Dust on My Feet: Anzac: the Turkish Monuments on the Gallipoli Peninsula

As Anzac Day comes around once again, there is a tendency to forget that this is an equally important event from Turkey. Rightly or wrongly, the Ottoman Empire had been drawn into an alliance with Germany and the Astro-Hungarian Empire in the First World War, and for Britain, France and Russia, this posed a threat, both to Russia’s access to the Mediterranean and, hence, to the rest of the World, and also to Britain’s sea routes through the Suez Canal and, consequently to India, then the jewel in the British Crown. Churchill, as First Lord of the Admiralty, had devised a plan, maybe ill-concieved but certainly ill-executed by the War Office, to capture the Gallipoli Peninsula which would give the Allies control of the Dardanelles and hopefully lead to the capture of Constantinople taking Turkey out of the War – what could be more simple? The plan did not take into account the tenacity of the Turkish defenders who were, after all, defending their homeland from foreign invaders, some of whom were from ‘the uttermost ends of the earth’.

Banners on the Grand Eceabat Hotel, Eceabat

Turkish Martyrs Day, on the 18 March, commemorates the defeat of the first Anglo-French attempt to force the Dardanelles on 18 March 1915 using, purely, a naval force. Many of the Turkish forts were badly damaged, but the Allies lost 3 battleships sunk and 3 seriously damaged, before turning back and re-thinking their invasion plan, which saw the invasion of the Gallipoli Peninsular on the 25 April. The Turks had their hero on the 18 March. Corporal Seyit who, in the heat of battle after a shell elevator had been put out of action, single-handedly carried three 275kg shells to his gun which, in turn, badly damaged the ill-fated HMS Ocean. After the action, he was asked to lift a shell for a photograph but was unable to do so. He is then said to have uttered “If war breaks out again, Ill lift it again.”

Statue of Corporal Seyit with a shell, Eceabat

As one crosses the Dardanelles from Çanakkale, the Dur Yolcu Memorial, above the fort at Kilitbahir, can be seen. An image of a Turkish soldier holding a firearm, points to words by Necmettin Halil, a Turkish poet, The words translated mean:
Traveller halt!
The soil you tread
Once witnessed the end of an era.
This is a reference to the many soldiers who lie buried on the Peninsular and the end of an era, probably refers to the Otoman Empire of which the Gallipoli Campaign was one of the last major battles before the Empire finally collapsed.

The Dur Yolcu Memorial overlooking the Dardanelles

The ferry from Çanakkale arrives at Eceabat on the European shore of the Dardanelles, the town closest to the Gallipoli Battlefields. On disembarking attention is drawn by a very large, detailed memorial to the bloody battles fought on the peninsular. The memorial is in several parts. There is a large collage of sculpted images of soldiers, both Turkish and Anzacs, topped by Mustafa Kemal, the Turkish commander, who, as Kemal Atatürk, became the ‘Father of modern Turkey’, a weeping woman, symbolising the grief for the battle-dead, sits beneath. There is a fascinating representation of both the Turkish and Australian trenches, complete with sculpted figures of soldiers in action as well as the dead and dying, all in interesting detail. Maps along the pavement show the Peninsular and where the important battles were fought. Instructive as well as a memorial.

Details of the large Gallipoli War Memorial at Eceabat

Near Cape Hellas, on Hisalık Hill, is the Çanakkale Martyrs Monument, a huge monolithic structure of four huge columns topped by a large concrete slab. Friezes of battle scenes decorate each of the four columns and a large Turkish flag adorns the bottom of the capping slab. In the shadow of the Monolith are other memorials, particulalrly to Atatürk, and graves of the Ottoman soldiers who fell in the defending their Homeland. The Çanakkale Martyrs Monument is a prominent landmark seen from across the Dardanelles and from much of the southern Gallipoli Peninsular.