My Diary in Serbia: April 1, 1915-Nov. 1, 1915 — John Shaqi
My Diary in Serbia: April 1, 1915-Nov. 1, 1915Stanley, Monica M.
History
My Diary in Serbia: April 1, 1915-Nov. 1, 1915
Stanley, Monica M.
World War, 1914-1918 -- Hospitals; World War, 1914-1918 -- Personal narratives
We have now started getting up at 4.30, breakfast at 5. We have had to
put on our summer clothes as it is very hot. I bought five lambs
to-day, 15 dinas each. They eat the meat the same day it is killed.
The small lambs and pigs are cooked whole. Forty wounded arrived to
day; they all had a bath with disinfectant in, and then put on clean
clothes, their own baked and tied up and put away with their names on.
Some of the wounded look very ill, but this place will soon do them
good. It makes us very happy to see them improving.
Tuesday, _April 27, 1915._
More wounded are to arrive to-day. We are to have surgical cases. When
the fighting starts our Field Hospital is to move on with the army. We
get quite used to getting up early. We are up at 4.30 and to bed at 9
o'clock; it saves lights. I sleep outside the tent, and many of the
others do likewise. It is perfectly lovely. I shall never want to
sleep in again.
The sun is glorious, rising above the mountain-tops. We are getting
quite used to the noises at night. We have the nightingales, one
singing against the other; the owls calling out; big black crickets,
which live in holes in the ground all over our camp and fields, making
their funny noise. Then there are fireflies, which at first I thought
were searchlights, as they were so very bright; cocks are crowing all
round at the various farms; stray dogs, which seem almost wild, visit
the camp at night and try to get into the kitchens to the stores, and
occasionally they will start barking and howling; in ponds near are
frogs croaking.
My staff are so nice, it makes work so much easier. I went into
Kragujevatz to-day to do some shopping. None of us are allowed to go
on account of typhus, but there is not much fear when one takes
precautions. The shops are quite nice and the shoes and clothes
quaint. Singer's sewing machines are seen everywhere; also Sunlight
soap, Colman's mustard, Peak Frean's biscuits, Peter's milk chocolate.
These things remind us of home. Rice, haricot beans and prunes are
very plentiful, and they form some of the chief articles of diet.
Wednesday, _April 28, 1915._
The wagons are drawn by oxen; they only do twenty miles a day. They
are magnificent beasts and are well cared for. We have bought two of
them and have called them Derry & Toms, as Derry & Toms gave us two or
three of their carts to bring out here.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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