It is estimated that one hundred and forty thousand troops became ill during the Dardanelles campaign. Survival in the heat, on an inadequate diet, plus the lack of proper sanitation and poor hygiene led to several outbreaks of dysentery. Preventable diseases and potentially fatal illnesses - such as pneumonia, typhus and cholera - claimed countless lives.
BRAVERY DURING THE DARDANELLES CAMPAIGN Bombardier Percy Samuel Hooppell Percy and Mary Hooppell owned Hooppell’s General Store in Point Nepean Road, Chelsea. Their son Percy, known as Samuel, was almost nineteen and already in training at the 21st Battery Australian Fortress Artillery when he enlisted as a gunner in August 1914. He was later promoted to the NCO rank of Bombardier in the field, where he took responsibility for organising groups attached to the field artillery unit. He was only twenty when he saw action for the first time at the Gallipoli landing. A month later, Samuel was killed in action at Quinn’s Post.
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Above: The bully beef ration store at Anzac Cove: Australian War Memorial Left: Hooppell’s store in Point Nepean Road, Chelsea: The Chelsea and District Historical Society