IN THE HOLY LAND.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 18 July 1918, Page 3

IN THE HOLY LAND.

The following letter was received by the last Egyptian mail from Trooper C. Gardner to his sisters at Glorit, dated April 9th, 1918 :—

Just a few lines to let you know that I am still alive and well. There was a big mail came in a couple of days ago, and I received a budget of home letters, so am pretty well posted in news. lam getting my parcels fairly well, especially the small ones as they come through with the letter mail. We are now camped on the Jericho Plains, on the banks of the Jordan. A jolly hot show it is too. We had a great day the first day we crossed the Jordan, on 23rd March. There was only our Regiment, and wo got about 80 prisoners, mostly Austrians and Germans, also seven machine-guns. The whole Regiment went stone mad that day, they Avere all looking for stouch. We went at a hand gallop across the flat for about four miles till the Jackos opened on us with about 20 machine-guns. I didn't know until afterwards what became of the other troops ; but we wheeled round to the flank, galloped down a dry watercourse, and right up under the nose of two machine-guns. There were plenty of bullets, but the gunners were excited I suppose and were firing too high. They got such a shock when we were so close to them that they went for their lives, so we off our horses and up the bank, and we had some rare shooting. One of our other troops, between 15 and 20 strong, got mixed with about 40 Jacko cavalry, and slaughtered the devil out of them ; they killed 17, took seven prisoners, besides founding a lot —they could see afterwards where they crawled away into the scrub. Our troop had their officer killed and three men wounded. One of the chads describing it to me afterwards said it was just like the pictures you see of Red Indians. The rest of the Brigade came out, and we joined them up next morning, and went on a week's stunt to (A Man) to blow up the Hedgah railway. I only got a few miles into the hills when my horse knocked up, and as there were no spars ones I had to go back to Jericho. The Division did their job alright, but the Jackos counter - attacked reinforced heavily by Germans, and our mob had to fight a rear-guard action out of it. We lost pretty heavily, I believe, but do not know the figures. The division got over 400 prisoners so I heard. The boys had a pretty tough time of it, no rations for three days, raining like fury, and just about frozen ; then came back to Jericho flats, having a spell for a. few days.

April 10.—I didn't have time to finish this letter the other day, so am making another attempt now. I have just been reading an old paper, and I noticed a piece in it about the cold-footed Mounteds having no fighting to do here. Feeling rather indignant about this I made enquiries, and found out as near as I could what our casualties were in this last bit of a stunt to blow up the Hedgah Railway that I have been telling you about. Our troops which took part in it were the Camel ELrigade, one division of Infantry, and the Anzac Mounted Division. Our casualties estimated 1200, and 300 prisoners. Turkish casualties estimated 2400, and 800 prisoners. It is certainly nothing compared with France, but still it is not too light considering we were only a raiding party.