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[Page 6]
28/4/15
Been in the trenches ever since last note with the exception of yesterday afternoon when our section were posted on the left of the hillside to pick off snipers who were concealed on the hillside and shooting our men from the rear – we have occupied and made trenches on three sides of the position of which a valley is the centre and also hold the other side under control by fire from the ships – We are sending out parties to clear the hillsides of snipers who are shooting a lot of our men from the rear and right and left flanks – several men and officers of A. Coy wounded and dead – Very deep ascent up to our position – you can hardly get a foothold – enemy keeps us at it day and night and if we show ourselves at all snipers spring at us – we have shot many of the snipers however – it is difficult to locate them however as the hills are all covered with short scrubs and undergrowth – had several narrow shaves from bullets lobbing up against me while digging cover within [with] trenching tools – our chaps on the right of the position have had to retire at times from part of the trenches on the right, but have always reoccupied them with a bayonet charge. The Turkish artillery is pouring schrapnel into us all the time – some more transports with an escort of warships arrived this morning (we can see on the boats below from our position high up on the hills – about a mile and a about [a half] from the beach – our aeroplanes go out scouting every day – fighting on our right very stiff – one of our mine trawlers sung [sunk] on the beach by the enemy shells – they are now burying some of our dead at the head of the valley on the right – poor Tom West shot dead by our [a] sniper in the trench alongside me – shot through the mouth – our machine gun is about six yards above me on top of hill and it draws a lot of the enemy fire which we get the benefit of – we had to dig ourselves in deep, and bank up the sides and the rear of the trench, as we are being sniped at from the right flank and rear left.
28/5/15[Should be 28/4/15]
Still in the same trenches and we have had to take turns for a sleep as we have not been relieved since we came here – feeling pretty good but very cold at night as we had to leave our packs and overcoats on the beach (being too much to carry up the steep hillside) – very hot in daytime and very cold at night – we keep up