The Capture of Chunuk Bair.

On the right things were going better. At dawn the men of the Wellington Infantry Regiment were ready again to attack the fatal crestline. The tired troops of yesterday were once again to essay the seemingly impossible.

At 4.15 in the grey of the morning, the Wellington Infantry and the 7th Gloucesters, led by Lieut.-Colonel Malone, commenced the desperate struggle for Chunuk Bair. So far as the New Zealanders are concerned, August 8, 1915, was the blackest day on the Peninsula. But the prize was the strategical key to the Gallipoli Peninsula. Win the Ridge and we should win the Narrows. Open the Narrows to the Navy, and Constantinople was ours! Surely a prize worth fighting for. So from the scanty trenches on Rhododendron Spur leapt the Wellingtons and the 7th Gloucesters.

By their dash and audacity the crestline was soon gained. We now had a footing on the ridge, and to cling to that foothold and extend from it was now the pressing need. The Wellingtons and Gloucesters started to dig in, but the enemy evidently made up his mind to cut the New Zealanders off. A body of snipers picked off all the machine gun crews. When Malone's battalion was seen marching along the skyline four machine guns were pushed up to him. These guns never came back. When half way up the ridge a veritable hail of lead burst round them, and they were so badly damaged that only one gun could be reconstructed from the remnants of the four; but it got into position and did good service until the whole of the gun crew were killed or wounded.

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Two machine guns that were to support the right flank of the attackers from the Apex were pushed forward on the slope to avoid being silhouetted against the crest line. The Turkish snipers now concentrated on these guns. Soon all the personnel were killed or wounded. A Maori machine gun close by lost their officer killed and had nine other casualties, but a few men fought their gun all day without a murmur. This was the only machine gun left in action on this flank.

The devoted party on the crest was assailed with every variety of shell, hand grenades and maxims. Time after time, Turks advanced to the attack but were driven off at the point of the bayonet. The Gloucesters who had lost all their officers now came down the ridge to the help of the New Zealanders. They seemed dazed, but instinct and the example of the New Zealanders convinced them that the bayonet was the weapon for the Turk. Time and time again they charged and cleared their front.