The Soldiers' Mail-Bag.

Free Lance, Volume XV, Issue 789, 13 August 1915, Page 25

The Soldiers' Mail-Bag.

CAPTAIN W. J. Hardham, V.C., of Wellington, in an interesting letter written from Gallipoli Peninsula a few days before he was wounded, states :—' 'We are in the trenches now within a few hundred yards of the onemy, but our men have worked so iiard. and made our portion of the trenches so sound, that the risk is very small so long as we are careful. Every day I am more proud of our men, and I know better than ever now what a grand lot of fellows they are.

"When the history of this great war is written, I am certain there can be no better or. braver action than the landing of the Australians' at this place. Everyday I wonder how it was ever possible in the face of what they met. I feel that from now on I could take off my hat to any Australian, soldier I see.

"We are lying in the reserve trench, and, of course, firing is going on continuously day and night, but we are holding our own, and do not feel the least doubt of our position. I get a swim every other day at least. There is no fresh, waiter to, spare for washing, so we wash ourselves and our clothes in the sea, which is quite close.

"We have a glorious view from our camp, and the evenings and sunsets are lovely. We cannot get much view of the sunrise (although we are always up at that time), as the enemy are on that side, and our view is through loopholes for safety's sake, for some of their snipers are good shots. We nearly forget the days of the week, until the chaplain comes along to see if there are any men off duty for church parade, and one is held; and then we know it must be Sunday.

"It is a wonderful sight to. see , the men bathing as shells are flying over them. Now and then a bather is' hit by shrapnel or a sniper. Still they bathe in hundreds, as, of course, we must keep ■clean.

"It is quite common to see some very close shaves occur here, for sometimes shells land quite close, and even in the midst of groups of men, and yet not hit ■a sim°;l e one of them; but, of course, it is not always so. lucky. We do not hear any .word of our wounded once they leave here, but we know they are 'being taken to safety and every care shown them.

"We are being well fed; bully beef and biscuits is the principal fare, but we get jam, bacon, and to-day fresh meat, dried vegetables, and potatoes, and we also get tobacco and-' matches.

"I witnessed the sinking of H.M.S. Triumph, and from where I was had a

Excerpts from Letters from the Front.

Writing later from the Victoria Hospital, Alexandria, Captain ' Hardham says: "We are having every care taken of ns. The doctors, nurses', R.A.M.C. are splendid, and I am sure in a lot of cases must nearly work night and day. The hospital here is very fine, and the attendance could not be better.

"The behaviour of the men when wounded is beyond praise. . One does not hear a murmur, and when they speak it is to pass some ordinary or original remark, and the way they bear their affliction is a lesson and a model' to mankind."

Captain Hardhain is now convalescent, and has been sent to England. *• * *

"There was to be a general! advance that afternoon;, and a certain number were tq go forward in ftlhe morning to get a ridge, of which I was one. About 200 of us started, but had only gone about three-quarters of a mile when 25 was the number left. I was beginning to think I was bullet-proof when I received my first, a shot in ithe arm. One of my mates bound it up, which stopped the bleeding somewhat. I lay down for about half-an-hour, when a pal in 'distress groaned', and I asked 1 him the cause. He told! me he was shot through the groin, and was bleeding very badly, so I crawled as best I could over to him and bandaged him up a little. No sooner finished my first-aid when another bull'eit. (explosive) struck me in. the thigh. The place of exit is a hole you could put both fists in. There was nothing- for me to do then but to lie still, and for eight hours

splendid view, and with, the glasses could see everything. Some of our fellows actually saw the column of water go up when the torpedo struck her. In ten minutes the decks were under water, and in less than half an hour she had disappeared. There were plenty of small steamers and torpedo boats'about, and I believe the loss of life was small. How hellpless one feels at a time like that is past all belief and understanding-" "

"I, with many more, lay on, that ridge with bullets ploughing the ground all round' us. My two wounds really did not hurt me- much till next morning. In fact, I helped to carry a poor fellow \vho was shot through both legs to a dressing station two miles back. Then that night I was compelled to walk three miles back to another dressing station (the base) to have my wounds attended to. After that I felt very ill, and just lay on the ground; with no covering. The next morning I was put on a transport. There were 1200 wounded, with two doctors' and 20 orderlies, so

you can imagine how we were." —Private H. 6. Farnall, of the 3rd Aucklands (brother of Mr. A. M. Farnall, lion. sec. of the Wellington Amateur Swimming Association). * ■» * ■» "I received some papers Boh sent me. Tell him or Mum to send the Free Lance. We miss the newspapers, so don't forget to send plenty. We are close to the sea, and have plenty of swimmifag. It's funny to see our'chaps in swimminor and the Turks shelling them all the time. There are a lot of German officers with the Turks. A lot of the Turks have given themselves up, as they say they are sick of the war. There is one thing about the Turks that one must admire. They are brave, and once they get a position they take a lot of shifting."—Gunner Joe Kenny, with the Main Expeditionary Force.

A corporal of marines, who was on board H.M.S. Irresistible when she was struck by a mine in the Dardanelles, writes to a friend: —"We unfortunately struck a mine and began to sink, which the Turks could see, and they peppered our poor old ship with. shells as we were going down. How \ve escapedl being blown to atoms I don't know. Everything went off grand, and the amusing sight was to see all hand's blowing ap their swimming collars. Aft and on the quarter deck the boys were dancing the Bunny Hug and singing ragtime songs to mouth-organ accompaniments. The shells' t-o creep nearer and hearer, and our old ship was listing heavily to the starboard. We could not fire our guns because the ship was leaning right tover almost. Suddenly a torpedo-boat came full speed down the Dardanelles amidst awful shell fire, and saved nearly all the hands. It is really a marvel, to me that she was not smashed to bits." * * *

"We were told that our signal' to charge would "be a bomb fired into the Turkish trench at three minutes to eleven. I must say the worst part of the whole business was the few minutes Ave were huddled in our , trench waiting and watching for the bomb and the word 'go.' They were minutes of toYture. A.t last, after we had tremtjled ourselves tired and. given our hearts a gentle push down our necks with our fingers, we heard that dreadful' bomb and also' Come on, ladls.' Almost 1 immediately we jumped out_ of our trenches ~and dashed where—straight for what looked like a red-hot fence. The rifles of the Turks seemed as close together as the pickets of a fence. The moment I put my head above the trench I saw the most dreadful sight—one I shall never forget; The (flashes of rifles and explosion of shells and bombs were terrific, and the noise was deafening.

"When at last we did reach the Turks' trench there were only seven of us alive, and six of these were wounded. The front of the trench was built up with sandbags, and the Turks were firing" through little portholes that had been left between the bags, so that they could not see us until- 1 we put our heads up over the trench. But we did not show our heads until we had thrown our bombs in, and while the confusion caused by the explosion was going on amongst them,- we, jumped into the trench and then got to work back to back with the much-dreaded cold steel. One f £ our seven had his hand! blown off by the Turks, and another, was shot through the lieart while getting into the trench. So it left five of us, not only to fight for our countrv. but for our lives. All five of us were Haurakis. We were soon in command of about fifty yards' ( f trench which we held until our engineers had slipped through and our supports came to our relief." —G.J. Coutts, a Waihi bugler boy.

"We are all 1 living in dug-outs close to the beach, and l have plenty of swimming until the Turks start their Hymn of Hate, as we call their shells. We have got it pretty hot at timesi from their artillery. As a matter of fact, we have been under fire all the time since we landed, but now and again they give us hell with shrapnel, and then it's a case of getting down deep in a dug-out or else stopping a shot. I don't mind admitting we don't need much telling to take cover. The Turkish trenches are only eigliifc yards away from ours in some places, and there is plenty of close fighting at times and a lot of hand-gre-nade throwine. We are now getting better tucker than we got in Egypt or anywhere else. The _ weather is very hot and not much rain. I have lost about a couple of sitone since I left New Zealand, but I have never felt better in all my life. Plenty of good tucker and! no work to speak of; the only thing scarce is drinking water. My job at nresent is looking after the telephone lines and mending them where broken. The Turkish snipers have nearly ' got me and my mate a couple of times, but we are getting wise to them now, and have a shot at them when they start their little games. Well, as notepapea* is scarce, I will finish. Don't forget to send some papers." —Gunner Joe Kenny, of Wellington.

"Please let me know per return mail wlieoi -the. To wns-St anbury boat race was rowed, to settle a bet." —An _ Australian's urgent request from Gallipoli.

x orsb thing we have to face is not the live Turk, but the dead one. .Alive the enemy is pretty bad, dead he is an unspeakable Turk indeed. I have seen twenty of our lads temporarily knocked out by nausea after blundering on a batch of the enemy's- dead buried under a handful of sang."—An Australian at Galhpoli.

A Canadian soldier writes:—ln the trenches the Germans are always shoutquestions to us. We shout back: Waiter, bring two beers and not too much suds!" Most of them that speak jingiish are waiters.

"3]f all those who are able to fight were to come out here and see what the British Army has got to do, I think they would join the Empire touring y ' i. T , he British Tommy has "gone through what no other troops in the world could have done. He is, of course, not turned out on 'Varsity lines, but he is-a man. He will swear at everything an<i everybody above and below the -i wvfu £ holds on when- perhaps only l-50th of his regiment is left. Then He will curse because someone has bagsed some trifling article 0 f his, or some equally unimportant thing."—One of the London Rifle Brigade.