HELLES MEMORIAL
Gallipoli, Turkey
The Helles Memorial (near Sedd el Bahr in Turkey, on the headland at the tip of the Gallipoli peninsula overlooking the Dardanelles) is the Commonwealth War Graves Commission battle memorial for the whole of WW1’s ill-fated Gallipoli Campaign.
It also commemorates over 21,000 individual men from the UK and India who died in Gallipoli or Gallipoli waters and Australians who died at Helles, and have no known grave. (Three other memorials – The Lone Pine, Hill 60 and Chunuk – commemorate missing Australians and New Zealanders at Anzac Cove. The Twelve Tree Copse Memorial commemorates the New Zealanders at Helles.)
At the time these photographs were taken in August 2011, extensive renovations were taking place (see the Appendix below) and much of the memorial was inaccessible.
Side view of the memorial showing the temporary plywood boards erected for the renovation
The beaches over which the attack on Helles was made, photographed from the memorial.
Orientation and battle description panel.
Memorial to the men of Hawick, Scotland, next to the orientation panel.
The beaches over which the attack on Helles was made, photographed from the memorial.
The beaches over which the attack on Helles was made, photographed from the memorial
Main entrance to the memorial.
Base of the memorial.
Inscription to those who have no known graves.
Panel to the ANZACs.
Panel to the Suvla IX Corps.
Panel to the Helles VIII Corps.
Panel to Royal Navy ships lost.
Renovation notice.
Panel to men lost at sea.
Plywood barrier.
A peep at the renovation area.
Images courtesy of Debbie Wilbur © 2011
APPENDIX: The restoration of the Helles Memorial
Details of the restoration project – which ran from May 2010 to November 2012 – are available via the link below.
And here is an image of the memorial free of the hoardings seen in the main article.
Photograph (via Wikimedia) with thanks to Harvey Barrison CC BY-SA 2.0
RM 2020