FEARFUL SLAUGHTER.

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume XLII, Issue 13816, 16 October 1915, Page 4

FEARFUL SLAUGHTER.

"ONE OF THE. LUCKY FIVE."

"Private Sydney Braham, Auckland Infaatry Battalion, who went to the front the /fifth reinforcements, describes "., his eXperie)iC;es at (jlaUipoli in, a letter to his "mother, Mi's graham, 15, O'Neill t ponsonby. Th§ letter w^s written in' the ITirpt London. General Hospital, Cainberwell, England, ' where , Pri- ,, Braham is lying wounded. Pri-; « vit« Braham writes:— "We arrived at " tJallipoli on August 7. As we approached the place we could hear the roar of ths guii^, and we cdme fonder fit? we were two nuleV from the land.. '.A great battle vfas in progress when we arrived. On bur way to the trenches we..saw thousands of .dead and; pounded lying all larpuhd. our lines. In fact, "it- wasV.just 'like, the picture we saw at Windsor easile, which represenled.>j3ante> infer,no," W/e , \yere, given the Qr/d'er to ohargei, but we did not get n^ore $han 10 yards out pf the: trench before, hundreds of .our. boys were, Sshbt down, and jyahad, to . retire. . Ths Turks took the;^ offensive, and attacked eight times during; one day. > Wo hold tlieni off, but we. lost heavily. We went up with' 1100 men, and when . I left for the hospital ship two day* later we could only muster 250. There .were only 65 of us left. to hold our part of the trench; We held it for three hours against great odds until there, were only five left* ~ I, was one of the lucky, five., ,W.e Sj:6re $hen «alled out, and fresh j men took our places. I was iien sent :tp the base, a distance of .three, miles, to get - some food" • for , tb© , relief party. While >• I \vas on tho way I inet George Lury _ .going to the dressing-station. I be- * lieve ho was wounded,,, .While" I was getting the rations two shells burst "right amongst us and killed three Indians and three mules. I felt a pain, in ~* -.'my. leg atid shoulder and knew that j; had " been hit. Directly afterwards another shell «ame over . and the concussion threw me a distance of .12: ft over a .lot of boxes. I thought my back was broken. V l,. was placed on the hospital ship and 'brejight to I am now Eettiixg well, attd, hope to be out of the hospital in a few days."