Trenching at Gallipoli: The personal narrative of a Newfoundlander with the ill-fated Dardanelles expeditionGallishaw, John
History
Trenching at Gallipoli: The personal narrative of a Newfoundlander with the ill-fated Dardanelles expedition
Gallishaw, John
World War, 1914-1918 -- Campaigns -- Turkey -- Gallipoli Peninsula; World War, 1914-1918 -- Personal narratives, Canadian
While we were writing, the orderly sergeant, that dread of loafers,
who appoints all details for fatigue work, bore down upon our dugout.
"Two men from you, Corporal Gallishaw," he said, "for bomb throwers.
Give me their names as soon as you can. They're for practice this
afternoon."
"One here, right away," said Art, "and put Lew O'Dea down for the
other."
Lew O'Dea was a character. He was in the next dugout to me. The first
day on the Peninsula, his rifle had stuck full of sand, and some one
had stolen his tin canteen for cooking food. He immediately formed
himself into an anti-poverty society of one thereafter, and went
around like a walking arsenal. I never saw him with fewer than three
rifles, usually he carried half a dozen. He always kept two or three
of them spotlessly clean; so that no matter when rifle inspection
came, he always had at least one to show. He had been a little late in
getting his rifle clean once and was determined not to be caught any
more. His equipment always contained a varied assortment of canteens,
seven or eight gas masks, and his dugout was luxurious with rubber
sheets and blankets. "I inherited them," he always answered, whenever
anybody questioned him about them. With ammunition for his several
rifles, when he started for the trenches in full marching order, he
carried a load that a mule need by no means have been ashamed of.
"Do you want to go on bomb throwing detail this afternoon?" I called
to O'Dea across the top of the dugout.
"Sure," he answered; "does a swim want to duck?"
"Fine," I said; "report here at two o'clock."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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