[Footnote 29: The French word for a keepsake.]
[Footnote 30: Some of the earliest hand grenades used by our men were made of jam pots which came from the factory of Messrs. Tickler; hence the nickname.]
The year 1915 saw the beginning and the end of a campaign which will go down to history as a splendid failure. Aided by the French, the British strove to force a right-of-way through the narrow and strongly fortified channels which give access from the Mediterranean Sea to the southern shores of Russia. Two attempts were made--the one naval, the other military--but both were fruitless. Ships of war strove to batter down the forts that commanded the channels, but had to retire discomfited. Then an army was landed on the Gallipoli peninsula, and a desperate effort was made to take the forts from the rear. The army was set an almost impossible task, yet it very nearly achieved the impossible. Men still live who surmounted the last great obstacle that lay between them and victory.
How the British and French landed on narrow beaches in the face of superior numbers of the enemy; how they fought their way up the cliffs in spite of artillery, machine guns, and entrenched infantry; how with superb courage and dogged endurance they established themselves on the peninsula; how they sacrificed themselves like the Spartans of old in fierce assaults on the ridges and high hills that barred the way to their goal; and how, finally, they withdrew to their ships without the loss of a single life--all this is a story which no Briton can read without mingled pride and pain: pride in the men of his race who nobly fought and died in the hopeless struggle; pain, that so much bright and gallant life should have been given in vain.
Henceforth the Gallipoli peninsula is sacred ground. The bones of tens of thousands of our gallant fellows lie buried in its soil. In days to come, when wandering Britons shall sail by its peaceful shores, they will hush their voices and think tenderly of those who sleep their last sleep amidst its rugged hills and deep ravines. It will be strange, too, if a prayer does not arise from their hearts that the Empire may ever be defended by men of such matchless valour and lofty devotion.
