The great difficulty of the new plan was that it was impossible to surprise the enemy.  The whole Gallipoli Peninsula was so small that a landing at any point would be promptly observed, and the nature of the ground was of such a character that progress from any point must necessarily be slow.  The problem was therefore a simple one.

The expeditionary force gathered in Egypt during the first half of April, and about the middle of the month was being sent to Lemnos.  Germany was well aware of the English plans, and was doing all that it could to provide a defense.

On April 28d the movement began, and about five o’clock in the afternoon the first of the transports slowly made its way through the maze of shipping toward the entrance of Mudros Bay.

Immediately the patent apathy, which had gradually overwhelmed everyone, changed to the utmost enthusiasm, and as the liners steamed through the fleet, their decks yellow with khaki, the crews of the warships cheered them on to victory while the bands played them out with an unending variety of popular airs.  The soldiers in the transports answered this last salutation from the navy with deafening cheers, and no more inspiring spectacle has ever been seen than this great expedition.

The whole of the fleet from the transports had been divided up into five divisions and there were three main landings.  The 29th Division disembarked off the point of the Gallipoli Peninsula near Sedd-el-Bahr, where its operations were covered both from the gulf of Saros and from the Dardanelles by the fire of the covering warships.  The Australian and New Zealand contingent disembarked north of Gaba Tepe.  Further north a naval division made a demonstration.

Awaiting the Australians was a party of Turks who had been intrenched almost on the shore and had opened up a terrific fusillade.  The Australian volunteers rose, as a man, to the occasion.  They waited neither for orders nor for the boats to reach the beach, but springing out into the sea they went in to the shore, and forming some sort of a rough line rushed straight on the flashes of the enemy’s rifles.  In less than a quarter of an hour the Turks were in full flight.

While the Australians and New Zealanders, or Anzacs as they are now generally known from the initials of the words Australian-New Zealand Army Corps, were fighting so gallantly at Gaba Tepe, the British troops were landing at the southern end of the Gallipoli Peninsula.  The advance was slow and difficult.  The Turk was pushed back, little by little, and the ground gained organized.  The details of this progress, though full of incidents of the greatest courage and daring, need not be recounted.