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Offensive against Baby 700 Hill

Dominating the beach on which the Anzacs landed are two hills. British naval gunners estimated the smaller of the two to be some 700 feet high and named it Baby 700. Maps provided to the troops failed to show the strategic importance of Baby 700 or to reveal the nature of its terrain. The Anzacs sought to take Baby 700 within hours of landing. Caught in the treacherous ravines and steep gullies and on an unmapped open ridge, with the Turks firing down on them, line after line of Australians and New Zealanders were killed and wounded. Each side made ground and then lost it, until dusk when the Anzacs retreated to hold the lower spurs of the escarpment. The Turks held the heights. On 27 April 1915, the Turks launched a determined attack to push the Anzacs back to the beach but failed. A second Anzac attack on Baby 700 was ordered on the night of 2 May. The attack was poorly prepared and coordinated. A New Zealand battalion had been delayed and the Australian brigade leader, John Monash was not informed, with costly results. Turkish forces held off the attack; the Anzacs suffered heavily for no gain.

IMAGE
Further progress with tank [Up the hillside to the headland above Anzac Cove, a line of about 16 soldiers drag a large cube-shaped tank on a two-wheel cart with three or more pushing the cart from behind, against a rugged mountainous backdrop], May 1915
ENLARGE IMAGE
J.P. Campbell
Further progress with tank [Up the hillside to the headland above Anzac Cove, a line of about 16 soldiers drag a large cube-shaped tank on a two-wheel cart with three or more pushing the cart from behind, against a rugged mountainous backdrop], May 1915
Pictures Collection