Sword Bayonet, Pattern 1907, Mark. I : recovered from Gaba Tepe, Gallipoli

Remains of a Pattern 07 bayonet. The hilt has plain wooden grips held to the tang with two screw bolts. There is a small hole on one side of the grips. The bayonet is missing its cross guard, muzzle ring and quillon. The blade itself is rusted (inert) and slightly warped.

This bayonet was found on the beach at Gaba Tepe by the Australian Historical Mission on 27 February 1919. It was probably left there by an Australian soldier who took part in the raid on Gaba Tepe in May 1915.

On 4 May 1915 Captain Raymond Lionel Leane led a party of engineers from the 3rd Field Company and over 100 men of the 11th Battalion, together with a medical officer and stretcher bearers on a raid of the Turkish positions at Gaba Tepe.

Parts of the Australian and New Zealand positions were within view of Turkish artillery observers, and their guns at Gaba Tepe. Leane's party were to note what defences protected the area, destroy communications and destroy any garrisons that might be there. Another group, under Lieutenant Rumball was to move towards Gaba Tepe over land and cut through the barbed wire on the beach. After completing their mission, Leane's group was to withdraw north through the cut wire.

To assist with the success of this mission, it was to have been carried out at the same time as a Navy raid on the Turkish position at Nibrunesi, Suvla on 30 April. However, Leane's raid was postponed until 4 May and at 3.30am they left Anzac on board the destroyer Colne. The party landed at Gaba Tepe as dawn broke. They detected no sign of life on the beach as they approached, but as they landed came under intense fire. About a dozen soldiers were killed and others wounded. The rest of the men rushed off the boats, through the shallow water, across 14 metres of beach, to the shelter of the bank that bordered the shore.

The Turks had a machine gun highly placed in the trenches, which covered most of the bank, and more men were shot. Leane surveyed the defences and found there was no way to advance further. The wire was stronger than English barbed wire, with longer barbs. The only path that led through the wire was covered, and any attempted to reach it across the open field would mean certain death.

Leane quickly organised the retirement from Gaba Tepe. He sent a party of men to the northern wire that Rumball's group was to cut. They found two belts of wire, the first had not been cut and ran into the sea. Four men waded around this belt of wire, reaching Rumball's group through an opening they made in the second belt. Four other men returned to Leane's position. One man was killed and another was pinned down by machine gun fire.

At 5.15am Leane signalled the navy to withdraw the wounded men. A small steamboat came with a rowing boat in tow. Stretcher bearers rushed the wounded to the shore. The British destroyers had kept up covering fire, but stopped as the wounded came to the shore. The Turks did not fire upon the wounded when making their way to the boat. However, when the steamboat departed, they began firing again.

Leane signalled for the Navy to send more boats for the rest of his men, and signalled the position of the Turkish machine gunners, so the ships could direct fire on them as cover. Two picket boats approached the shore, each towing two ship's boats. As Leane's men rushed to the boats the Turks opened heavy fire on them; Leane was wounded in the hand, and others were struck by the bullets, but all got away. The soldier pinned down at the barbed wire, was spotted later in the day by one of the destroyers and rescued.

The raid was a failure, but it confirmed the strong entrenchment of the Turkish position at Gaba Tepe, which remained the main observation position for the Turkish artillery throughout the campaign.