4 p.m.—I have just received orders attaching me temporarily to the ammunition column, which is practically without any officer as Cockie has several guns on the river front, and is continually up in the observation post there. I am to take charge of the column and incidentally relieve him at observation. It is thought that the enemy may try to rush boats down the river. They could never get past our four-point-sevens in horse barges moored on the river, or the 5-inch or the 18-pounders or the 12-pounders from the Sumana. But great vigilance is necessary. The river is at least 400 yards wide.
It is quite good business getting attached to the column. I shall be practically C.O. with all the horses and wagons and ammunition, and two guns to keep my eye on, and observing between whiles. It will mean living in a house, for which I am very thankful. Anyway, I have been moved about owing to casualties certainly as much as any other subaltern, and up till now I have been fairly fit all along. Those early days in the brick kilns, then in the shallow trenches, then in the Fort, and especially during the floods in this battery, absorbed my fitness, and I am now a bag of pains and have lost ten pounds in weight.
I have had tea, and am already packed up. Farewell my dug-out, in which I have spent many wonderful hours and thought many strange thoughts. I am wiser at leaving than on entering thee. Timon, also my friend, thou hast earned thy freedom. Thy supper eaten, I shall put thee near the pond behind the old communication trench near the palm woods. I have no time to write an elegy upon thee. Thou camest sharply into my life and leavest it as suddenly. It is the way of the army and of life. Thou hast been a soldier's companion. Many, many are the fantasies we have indulged in, have we not? Many thoughts exchanged that could never be set on paper, oh dear, no. What better confidant than a wee green frog! Mind not thy unceremonious dismissal. My advice is to smile. When thou seest thy fly, go for him between wind and water, and smile even if thou art unsuccessful. Joyful days and full rations I wish thee. Never think! Farewell!
February 19th.—Graoul removed my kit to the building in the town occupied by the 6th D.A.C. near the Minaret, where I had enjoyed my Christmas dinner. It is close to the mosque, and two minutes from the guns on the river front. There is the usual tiny concrete square with rooms all around it, mostly occupied by the servants, and one large room with wooden shutters which was the mess. Cockie sleeps in a basement room as being presumably safer and wishes me to share with him. But he is such an extremely exuberant and nervy companion, I have taken a small room on the first floor which has a thick wall on the side from which the shells come. Of course the doorway is also there, directly in line of the usual fire direction, and many bullets have at one time or other entered there and gone through the front wall which is quarter inch wood only. However, I have enough room for my bed, and must learn to lie close. Outside my room is a tiny promenade space of the flat roof and the basement rooms, and bounded by a low wall which stops a lot of bullets. I have often sat up there close to the wall and read while bullets cracked into the other side of it or flew overhead. Looking over this wall, one may see the deserted shell-ploughed ground between the battery and the palm trees that fringe the river, the river itself and the Turkish trenches beyond.
I dined with Cockie and Edmonds, who is convalescing, and enjoyed an excellent cup of coffee with tinned milk.
I commenced duty this morning by inspecting the horse lines. Cockie has not been near the lines for months, and the general condition of things is highly creditable to the N.C.Os. who have carried on. The horses, I find, are easily the best conditioned in Kut, but that is because they are by far the youngest, and also have not had the work of the battery horses. The wagons and harness require attention, and I have ordered inspection of each in sections. We are almost out of dubbin, which is in great demand for light. A twisted piece of rope, or wick, if possible, gives a mild, dull light.
Graoul I had to send back to the battery, which is too shorthanded to spare men. My new servant is a Punjabi Mohammedan from the lines, by name Amir Bux. He is a good, silent lad, and very attentive. This morning the aeroplane got up and then went down so we have been spared one entertainment at least.
This afternoon I spent some hours in Cockie's observation post, river front, which is a tiny sandbag affair arranged around an opening in the roof to which a ladder leads from the first floor of the heavily bricked and sandbagged building on the river bank, and some forty yards from the water. This tiny strip of land, once the wharfage, is now grass green. To cross it is certain death. The observation post is certainly the most exposed in Kut, being nearer the river front than the Heavies, and getting all the 5-inch over and shorts. The Turks are thickly entrenched on the other side of the river, and have a bee line on every brick on the water front. The two-horse artillery guns and the 18-pounders are behind emplacements just below, and are within megaphone distance from the observation post. Our telephonists are at the foot of the ladder on the first floor. The post commands a view of three quarters of the horizon, the whole of the right bank, and has artistic advantages all its own. The solitary waters of the sunlit Tigris and the misty distances between and beyond the palm trees invite one to pleasant dreams after the strenuous times of trench days, and fort days, and perpetual dug-out days.
Edmonds returned to the battery and my dug-out. He has had a delightful period of convalescence here on the balcony, and seems much more fit.
This afternoon there was quite a strafe. The Turkish snipers' nest near the mouth of the Shat-el-hai, opposite our observation station, became troublesome, and we popped a few into them from the 13-pounders. That shut them up. Then Fanny, the huge Turkish trench mortar near the Woolpress post we hold on the other bank, popped her bomb of 150 pounds weight towards us. The bomb comes slowly at about the pace of a falling football, and of course is quite visible. It burst about a half-minute after reaching this bank, but did no damage. Then Fritz flew over and dropped three crashing bombs on the town, and returning to the Turkish lines for more ammunition, dropped four bombs near the 104th heavy battery. We gave him a hot rifle fusillade, and our improvised anti-aircraft gun did quite well. One burst was just below and two just in front. Fritz mounted very hurriedly.