end of a fortnight in the front line. On a moving
day Gully Ravine was littered with men who had fallen out of the ranks
of a dozen regiments as they trudged, heavily laden, along the winding
and dust-swept track.

Sir Ian Hamilton wrote of our men early in August: "The ---- Manchesters
are a really good Battalion. Indeed, the whole of that Brigade have
proved themselves equal to veteran Regulars. The great misfortune has
been that there are no drafts ready to fill them up quickly. Had they
been at once filled up, as is the case in France, they would be finer
than ever. As it is, I fear lest the remnants may form too narrow a
basis for proper reconstruction when ultimately the drafts do make their
appearance."

The drafts we received on Gallipoli were the cream of the 2nd and 3rd
reserve lines, which had been organised at home under Colonels Pollitt
and Hawkins. They gave up their ease and often their ranks in order to
serve England better, but their numbers were small. The work of
reconstruction, to which Sir Ian Hamilton looked forward, came
afterwards in Egypt.

Sometimes the infantryman wondered whether, even if the essential
reinforcements arrived, they would ensure victory. On this point it is
difficult to judge. The home Government had committed itself to the
project of an offensive on the Western Front in the autumn of 1915, in
spite of the huge obstacles that confronted the Allies in that theatre
of war. The tactics of the period did not even organise trench raids.

The memory that dominates all recollections of Gallipoli is that of the
grandeur of the British soldier. Though he took no part in the miracle
of the landings, the East Lancashire Territorial proved himself worthy
of comradeship with even "the incomparable 29th Division." He ranked
with the Anzac and the Lowland Scot in the great adventure. The original
1st-line of our Battalion were really destroyed in Turkey with their
comrades of the same Brigade, but their gallantry in the early assaults
and their inflexible fortitude in the trenches--pestered by flies,
enfeebled by dysentery, stinted of water, and worn out by hardships--are
a lasting title to honour.

Their story, as told in the pages of the _Sentry_, was read by General
Wingate a few months later "with mixed feelings of joy and
sorrow--sorrow for the many good friends who have laid down their lives
for their King and Country, and joy that it has fallen to the lot of the
gallant Battalion