as the shrapnel was bursting all around. I was talking to the chap on my left, and saw a lump of lead enter his temple. I turned to the chap on my right. His name was Fitzgerald. He was from Cork, but soon he was over the border. The one piece of shrapnel had done the job for the two."
Thus men in khaki poured out of the side of theRiver Clydeand raced down the gangway or jumped from it at once on to the first lighter. Two men out of every three fell. The commanding officer of the Munsters, Colonel Monck-Mason, was wounded and put out of action early in the proceedings. Soon the first and second lighters were piled high with wounded and dead, twisted into all sorts of horrid shapes, and the men who escaped being instantly shot were to be seen stepping and jumping and even walking over the bodies of their fallen comrades. Many of these flung up their arms, spun round, and, with a cry of agony, went splash into the sea never to rise again. Then the horrors of the situation were added to by a most unfortunate mishap. The lighter nearest to the beach gave way in the current and drifted backward into deep water. The men in it jumped out in the hope of being able to swim and wade to the shore. Most of them were drowned by the weight of their equipment. But the Munsters never quailed. All the time they continued emerging from theRiver Clyde, in an unbroken stream, two men out of every three still dropping on the gangway or on the bridge, and the survivors still pressing forward with their faces dauntlessly set for the land. Those who got to the shore rushed to join the Dublins under the scanty cover afforded by the low sandy escarpment. The first of the Munsters to gain the beach was Sergeant Patrick Ryan. He swam ashore in his full kit; and got the Distinguished Conduct Medal for "showingunder heavy fire the greatest coolness and powers of leadership."
Mr. H.W. Nivenson, one of the newspaper correspondents with the Mediterranean Expeditionary Force, mentioned in a lecture on the operations which he delivered in London, that he and others saw the landing through their glasses from a ship some miles out at sea. One of the party, seeing the men who had landed dropping on the beach, and not understanding the tragic nature of the scene, remarked to Mr. Nivenson: "Why are our men resting?" The beach was, in fact, strewn with maimed men, or men on whose sufferings the oblivion of death had mercifully fallen. Pinnaces which had towed the boats of the Dublins hung about picking up the dead and wounded from the sea, and members of their crews heroically landed on the beach to carry off the disabled living. Officers and bluejackets suffered death while engaged on this work of mercy. Consequently most of the wounded could only be removed when it was dark. They lay on the beach all day, in the hot sand under the broiling sun, in agonies of pain and thirst, till nine o'clock at night. Surgeon Barrett, of the Royal Navy, a Cork man, who was on theRiver Clyde, says:—"I had some of the wounded back on board—chaps whom I had seen half an hour before well and strong—now wrecks for life. It was awful. They were very cheery and dying to be back again at the Turks. It was very strange. I would see a poor chap dying, and asking him where he came from, the answer would be 'Blarney Street, Cork'; another 'Main Street,' and one poor sergeant, who had five bayonet wounds in his stomach, came from 'Warren's Place.' He died that night, and was cheery to the last. They are fine fellows, and won the admiration of everyone." Surgeon Peter Burrows, R.N., another Irishman, though severely wounded, remained on theRiver Clydeuntil April 27th, succouring the injured. He attended to 750 disabled men while suffering great pain himself, and being quite incapable of walking during the last twenty-four hours of his continuous duty. The Distinguished Service Order was given to Surgeon Burrows.
Altogether more than 1,000 men had left theRiver Clydeby 11 o'clock in the morning. Two-thirds of them had been shot dead, drowned, or wounded. The landing was then discontinued. It was resumed under the shelter of darkness, when, strange to say, the 1,000 men remaining on theRiver Clydegot ashore without a single casualty. In fact not a shot was fired against them. But before they were landed a night attack was made by the Turks on the remnants of the Dublins and Munsters crouching on the beach under the protection of the bank. Lieutenant Henry Desmond O'Hara, of the Dublins, took command, all the senior officers having been killed and wounded. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Order and promoted to be captain for his initiative and resource in restoring the line when it had been broken by the Turks, and organising a successful counter-attack which caused great loss to the enemy. Captain O'Hara died soon afterwards of wounds received in action. He was the only son of Mr. W.J. O'Hara, resident magistrate, Ballincollig, Co. Cork, and a nephew of Dr. O'Hara, Bishop of Cashel.
In the morning an assault was made upon the fort and village on the heights. The Dublins advanced, with the Munsters on their right and the Hampshires on their left. Through the prickly scrub or brushwood of the hill ran three lines of trenches and a network of entanglements made of barbed wire of an unusually strong and vicious kind. Out of these entrenchments the machine-guns poured a devastating stream of lead. To attack such a position seemedalmost to match in madness the landing of the day before. I do not think there is any sound of battle more appalling to the soldier who has to face it than the devil's tattoo of the machine-gun sending forth its six hundred bullets by the minute. "It was up the hill and back again, up and back," writes a Kildare man in the Dublins, "till we began to wonder if the Turks would not drive us into the sea." Lord Wolseley said that one of the most difficult things for an officer to do is to induce a line of men who, during an advance under fire, have found some temporary haven or shelter, or have lain down, perhaps, to take breath, to rise up together and dash forward in a body upon the enemy's position. Here, however, there were deeds of bravery of the highest order. Corporal William Cosgrave got the V.C. for pulling down, single-handed, the posts of the high wire entanglements. In order to give encouragement to his men Sergeant C. Cooney, of the Dublins—afterwards awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal—freely exposed himself in the open, though the Turks were lying within seventy yards of him. This conspicuous contempt of danger had the effect the gallant sergeant desired. The men charged with a daring and fury that swept the Turks out of the trenches, at the point of the bayonet, and had them back in the village by 10 o'clock. In the streets the Irish were held in check for hours and suffered more heavy losses from the fire of the Turks strongly posted and concealed in the ruins of the houses. But at noon the final rush was made, and the Munsters and Dublins stood triumphant within the captured fort. Most of the Turks had retired during the last stages of the attack; but in the fort were captured 200 of the enemy with several machine-guns. The first man to enter the fort was a Dublin Fusilier, Private T. Cullen, who got the Distinguished Conduct Medal for conspicuous gallantry.
The landing at "Beach V," Gallipoli, is one of the most terrible and heroic episodes to be found in the annals of the British Army. The Turks and the Germans were amazed at its audacity and mad recklessness. By all the rules of war it was doomed to disastrous failure. Von der Goltz, the German General, who designed the defences, boasted that the landing was impossible. It succeeded because of the unconquerable bravery, determination, and self-sacrifice of the troops. Yet the part taken by the Irish regiments is meanly ignored altogether by Admiral de Robeck, and but scantily recorded by Sir Ian Hamilton. Ten lines to the Dublins; less than twenty to the Munsters! How inadequate and bald the account of the General appears in the light of the full immortal story! But tributes to the magnificent bravery of the Irish have been paid by others. Major-General Hunter-Weston, commanding the 29th Division, made a stirring speech to the 1st Dublin Fusiliers on their relief from the firing line after fifteen days of continuous fighting. "Well done, Blue Caps!" he cried. The Dublins are known as "Blue Caps." During the Indian Mutiny a despatch of Nana Sahib was intercepted in which he referred to those "blue-capped English soldiers that fought like devils." These were the predecessors of the Dublins.
"Well done, Blue Caps!" said General Hunter-Weston, "I now take the first opportunity of thanking you for the good work you have done. You have achieved the impossible. You have done a thing which will live in history. When I first visited this place with other people of importance, we all thought a landing would never be made, but you did it, and therefore the impossibilities were overcome—and it was done by men of real and true British fighting blood. You captured the fort and village on the rightthat were simply swarmed with Turks with machine-guns, also the hill on the left, where the pom-poms were. Also the amphitheatre in front, which was dug line for line with trenches, and from where there came a terrific rifle and machine-gun fire. You are indeed deserving of the highest praise. I am proud to be in command of such a distinguished regiment, and I only hope, when you return to the firing line after this rest (which you have well earned), that you will make even a greater name for yourselves. Well done, the Dubs! Your deeds will live in history for time immortal. Farewell."
Brigadier-General W.B. Marshal, of the 29th Division, writing in November, 1915, to his friend Mr. James O'Regan, Grand Parade, Cork, says:—"I am now one of the very few survivors of those who landed with the 29th Division on April 25th, 1915. Nearly all the rest have been killed, wounded, or invalided, so that I may count myself very lucky after eight months of strenuous work, I should be glad of a change." He adds some very striking passages:—"Though I am an Englishman, I must say the Irish soldiers have fought magnificently. They are the cream of the Army. Ireland may well be proud of her sons. Ireland has done her duty nobly. Irishmen are absolutely indispensable for our final triumph. If I am spared to return at the end of the war I shall make my future home in 'Dear Old Ireland,' which has always had a warm corner in my heart, for in no part of the world have I met more generous, warm-hearted, or braver people than in the Emerald Isle." Trooper Brennan, of the Australian Light Horse, writing from Anzac to his father in Kilkenny, says he received an account of the Landing of the Dublins and Munsters from men of the Royal Scots; and goes on to make this comment:—"Somehow, it's a funny thing how nearly every account of an Irish regiment'sprowess comes from a Scotchman—I remember it was a Highlander who told of the Munsters at Mons. At any rate, I tried to get some particulars from a few of the Dublins and Munsters themselves, and I failed miserably. They were all talking of poor Johnny this and that who got shot, or Paddy something-or-other, or the bad water, or the failure of the rum issue, so I came to the conclusion that an Irishman's fighting is somewhat like his temper or dislikes—no sooner dispensed with than forgotten."
Here, sure enough, is a Scot who was at Gallipoli, and saw the landing, writing in glowing terms of the Irish in a letter published in January, 1916, byThe Tablet, who took it from a Scottish paper:—