On the 22nd of October intelligence was received of considerable Turkish activity in the Sinai Peninsula. We were still at peace with Turkey, but it was highly probable that a surprise attack upon the Suez Canal might precede a formal declaration of war. The Canal had been patrolled by a battalion of Highland Light Infantry until early in October, when its duties had been taken over by Indian troops. To strengthen the Canal defences the 1st and 2nd Field Companies, R.E., were sent to Ismailia on October 26 and 27, and a few days later a detachment of the Signal Company and the machine-gun sections of the 5th Battalion, East Lancashires, and 10th Battalion, Manchesters, also left Cairo for the Canal zone. The Sappers bridged the Canal in three places, manned the searchlights, supplied crews for steam-tugs—it was in consequence of an explosion on one of these boats that the first casualties of the Division occurred, Lieutenant Woods and six non-commissioned officers and men being killed—supervised the water supply, destroyed the native village of Kantara, and built fortifications. The Signal Company laid a cable between Kantara, Ismailia, and Suez, and the motor-cycle despatch riders of this company were the first ever employed on active service outside Europe. The work of the Engineers received much-valued commendation from the Commander-in-Chief. A section each of the 2nd and 3rd Field Ambulances had been sent to Ismailia and Kantara respectively to be attached to the Canal defences, and these gave what assistance was needed to Indian troops as well as to the men of their own Division.[1] Another section of the 2nd Field Ambulance took charge of the Australian hospital at Mena, at which place, and also at Meadi and Zeitoun, the East Lancashire Transport and Supply Column had formed depots and undertaken transport duties for the Anzacs until their own A.S.C. units arrived.