Quinn’s Post Cemetery

Quinn’s Post Cemetery is a Commonwealth World War I graveyard for those killed during the Gallipoli Campaign. Quinn’s Post was a vital strategic point for the New Zealand and Australian forces which saw fierce fighting throughout the Gallipoli Campaign.

Quinn’s Post Cemetery history

Quinn’s Post was named after Major Hugh Quinn of the 15th Battalion, who died there on 29 May 1915 in the course of one such attack. Quinn himself is actually buried at Shrapnel Valley Cemetery.

The eight month campaign in Gallipoli was fought by Commonwealth and French forces in an attempt to force Turkey out of the war, to relieve the deadlock of the Western Front in France and Belgium, and to open a supply route to Russia through the Dardanelles and the Black Sea.

The Allies landed on the peninsula on 25-26 April 1915; the 29th Division at Cape Helles in the south and the Australian and New Zealand Corps north of Gaba Tepe on the west coast, an area soon known as Anzac.

Quinn’s Post was established on 25 April by a New Zealand machine-gun crew. In the months that followed, the post was held by a number of different Australian and New Zealand units and was the subject of incessant attacks and continual hand-to-hand fighting with the Turkish post opposite, who knew it as ‘Bomba Sirt’ (Bomb Ridge).

The original cemetery was made after the Armistice by the concentration of 225 isolated graves, all unidentified, into Rows E to I. Rows A to D were added later. The graves from Pope’s Hill Cemetery, and six other graves found later, were brought into a plot, at the north-east end. Pope’s Hill Cemetery was at the foot of Pope’s Hill, where the track turned up to Quinn’s Post. The hill was named from Lt. Col. H. Pope, then commanding the 16th Australian Battalion, which reached it on 25 April.

Quinn’s Post Cemetery today

Today, the Quinn’s Post Cemetery is managed by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission and houses 473 graves, most of which are Australian and 294 of which are unidentified. Several memorials at Quinn’s Post Cemetery commemorate those missing soldiers or those with unknown graves.

Getting to Quinn’s Post Cemetery

The Anzac and Suvla cemeteries are first signposted from the left-hand junction of the Eceabat-Bigali road. From this junction, you should travel into the main Anzac area. After 11.4 km’s, the cemetery will be found on the left.