ow acting as a reserve, were in position before
sunset. Large bodies of Japanese troops were in bivouac immediately
behind the centre of the village near their headquarters ready to deploy
in either direction.

On the evening of August 22 orders were received to push forward the
observation post of our armoured trains to a spot indicated, which
proved to be six hundred yards ahead of our positions and near enough to
be easily raided from the enemy lines. Lieutenant T.E. King, my
machine-gun officer, was at the same time ordered to move forward two
maxims, with a reduced company of Czech infantry in support to protect
this advanced post. The night was enlivened by constant skirmishes
between British and Terrorist patrols until about 8.30 A.M., when it was
observed that the Japanese patrols on the right had quietly retired
without giving any notice of their intention, and that the enemy were in
position on the plain for an attack and had already advanced along a
ridge to within a hundred yards of the outpost. The movements of the
enemy were observable only from the main look-out, from which orders
were already on the way gradually to withdraw the party to a position
nearer the lines. Before the order could be delivered the enemy
attacked. Lieutenant King proceeded to withdraw the guns alternately,
working the foremost gun himself, but defective ammunition frustrated
his effort. He gallantly tried to restart the gun, but the enemy were
now upon him, and he had no alternative but to retire without the gun.
The small Naval party in the advanced look-out were practically
surrounded, but under Petty Officer Moffat, who was in charge, they
managed to get out, with the enemy on their heels. This party was saved
by a marine named Mitchel, who, seeing Petty Officer Moffat in
difficulties, turned on his knee and faced his pursuers. Their fire was
erratic, but his was cool and accurate, and after three or four rounds
the Magyars kept their heads well down in the long marsh grass, which
permitted the party to escape. The result of this skirmish, however,
allowed the enemy armoured train to advance to a point dangerously near
our defensive works, which, with a little more enterprise and
determination, he might easily have enfiladed. But though the enemy
train had mounted a 6-inch gun our 12-pounder Navals were too smartly
handled to allow any liberties to be taken. This was the situation on
the morning that the Japanese 12th Division