Diary Entry - 7th April, 1917

Walford: The Bosch again shelled through the night, this time landing in our DAC, who were closer downhill towards us, the toll being this time four horses killed. In the middle of the night I heard a lot of movement and shouting on the road. This proved to be the DAC moving to another camp between us and Gouy Servins. D 36 also moved their lines to the fringes of Bois de Bouvigny so as to get some shelter from the wind. Hoyland and I went up to the guns at eleven a.m., after we had completed several commissions at the ammunition dump and RAHQ. It was my first view of the guns in this position. They had quite a comfortable place and seemed to be left alone by the Hun. The main feature of the spot was the approach over a long track built of wooden sleepers with only room for vehicles to go one way. We were up there till five, expecting to see Bailey, but, as he remained at the OP all day, we eventually left without seeing him.

Bee: Very cold first thing, cleared up a bit and during the afternoon dried up a lot. I went to the OP early this morning and started wire cutting. It is a very hard place to see any wire at all. The background has been turned up such a lot, it does not stand out. Claudet and Duran went down to the front line and checked our shooting. The infantry were cleared out of the trenches, which is very satisfactory. We fired 1400 rounds and my head and eyes were quite sore by the time we had finished. We started at eleven a.m. and did not finish up until six p.m. The guns shot perfectly. The Hun plane brought down one of our observing balloons during the afternoon, and set it on fire. But fancy, the men got free with  parachutes. The Hun has some very fast planes here and he can run rings around ours. Had a letter from Mim suggesting that I should go back to Australia. It sounds very nice but at present I can't see how it can be done.