ROUND OF THE TRENCHES.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXVIV, Issue 30, 11 January 1916, Page 7

ROUND OF THE TRENCHES.

SOME TURKISH SHELLING. MORTARS AND CATAPULTS. A STORM AND ITS EFFECT. No. 11. GALLIPOLI PENINSULA, 7th NOV. (From Malcolm Ross, Official War Correspondent with the N.Z. Forces.) We were awakened in the early dawn by the loud reports of .ships’ guns. “Dirty Dick” was at ids work again, and no sooner had we 'unshed breakfast than the morning hate began. Tire 6-inch, howitzer and toe “seventy-five” tried to stir us np again—and failed to do so. Some few of the staff come out. of their sandbagged walled and tarpaulin-roofed/ offices to see where the shells are falling; others go placidly on with their work. Of date the lurk has been a little more prodigal with his heavier ammunition. Bulgaria’s intervention, the long-promised landing of a German army in Servia to link up with the Turkish army, and the hope of munitions from Krupp’s, were no doubt accountable for the change. Lord Kitchener, realising the situation, had sent a message to the troops warning them that they might be subjected to a heavier bombardment than formerly, and advising them to dig. But the hold-up of the Germans on the Servian frontier, the landing of the Allies at Salonika, and the likelihood of further assistance to the Servians from Russia, had again altered the complexion of affairs, so that the Turk once more had to begin to husband his store of shell. The morning hate was therefore of short duration. Like the evening hate, it was also ineffective; but there was always bhe uncomfortable feeling that the Turkish gunner might get one in.

IN THE ANZAC ZONE. After breakfast, in company with the General, Colonel Rhodes started on an extensive round of the trenches, extending over several days. The first day’s visit was to Anzac, up the ridge over which the New Zealanders swept on to Plugge’s Plateau on the memorable 25th April. The old Turkish trenches and the wooden crosses on the graves of some of the New Zealand Artillery are interesting reminders of the first days of the fighting. Thence our route lay via Shrapnel Gully and Monash Valley to the celebrated Quinn’s Post, past an Indian camp and a little cemetery with small wooden crosses and shell-eases over the graves of officers and soldiers from many parts of the. Empire. We halt' where General Bridges received his mortal wound, at a spot where shrapnel claimed many a victim. As we proceed up the valley a warning notice reads; “Danger! Keep to the Sap.” Away on the .heights to the right the intermittent “tat-tat-tat!” of a mountain-gun emphasises the warning.

BOMBING AND MINING. At Quinn’s we find they are still bombing and mining. Though, in mining warfare, the advantage is generally with the attackers, here our men have been too clever for the Turks, and we have more than held our own. The defences are always being strengthened and improved, and though the Turks are only a few feet