Colonel Pearson, O.C. Lancashire Fusiliers, of Lancashire Landing fame, visits us in an exhausted state, his clothes damp and sodden. We provide him with an outfit of dry clothes, gathered from our respective kits. He talks about going back to his regiment to-night, which is sheltering in the C.R.E. nullah, by our forward ration dump, but I think soon he will collapse altogether and have to be evacuated. He was all last night holding a portion of our flooded, sodden and freezing line. At night Horne and I go on to cart some of the rations from the C.R.E. dump to Hill 10 by A.T. carts. On arrival at the camp of the Royal Dublin Fusiliers, we find a poor shivering fatigue party waiting for us. I had expected to find these men in a miserable condition, for their camp has suffered heavily in the storm, and even the best built dugouts have been washed entirely away. We have brought with us whisky-bottles filled with rum and water. As the last cart is unloaded, we hand the bottles to the sergeant, who calls the men up one at a time. They come forward eagerly as each name is called, “Private Murphy! Private O’Brien!” etc., and drink a tot from the bottle handed to them.
It is amusing to watch them standing waiting their turn, with keen anticipation, for a pull at the bottle under the superintendence of their watchful sergeant, who regulates fair play in the length of the drink by interrupting an extra long one by snatching the bottle from the man’s mouth, now and again. As we go away, several of the men shout, “The blessings of Jasus be on you, sir!” in a Dublin brogue, and we leave the poor devils to shiver in the camp the rest of the night. We are delayed in our return by a chase after two mules, which we capture after much difficulty amongst gorse-bushes, trees, and boulders. Calling in at the Australians’ dugout on Kangaroo Beach, we see them sitting round a welcome log fire, and as we warm ourselves, a figure covered in a blanket, his head swathed in a cloth, creeps in stealthily like a cat. He is a half-frozen Drabi, edging towards the fire to warm himself. An Australian makes him understand that he had better go back to his camp, and orders him out. He creeps out, but after a pause I see him come back stealthily once more, unnoticed by the others, and sit at the back of the stove on his haunches, his hands spread out for warmth. He is at last noticed, but some one says, “Let the poor devil be!” and we go on talking, taking no notice of him.
November 29th.
The gale is still heavy, but the blizzard has stopped. The sky is clear overhead, but it is freezing hard, and the steady stream of casualties from the storm still continues to be evacuated. The whole country-side has frozen hard. All day we are hard at work sending up comforts to the line and to the C.R.E. nullah, and nursing the casualties who have arrived in our little camp. The wind is slackening a little, and in consequence the sea is going down. Advantage is therefore being taken of this to thin down the overcrowded casualty clearing station and the many improvised shelters, which are overflowing with cases. The hospital ship is standing close inshore, only five hundred yards off West Beach. My visits to D.H.Q. on the top of the hill above our gully are made to-day with great exertion in the teeth of the bitterly cold gale, and I arrive at the top each time absolutely exhausted. Before I go into the D.A.Q.M.G.’s little dugout, which is his office and bedroom combined, I have to sit down on a boulder to recover my breath.
Horne and I go up with the A.T. carts to take more of the forward reserve rations from the C.R.E. nullah over to the left of Hill 10, for two forward dumps have to be made of equal numbers of rations, and the one we have now is therefore being halved. Hill 10 is a position of which several of our batteries have taken advantage, and in consequence is a favourite target of the Turkish gunners. One veritably walks on a surface of shrapnel bullets around this hill, lying like pebbles on the shore. On arrival at the nullah we find that all the Supply boxes, with their tarpaulin covers, have been built up to form a large improvised dressing station. They are full of cases of frostbite and exhaustion. From all around comes the sound of men groaning. And so the carting of rations to Hill 10 is off to-night. As I walk back, I hear a groaning voice calling “Mother, mother!” and peering through the darkness of the night, I see the form of a man lying under a gorse-bush. Poor devil! His mother, to whom he calls, is probably knitting him socks at home. We carry him along to the 89th Field Ambulance Dressing Station, just to the right of the nullah, having to negotiate a muddy brook on the way. We walk back fast, to get up a circulation, and find on arrival that a nice fire has been kept up. The roads are hardening with the frost. This will aid the solution of the transport difficulties, which have been almost insuperable during these awful last few days, for the wind has been so strong as to almost prevent the use of the light motor-ambulance, and horse transport is restricted, owing, I find, to animals having already been evacuated just before the storm.
November 30th.
We awake to find the gale has died away. It is a cool, beautiful day, with not a cloud in the sky. In fact, the sun is beaming warm. It is hard to believe that we have just passed through a terrible blizzard. The beach is crowded with cases of frostbite waiting for evacuation, which is rapidly going on now. Men lie about everywhere on the beaches, with their limbs swathed in bundles of bandages. Many cases are serious, and not a few will lose their limbs. The Main Supply depot is now a large hospital of shelters built of boxes and sailcovers. All over the beaches men are hunting about for lost property buried in the mud. Dugouts and trenches are being drained of the remaining water. The beaches are gradually becoming themselves again. The Division has suffered heavily.
On the inspection of the Royal Fusiliers to-day, one company, on being called to attention, proved to be a company consisting of Captain Gee, a sergeant-major, and a private. Captain Gee shouted, “Sergeant-major, call the company to attention.” The sergeant-major then shouted, “‘W’ Company, ’shun!” and the one man left, who was the company cook, sprang to attention.
Gee, forty-five years of age, and who at the best of times could not be called robust-looking, stuck this storm through at his post in the trenches, which are situated on the lowest ground—trenches which in consequence suffered the worst of all—until he was relieved.
He told me after that on coming back on relief he came to a small nullah, and that he was so weak and finished that he actually cried like a child before he could summon up the will-power to get across that little brook, which at ordinary times he would have cleared at a leap.