Gye, Rolo and I made a cheery little party and never found the time hang heavy on our hands, nor were we ever dull for a moment, even when we returned from convoy work at two o'clock in the morning. We would then have dinner together, and Gye was such a wonderful story-teller, and Claude Rolo was such a good second, and he also possessed such an infectious laugh, that I have often literally fallen from the box on which I was sitting, convulsed with merriment. I am sure the men of L Battery, R. H. A., who were camped close by, must have wondered what all this unseemly racket was about at such unearthly hours of the morning.
Gye's knowledge of colloquial Arabic was profound. It is related of him in Egypt that a Cairo street loafer on one occasion maliciously annoyed him, whereupon Gye turned upon him and let loose such a flood of Arabic slang, minutely vituperating the fellow himself and his ancestors for fourteen generations back, that, despairing of ever reaching such heights of eloquence, the loafer, out of sheer envy, went straight away and hanged himself!
In this first little bivouac of ours I spread my ground sheet and blanket in the corner of what had been a house. The guns of the Fleet had evidently got on to it and now nothing was left standing but some of the walls, which in places were about three or four feet high.
A day or two after settling in here I happened to jump down from one of these walls and the ground gave way somewhat under me. We made an excavation into it and discovered, hidden away in an underground chamber, an old green silk flag, so ancient that a touch rent it, an antiquated battle-axe dating, I should say, from the time of the Crusaders, and also some antique brass candlesticks—a curious and rare find in such a place.
It must not be supposed that the Turks left us in peace during the day. They constantly dropped shells into our little valley, tearing holes in the ground all round us, but by great good fortune while we were in this place we suffered no casualty of any kind, either man or mule.
On May 1st, after nightfall, I sent Claude Rolo out in the direction of the Gully Ravine, with ammunition and supplies for one of the Brigades of the 29th Division. He got to his destination safely, but while he was unloading the convoy, at about ten o'clock, whether by chance or design I know not, a tremendous hail of shrapnel was poured upon them from the Turkish guns a couple of miles away. Some forty of the mules had already been relieved of their loads and many of these broke away and galloped off into the darkness.
This turned out to be a providential diversion, for they helped to save the British Army that night, in much the same way as the cackling geese once saved Rome, for, all unknown to us, masses of Turks were at that very moment creeping up in the dark just before the rise of the moon. They were in three lines, the first line being without ammunition, as it was their particular business, when they got near enough to our trenches, to rush them with the bayonet. The Turkish General Staff, however, had not calculated on Zion mules! The terrified animals, scared and wounded by the shrapnel, careered over our trenches and clattered down with clanking chains on the stealthy foe. The Turks undoubtedly took them for charging cavalry, for they poured a volley into them and thus gave away their position.
Our men instantly lined the trenches and opened such an intense fire that the Turks were utterly routed, and those of them that were left alive fled back to the cover of their own trenches. The battle was taken up all along the line, and, if volume of musketry counts for anything, it was the hottest night fight we had during all the time we were on the Peninsula.
Claude Rolo had a most arduous and perilous time collecting his men and mules in the midst of all this turmoil, but he eventually got them together and took them down a side track to the Gully, into which they all scrambled helter-skelter, for safety.
One of the men, Private Groushkousky, distinguished himself greatly in this fight, for when the hail of shrapnel descended on the convoy and stampeded many of the mules, this plucky boy—for he was a mere youth—although shot through both arms, held on to his plunging animals and safely delivered his loads of ammunition to the men in the firing line. I promoted Private Groushkousky to the rank of Corporal, for his pluck and devotion to duty, and, in addition, recommended him for the D. C. M., which I am glad to say he obtained.