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[Page 37]
May 1915
20th – were camped. Up again at 7am
[Note in margin:] Friday
21st – Digging Dug-outs all a.m. & shifting panniers & other stuff from beach slept in afternoon. Firing not so heavy throughout night. Aeroplanes overhead. Big shell exploded in hill not far off camp, covering us all with dirt.
22nd – Raining lightly in morning, made grey clayey soil very sticky & uncomfortable. Preparing for building hospital this afternoon. Went down to beach & brought all our equipment up & left same at foot of Gully. Sgt. Morgan & Cpl Webb, slept there.
[Note in margin:] Tuesday
23rd – Wrote military p.cs & letters to Mater & Aunt Jack. Dead man named Jones of 4th inf. (Vic) found over hill. Identification disc taken. Relics bayonets, cartridges, belts etc found. Went for swim on beach & drew rations in afternoon. Arrangements made for shifting camp to near 3rd Fd. Amb Started Dugouts
[Note in margin:] Italy declared War
24th – Digging our dug-outs in new position. Armistice to bury dead arranged between Austns & Turks. from 9am to 4pm. Visited trenches about noon Gruesome sight. Hundreds of bodies Turks 12 to 1 lying about unburied. Cartridges & equipment galore. Some found with trench tools in hand having started dugouts when bowled over. Capt Robinson told me they had found Lieut Roberts' (Alf's cousin brother) body. All or most of Austns buried, estimated about 2500 or 3000 Turks dead. Hills took wind out of us, climbing them seemed impossible to charge up. Top like plateau & Austns scattered over it killed whilst charging, some riddled with bullets, skulls perforated. Sleeping in dugout with Miles & Wiggins. Sniping after armistice over. Austns in splendid & almost impregnable positions. Seems as if big movements of troops pending. Rumoured big fort (supposed Kilid Bahr)