Item 02: Leslie William Sutherland diary, 1 January-13 December 1916 - Page 7

[Page 7]

January 9, 1916 Sunday

Jack Wills Chas & I went in for the Douglas this morning instead of going to Church found her to be OK although a trifle rusty, filled up & went out to Mena round the Pyramids where we had a wet set out for home at a steady 30 ml per hour & arrived without mishap. Hal & I then went on leave it being our turn done up to kill we got into Cairo at 2.15 hired the best car we could find & set out for the Barrage, the roads were fair, day glorious & the car splendid so when we arrived there after passing everything on the road we were in good spirits, took photos, came back at 6 had tea at St James, then went to a dance at the Sane dè Casino, not up to much, had a decent supper, met Wrigley & got back to camp at 10.30 tired.

January 10, 1916 Monday

Spent all the morning running about on the bus after petrol horses etc went down to the remount depot & found that our horses would be ready at 12 but when we lobbed at 12 the rotters told us to come again at 3, when we finally got them had quite a circus on the way home, horses everywhere, preparations going on apace for the morrow when the Brigadier is inspecting troops who move out on the following day. Aeroplanes up all the afternoon & we had the check to gallop over their aerodrome but nothing doing as they happened to be Tommys. Matthew left us today & took up his new job, wrote letters, met Bill Chatham this morning in all his importance only not feeling quiet to comfortable in his new role as Sig officer to the 3rd Bde.