Scarecrow Army by Leon Davidson

Author:Leon Davidson [Davidson, Leon]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781925126594
Publisher: Walker Books Australia
Published: 2015-03-14T16:00:00+00:00

Private Pete Walden

STALEMATE, JUNE TO JULY 1915

On 25 May, a German submarine torpedoed the British battleship Triumph. It keeled over, smoke billowing into the sky as other boats tried to rescue the crew and hunt the U-boat. Almost all the fighting in the trenches stopped as the Triumph sank. The Anzacs had felt protected by the Triumph, so much so that they wanted to be docked a month’s pay to have the ship refloated. But the damage had already been done. The rest of the British fleet was removed to the safety of Imbros harbour and was only used when needed. The men felt less protected now.

By June, the Anzacs were bored looking at their clay walls and even the new reinforcements were sick of the war. Most of their battles were now against flies and lice — they could go days without firing a rifle, let alone seeing a Turk. There were no major attacks planned, the weeks of tunnelling were getting nowhere and no one could see an end to the fighting. Most were now sure they’d be at Gallipoli until they died or were wounded badly enough to be sent home. Men took the deaths of friends and others around them in their stride. Few cried — they knew they’d never stop if they started.

The men always tried to make the most of their bad situation. John Skinner, of the Otago Infantry Battalion, used to shoot at a flock of vultures that flew over every morning. He never hit one but it made him happy just to see them change course. The soldiers made friends with tortoises that occasionally slept in their dugouts, searched Turkish bodies for souvenirs and watched the bi-planes fly over. They’d follow each bomb the pilots dropped and cheer as they exploded on the Turkish trenches. But many men feared the long metal darts dropped by the German planes. They were designed to go through a soldier’s head down into their body but just about every time they were dropped, they landed on their sides. The men started cheering themselves up by taken out their frustrations on the Turks.

At night they waved flares in front of their bayonets to make the Turks think they were about to attack. Once, some Australians asked them how many would eat a can of bully beef and when the answer came back that many could, they threw a bully beef bomb over and yelled, “Well share that among you.” Some of the New Zealanders kept themselves busy painting “Turkish delight, distribution free!” on their artillery shells before firing them at the Turks.

If there was a quiet moment, the men played chess, waved entrenching tools to let the Turks know their bullets had missed, and played poker, gambling with matches. They even arranged a shooting duel between an Australian and Turkish soldier, but a Turk who didn’t know about the duel shot the Australian. At Lone Pine, the Australians held up a piece of metal and laid bets on which side a sniper’s bullet would hit it.

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