Diary Entry and Letter Home - 8th December, 1915

Diary Entry

Another uneventful day off duty, and I spend most of the day writing letters and studying animal management, which is very dry and uninteresting. After lunch, Siggers and I stroll along the tourbières loop to see a 60-pounder (5-inch gun). It looks a tremendous size after our pop guns and weighs five tons. It makes one realise what the 15-inch gun must be like, let alone the 21-inch. At ten o'clock, the subs all went out to the Béthune road to see Siggers off on leave. We waited about, in hopes that he would get a car and, while standing there, met a certain Captain Sam Atkinson, who was looking for Rodd, our adjutant; they were going to raid the coffee bar. It seems a man had come up from Béthune that morning and taken a position behind the counter, to get experience. They were suspicious of him, as he had no identification badges on his tunic. Siggers, after about ten minutes' wait, mounted his horse, which was rather impatient, and he and his unfortunate servant, who was loaded up with luggage, which consisted chiefly of fuzes and other war relics, set off for the town.

Letter Home

Dear Mother,

I am writing this today as I am off duty and have nothing much to do. There has been very little doing lately, and the weather has been beastly wet. It generally manages to rain about two hours daily and sometimes manages to get an hour in at night as well. The trenches are simply awful, even with the precautions they have taken of putting boards and bricks on the floor. I heard of some of the infantrymen being bogged the other day and, after two hours standing up to their waists, someone came along and dug them out. One can't conceive what they are like unless one sees them. I believe the German trenches are the same, and we bagged a lot of them the other night, when the relief were coming up, as they were walking along in the open and would not face the communication trenches.

Bee has been shifted off to Béthune on a course of some sort. I heard from him, and he does not seem very pleased about it. However, I suppose I shall be the next to go.

On Sunday, I was up in the O.B. when the Bosch started to loose off quite a lot of shell during the morning. However, we replied very strongly and silenced him in about an hour. I believe he caught a lot of our infantrymen coming up the road to the trenches. He kept dropping shells - 77 (ins) – over about every five minutes. I think our battery got a bit of their own back, as we invariably have three rounds of gunfire some time after dinner into one of the towns behind the Bosch lines.

Siggers and I had quite an uncomfortable five minutes coming down the road from the O.B. The Bosch sent a few "whizbangs" over, searching the road. Well, the first ones came over when we got to what we call Harley Street, where there are a lot of motor vans and infantrymen on the move. You should have seen that street clear. We used to duck and crouch every time they came whistling over, and I did not feel at all brave about them, but my mind was relieved when I saw the infantrymen stretched out in the mud alongside the road, behind the trees. However, they all whistled well over us, and I do not think they got anyone.

I do not think I told you in what sort of place we are billeted. Well, the Mess is in part of an old farmhouse. One approaches it through the kitchen, and a pretty dirty one too, as you can imagine, with everyone tramping through with mud on their boots to the ankle. We are very lucky in having another sort of "estaminet" to sleep in, with nice tile, (or rather brick floors) and a leaky roof. However, we consider ourselves lucky not to be sleeping in dugouts. There are thousands of rats about, and last night we had an organised hunt. One man had a revolver, but we prevailed on him to put it away after he had had three shots, as he was not too safe. We saw plenty of rats but found it very hard to hit them with sticks, and we had only a small torch for a light.

On Monday night, we had two guests in to dinner (I forgot to mention that our attached Terrier officers left on Sunday). In the afternoon, Suttie, Hoyland and Kellagher sallied into Béthune and came out burdened with champagne and other dainties. They were all very wet when they arrived but seemed in high spirits for all that. After tea, Hoyland and Kellagher returned and assisted the cook in preparing the dinner, by aid of a cooking book. The guests arrived at eight pm and dinner was served. A very good meal it was too. I will put the contents of the menu on the back of the third sheet of this letter:

Menu

Hors d'oeuvre

Consommé

Faisan Roti

Fruites

Savouries

Cafe

48th Batt: R.A.

I would like to send you a menu card to show you how we did things, but there were only two, and they are gone.

It was most amusing: we arranged with the battery in the evening that there were to be laid on certain lines at ten pm and to be ready for three rounds of gunfire. About ten pm, the subject of strafing cropped up and it was suggested that we fire on something and see how long it took the battery to get into action. Well, the orders were telephoned to the battery and, 12 seconds after Suttie hung up the receiver, the guns fired. The visitors, needless to say, were very much impressed with the efficiency of our battery, and one of them was our adjutant.

We will probably go out to rest on the 28th. It seems a jolly nuisance, as you have to take all your equipment with you and, of course, you never know what part of the Front you will be sent to after rest.

I was down at the wagon line yesterday. The horses look wonderfully well, under the circumstances. Of course, it is mud to the knees there. They have a better place to stand on now, as a lot of bricks have been laid down, but they crumble very quickly and it is still far from comfortable.

I have a groom and two animals called horses, but they are not very wonderful creatures. It always amuses me when I go riding to think of having a groom following you to hold your carver and be general flunkey. There is a servant to look after one in the billet also.

Walford