This website has been prepared by
the first "hotel de charme" on the Gallipoli peninsula
... and not
far from them the modest memorial of the Turks marked the place where they
stopped that charge ....
On the monument was a tablet to a Turkish sergeant
who, in the days of fierce
fighting at the Nek, held out in some crevice near our lines untill his mates
heard his last call : I die happely for my country, and you, my comrades,
will avenge me
"Gallipoli Mission",
(Crows Nest 1990), Charles E. W. Bean, p.
342-343
"Mehmetçavuş abidesi/Sergeant Mehmet's memorial" reproduced from a period postcard (Başar Eryoner - private collection)
Stories tell
that Sergeant Mehmet of the 64th Regiment was killed here but actually he
survived the war and became a lieutenant at the direction of Enver Pasha, the
Turkish Minister of War. Sergeant Mehmet came from the village of Sefalı,
located in the township of Çiçekfağ in the central Anatolian province of
Yozgat. Though he became famous during the Gallipoli Campaign, he was a
humble soul who refused to wear his medals after the war because, in his own
words, in his old clothes, he was not dressed well enough to do so !
"Gallipoli Battlefield Guide", (Istanbul 2006), Gürsel Göncü & Şahin Aldoğan,
p. 51
