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[Page 29]
out to them. Some people blame the troops. I do not, I blame their orders. There is no doubt that this Army Corps of Australian and New Zealand troops is the backbone of the fighting forces in this country and that they rely on us to do all their hard work and we shall still have to do it for them as this position of Sari Bair has got to be taken sooner or later, but I estimate it will take 3 Divisions to accomplish it and they will have to be run by the Army Corps Commanders. It is too much to expect an attenuated Divisional Staff such as ours to run a major operation with 3 Divisions attached to it and no extra help in the way of staff. The medical arrangements for the evacuation of the wounded were best passed over – too scandalous for words. Had I not seen them with my own eyes I would not have believed such things possible at this time of day (this for your private information). Hundreds of men were left on their stretchers on the beach ready to be evacuated to the hospital ship but no means of [indecipherable] and there they remained – some of them 48 hours in the boiling sun and no water and dust up to their necks. Sapper Critchley Salmonson was one of them. Of our 4 Infantry Battalions the Auckland and Wellington bore the honours of the day but still I should not say so as they all were magnificent. Poor old Malone was killed instantly by a shrapnel bullet right through the heart as he stood up in the forward trench with his leading company on Chunuk Bair ridge encouraging his men. His body was never recovered in fact hundreds have never been recovered and still lie on the top of the hill. Bauchop was mortally wounded leading his men in a charge against the Turk positions on what we always called Bauchop Hill. I spoke to him just before he died. He was paralysed below the waist but still as calm as anything. He said to me, "they have done me down but still we got at them". Overton was killed leading the left column but by bad luck the [indecipherable] which followed him missed the way. Had these two mishaps not occurred the whole force would now be on the top of Sari Bair without a doubt. The 5th reinforcements of the Auckland Battalion were absolutely superb. They only arrived on the morning of the 9th and were sent straight up into the firing line where they arrived just in time to save the New Zealand Infantry Divisional headquarters from being scattered. Out of the 150 that went up including Major Hume only 3 survived. It was a marvellous performance on the part of raw men who had not been under fire before. When we were compelled to withdraw from the position we of course had to take up a more contracted front which we still now hold. It is therefore a great improvement on the former one but nothing to what it might have been.