OUR ANZACS ed with minefields, meticulously placed artillery and large fortresses along the coast. Three months later, a large fleet of French and British battleships tried to power through to Constantinople (now Istanbul), but the entire fleet was sunk and crippled by the heavy Turkish defences. Naval commanders came to the conclusion that they could not survive another attempt through the Dardanelles Straits, and their only option to cripple the Turks was to invade and occupy the Gallipoli Peninsula, and so the plan for the Gallipoli landing was born. The landing at Gallipoli was supposed to go off without a hitch, with tens of thousands of men ready to fight. On 25 April 1915, the ANZACs orchestrated the first assault, landing on Gallipoli in Turkey. Although troops were supposed to land on Brighton Beach, which had a more accommodating terrain, a mistake was made and ships instead landed on Anzac Cove, which gave the defending army a great advantage on the high cliffs. The 5th Battalion made up part of the 2nd reinforcements of the landing force. Ernie would have come ashore on an amphibious troop carrier, and would have watched the carnage on the beach battlefield as the ANZACs fought the Turkish Army who were bunkered on the cliffs. Ernie made the landing, but was hit in the abdomen by shrapnel which caused him grave injuries. He was first sent to the City of Bonares ship to receive treatment for his wounds but was then transferred to the No.17 General Hospital at Alexandria in Egypt with many other wounded soldiers from the landings. Ernie died eight days later on 3 May 1915 of his wounds.
Although in the following months, Wilson’s sister made many written enquiries, none of Ernie’s belongings were ever recovered. The Gallipoli landing turned into a lengthy battle and a massacre of Allied troops. After many months of brutal combat, in which virtually no enemy ground was taken by the Allies, the British called for the attack to be called off, and for all Allied troops to evacuate. Ironically, unbeknown to Allied commanders, the defending enemy were out of ammunition, which would have made it possible to pass through the Straits and into Constantinople with relative ease. Had they known, tens of thousands of lives could have been saved, and it would have been a very different war. Although his effects were never returned home to his family, Frederick Ernest Wilson’s grand sacrifice for his country is recorded on the War Memorial Monument at the Hastings foreshore, where he is listed as ‘E Wilson’, with the ‘E’ an abbreviation for Ernie. Frederick’s name is also located at Panel 45 in the Commemorative Area at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra. After the catastrophic Gallipoli landing, the 5th Battalion went on to fight in many pivotal battles at Cape Helles, ANZAC Cove, Lone Pine and on the Western Front. The Battalion fought all the way up to the peace treaty which marked the end of the war. They returned home after that, having lost a great majority of their numbers in battle, so much so that the returning troops from the 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th Battalions were amalgamated to form the 2nd Brigade Battalion.
Southern Peninsula News ANZAC Special Edition 2013
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