Hill 60 Cemetery

Hill 60 Cemetery lies well to the north of the old Anzac position. Australians first came into this area during the ‘August Offensive’, 6-10 August 1915, when an attempt was made to break out of Anzac by capturing the heights of the range which can be seen to the south-east of the cemetery – Hill 971 and Chunuk Bair.

Originally in Turkish hands, Hill 60 was attacked successively by the Canterbury and Otago Mounted Rifles and the 18th Battalion AIF on 21-22 August 1915 and was partly captured. The cemetery was commenced, amongst the trenches of Hill 60, after these actions. It was enlarged after the war by bringing in bodies from other smaller battlefield burial sites. There are now 788 burials in this cemetery, 712 of them unidentified. Fourteen Australians have known graves here with a further sixteen commemorated by Special Memorials. Twenty of the Australians either buried or commemorated here were serving with the 18th Battalion or the 9th Australian Light Horse Regiment, both units heavily involved in the fighting in the area in late August-early September 1915.

Also in Hill 60 Cemetery is the New Zealand Memorial, one of four memorials on the Gallipoli Peninsula commemorating New Zealanders who have no known graves.

Location Information

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.

On leaving the Anzac area and heading towards Suvla, you will find the cemetery at 15.6 kms. at the end of a right hand rough track 600 metres long, which is difficult to negotiate in the wet.

Hill 60 is on the 60 metre contour line, at the end of a range, which runs South-Eastward towards Hill 100 between Kaiajik Dere and Asma Dere.

Hill 60 Cemetery is reached along a 800 metre track, which requires a 4-wheel drive vehicle during wet weather.

Visiting Information

The Cemetery is permanently open and may be visited at any time.

Please note that in the absence of a cemetery register, visitors are advised to locate the Grave/Memorial reference before visiting. This information can be found in the CASUALTY RECORDS within this page.

Historical Information

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. On 6 August, further landings were made at Suvla, just north of Anzac, and the climax of the campaign came in early August when simultaneous assaults were launched on all three fronts.

At the beginning of August 1915, Hill 60, which commanded the shore ward communications between the forces at Anzac and Suvla, was in Turkish hands. On 22 August, it was attacked from Anzac by the Canterbury and Otago Mounted Rifles, followed later by the 18th Australian Infantry Battalion and supported on the flanks by other troops. It was partly captured and on 27-29 August, and the captured ground was extended by the 13th, 14th, 15th, 17th and 18th Australian Infantry Battalions, the New Zealand Mounted Rifles, the 5th Connaught Rangers, and the 9th and 10th Australian Light Horse. The position was held until the evacuation in December.

HILL 60 CEMETERY lies among the trenches of the actions of Hill 60. It was made after those engagements, and enlarged after the Armistice by the concentration of graves from Norfolk Trench Cemetery and from the battlefield.

There are now 788 Commonwealth servicemen of the First World War buried or commemorated in this cemetery. 712 of the burials are unidentified, but special memorials commemorate 34 casualties known or believed to be buried among them.

Within the cemetery stands the HILL 60 (NEW ZEALAND) MEMORIAL, one of four memorials erected to commemorate New Zealand soldiers who died on the Gallipoli peninsula and and whose graves are not known. This memorial relates to the actions at Hill 60. It bears more than 180 names.