Letters from Harold Edward 'Pompey' Elliott to his family, June - December 1915 - Part 2

(5)
of course you will have heard that
one of the Walker's other cousins Capt
Lunton has been killed and also
Lily Wooley's brother. Major Bennett is
still well & looks splendid - the picture of
health. There are all sorts of jokes here
amongst the men e.g. The Artillery had
mounted two guns vy near the firing line
but as they did not want to advertise
their position too soon to the Turks they

refrained from firing for about a fortnight
Finally however they did fire a few rounds
The Infantry in the trenches near them sent
a sarcastic message to them saying they were
glad to see the Artillery had joined
the Allies at last. This annoyed the
Artillery considerably. A day or two after

the Turks put up Barbed Wire in front
of their trenches & the Artillery said that
Turks had pinched it from in front 

of of the Infantry Trenches & offered to lend
them their dg little dog to watch it. & they

took up little pieces of barbed wire & asked

the Infantrymen if they knew what that
stuff was. All the Light Horse are
here now & the Infantry who used to
envy them at Mena gave them a 
P.T.O.
 

6

great reception One sling off was this "if
they were found going  this wrong way
they wouldn't be able to make the old
excuse that their horses had bolted"
Well dear old lady I must close now

Give a big heap of love and a kiss

to my pets & remember me to
all Baichly & Nar a & all their heirs.

I expect Jack should be here now
shortly. I suppose poor Nana is
just about worried to death amongst about
us all. But I am so glad your
operation was all safe over before
you heard about us.
I expect you will have some
trouble reading this letter but pen &

ink are out of the question
At this moment except for on or
two rifle shots at intervals of a minute
or more you would hardly dream of that

a war was going on. It is a lovely day

& although nearly all the tall scrub on the

hill sides had been cut down & burnt for
fuel the hill sides are still green & pretty.

In a few minutes I suppose it will all
start again the crackling of the rifles the 
rattle of the machine guns & the boom of the 
cannon
 

(6) 7
the long whistle of the shells which ^ often arrives before the 
Artillery & allows you to take cover if
you only knew where it was going to lob.
Yesterday one of our aeroplanes sailed
up over the Turks trenches with their
shrapnel shells leaving puffs of white 
smoke around it & dropped three
bombs down on their trenches which
imploded with a tremendous 

crash & great columns of black smoke

rose up. It is supposed reported that
great damage was done to the trenches
but it is impossible to say for sure.
Well goodbye again my dear little wife

who is not a [[?]] or anything at all
but the best most loving sweetest little
woman in all the world with all

love from your very own
Dida Donny
 

24.2.1925  6/7.  5015/100 2830

Lot 698 P/S. No 8486 part of
6. P. 13 P/ Kee[[?]]dora C/ Bourke

 

 

Printed form - see original document.

 

Gallipoli Peninsula

17/6/15

My Dearest Kit, This will only be a wee short
letter but will let you know that I
am still feeling splendid & am quite safe
I had a long walk through our trenches
yesterday & my lame foot is a bit sore

today so I am taking it easy. The Turks
gave us a bad time with shells yesterday
but we remained in our trenches & holes &

did not suffer many losses. One of my 7^th

men got a slight scratch from a fragment
of a shell which fell into his dug out 
The brass washer off one lobbed on the

roof of my home but didn't come through
but just above our camp the hillside

was peppered very severely over a dozen
shells tearing up the ground & scattering
the clods down on us. In the evening
I had a walk round & in crossing the
hill at the back of our camp I stumbled
over the dead body of one of our men who
must have been killed in the first attack
two months ago as he was just a skeleton

his skull & fingers shining white & bony in

the moonlight. I am arranging for a party

to bury the poor chap this morning & to try &
find out who he was. I expect a number 
of of the missing will be like him in this
 

this is a joke. For a long time I haven't been able to all you [[?]]
good or cannot of [[?]] censor but our dr is the tenon so I [[?]]
be some have to care my letters in trust & just [[?]] these passed

so I open some again as ranked was like & was to you love [[?]] [[?]]

[[?]] [[?]] [[?]]

scrub until doomsday & their fate will
never be known but this scrub being
gradually cleared away for firewood

behind our lines. When we advance

again I suppose it will be the same as
before I also went on to the trenches again
to make certain of the losses. I found that
one of the 6^th Regiment had been killed
& one wounded. Two of the 5^th had been blown

all to little bits by a big shell. They were
mates & were standing talking together in the
trench when the shell exploded. A third
man was in a little nitch cut in the trench
quite near them & although he was covered
with the earth he was not touched by the

shell at all. 3 of the eightet 8^th Regiment
including a Sergeant were killed & 6
wounded & one of the Light Horse who

had gone into the Trench to see a pal

had half his foot cutoff. About 20 of our

old men came back this morning &
also 18 new men. So we are gradually

being built up again. We will have

about 550 in the Regiment now. Well pet

I must stop now & post this. I feel just as well
as I can be & my foot is quite all right except
for a slight stiffness & soreness still when I

[*2DRL/0513*]
[*walk about to much as I did yesterday. The long gold lasting
xxx xxx xxx xx xxx . Little is as lovely as ordinary xxx xxxx
D.R.L. 3297 (3rc/s)*]

Gallipoli Peninsula

22^nd June 1915

My dearest Kit, I received your very welcome letter

dated 3^rd May also those dated the 11^th & 12^th. Naturally
I was delighted to get them all at once & to hear such 
very recent news of you & that you and my wee pets the little ones are

well. I trust by now you will have completely recovered

from the operation. My poor old darling. You have had
more than your share of trouble and yet are my sunshine

lady all through. My dear little sweetheart If anything

could nerve us to do our duty here it is the love and
trust of such women as you May God bless you always

Things here have been very very quiet in front of our lines

of late. In fact we believe that there are very few
Turks in front of us but every day their lines of

trenches grow more formidable. They have a lot of
machine guns in their trenches & they appear

to be relying [[ing?]] on these to hold us in check if
we ^ try to advance & keep most of their troops further
in rear where they can provision & water them
more conveniently, paper & ink is getting very

scarce here. I only brought part of a pad with me
& you have to carry everything on your back over

hills as steep as the roof of a house & now this letter
will finish the paper right off. I received a letter
from Mr Richardson & was very pleased to get it. He
had heard of myself & Moore and others being hit

I will have to reply on any old scrap of paper I can find
You might ring him up & tell him I got his letter

P.T.O.

2
he lives at Walpole West Kew. Both he & Mrs R
are very nice. I have the little present they gave 

me ; the knife, fork & spoon outfit with me still
Also yours & the wee pets children's photo. It is getting a bit [["Bokity"?]]

as our Ga Ga used to say but it cheers &

comforts me. I've also got barly bible with one still

did I tell you in my last letter that Major [[Alfgaetem?]]

is back with me now. It is lovely splendid to have
some of the old men back with us. One of the
men has just brought me the [[?]] paper
It had a paragraph that you had written to the
Council expressing your thanks for their letter to you

& that you would be glad when I was back
with the boys. You are a brave wee darling girl
& know exactly how I felt, I was very
lonely & miserable away from my 'family"

but there is such a sad change in it. I
hardly know all the regiment for all the new
men that have been sent out & all the old
faces that are gone. But they are all full of
fight & when we advance will make the
Turks sit up. There is no doubt however tho
some of these Turks are mighty very brave men, they
sneak out of their own trenches & up to ours very
[[clircily?]] & throw bombs into our trenches. It is
extremely dangerous for our men are pretty
sharp at watching them & you have only
to walk along our trenches to know
[*D.R.L. 3297 (3^rd S)*]

3
that many of them have paid the penalty. Our
men bury them whenever they can even at
considerable risk but many are too far out for
this & the Turks never worry about them. The
stench at times is awful & the place is plagued
with flies. It would not astonish me a bit
if a plague of choler’s or typhoid were to
break out here. We are [[?]] being fed
well & our men are in good heart which
should enable them to [[?]] it off. Fortunately 
too the weather is very dry but should it
rain I am afraid all the alls wells would be
contaminated by the dead. Where the Turks
have buried their dead in front of our lines
they are barely covered with the soil and
their shells bursting constantly tend to
disturb them & in many cases our men have
to cover them up again. But it is [[cassdiful?]]
how callous the men become. A shell burst
& threw a dead Turks skull out of the grave
into the trenches. He must have been killed
in the first attack as his skull was just
bare & bleached. His lower jaw fell off & some
one got it & went along the trench asking
people if they had lost a set of false teeth &
then showing them the jaw. We are still in
[[Nisissi?]] except a few men who are in the trenches 
PTO