Ahmet Basaran- Yenice-Cinarcik koyu

My name is Ahmet son of Tahir. I was born in 1887. I am 94 years old. I served for the army for six years. I was a heavy gunner in the Galipoli front.

When I first arrived to the front, I was trained for 60-70 days in the Cimenlik Fortress. Then I joined the sixth company.... We were positioned in the Nar Fortress, where we have stayed for six months. Later we were sent to 5th company of the Dardanos forts. We were 150 men. Our commander was Captain Ahmet. We had four batteries. Their shells were similar to rifle shells. We were holding them and putting in the battery. On 18 March, we were under Kepez. The battleships of the enemy were coming from Salonica. They were bombing our forts. The batteries were destroyed... ammunition stores were fired. After a while Kumkale and Helles forts were shut up. The battleships were gradually coming towards our sight. Then we fired our batteries.

I was the second gunner of the battery. I was positioning the shells. That day the strait was full of battleships like black clouds. Hit the one you can.... About sunset, one of the enemy ships sunk in front of us.

We have camouflaged our batteries by covering them with pines. At nights, we were pulling them out. We had a projector for the nights. They tried to destroy our projector but they failed. That night they came back and investigated the ship wrecks. And we began to fire. They have gone. On the other day, they attacked again. But failed again. I have given up and gone. But bombarded the Helles. Reduced our soldiers and landed on the peninsula.
They had balloons, I saw. When we have seen the balloons, we were hiding. After the balloons, they were usually firing. Many shells hit our trenches but killed no one.