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Clip description
Australian long boats reach the beach at Gallipoli, early in the morning on 25 April 1915. Hundreds of men storm ashore under heavy fire from rifle and artillery. Many die on the beach, and are left behind as the Anzacs rush the cliffs. More long boats follow them onto the beach, with support fire from naval ships. A Turkish machine gun post on the ridge fires constantly, until silenced by an accurate shell from one of the ships.
Curator’s notes
This footage was thought lost, until historian Dr Daniel Reynaud recognised that it was preserved in two other films. These landing scenes were shot at Tamarama Bay in 1915 using soldiers from Liverpool training camp. Thirteen years later, in 1928, the shots were used again in another film, The Spirit of Gallipoli. Dr Reynaud was able to prove a link by studying still photographs and matching the locations at Tamarama Bay.
His reconstruction also includes some much grainier footage of soldiers landing on the beach. This appears to be shot from the other side of the beach, but in fact, it is a reversal of the existing shots, in much worse condition. Dr Reynaud found this footage in a compilation called The AH Noad film, held by the Australian War Memorial. That Noad film also recently yielded approximately one minute of previously unrecognised actuality of the beach at Gallipoli.
The Tamarama re-enactment footage has been misused many times by subsequent films – as if it is actuality of the original landing. There is no such actuality. There were no movie cameras allowed at the landing, nor would they have captured much if they had been there, since the landings began in darkness at 4.30 am.
