Gallipoli: The FInal Battles and Evacuation of ANZAC

by David W. Cameron

In early August with the failure of the August Offensive at Gallipoli the senior commanders still believed that victory was possible. To help prepare for a new offensive sometime in the first half on 1916 the allied forces attempted to straighten out the line connecting Suvla and Anzac at a small hillock called Hill 60. This tactically meaninglesspiece of Gallipoli real estate would cost the lives of thousands of men from both sides over a two week period.Many, with justification would argue that the fighting at Hill 60 was even worse than the fighting at Lone Pine of just a few weeks before. The end result was a huge casualty list for gaining a few hundred metres of ground. With this theGallipoli Campaign ground to a halt and the unspeakable was being spoken – evacuation was in the The Final Battles and Evacuation at Anzac is the first book since Charles Bean’s Official History to provide a detailed narrative of the bloody and tragic battle for Hill 60, along with the other engagements that went on until the verylast days at Anzac – viewed from both sides of the trenches. It is also the first since Bean, to examine in detail the planning and execution of the evacuation of the troops from Anzac –the most successful part of the whole Gallipoli fiasco. As in his previous books Cameron’s detailed research and use of firsthand accounts including letters, diaries, and interviews,enables him to convey the confusion of battle while also telling a good story with a powerful emotional impact.Dr David Cameron is a biological anthropologist and was formerly an Australian Research Council QEII Fellow at the Department of Anatomy & Histology, University of Sydney. He has written several books and this is his third on theGallipoli Campaign. In early 2003 he conducted a preliminary archaeological survey of the Anzac Gallipoli battlefields and held discussions with Turkish and Australian government officials about conservation issues relating to the Anzac area.

Genres: World War I, History

358 pages, Paperback

First published September 12, 2011

About the author

David W. Cameron is a Canberra based author and has written several books on Australian military and convict history and human and primate evolution including over 60 internationally peer reviewed papers for various journals and book chapters. He received 1st Class Honours in Prehistoric Archaeology at the University of Sydney and later went on to complete his Ph.D. in palaeoanthropology at the Australian National University.

He is a former Australian Research Council (ARC) Post Doctorial Fellow at the Australian National University (School of Archaeology) and an ARC QEII Fellow at the University of Sydney (Department of Anatomy and Histology). He has participated and led several international fieldwork teams in Australia, the Middle East (Turkey, Jordan, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates); Europe (Hungary) and Asia (Vietnam and India) and has participated in many conferences and museum studies throughout the world.

Reviews

[Shaun Major · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cameron's writing has got drier as his collected works on Gallipoli have gone in. Partly this is because of the fragmented & unstructured months that followed the August Offensive & partly because, like those ANZACS, Cameron seems in a hurry to get to the end. His passages on the Evacuation are beautiful, in depth & well planned,much like the real event, so that in the end it is with some sadness that this series of tales comes to an end.

[David McCard · Rating 4 out of 5]

it was a good read a bit sad in ways but that what the War did.