r started till late in the
afternoon. All that day we were busy preparing our trench kits and
packing up the necessary kit which had to be as little as possible. We
always marched up in kilts and marched out in kilts, but during our
stay there our clothes were the irreducible minimum, shorts and
shirts. I well remember my first spell in the trenches of the famous
Sanniyat position. We usually held the centre of the line with an
Indian Regiment on either side and one in reserve. We left camp soon
after seven, the night was one of those wonderful clear still
moonlight nights for which this country is justly famous. It was
difficult to imagine before one came within sound of rifle fire that a
grim struggle was being enacted a mile or so in front, everything was
still quiet and peaceful, there were no villages to pass through on
our way up, it was simply open flat country with a river on one side
and a marsh on the other, a long dusty road leading from the Rest
Camps to the rear of the trenches. A light was burning in Brigade
Headquarters and a sentry on duty and we silently filed up the long
communication trench which was deep in dust as rain had not fallen for
months. We passed fatigue parties coming down for rations and the dust
was most distressing. The relief of trenches is usually a long and
tedious process--handing over stores, getting receipts, pointing out
anything of exceptional interest and generally getting settled down
for ten or fourteen days. The Regimental Headquarters were about 200
yards behind the front line and connected up by telephone and various
companies and platoons took it in turn to do their round of duty in
the front line. I think in the trenches you come to know men as you
can get to know them in no other place, the reserve of civilization is
often thrown off and you know a man for what he is, not for what he
would have you think he is. I remember sitting one night on the fire
step of the front line trench and having a long and interesting talk
with a Sergeant about Nigeria. He was telling me all about his life
out there before the war, and the part he took in the Cameroon
Campaign. Back in a Rest Camp he would never have got so
communicative, but when one knows that one's lives are dependant on
each other a close comradeship often results between both officers and
men. This gallant fellow some months later was killed as his company
was advancing to attack a Turkish position after the capture of