Destination Guides Turkey

Gallipoli peninsula (Turkish: Gelibolu Yarimadasi) is located in Turkish Thrace, the European part of Turkey, with the Aegean Sea to the west and the Dardanelles straits to the east. The name derives from the Greek Kallipolis (Καλλίπολις), meaning "Beautiful City".

Battle of Lone Pine The Battle of Lone Pine, which took place during the Gallipoli campaign, was the only successful Australian attack against the Turkish trenches within the original perimeter of the ANZAC battlefield, and yet it was merely a diversion to draw attention from the main assaults of 6 August against the Sari Bair peaks of Chunuk Bair and Hill 971. Prelude The Lone Pine battlefield, named for a solitary Turkish Pine that stood there at the start of the fighting, was situated about the centre of the eastern line of the ANZAC trenches on a rise known as 400 Plateau that joined Boltons Ridge to the south with the ridge along the east side of Monash Valley to the north. Being towards the southern end of ANZAC, the Lone Pine region was comparatively gentle and the opposing trenches were separated some distance with a flat no-mans land intervening. The original Australian front at Lone Pine contained a salient. To the north of the salient, on the Turkish side, was the head of a gully called The Cup. This was a reserve area for the Turks and lightly fortified. The Turkish trenches at Lone Pine were the strongest at ANZAC and no attack was expected there. The commander of the Australian 1st Division, which was to make the attack, was General H.B. Walker who had replaced General W.T. Bridges after he was killed by a sniper in May. General Walker did not approve of an attack at Lone Pine, let alone a mere diversion. When General Sir Ian Hamilton, the British commander, insisted the attack proceed, Walker endeavoured to give his troops the best chance of success possible on such an unfavourable battleground. The battle The width of the front of the attack was 220 yards (200 m) and the distance between the two trench lines was about 100 yards (91 m). To reduce the distance to be crossed, the Australians projected a number of tunnels to within 40 yards (36 m) of the Turkish trenches. Immediately after the attack, one of these tunnels was to be opened along its length to make a communications trench via which reinforcements could advance without having to cross the exposed ground. Some of the attackers would have to make the advance over ground from the Australian trench line. To provide some measure of protection for these men, three mines were set and exploded to make craters in which they could seek shelter. The preliminary bombardment was stretched over three days and was successful in cutting much of the Turkish barbed wire. At 5.30 p.m. the Australian 1st Infantry Brigade attacked. Half the force went via the prepared tunnels and half crossed the exposed ground between the trench lines. When they reached the Turkish trenches they found them roofed with pine logs with no easy entrance. Some fired, bombed and bayonetted from above, some found their way inside and others ran on past to the open communications and support trenches behind. All the ground that was won by the Australians at Lone Pine was actually reached within a couple of hours of the start of the attack. However, the battle itself raged for another six days as the Turks counterattacked incessantly and at great cost. The 2nd and 3rd Infantry Brigades were poured in to reinforce the Australian gains. The fighting took place in the complicated maze of the former Turkish trench system. Hand grenades were the weapon of choice and the close quarters meant that some of them would travel back and forth up to three times before exploding. The Australians held the old Turkish fire trench and had footholds deeper in Turkish lines. They blocked the Turkish communications trenches as best they could, often with the bodies of the dead, to thwart raids. Other bodies were simply pitched over the parapet or left to lie at the bottom of the trench under a thin layer of dirt. Aftermath Though a victory for the Australians, the wider repercussions of the attack at Lone Pine weighed heavily on the outcome at Chunuk Bair. Sent north to reinforce Lone Pine, Lieutenant-colonel Hans Kannengiessers Turkish 9th Division was directed instead to proceed on to Chunuk Bair where, at the time there was only an artillery battery and its 20-man infantry defence. His force arrived in time to seriously delay the New Zealand attack. Seven Australians were awarded the Victoria Cross at Lone Pine, including Corporal William Dunstan, who after the war became the general manager of Keith Murdochs newspaper The Herald in Melbourne. Another VC recipient was Captain A.J. Shout who had already earned the Military Cross and been Mentioned in Dispatches since landing at Gallipoli. He was mortally wounded at Lone Pine and was buried at sea. The other VC recipients were Privates Leonard Keysor and John Hamilton, Corporal Alexander Burton and Lieutenants Frederick Tubb and William Symons. On ANZAC Day, after the dawn service, Australian visitors congregate at the Lone Pine cemetery for a memorial service to remember all their countrymen who fought and died at Gallipoli. Memorial Lone Pine trees have been planted in Australia , New Zealand and Gallipoli to commemorate the battle and the Gallipoli campaign in general.

The Battle of Chunuk Bair was a World War I battle fought between the Turkish defenders and troops of New Zealand and Britain on Turkeys Gallipoli peninsula in August 1915. The capture of Chunuk Bair, Conk Slope (Canak Bayiri) in Turkish, the secondary peak of the Sari Bair range, was one of the two objectives of the Allied August Offensive that was launched at Anzac and Suvla to try and break the stalemate that the campaign had become. The capture of Chunuk Bair was the only success for the Allies of the campaign. However, the success was fleeting as the position proved untenable. The Turks recaptured the peak after a few days and were never to relinquish it again.

Anzac Cove (in Turkish Anzak Koyu) is a small, cove on the Gallipoli peninsula in Turkey made famous as the site of the First World War landing of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC) on April 25, 1915. The cove is a mere 600 m long, bounded by the headlands of Ari Burnu to the north and Little Ari Burnu, known as Hell Spit, to the south. Following the landing at Anzac Cove, the beach became the main base for the Australian and New Zealand troops for the eight months of the Battle of Gallipoli. Anzac Cove was always within a kilometer of the front-line, well within the range of Turkish artillery though spurs from the high ground of Plunges Plateau, which rose above Ari Burnu, provided some protection. General William Birdwood, commander of ANZAC, made his headquarters in a gully overlooking the cove, as did the commanders of the New Zealand and Australian Division and the Australian 1st Division. It was on 29 April that General Birdwood recommended that the original landing site between the two headlands be known as Anzac Cove and that the surrounding, hitherto nameless, area occupied by his corps be known as Anzac. Australian 4th Battalion troops landing in Anzac Cove, 25 April 1915.The beach itself became an enormous supply dump and two field hospitals were established, one at either end. Four floating jetties were quickly constructed for the landing of stores, later replaced in July by a permanent structure known as Watsons Pier. The volume of stores quickly overflowed onto the adjacent beaches; firstly onto Brighton Beach to the south of the cove and later onto North Beach beyond Ari Burnu. Three wireless radio stations were established on the beach to maintain contact with the fleet. While the cove was relatively sheltered from shellfire from across the peninsula — the Chanak forts, as well as the Turkish battleships Torgat Reiss and Hayreddin Barbarossa anchored in the Dardanelles, shelled the waters off the cove — it was partially exposed to view from Gaba Tepe to the south and completely open to view from Nibrunesi Point at the southern tip of Suvla Bay to the north. Nibrunesi Point was under the guns of the Royal Navy so was never used to fire on Anzac, however the well-concealed Turkish battery at Gaba Tepe, known as Beachy Bill, was a constant menace. Despite the shelling, Anzac Cove was a popular swimming beach for the soldiers — at Anzac it was a struggle to supply sufficient water for drinking, there was rarely any available for washing. When swimming, most soldiers disregarded all but the fiercest shelling rather than interrupt the one luxury available to them. View of Anzac Cove from Ari Burnu, July 2004.On Anzac Day in 1985, the name Anzac Cove was officially recognized by the Turkish government. The Anzac Day dawn service was held at Ari Burnu Cemetery within the cove until 1999 when the number of people attending outgrew the site. A purpose built Anzac Commemorative Site was constructed nearby on North Beach in time for the 2000 service. Over the years Anzac Beach has suffered from erosion and the construction of the coast road from Gaba Tepe to Suvla, originally started by Australian engineers just prior to the evacuation of Anzac in December 1915, resulted in the beach being further reduced and bounded by a steep earth embankment. The only way onto the beach was via the CWGC cemeteries at each headland; Ari Burnu Cemetery and Beach Cemetery. In 2003 the Australian government announced that it was negotiating with Turkey to place Anzac Cove on the National Heritage List, which included Australian sites such as the Eureka Stockade gardens. However this request was dismissed by the Turkish government as the Gallipoli peninsula itself is Turkish territory and already a national park in the Turkish National Park System. In 2004 the Australian Minister for Veterans Affairs, Danna Vale, made a request to the Turkish authorities that roadworks be carried out in the area. In 2005, the resultant efforts to widen the road to provide a bus parking area for the Commemorative Site covered some of the remaining beach, making it impossible to traverse, and cut into Plunges Plateau, making the path to the summit and Plunges Plateau Cemetery impassable. Concerns were expressed that human remains from unmarked graves have been uncovered and discarded.

The Battle of the Nek was a small World War I battle fought as part of the Gallipoli campaign. The Nek was a narrow stretch of ridge in the Anzac battlefield on the Gallipoli peninsula. The name derives from the Afrikaans word for a mountain pass but the terrain itself was a perfect bottleneck and easy to defend, as had been proven during a Turkish attack in May. It connected the Anzac trenches on the ridge known as Russells Top to the knoll called Baby 700 on which the Turkish defenders were entrenched. In total area, the Nek is about the size of three tennis courts. On 7 August 1915 two regiments of the Australian 3rd Light Horse Brigade mounted a tragic and futile attack on the Turkish trenches on Baby 700.

Johnstons Jolly Cemetery stands on the northern part of Plateau 400 in the Anzac part of the Peninsula. The Gallipoli campaign was mounted by Commonwealth and French forces in an attempt to force Turkey out of the war, to relieve the stalemate of the Western Front in France and Belgium, and to open a supply route to Russia through the Dardanelles and Black Sea. Allied landings were made on 25-26 April 1915 at Helles, on the southern tip of the peninsula, and on the west coast, in an area which later became known as Anzac. On 6 August, further landings were made at Suvla, just north of Anzac, and the climax of the campaign came in early August when simultaneous assaults were launched on these three fronts. Johnstons Jolly (called by the Turks Kirmezi Sirt, or Red Ridge), was named from the commander of the 2nd Australian Division Artillery, Brigadier-General G J Johnston, CB, CMG, VD. The position was reached by the 2nd Australian Infantry Brigade on 25 April 1915 but lost the next day and it was never retaken. The cemetery was made after the Armistice when graves were brought in from the battlefield. There are now 181 Commonwealth servicemen buried or commemorated in this cemetery. 144 of the burials are unidentified and there are special memorials to 36 Australian casualties believed to be buried among them, almost all of whom were killed in the capture of Lone Pine in August 1915.

The Kabatepe Museum (or Gallipoli Museum) is located within the Gallipoli Historic National Park. It commemorates the Gallipoli Campaign, now considered a defining moment in the modern history of not only Turkey, but of Australia and New Zealand as well. The museum hosts numerous relics from the campaign, including weapons, ammunition, uniforms, photographs, letters written by the soldiers to their families, and private belongings such as shaving tools, cocoa cases, leather flasks etc. There are also more shocking artifacts such as the skull of a Turkish soldier with the bullet hole in the forehead which killed him, and the shoe of a soldier still containing a bone from the owners foot.

Guzelyali is a seaside village in Canakkale Province of western Turkey. It is 15 km from the Canakkale city centre. Guzelyali is surrounded by deep green woods with pleasant pine smell in the east and by the Canakkale Strait (the Dardanelles) with its completely deep blue sea in the west. Distances from Guzelyali: Bozcaada (island) 40 km, Assos/Behramkale 50 km, Gelibolu (Gallipoli) 30 km, Truva (Troy) 10 km, Istanbul Ataturk Airport 300 km. The population of the town is about 500 in winter, and about 5,000 in the spring and summer seasons. It has a post office, mosque, parking area, restaurants, two big markets and a few small shops.