ss in Gallipoli. It took place on April
26th, 1915, the day after the famous landing of the Dublins and
Munsters at "Beach V," when the survivors of these battalions were
advancing to the attack on the Turkish positions on the heights of
Sedd-el-Bahr. The first defensive obstacles encountered were barbed
wire entanglements of exceptional strength and intricacy, behind which
was a trench of enemy riflemen and machine-guns. "Those
entanglements," says Sir Ian Hamilton, "were made of heavier metal and
longer barbs than I have ever seen elsewhere." A party of the Munsters
were sent forward to cut them down, but the men's pliers had not
strength and sharpness enough to snip the wires. Then it was that
Cosgrave, a giant in stature and vigour--6 ft. 5 in. in height and
only twenty-three years of age--"pulled down the posts of the enemy's
high wire entanglements single-handed, notwithstanding a terrific fire
from both front and flanks thereby greatly contributing to the
successful clearing of the heights," to quote the official record. The
deed has a distinction peculiarly its own, for it is the only thing of
the kind to be found in the long roll of the Victoria Cross.

Cosgrave was wounded in the bayonet charge which subsequently carried
the trench. A bullet struck him in the side, and passing clear through
him splintered his backbone. He was invalided home to Aghada, a little
fishing hamlet in County Cork, where he was born and reared and
worked as a farm boy until he enlisted in 1910. Seen there, he told
the story of his exploit, as one of the party of fifty Munsters
ordered to rush forward and remove the entanglements:--

"Sergeant-Major Bennett led us, but just as we made a dash a
storm of lead was concentrated on us; Sergeant-Major Bennett was
killed with a bullet through his brain. I then took charge and
shouted to the boys to come on. The dash was quite one hundred
yards, and I don't know whether I ran or prayed the faster. I
wanted to succeed in my work, and I also wanted to have the
benefit of dying with a prayer in my mind. Some of us having got
up to the wires we started to cut them with the pliers, but you
might as well try to cut the round tower at Cloyne with a pair
of lady's scissors. The wire was of great strength, strained
like fiddle strings, and so full of spikes that you could not
get the pliers between. Heavens! I thought we were done; I threw
the plier