Mention has been made of the missing who returned; especially distressing to their loved ones were the missing who did not return. Many deaths could not be confirmed until much later due to the lack of eyewitnesses or recovery of a body. Hope that they had become prisoners was common, and newspaper columns often had requests from relatives about the fate of their loved ones. In the case of Private William Cowley, a West Bromwich lad, the anguish of the parents is imaginable. A statement, forwarded by the British Red Cross, by Private Frank Davies, 9/Warwicks, stated:

On August 10th 1915 at Sari Bair (Hill 971) I was in a trench with Bill Cowley and he was shot at about 7.30 in the morning. He died instantly and I was one who helped to bury his body. Davies later wrote to Cowley’s parents with further information of his tragic death: I much regret to say that I was with your son on August 10th at Sari Bair when Bill was killed. He lay in the trench dead, shot through the mouth. Afterwards the battalion retired, not being strong enough to check the attack. Bill was covered in with the parapet from the Turk’s shells. That is how we could not get anything of Bill’s small book (i.e. pay book) and property. There were four or five of the type of Bill buried in the trench. He was a battalion sniper and did fine work before his end. We lost a good fellow in him for we were not very strong after we came out of action.33

At the Farm Brigadier General Baldwin was killed and his headquarters was overrun, and a considerable amount of equipment and many rifles and machine-guns were lost to the enemy. Those encamped at the Farm had little time to react and many just ran away as the front line collapsed. Command of the brigade temporarily passed to Lieutenant Colonel Bewsher, 10/Hampshires, until he was wounded. At around 10.30 am, officer-less units were falling back. In one incident, Captain Norman Street, a 39 Brigade Staff Captain, led forward a group of retiring men back to hold the Farm. When Street was killed the troops withdrew again, ending up near Cayley’s headquarters near the easternmost fork of the Aghyl Dere. Birdwood sent Cayley his last reserve, 5/Connaughts, but by the time they arrived at the Farm at around midday the situation was just about irreversible. Chunuk Bair had been lost, the Turks had recaptured The Pinnacle and from that position were threatening the British troops at the Farm. At dusk the Farm was evacuated, leaving behind about a thousand British and Dominion dead.