Volume 2: Letters written on active service, M-W, 1914-1919 - Page 209
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[Page 209]
our artillery started to bombard the Turks while our good old planes watched the effect it had on them, then word was sent to us to charge up to the foot of the first hill on our horses then dismount and finish on foot with the bayonet.
Well we started and so did the Turks artillery and machine guns, but not horse or man care much about their artillery but dashed straight on.
It was a magnificent sight to see line after line, without a bend, of prancing horses and horsemen going at a hand gallop over the lovely green lawn country into shell and machine gun fire, but they reached there and dismounted for a go with the bayonet, and the horses were taken back out of reach of the artillery and they start to advance over country as flat as a table yet on a gradual slope of a hill where the Turks were blazing away at us for their lives and there was not a three pence worth of cover so we ran till we were blown out with our heavy load and still a good way from the Turks but their machine guns were hitting a few of our boys, but, however, we lay down and had to dig the top off the ground with our sheath knives, for the roots of the grass would not let our fingers go through, but anyhow we got cover by digging and the Turks Machine Guns got hot and the air was thick with bullets, so we stayed there for some time while our guns gave them what for.
You could not see the hills for black and white smoke, between their fire and ours, and our faces got as black as niggers.
Well we were in a position that we could not go forward for the fire was too thick, and to advance would be too large expence of life, so we stayed there until late in the afternoon when we thought we would have to retire and just then our boys showed up on the other side of the ridge charging and yelling for their lives with the bayonet flashing in the sun, so we made a dash for the last lap and got in the trench with Jacko and the square-heads, and they surrendered guns and all just before dark, so we collected them up and their gear and started them off back to El-Arish, while we reformed up and got our wounded away, which was a good few, but not many for the hot-corner we got into.
Just then the German plane showed up and came over some of the Bedouins camp and dropped bombs for our planes had gone, after their splendid days work, so the German thought he would take his chance to do some damage, but the bombs he dropped fell in among the poor Bedouins and