Our casualties, although light compared with the Turks, must be heavy. Over 300 passed through our station before dark, but at that time perhaps the bigger half was still to come. Those lying between trenches have usually to lie where they fall till dark. Our losses would likely be 3000 to 4000.
The Asiatic guns, finding they could take little active part in the proceedings, although they fired occasionally on the French, amused themselves by firing at W. Beach and the battery on Tekke Burnu, and with forty-two shots managed to kill two men and wound eight. One of our men, Corporal Dunn, got badly hit while in Aberdeen Gully by a two-pound shell cap. It was due to the premature bursting of one of our own shells. (Corporal Dunn died a day or two afterwards.) So far the wounds received by our Ambulance have been slight.
Padre Creighton had a peculiar experience at 1 a.m. to-day, while asleep in his "crow's nest". He has taken up his quarters with us in Aberdeen Gully, and has a dugout about 15 feet above the path that winds the length of our Gully. This is almost sheer up and is reached by steps cut in the rock and sandbags. It was formed by levelling a natural recess, and had a galvanised iron roof. Sheer up from this again the rock rises another 70 or 80 feet to the mule track above. A packhorse with two heavy tanks lost its footing on its way up and fell crashing down on Creighton's place, carrying away the roof and a number of sandbags, and dropping one of the boxes in the middle of his bed. The padre escaped untouched. Kellas, sleeping further down the path, rushed out and found himself face to face with the runaway steed, which, still more strange to say, was also unhurt. The padre in the bright moonlight was standing in his pyjamas on the top of his steps, scratching his head, and wondering what it all meant.
The heat all through the day had been most trying, and as I trudged down The Gully by myself, Thomson remaining behind, in the sweltering heat, the whole way packed tight with ammunition and other wagons, through a dust that filled The Gully to the very brim, I felt dead tired after a hard day's work and the long tramp of yesterday, when we looked in vain for a site for a new advanced dressing station. The road seemed without end. As I neared "home" and came over the slight rise at our cemetery the moon rose through a slight haze over the classic Mount Ida, as a great blood-red ball, while on my other side, out in the Gulf of Saros, a dense cloud hung over Imbros, which every few seconds was lit up by a flash of lightning. I had little food all day, and was too tired to eat, but after a big drink of lime juice I retired to bed and slept the sleep of the just—of the tired at any rate.
And so ended a day in which we had had a good specimen of a modern battle, where both sides had shown equal and indomitable pluck.
June 29th.—Spent the day resting and washing clothes. When I can I have a washing day twice a week.
Many wounded passed through Aberdeen Gully after I left last night, the total up to some hour this morning being 566, which meant a lot of hard work.
After I left, Ashmead-Bartlett was passing, and recognising Padre Creighton he went over our Gully, and greatly admired the place for its suitability and picturesqueness, and is to give a description of it in one of his early articles to the home papers—so he says. He told our fellows the following story of a friend of his, who had been through the landing of April 25. He wrote home saying that shells flew thick about his ears, torpedoes chased him about, and mines floated all round; still he was not in the least afraid, he just thought of what his padre told them the previous Sunday, when he exhorted them when in danger to look upwards. He looked upwards, and behold! here was a bloody aeroplane dropping bombs.
Early in the afternoon we had a goodly number of shells. Yesterday, when I was up The Gully, a large piece of shell flew through our mess tent, where the servants were sitting, and landed in a jam pot on the table, splashing an orderly all over; he, mistaking jam for his own blood, did not know whether he was really alive or dead.
June 30th.—We had seven large shells during the night, all landing on our side of W. Beach. Two traction engines have been fitted up lately down on the shore, and one of these was smashed, and a tool-house beside it blown pretty well to pieces. There was also some fighting about our left and centre, but I have not heard the result. The Turks have now a plentiful supply of ammunition, and all yesterday afternoon and this morning have poured a constant stream of high explosives into the French side of Kereves Dere.