The Great Gallipoli Escape by Jackie French

Author:Jackie French
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2023-02-25T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 10

GETTING READY

A Dug-out Lament

It ain’t the work and it ain’t the Turk

That causes us to swear,

But it’s having to fight at dark midnight

With the things in our underwear.

Today there’s a score — tomorrow lots more

Of these rotters — it ain’t too nice

To sit skin-bare in the keen morning air

Lookin’ for bloomin’ lice . . .

Lance-Corporal A Saxon of the 21st Battalion

The Bran Mash 1915 (published by the 4th Light Horse, Gallipoli)

Thursday 16 December 1915

‘I ain’t going,’ said Wallaby Joe. He didn’t even move from his ‘step’ in the trench, staring at the enemy lines through the periscope.

Nothing had been announced and everybody knew. Neither Lanky nor Nipper had said anything even to Spud or Wallaby Joe. The captain had been right — rumours spread faster than flies at Gallipoli. But it was impossible to keep the evacuation a secret any more, though there were wild guesses about when they were to leave. One week? Five weeks?

Possibly a third of the fighting force had been evacuated now: too many to keep up the pretence that they were just being ‘rested’ at winter waters. More crates of stuff not worth carrying back to the ships were piled in great heaps along the shore to make it look like new supplies were coming in.

Each night the Indian muleteers led their empty mule carts up to the heights above, the wheels creaking as if they were heavily laden on the way up, chains clanking loudly, as if bringing up heavy guns and ammunition.

After a short rest the muleteers oiled the wheels, secured the chains, and led their animals down again, with such skill that not a single hoof beat was heard as they chose the quietest way back down to the beach. Another rest then up to the heights again, once again with as much noise as possible.

‘You ain’t got a choice,’ Spud told Wallaby Joe. He absently pulled the crumpled photo of his wife from his pocket, glanced at it as he did several times a day, then carefully put it back in its oilcloth. ‘We go when and where we’re ordered to.’

‘Didn’t come here because some bigwig ordered me.’ Wallaby Joe seemed to have found the power of speech again. ‘I came to defend me country and me cobbers. Me cobbers are here, and that’s where I’m staying.’

‘But we’ll be with you,’ Nipper reassured him.

Wallaby Joe’s face lost its hardness for a second. ‘The cobbers I joined up with, kid. Grew up together, worked on the Cockatoo Island docks together. Banjo married me cousin, and Smithie married Banjo’s sister. Banjo’s down in the cemetery now, and Smithie’s in pieces in a trench somewhere. We swore we’d stay together. I ain’t going to break me word.’

He turned his back, and stared through the periscope again, though there hadn’t been any movement from the Turkish trenches for days, except the big shells from the howitzers, and there was no way of keeping a look-out for those. ‘I ain’t leaving my mates.’

‘But . . .

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