The Thirteenth Hussars in the Great WarDurand, H. Mortimer (Henry Mortimer)
History
The Thirteenth Hussars in the Great War
Durand, H. Mortimer (Henry Mortimer)
Great Britain. Army. Hussars, 13th; World War, 1914-1918 -- Regimental histories -- Great Britain
_Amara, November 12._--“Just a very hurried line, as post goes at 7
to-morrow, to say I am very fit, after 150 miles; we have been just
ten days getting to Amara. I have hardly marched with the Regiment
at all, as each day I and one or two others have got leave to shoot
independently on to the next camp; to-day, for instance, Twist,
Jeffrey, and I left the last camp at eight and shot our way here,
getting about fifty head. I got 5 brace of partridges, 4 couple of
snipe, 5 sand-grouse, and 1 duck--a great day. We arrived here two
hours after the Regiment, whom we never saw once on the way.... This
seems a topping place, but we go on another six miles to-morrow and
join the Brigade: how long we shall be there no one knows at present.
I have enjoyed the march like anything, bar one or two nights when we
struck thousands of mosquitoes. Thank goodness we have handed over all
the remounts we had to bring up here and which delayed us so. The last
two or three days I have been wading about in shorts after duck and
snipe. It is very cold at night now, but still very hot between 12 and
3. Had a tremendous dinner to-night--soup, whole partridge and peas,
boiled mutton, onion sauce and beans, tinned peaches and rice, a snipe,
followed by a cigar and a bowl of cocoa.... The sand-grouse came over
to-day in swarms and blackened the whole sky, most of them much too
high; must turn in now as I am dead tired.”
_Captain W. H. Eve--Amara--November 12._--... “To-day we have marched
fifteen miles to this place and didn’t get in till about 1.30, and
then went straight on to the Remount Depot and handed over the
remounts--thank goodness! It’s been rather a rotten march so far,
spoilt by these remounts, which have made a terrible lot of work and
caused us to march very slowly, only at a walk, and it has been very
hard indeed on the men and very tiring for all of us.... The flies and
mosquitoes at some of our camps have been wicked. I should think this
is quite a nice place [Amara], but have hardly had time to see. Our
shooting has been spoilt by our being the last lot of four, and now we
can only shoot with an escort, which I shall hate, so I don’t suppose
we shall do very much. They say there aren’t any pig to be found till
the rains, when they all get flooded out into the desert. We have been
through all sorts of country, a lot very dreary dry marsh, but some
very nice, like moorland, short turf and thick scrub. Hardly any just
sandy desert since the first few days.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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