"Well the first I knew about Gallipoli was when Lord Fisher I think he was the Admiral in charge of the British fleet at the time. He ordered a battle fleet to go up into the Dardanelles there and they bombarded the Anzac Cove or wherever it was at Gallipoli there. And they gave it a bombardment for probably two or three hours or more. And then the fleet went out. Six months later they come and invade the place. Which I thought was the greatest bit of stupidity I'd ever heard of as far as the army was concerned.

You'd warned them. Given six months. The Germans were the allies, Turkey was allied to Germany. The Germans went and fortified that place and made it almost impregnable.

And they of course they had trenches on the hill all the way up and machine guns and what not, and plenty of artillery up on the top.

They cut our fellows to pieces. They were merely murdered, actually. They were useless. No point in it at all. I was absolutely disgusted. but of course they did a lot of silly things in the war, the top brass. That was one of 'em. It turned out as I thought it would. They couldn't take the place.

CORPORAL FRANK MACDONALD