Item 01: Leslie Kemnitz Stuart diary, 18 March 1915-4 March 1916 - Page 260
Primary tabs
Transcription
[Page 260]
Saturday 21 August, 1915
Warships fired a few rounds in the morning, in afternoon a heavy attack was made on enemys trenches in the direction of hill 971 covered by the guns of the fleet & land batteries. The Turkish guns were hopelessly out classed & duly made very feeble reply. The shooting of the British was exquisite. They turned about 4 square miles into a veritable inferno using luddite & shrapnel. At times the dust & debris was so great as to resemble a fierce dust storm. We watched the fun from the high cliffs near Mt Camel [?] in spite of the number of spent bullets that came our way, which were calmly ignored by the boys. We are advancing now to man the reserve trenches, it will be our first taste of real fire.
We slept behind the line of trenches. We were in a bad position, spent & stray bullets fell amongst us while we slept & we lost several men.
This bombardment was when the English Yeomanry advanced under shrapnel to Chocolate Hill.