Letters from Harold Edward 'Pompey' Elliott to his sister-in-law, April 1915 - December 1916 - Part 11

women & ladies will all be exposed to this
awful thing War. It is truely awful that
we should have to ask our Brothers to
come & share these frightful dangers here
with us but on the other hand the risk of them [[ ^war ]]
is so dreadful even to contemplate the
mere possibility of such a thing that with
all sorrow & grief & anxiety at the prospect
we must have Conscription if we are not
to fall by our own fault” That is my view
& has been from the Very instant war was declared
& such it still remains. Germany is still so
terribly strong & is putting up such a fearful
fight of it that we dare not relax one single effort
or ounce of strength that can be summoned
for our purpose without danger of an awful
reverse. Here in this dreadful place in spite
of all our artillery, in spite of our aircraft in spite
of the wonderful bravery of our men & officers we
are driven back again & again by the enemy
who is brave & reckless too who has officers trained
for years & years to every trick & art of war
so that he frequently makes us look fools 
 

It is like a trained wrestler fighting
or Boxer fighting with a big untrained
chap from the country who may be
stronger in every way but unless he is very
very careful & watchful is almost certain to
be caught & sent flying across the ring or sent
to sleep with a punch on the jaw. Even now
here where we seem to have the upper hand in every
way if we relax the slightest in our vigilance
he or carefulness in preparing an attack
he still deals us slashing staggering blows
that make us real reel back in confusion
& dismay. In face of this dare we relax one
single effort. For myself I say “No”, I dare not
do it,.” & we dare not do it. Every nation says the
same. Australia far away from the fight looks on
& sees that we are actually winning a bit of ground here
& there – Says Oh the Boys will lick the Germans
all right in the end & goes on about its business.
It does not see the fearful struggle – the
piles of dead men unburied yet & trodden 
in the mire – the fearful unending labor
to put & Keep the newly made trenches
in Order & make them habitable. It doesnt 
 

see the dreadful suffering of the Men who
are forced to stand in the frontline &
bear it all – frost & snow rain & hail bullets
bayonets shells & bombs. night & day & apparently
does not realize that every few thousand
men sent over will give all a better chance
to live. That will be That there will be less work
to do. that there will be a chance of relieving the
men every 2^nd night instead of every third & 
this would save terrible suffering for every
day you spend in The front line more than
doubles the suffering. That the Battalions
taken out of the line would have instead of one
week or two weeks rest would have a
clear month to clean & rest themselves
to get rid of their colds & coughs & heal up their
poor sore feet & get fit & well to come back
for a few more [[ l ]] nights in these awful
trenches – But there it is. For good or ill
Australia has thrown away the chance of putting
in all its strength just when we have got
the enemy giving way – The result may well
be that even her little extra effort would turn
the Scale – just as it is the last straw breaks 
 

the camels back so it is always the
last fresh man put in who turns the Scale
of a Battle. It may well mean that as the
Australians are too weak to go on attacking
in their sector that the Germans will
have all the winter to build up new trenches
put up new barbed wire & dig thousands
more underground caves to Keep their men
safe in when we once more start advancing &
worst of all may give them the chance of building
Tanks or Landships like ours – perhaps
even better ones & in this case our cake is
dough – I confess that the thought of these
lumbering monsters coming down upon us
is awful to contemplate – There is such a
feeling of helplessness in regard to them. Infantry
have no chance with them at all. If you get in
their way they simply come & tread on you
or shoot you to bits. The Germans latest
orders are for the Infantry to get into their
dug outs & hide whilst the Artillery
deal with the Tanks & special light Artillery
are to be brought up to lie in wait
for the Tanks. The trouble is that this 
 

getting into dug outs is hopeless if our
Infantry press on – they have the Germans
in a bag as has been proved again & again.
The only trouble so far with the Tanks
(&- really that has been the only thing which
prevented us walking all over the Germans)
is that they have a terrible hap habit of
going out of order just when they are wanted.
Of course they are such heavy things & the
mud is so terrible [[ ^deep ]] that the strain on
the engines & machinery over the rough
ground climbing over trenches & butting
houses & trees down must be terrible
& so they go bung very quickly – We are
however promised hundreds more when
the ground dries – bigger – better engined
[[ ^{better armoured} ]] & more powerful in every way & if Fritz
does get a move on with something of the
Sort his cake should be dough. but
with it all there’s such a terrible lot
of Fritzes that there seems no end of
Killing them.                  18/12/16
Had to stop yesterday to read two
little letters from Katie which came along 
 

a bit late but got here all right in the
end. One is dated 31^st Oct. & the other the
29^th Oct. There was one funny little round
photo of Katie & a bit of brick wall. She looks
drefful [[ ^very ]] thin but as bright as ever.
After I finished reading them the [[ Dc ]] came
up & packed me off to bed. About 3 days
ago I got just a little bit blown up by a
whopping big shell. Fortunately for me the
mud was so soft & it went about a mile more or
less down into the mud & all the sharp pieces that cut
you to bits were smothered up & never came up at all
but it was very close almost under my feet & the
tremendous explosion so near affected me very
queerly; I dont pretend to be brave or anything of the
sort but it all happened so suddenly & without any warning
– Most of the big shells you can hear coming but this one must
have been a fast naval one or something of the sort that
travels faster than its own sound & we heard nothing.
Well there was just the awful bang & a cloud of
smoke & splashed of mud all over us. I was walking
behind a Major Greenway & he was thus a little
bit further from the shell than me [[ ^{I was} ]] & as I sort of
staggered forward he flung his arms round me 
 

& spoke so anxiously – Are you hurt Sir
Are you hurt, that I burst out laughing
& we went on about our business congratulating
ourselves mutually on our escape. The incident
went out of my mind at once almost because dozens
of such escapes are happening all round you here
I suppose everyone who has once been up to the Front
line has escapes nearly if not quite so [[ as ]] narrow – 
But when I went to bed that night I felt very queer
Although I felt as sleepy as usual I could not
go off at all. If I dozed the least little bit I must [[ ^would ]]
suddenly give a nervous jump & wake right up
again. Katie will tell you that often ordinarily When going
off to sleep I give a nervous jump like that -Well
it seemed as if the explosion had increased this
nerve tension in some way so that the start was
so Violent that it woke me right up & [[ This ]] made
sleep impossible. This went on for three
nights – the first two nights I did eventually
get a little sleep but the last one of all
I never got a wink. So I yesterday called
in the Doctor & he made me get into bed
right away & Keep quiet – then gave me a
sleeping draft to take after dinner 
 

I took my draught all right and
about 7 pm got off into a lovely sleep.
At a quarter to one that silly old
fool of a Fritz got cutting his capers
again & lobbed a big shell right into my
Camp about 20 yards from my door &
nearly shook the place down. I tried to
get off again & had rotten luck. I dozed
off about a dozen times & had frightful
nightmares each time. I fell off bridges
& got blown up by shells & went into a big
house or billet to find Katie & found
dozens of bed rooms all round the place
& didnt Know which was hers & got
into a terrible state because I had to
go away as I thought without having
seen me [[her ]]. This dream was brought
on by Katies letter I had just read
saying how disappointed she would
have been had she come to England
& waited for months like Violet &
then had to go away home without
seeing me. I was nearly scared to
death to go to sleep again after that &
was glad morning came at last. Tonight 
 

I am to have another draught to try
again but no more after that. I think
it must be cocaine or morphine or
something he is giving me because he
says it would be bad to form a habit
of taking it. I though so myself &
did not take a 2^nd dose last night
although the [[ Dc ]] said I might take a
2^nd tablespoonful at the end of 4 hours
if the 1^st dose did not send me off.
However the 5 or 6 hours sleep I did get
were lovely & I feel as good as new now
I Felt plenty sick [[ ^{pretty bad} ]] yesterday. My cold
feels better. The [[ Dc ]] man was an old
University Footballer. Doig. Do you remember
him? He is a very nice boy. Tell Katie that
I can find no trace whatever of any Lt Douglas
Anderson in the 15^th Brigade & no Andersons
at all in the 60^th Bn i e officers. In the 57^th Bn
the was a Lt. Edward Handfield Anderson
5 7^th Bn. missing on the 19^th July. He is
almost certainly dead. He was told not
to go out in the Charge as the 57^th were Reserve
but he joined Bert Layh’s Bn without 
 

permission for pure love of a Scrap [[ ^fight ]] &
never has been seen or heard of since. It
was dark when he went out. He told
his Sergeant he was going & a Corpl
said he would go with him & away
they went leaving the Sergt in charge of
his men a very wrong thing to do &
I suppose they both got Killed for
neither returned & of course being with
a strange Battn nobody Knew them or
remembered having seen them at all.
which could very easily happen. There was
also another fine young fellow Lt Alexander
Campbell Anderson. There’s a braw Scot
for you. He was in the 59^th Battn & had
his foot shot off by a Shell. He was for
a long time in the “St Omer” Hospital
in France very bad. The last I heard
was that he was getting better & would be sent
home to Australia. We have now with
us a 2^nd Lt Bruce Anderson 58^th Bn
He is quite all right & is with his
Battalion today. Tell Katie to tell Mrs
Smith She must have made a mistake