HMS Centurion (1911)
1923 Letter Home by Frank Milne, R.A.N.

HMS Centurion,
Mediterranean Fleet,
14 th September 1923

Dear mother,
I am able to catch a mail to England at 4 O'clock so will let you know everything right away. Yesterday we arrived here, Haifa, and got the first mail for a month, I got a letter from Barbara and one from you. At present we have not seen the place but hope to get a run to Nazareth, which is about an hour or two from here. Some of the officers and men went to Jerusalem, but none of the gun room were allowed.

The place here is hot and nasty, and instead of the usual Mediterranean blue the water is a frightful yellow. I shall now hark back a little. While we were at Chunuk the four of us and two others walked across to Anzac. It was rather tough going, especially near Anzac, for the gullies are very numerous with almost vertical sides in places. As we struck the coast higher than we intended we got a really good view right from Suvla Bay around past Anzac to Gaba Tepe.

We spent a fair time on top crawling in and out of old trenches, dug outs and tunnels. What beats me is how the diggers ever managed to drive the Turks out of their positions, they were almost impregnable. We then went on and got down to the beach by way of Shrapnel Valley. Once there we saw lots of the echoes of the landing. All along the beach were huge wire entanglements and shells, while we were able to pick up lots of shrapnel balls and used rifle bullets. The beach must have been an absolute sea of bullets. In one place when we were digging at a place in an old trench we unearthed a skull. The poor bloke had gone west with a hole in the middle his forehead.

We visited a lot of the cemeteries on the hills Courtneys post, Shrapnel Valley etc, as well as the various beach cemeteries. They are rather well got up and are now having the head stones put up instead of the temporary crosses. The transportation of stone there is rather difficult as there are absolutely no roads and an aerial way has to be used to get all materials onto the top of the hill. When we had seen all round Anzac we took a road along the beach around to Gaba Tepe but did not get right around to the point as we had to turn off to Khelia to catch our boat there. We had a terrific walk, but it was well worth it - there is a rock formation overlooking Anzac Cove which when seen from the right angle is just like the head of the Sphinx. As it stands out 50 feet up from almost perpendicular cliffs you will understand how tremendous it looks.

We also saw up in the hills, the Turkish gun at Baby 700. She was more or less complete except that the breech block was missing and the barrel had been blown up. On examining the various markings we found it was a Vickers 6 inch. British made of the same type as in the " Sydney " but about ten years older in make. It shows how our own things we used against us, does it not.

At Khelia they were very busy evacuating under the terms of the peace treaty. It is going to be "some" 6 weeks for the people there, as there are thousands of men and tens of thousand of pounds worth of equipment to be got away. Five transports left while we were there, loaded with troops and gear for England, Egypt and Malta . As our Captain was Senior Naval Officer there at the time we were given an extra steam boat, which I ran. She had a lot of work to do over the Khelia side running correspondence about and things like that, so things were pretty busy while they lasted. After our week there, however, we left for a trip to Cyprus and Haifa. We had nearly a fortnight there a week at Limasol and the same time at Kyrenia. It was frightfully hot there where we were lying, especially in these ships which have very few scuttles, for the rest of the side is armoured. Our only ventilation here in the gun room is fetid air and a small skylight.

All of the gunroom bar Chas. and I went up for a week to the hills to stay with people up there. I was the unfortunate who did not draw a place at all and Chas has something wrong with his face so he could not go. All the people up in the hills got a wonderful time while I was left gulling behind. However I'm not worrying, I was not ashore so much, but I had quite a nice time while there.

I'm afraid there is nothing more to tell at present. Please give my love to all at home, not forgetting lots for yourself.

Frank
(Courtesy of Sandy Milne)



This is a letter written by Frank Milne (then aged 18) to his Mother, while he was seconded to the British navy in the Mediterranean in 1923. He was serving as a junior Officer on the HMS Centurion. They were involved in overseeing the breakup of the Ottoman Empire after the First World War. They were anchored off the coast near Anzac Cove and a few of them had the opportunity to go ashore and walk around the battle ground which was largely as the Diggers had left it.
-Sandy Milne



Page published Apr. 30, 2010