Went to see my old friend Harry Burnett and was just getting into the gun pit to shake hands when a shell carried his head clean off his shoulders. Poor devil. He was one of the best and was in the bank with me at Enmore. This is when the war is fully brought home to one.
Big Turkish attack expected tonight against Australian position. They dropped pamphlets today from aeroplanes saying they were going to drive us into the sea if we did not surrender. Duty 0600 to 1800. J. A. Graham FOOTNOTE: Below are some pages from the records of Private Richard William Burnett (1462) in the National Archive: http://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/ViewImage.aspx?B=3171523
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Duty 0600 to 1800. Very hot.
Abdul throws his ironmongery about freely. Demonstration by 3rd Brigade and our Brigade with object of drawing their fire. Our hopes are rising. Will evidently have plenty of excitement in a day or two. Turks have received huge reinforcements. Issued with gas helmets but don’t think we will need them as the Turk is too much a gentleman. Our aeroplanes are very active. J. A. Graham Feeling absolutely run down.
Duty 0600 to 1800. Bombardment of enemy positions by warships. J. A. Graham Very hot and the flies are awful. During meal times one has to fight for dear life to keep them off. They swarm on the food in thousands.
Duty 0600 to 1800. Abdul continues to throw his ironmongery into our back yard. A large body of Turks camping just out of range of our guns. Another old pal gone. J. A. Graham Still hot.
Abdul getting busy with his big guns. Duty 1200 to 1800 which puts me on day duty. Thank God. J. A. Graham Still hot.
Duty 1800 to 0600. Very quiet. Great activity among the Turks. Knocked a bit silly today from concussion of shell explosion. Awful sensation. Am quite deaf and have an awful headache. Hot.
Duty 1800 to 0600. Crescent moon tonight. Another great night for the Turks. Quiet again except for usual artillery duels. J. A. Graham Still hot. Usual bombardments.
On light duty (changing the shifts) from 1800 to 0600. Have lost about a stone weight since arriving on the Peninsula. All my friends and fellow men are also losing weight. The condition of the men is fair. The strain has been tremendous and something will have to be done to get the men into good nick again. Amazon moon tonight. This is a great night for the Turks. Abdul is likely to make a disturbance. J. A. Graham Mortars bombard Gaba Tepe.
Reinforcements arrive for our Regiment. Innoculated for Cholera. Duty 1800 to 0600. Furious bombardment by us on Achi Baba. Saw Turks from Observation Tower leaving the position. A battalion of infantry and six guns drawn by six horses each are retiring but unfortunately we can’t reach them with our guns. Was cornered by a sniper today and had to run the gauntlet about 50 yards. It did not take me long to cover the distance but quite long enough for him or them to have 7 shots at me, all going close, too close, one of them cutting a button off my trousers. J. A. Graham Duty 1800 to 0600. Have been averaging for the last week or two 3 hours in 24 hours sleep. Too hot and too many infernal flies.
Mail day, rum issue and tobacco issue in the trenches (a Gala Day). Have moved into my new shrapnel proof dug out. Very cosy. Nearly all my old friends are gone now poor devils. One of my mates named Emerson and I are undoubtedly the luckiest beggars under the sun. We have had some thrilling and hairbreadth escapes together. We are getting that way now that shrapnel holds no fear for us. It has burst all over us and all round us. It has knocked our dugouts in on top of us and yet we have come out of it without a scratch so far. Another time a high explosive shell lobbed into our dugout and didn’t explode (lucky for us). If it had exploded they would never have been able to find our pieces. J. A. Graham |
AuthorJack Graham, ANZAC soldier, kept a diary from 1914-1918. Here it is, blogged 100 years later to the day.... Archives
February 1958
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