Item 03: Archie Barwick diary, 10 May-23 July 1916 - Page 134
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[Page 134]
position, this is how we done it, Sergt Howarth & myself were in front with 3 bombs each, on both our flanks & a little behind us were 2 more men one with bombs & the other with a rifle ready for any emergency, behind us again were 2 more men armed the same as the flank men, & to complete it we had a man posted in the middle of the party so it did not matter where they attacked us we could get our full strength on to them. The formation is like this, [ diagram with two dots in the centre on top, two dots below and to the left, one dot below and in the centre below the first two dots, two dots below and to the right, then finally two dots in the centre below the single dot. It is roughly a square tilted onto a point with two dots at each point and one dot in the centre]
The ground where we were out on is a tangle of wild oats, grass &etc, nearly up to your middle, broken here & there by trees & little streams, when you are out long it is a great strain on one, for you are expecting any minute to run across them or get wiped out by the machine gun fire which never seems to