After March 8th, all horses not wanted for food were shot to save their keep, and many a good animal was sacrificed in this way.
By the 19th, the bread ration was only ½ lb., while the Indians were getting 10 oz. meal. The small quantity of food began now to tell on the strength of all ranks, and cases of bad enteritis—so-called—were common, these resulting in many deaths during the last days of the siege.
It is really wonderful what an amount of satisfaction can be derived, under such conditions, from simply imagining a first-class meal, and I remember one day, in my dug-out, having a great time going through a long menu and choosing everything I should like best.
When the grass began to grow towards the end of March, we gathered what the Sepoys called ság or anything we could make a sort of spinach with. It was like eating wet hay, but, undoubtedly, kept scurvy down, and if well soaked in vinegar was not so bad.
In Woolpress they managed to get a little fish from the river, fishing by night.
Our activities after March 8th were directed to keeping out the floods. Two big bunds were made, one inside the other, round Kut. The Arabs in the town were forced to work on the inner one and thus saved the troops, who were weak enough as it was already with making the outer bund.
By the end of March we had a splendid bund across the middle line capable of keeping out nearly three feet of water; this being 4 ft. 6 in. high and about 20 ft. thick at the base, all the soil having to be excavated from pits in front. The sappers had told us that our mess dug-out was just about the lowest spot round Kut and would be the first place to be flooded; however, when the floods really came, we found we were two feet higher up than the regiment a little further along the line. It was hard work making these bunds, and all the men not otherwise on duty were out every night. The bund also had to form the firing parapet, and with barbed wire entanglements in the "borrow" pits in front and again beyond we were well protected from any attack, not to mention the floods which would have made an advance by the enemy almost impossible.
All through April the water slowly percolated up and the dug-outs and trenches had to be continually raised, until by the end of the month we were nearly up to ground level. The river rose to its highest level during April, but fortunately news was received, by wireless, from a British officer with the Russians at Lake Urmia, of the various floods, so that we were more or less prepared. Actually we had never much more than 2 ft. 6 in. outside our bund, which held well. Had we been driven back inside the inner bund, the whole force would have been cooped up in a very small area and any shelling would have been bound to take a large toll.
For the last ten days there was no tobacco left. People were smoking used-up tea-leaves, orange leaves, liquorice, and even grass. Whatever smoking tea-leaves may be like for the smoker, it is exceedingly unpleasant for everybody else, especially in a dug-out.
Throughout the April fighting we followed each communiqué from General Gorringe with the greatest anxiety, watching his shells bursting over the Turkish lines by night and always hoping on until after the Julnar had failed to get through.