Zeitoun
4/2/1916.
Dear Everybody,
Well, here we are back in old Zeitoun, & camped not many chains from where we were encamped last year. After spending a few days in a small camp at Ghezik, a place some mile from the centre of Cairo & between it & the Pyramids, we moved out here. The main body, or what is now called the main body, is now on the canal, ready for anything that might happen in that quarter. At present it looks as if I am, along with a number of others, going to have some difficulty in getting back to the regiment. The force that is there is made up principally of reinforcement men, & as a consequence they are not giving the main body men much of a hearing. However so long as they do not get any fighting to do, I am quite satisfied to remain here. As a matter of fact I think we are getting too old soldiers to worry over such trifling matters. I am afraid whatever happens the Otago M. will never again be the regiment it was, it lost heavily when it lost the Colonel & Capt. Hay. This place has not altered one bit, the only difference is that instead of horse lines, we have sort of huts, built
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of some matting which is very easily obtained, for the horses, otherwise the life is just the same. If anything the camp, despite the absence of the main body on the canal is just as big as it was this time last year. The last letter I got from Rothie was dated 20th Dec. & reached me yesterday. I am very pleased at getting it for it shows that my mail is now coming direct here, & so far as I can remember I do not think I have missed any. This last few days I have been getting quite a number, amongst them some from Kate written while they were at Suez; in which she was going a million about them going to be sent back, and about being so near me & then not getting a chance of a word. Little did she know of how we would meet. Have also had several letters from England too. Oh! the letter enclosing the letter that reached Rothie for me from the Hoopers arrived about a week ago. It is rather extraordinary how it went to N.Z. I wrote them from Cairngorm hotel in Scotland but did not give them any further address, having told them before I left that if they wrote me c/o N.Z. Record Office, letters would reach me all right. They told me when I got back that they had forgotten that. The proprietor of the hotel must have looked up the visiting book & there found my N.Z. address, hence its arrival at Rothie.
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Sunday afternoon and I am taking it easy in my tent catching up a little correspondence. It takes some writing to keep it up to date now-a days. Church parade was the only parade we had today, and in all conscience it was plenty for according to orders & the syllabus for the coming week we are going to have some pretty hard training. Had hoped when we left here last year that we would be done with training but no such luck. Despite the fact of the reinforcements getting a good training in N.Z. it does not seem to be of the same standard as what they get here. Not only that, a force requires a good deal of working together to get it into smooth running order. The worst of the business is that the old main body men have to do the same work as the others & needless to say they find it rather irksome. However we haven’t enough horses for the men we have in camp & we must keep them in hand somehow. There is strong rumours going round that there is going to be another Mtd regiment formed out of the men that we have here. In fact it is more than rumour it is almost an accomplished fact. The first of the 9th reinforcements arrive tomorrow sometime, and when we get the horses they are bringing we will be in position to do something. Taking things all round the
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forming of a new regiment is the only fair thing that can happen. Otherwise we will have some of our main body senior N.C.Os going back to their own units, & they will have to salute men who were privates under them, & some of them privates in the reinforcements. It is pretty hard on those men who were sent to England severely wounded, & through no fault of their own were not able to get back here as soon as they might have done, that they should loose their chances of promotion. The forming of a new regiment will get over the difficult problem to a certain extent. I heard last night from Maj Orbell who is now in charge of the O.M.R. details here, that the Bde. Maj. in charge of the mounted men here, received a wire from the canal to the effect that I, along with several others, were to rejoin our units. The Bde. Maj. sent a wire back asking that we should be left here, other wise he would have practically no officers to carry on with. What will be the outcome of it all I do not know, & do not care much either. Much & all as I would like to get back to the old regiment, there really is not much inducement, because of the way they have treated the old main body men who have returned. We go back now & find all the senior positions in the regt.
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held by reinforcement subalterns. Enough of that, its a way we have in the army, eh! My tent mate is a reinforcement officer from Dunedin, Lieut. Paterson by name, he is in the O.M.R too. He was at a school of instruction for officers, which has been formed here, when the Bde. moved out, so far he has not received any word of rejoining. We have it on pretty good authority that when the forces leave here they will never see this place again. Meaning of course, that our next field of operations is going to be outside of Egypt & that our base will also be shifted. As a matter of fact, it is not expected that the men now on the canal will ever come back to Zeitoun again, but will embark from there. The time for our leaving here is put down at inside two months, & we expect to go West. I have met several of the nurses that came over on the Marama with Kate, & Mr Patterson & myself were out to tea with two of them last night. They are all staying at the Semiramis Hotel in Cairo, & are all very sick at not having had something to do before this. However I am pretty well convinced that before many more months are gone they will get as much, & perhaps more work than they can very well manage. Had the present lull in the fighting not come about, they would all have
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been fully employed & perhaps a good number more required. The Marama should by this time be in England, & I am wondering just what port they would go too. It will be splendid if they get, as Kate told me they were, a fortnight’s leave to have a look round. It will take them about a week to realize that they are in the Old Land. I have been down to the N.Z. hospital here seeing some of the men, & I know that Jack Haywood is there somewhere, but on the two occasions when I was there, they could not get hold of him, so up to the present I have not seen him. He has been pretty bad with enteric, & is now waiting to go back on the Marama, at least they all seem to think it will be the Marama. Adam Prentice is there too & is getting on very well, he too is waiting to get back. Bob Tapper is there also, he went with the force to the canal & just when they arrived there he developed a septic arm & had to go into hospital there. While there they discovered that he was also suffering from a touch of frost-bite in the feet; got it on the Peni, net result, he landed back here & expects to be in hospital for at least 8 weeks. Lieut. Braithwaite is there, he has enteric & is going back to N.Z. with the others. Oh! What do you think? we have had
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such a lot of rain here, quite out of the usual for Egypt. It rained practically all afternoon yesterday, & simply poured down during the night. It has been a glorious day all day, but seems to be banking up again now, whether we will get any more or not I can not say. However we do not mind, in fact it is rather a treat, lays the dust, & also hardens up the sand. All the men you know are in pretty good form, including Hugh Crawford. Jack McIlwrick I find is in England, & is supposed to be getting on very well. I never could find trace of him when I was there, but some of the men here have evidently heard from him. Well now I must be off. Remember me to all the folk. Au Rêvoir
Your,
Affectionate Brother,
E.S.McI.
P.S. Some of the Australian forces that were operating out on the Tripoli frontier came into camp last night. They report having had a good time out there. This I think marks the closing stages of the trouble that was brewing in that quarter. Am sending some more photos with this.
E.S.
