Once or twice we took part in field manœuvres—or Divisional Training, to use the proper term. For our little lot such things usually meant hard graft with the pick and shovel plus a lot of tough marching. The fun seemed to go to the infantry and mounted men—if there was any fun in the game. Sometimes we were out for only a single day, but it mostly worked out at a night and a day. Once we were away from camp for five days and nights. In all cases actual war conditions were observed.
I shan't forget the last Divisional Training we took part in. The idea was that the enemy, an infantry column, was strongly entrenched at some point unknown out in the desert. The attacking party, a division of Australian and New Zealand infantry, was to march out of camp at sunset, duly discover the enemy's position, and deliver a night attack with its full strength. The "enemy," to which my company was attached, left early the same morning, being given a day in which to select the position and fortify it.
Our luck was out when it came to dig. My word that subsoil was hard! In some places, graft as we might, three feet was all we could sink the trenches; we seemed to have struck the bedrock of Egypt. After messing up our tools badly and losing a lot of sweat we gave it best, contenting ourselves with raising the parapet where necessary, so as to afford the requisite cover and shelter to the defenders.
Our own O.C. was naturally anxious to make an A1 show in his particular line, so we prepared a boncer defensive position. We had stacks of wire, and we didn't spare it, shoving up entanglements that called for some getting through all along the line. It was understood that the wire would be plain stuff; but on the quiet, and to make matters more realistic, we shoved in a couple of strands of barbed—and smiled expectantly. We also rigged up a real good outfit in the way of coloured flares, and fixed dummy mines here and there in front of the entanglements; the latter were harmless, of course, but they sounded pretty bad when sprung.
The trenches were manned at the appointed time, the flares set, the mines connected up to the exploders, and everything made ready against the advance of the attacking division. Our chaps (the engineers) were spread along the position and placed in charge of the mines, flares, etc. It was slow work waiting; lights were forbidden, so we couldn't even smoke. It wasn't to say warm, either, and I reckon every man of us would a dashed sight sooner have been snug in camp.
Presently our patrols sent in word of the approach of the enemy's scouts, the main body having halted under cover of a dip in the ground about 1000 yards back. We had arranged a big collection of jam tins and similar alarms along the front of the entanglements, and it wasn't long until they began to play a lively tune in one or two places. We guessed what had happened: some of the aforesaid scouts had run foul of the wire, and owing to the barbed stuff we had mixed through it, couldn't get clear for love or money. We sent out a party to make them prisoners, and they were ignominiously herded in, protesting the while in lurid language against what they styled "a crook trick."
The first attack was delivered fairly early in the night, and resulted in a decided repulse for the enemy. Hardly a man reached the entanglements, for our flares lit up the heavens with a wealth of illuminating colours never before seen in the desert ("just like a —— picture show," as one of the officers remarked), and the explosion of a mine or two caused them to beat a hasty retreat. They didn't seem to fancy those mines a little bit, and had evidently some doubts as to their harmlessness. The whole thing was fairly realistic, what with the heavy rifle fire and the language, and both sides soon warmed up to their work. In fact, things got so warm that several lively bouts with Nature's own weapons took place between our patrols and some of the enemy who had crawled up with the intention of cutting the wire.
The next attack in force came off in the early hours of the morning, and after a long and fierce scrap the position was carried. In spite of the fact that they were under a deadly Maxim and rifle fire at point-blank range, those heroic infantrymen set to work in grim earnest, pulling down our entanglements and stamping out our flares. Time after time we notified them that they were all dead men over and over again, but they couldn't see it, and were disposed to argue the matter. Rifle fire, we soon saw, had no effect; however, there were plenty of handy-sized flints and agates lying around, and a judicious application of the same caused a considerable amount of delay and some loss to the enemy. I wonder what the umpires thought? They didn't show up during this phase of the operations—perhaps because of the reception that had been accorded them some little time previous, when both sides mistook them for an enemy patrol!
On being cleared out of our trenches, we retired to a new position on some rising ground, beat off the pursuing foe, and, operations ceasing, went into bivouac. Afterwards, the umpires gave out their report, and we felt good when it was announced that the attacking column had taken almost thrice the number of hours allotted to them in which to storm our position. But the infantry never quite forgave us for that barbed wire. The mines were also a sore point. And when we pointed out that it was simply realism we were after, their comment was brief and caustic: "Realism be damned!—look at our clothes!"