gunfire, alas, some eight months later in Kastelorizo Harbour. The
"Flashes" gave notable concerts.

From the 21st April I again enjoyed the command of the Battalion.
Colonel Canning went on leave to England, and his distinguished services
were recognised soon afterwards by a C.M.G.

Towards the end of May, 1916, the Division was unexpectedly ordered to
move from Suez, and broken up in order to supply battalions for digging
work at various spots on the eastern side of the Canal--mainly on the
then most advanced screen of detached infantry posts--where the existing
defence scheme had not progressed with sufficient speed. A more
combative strategy was obviously contemplated, no doubt provoked by the
recent action at Katia. In the late afternoon of the 25th May the
Battalion started on their march into the Sinai Peninsula. The transport
was left at Suez under Lieutenant M. Norbury and Sergeant A.B. Wells,
and with Captain A.T. Ward Jones as Brigade Transport Officer.

Among the posts thrown out into the Peninsula, none at that time was
more desolate or remote than the sandy ridge called Ashton-in-Sinai,
apparently in honour of Ashton-under-Lyne. It lies many miles to the
east of the Little Bitter Lake. The trek to this spot by way of Kubri
and Shallufa was an ordeal even for our seasoned troops in the blazing
heat of an African summer. At 3 A.M. on the 27th May the Battalion set
out from their chilly bivouac by the Y.M.C.A. hut at Shallufa along a
road made by the Egyptian Labour Corps to a site called Railhead, about
ten miles off, where we rested during the broiling day. At four in the
afternoon we started on the worst lap of the trek, a final two hours'
ascent across the softest and heaviest sand imaginable to the high
rolling dunes of Ashton.

CHAPTER XI

SINAI

The view at Ashton is superb. Looking back on Africa, we saw on the
horizon the pale contour of the Gebel Ataki beyond the silvery line of
the Bitter Lakes and the Canal. On its Asiatic side, the detached posts
of Oldham, Railhead, and Salford, held by other battalions of the
Manchesters, glittered under a torrid sky amid the great waste of
desert. Facing our front, the wilderness stretched towards Palestine in
endless undulation.

The sultry days spent by the Battalion at Ashton were, however, spoiled
by excessive heat and repeated sandstorms. Double-lined tents were only
supplied after much delay, and promised wooden dining huts only
approach