I will continue my account of our doings in diary form. Last week we
had a kind of general introduction to war. The last few days we have
seen a few of its more gruesome details.
_12th, Wednesday._ After posting your letter and one to Luly I read
some of the Mail's papers. We have had absolutely no outside news
since January 1st, and get very little even of the operations of our
own force. I then went to see Foster who has had to go sick and lives
on our supply ship. About 20 per cent. of our men are sick, mostly
diarrhoea and sore feet. The former is no doubt due to Tigris water.
They don't carry the chlorinating plant on trek, and men often have to
replenish water-bottles during short halts. Personally I have so far
avoided unboiled water. I have my bottle filled with tea before
leaving camp, and can make that last me forty-eight hours, and eke it
out with soup or cocoa in the Little Kitchener at bivouacs.
In the evening "D." Company had to find a firing party to shoot three
Indians, two N.C.Os. and one sepoy, for cowardice in the face of the
enemy. I'm thankful that North and not I was detailed for the job. I
think there is nothing more horrible in all war than these executions.
Luckily they are rare. The men, however, didn't mind at all. I talked
to the corporal about it afterwards--a particularly nice and youthful
one, one of my draft--and remarked that it was a nasty job for him to
have to do. to which he replied gaily, "Well, sir, I 'ad a bit o' rust
in my barrel wanted shootin' out, so it came in handy like." T.A. is a
wonderful and attractive creature.
_13th, Thursday._ Moved at 7 a.m., carrying food and water for two
days. The enemy had been located on the E. Canal, about eight miles
from D., and our people were going to attack them. The idea was to
hold them in front with a small force, while a much bigger force got
round their left flank (the Canal is on the left bank of the river).
Our brigade was to support the frontal containing force.
We marched about four miles and then halted about 9 a.m. There was a
strong and cold S.E. wind blowing, which prevented our hearing any
firing, and we could see very little shelling. Our air plane first
reported that a certain fort, which stood about a mile in advance of
the enemy's left flank, was strongly held; but we seem to have shelled
them out of that pretty easily, for about 2 p.m. it reported again
that the enemy had left his trenches on the Canal.
About 3.30 p.m. we advanced, and reached the aforesaid fort a little
before sunset. Here we heard various alarming and depressing reports,
the facts underlying which, as far as I can make out at present, were
these. The Turks, seeing their left flank being turned, quitted their
position and engaged the outflanking force, leaving only about 500 out
of their 9,000 to hold the canal. Our outflanking force, finding
itself heavily engaged, sent and asked the frontal force to advance,
to relieve the pressure. The frontal force, hearing at the same time
that the Turks had quitted their Canal trenches, advanced too rashly
and were surprised and heavily punished by the remnant left along the
Canal, losing half their force and being obliged to retire. So when
they met us they naturally gave us the impression that there was a
large force still holding the Canal, which we should have to tackle in
the morning.
We dug ourselves in about 2,000 yards from the Canal. It was very cold
and windy, and we had not even a blanket, though I had luckily brought
both my greatcoat and Burberry. There was a small mud hut just behind
our trench, littered with Turkish rags. The signallers made a fire
inside, and two stray Sikhs had rolled themselves up in a corner. It
was not an inviting spot, but it was a choice between dirt and cold,
and I had no hesitation in choosing dirt. So after a chill dinner, at
which I drank neat lime-juice and neat brandy alternately (to save my
water-bottle intact), I turned into the hut. The other officers
(except North) at first disdained it with disgust, but as the night
wore on they dropped in one by one, till by midnight we were lying in
layers like sardines. The Colonel was the last to surrender. I have a
great admiration for him. He is too old for this kind of game, and
feels the cold and fatigue very much: but he not only never
complains, but is always quietly making the best of things for
everyone and taking less than his share of anything good that is
going. Nothing would induce him, on this occasion, to lie near the
fire.
_14th, Friday._ The night having passed more pleasantly than could
have been expected, we stood to arms in the trenches at 5.30 a.m. This
is a singularly unpleasing process, especially when all you have to
look forward to is the prospect of attacking 9,000 Turks in trenches
behind a Canal! But one's attention is fully occupied in trying to
keep warm.
As soon as it was light we got orders to advance and marched in
artillery formation to within 1,200 yards of the Canal, where we found
some hastily begun trenches of the day before, and proceeded to deepen
them. As there was no sign of the enemy, the conviction grew on us
that he must have gone in the night; and presently the order came to
stop entrenching and form a line to clear up the battlefield, _i.e._
the space between us and the Canal. This included burying the dead and
picking up wounded, as the stretcher parties which had tried to bring
the wounded in during the night had been heavily fired on and unable
to get further than where we were.
I had never seen a dead man and rather dreaded the effect on my queasy
stomach; but when it came to finding, searching and burying them one
by one, all sense of horror--though they were not pleasant to look
upon--was forgotten in an overmastering feeling of pity, such as one
feels at the tragic ending of a moving story, only so oppressive as to
make the whole scene like a sad and impersonal dream, on which and as
in a dream my mind kept recurring to a tableau which I must have seen
over fifteen years ago in Madame Tussaud's of Edith finding the body
of Harold after the battle of Hastings, and indeed the stiff corpses
were more like waxen models than anything that had lived.
The wounded were by comparison a cheerful company, though their
sufferings during the eighteen hours they had lain there must have
been fearful: but the satisfaction of being able to bring them in was
our predominant feeling.
In the middle of this work we were suddenly recalled and ordered to
march to the support of the outflanking force, of whose movements we
had heard absolutely nothing. But when we had fallen in, all they did
was to march us to the Canal, and thence along it back to the river,
where we encamped about 1 p.m. and still are.
It was a great comfort to be within reach of water again, though the
wind and rain have made the river so muddy that a mug of water from it
looks exactly like a mug of tea with milk in it.
The wind had continued unabated for two days and now blew almost a
gale. The dust was intolerable and made any attempts at washing
hopeless. Indeed one's eyes got so full of it the moment they were
opened that we sat blinking like owls or shut them altogether. So it
was a cheerless afternoon, with rain threatening. Our supply ship with
our tents had not come up, but the Major (Stillwell) had a bivouac
tent on the second line transport, which he invited me to share, an
offer which I gladly accepted. We made it as air-tight as possible,
and built a wall of lumps of hard-baked mud to protect us from
snipers, and slept quite reasonably warm. It came on to rain heavily
in the night, so I was lucky to be under shelter.
_15th, Saturday._ This morning it rained on and off till nearly noon,
and the wind blew all day and the sun never got properly through: but
the rain had laid the dust.
_N.B._--With regard to parcels, none are arriving now, just when
they're wanted. The fact is they have to economise their transport
most rigidly. A staff officer told me that our supply of river-boats
just enables one boat (with its pair of barges alongside) to reach us
every day; our food for one day fills one entire barge, so that you
can imagine there is not much room to spare after ammunition and other
war material has been put on board. The mahila convoys are extra, but
as they take several weeks to do the journey their help is limited.
I have just seen the padre who has been working in the field dressing
station. In his station there were two doctors, two nursing orderlies
and two native sweepers; and these had to cope with 750 white wounded
for five days till they could ship them down the river. Altogether our
casualties in the two battles have been well over 5,000, so the Turk
has rather scored.
This afternoon news is ([Greek: a]) that we have got a new Brigadier.
Our brigade manages its commanders on the principle of the caliph and
his wives, and has not yet found a Sherazade. ([Greek: b]) that we
have got a brigade M.O.O. ambulance. This is a luxury indeed. We are
only just over twenty miles from C. now, so we hope to get through
after one more battle.
_16th, Sunday._ Still in camp. No sun. More rain. Friday's gale and
the rise in the river has scattered our only pontoon bridge, and
Heaven knows when another will be ready. All our skilled
bridge-builders are in C. The people here seem quite incapable of even
bridging the Canal, twenty feet wide. Typical, very.