g memories of
Gallipoli. The sentimental song was typical of the Territorial's taste.
Even now I can hear the refrain sung by Company Sergeant-Major J.W.
Woods:

"My heart's far away with the Colleen I adore;
Eileen alannah; Angus asthor."

At the finish, before singing the National Anthem and the no less
popular anthem of the Machine Gun Section, our men always sang: _Keep
the Home Fires Burning_. The soldiers could have no better vesper hymn.

On the 8th September 1915 we went into a new sector of trenches on
either side of what was called Border Barricade. The name was, like
Border Ravine, a relic of the Border Regiment, just as Skinner's Lane,
Watling Street, Essex Ravine and Inniskilling Inch recalled the
activities of other units.

I can claim personal responsibility for placing Burlington Street and
Greenheys Lane upon the map of Gallipoli. They are reminders of our
Headquarters in Manchester.

Border Barricade barred a moorland track which led upwards to higher
ground where the Turks were strongly entrenched. Below it were little
graveyards of Turkish and British dead, and below them the moors
contracted into the narrow defile of Gully Ravine. Here on the 15th
September we lost some casualties in a mine explosion, which the Turks
had carefully timed for our evening's "Stand to." Dense columns of smoke
and earth shot up high into the air, and the rapidly increasing darkness
of the evening added greatly to our difficulties. Most gallant work was
done in digging out buried men, a task of great danger, as the front
trench was completely destroyed, and the Turks, whose trenches at this
point were within ten yards of ours, were bombing heavily. Thirteen men
lost their lives through the explosion. For some days afterwards this
spot and an open space behind it were constantly sniped, and, as an
addition to our troubles, one of our own trench mortars, fired by a
neighbouring unit, landed in error in our lines, killing 3 men and
wounding 4, including Captain Smedley. Later the Turks exploded further
mines in the same area when it was occupied by other units.

Our chief losses, however, were through illness. Captain P.H. Creagh,
whose splendid work was rewarded by a D.S.O., left us at the end of
August for good, and joined his own regiment in Mesopotamia. Before the
end of September, Captain C.H. Williamson, the Brigade's excellent
Signalling Officer (afterwards killed in action); Captain A.H. Tinker,
at