BALKANS IN WINTER.

Taranaki Daily News, 23 February 1916, Page 5

BALKANS IN WINTER.

SUFFERINGS OF SOLDIERS,

A subaltern writing from the Balkans to his father says of the bitter weather lately experienced there:—Last night in our small trench was the worst night I 'have ever experienced. It stopped snowing at midnight, and a strong Wild from the north started, blowing sheets of snow up against us. In my platoon alone twelve men had to be carried back, done up with cold, some having turned , quite black. The thermometer must have registered several degrees below zero.

The weather has stopped all fighting, but v the Bulgars come in overy night and surrender—officers and men. Twentyseven came in on our right last night and gave themselves up. They don't come to us so much, because wc are on the open plain, and they would be seen too easily from their, own line*, One acknowledged that he had been through four wars, and that this was tlie first in which he hud not surrendered within ft fortnight.

Sleep, of course, is quite Impossible *t night, and often is in the daytime also, and everyone gets out behind the trench and walks up and down all night; but a lot of the men give in and lie down in the snow and go off to sleep. I have to pull them out and drug them up and down till they recover. Many of those who are attached to us spent last winter in Flanders, and they say it was never half as bad as this, and they only had short spells of four days in iihe firing line and then went back into billets.

Here we will not be in billets even when we go back into reserve after completing a fortnight in the firing line, nor do we get much food, and it is generally cold. We officers, of course, are able to supplement our food by parcels from home and purchases 111 Salonika.

Our great-coats and blankets get frozen stiff, so that (Ihey will stand up of their own; However, I am still very fit, though I have not washed or shaved for a week. Thanks to your parcels, I was able to change all my underclothing three days ago. I have just got a pair of gum boots through thequa* t.rmaster for only 13s (Id, which will be a great comfort in the snow, thpugh, no use for marching.