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With the Judæans in the Palestine Campaign

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<h2>CHAPTER XIV.</h2> <div class="center">We Win Our First Honours.</div> On the 28th August a patrol of six privates, under the command of a sergeant, crept up to the Turkish trenches near the Umm esh Shert Ford. It was a dark and windy night, so they got quite close to the enemy without being seen. When about thirty yards short of the Turks they lay down and then observed a sentry standing a little way off. One of the patrol, Private Sapieshvili, a Jew from the Caucasus, began to crawl forward and cautiously stalk the unwary sentinel. When eventually he succeeded in getting behind him, he stood up and advanced boldly, pretending to be a Turk, for he was able to speak a few words of Turkish. All at once he pounced on the sentry, seized him by the throat and bore him to the ground. The enemy in the trenches heard the scuffle and opened fire and one man of our patrol was badly hit. Sapieshvili, however, stuck to his prisoner, disarmed him and took him triumphantly off to our camp. The Turks in the trenches numbered about a score, and kept up a heavy fire, so the rest of the patrol withdrew. Before doing so, Private Gordon lifted his wounded comrade[119] (Private Marks) and carried him back to our lines under a rain of bullets from the Turks. I recommended these men to General Chaytor for their gallantry and coolness under fire. It was unfortunate that Private Marks' wound proved to be a mortal one. He had only joined the battalion some three days previously, and this was his first encounter with the Turks. He had served in France and other war centres, and had passed through many a fierce fight scathless. We gave him a very impressive burial the following morning, under the lea of a little hillock, with his face turned towards Jerusalem; the spires of the buildings on the Mount of Olives could actually be seen from the spot where we were standing around his grave. One of the ten men who, at Helmieh, had wished to join a Labour battalion, but who, on reconsideration, had seen that it was his duty to remain as a fighting soldier, was Private Greyman. He was a man who disapproved of all forms of violence. He hated war and all the brutalities pertaining thereto, yet he carried out his military duties most conscientiously. He happened to be one of a party on duty in the forward trenches on the Day of Atonement, and while repelling some snipers who were attempting to make it unpleasant for us in our camp, poor Greyman met with an instantaneous death, an enemy bullet passing through his head. I heard afterwards that when his widow received the usual War Office notification that he was killed in action, she refused to believe it, for she saw that the date given was the Day of Atonement, a day on[120] which she said no Jew could possibly be fighting; but alas, we had to man the trenches continuously, no matter how sacred or in what reverence any particular day was held by Jew or Gentile. We were sometimes attached to the 1st and sometimes to the 2nd Australian Light Horse Brigades under Generals Cox and Ryrie; when they moved we were placed under General Meldrum, the Commander of the New Zealand Mounted Rifles Brigade. All were keen soldiers and good and gallant comrades. While we were under General Ryrie I remember he said to me one day that he would like to come out and inspect my posts. "Very good, General," I said. "Come out with me any morning you wish." "When do you start?" he asked. "Generally at 3 a.m.," I replied. "That's a d—d good time to sleep," said the General. Another night some of our patrols scared the Turks badly, and they started a tremendous fusillade with every rifle and gun that could be brought into action. The noise of the battle reverberated down the Mellahah and reached the Auja, where General Ryrie was encamped. Thinking that a serious attack had begun, the General sprang hastily out of bed and planted his naked foot right on to the tail of a huge black scorpion. For a full half-hour afterwards Australia was heard at her best. When I saw him a couple of days later he philosophically remarked that there was virtue even in a scorpion[121] sting, for it had completely cured him of ever attempting to get out of bed again in the dark, even if all the Turks in the Ottoman Empire were at his door. General Ryrie, afterwards promoted to Major-General, was appointed to the command of the Australian Mounted Division, and had the K.C.M.G. conferred on him. Towards the end of August General Allenby reviewed the Anzacs at their Headquarters, some four miles to the north of Jericho. The Mounted Division was formed into three sides of a square, and into this General Allenby galloped, followed by his Staff. It was well for the Commander-in-Chief that he was a good horseman, for the spirited animal which he rode gave one or two very hearty bucks, quite enough to have unseated the majority of our Generals. Later, the Chief decorated a number of the officers and men who had gallantly won distinctions, and at the end of the ceremony made a good soldierly speech to the Division. I was invited to be present at the review, and on being presented by General Chaytor to the Commander-in-Chief the latter remarked, "Oh, by the way, Patterson, I fear I cannot form your Jewish Brigade, for I have been notified by the War Office that there are no more Jewish troops coming out." I replied that I thought this information must be inaccurate, for I had just had a letter from the officer commanding the 40th Battalion at Plymouth, informing me that he was about to embark with his battalion for service in Palestine. The Commander-in-Chief seemed somewhat surprised on hearing[122] this, but remarked that he considered his information later and better than mine, so of course there was nothing more to be said. A few days afterwards, on 30th August, General Chaytor had a conference with all his Brigade and Infantry Commanders, and as he had heard General Allenby saying to me that he considered his information with regard to Jewish reinforcements better than mine, he remarked: "Well, Patterson, your information about the coming of the other Jewish Battalions was better than the Chief's after all, for one of my officers has just come from England, and he tells me that a strong Jewish Battalion came out with him in the same ship and landed in Egypt a couple of days ago." As I considered it only right to let the Commander-in-Chief know that the information he had received was not accurate, I wrote and told him that I understood that another Jewish Battalion, some 1,400 strong, had already arrived in Egypt. In reply to this I got a memorandum from the Chief of Staff, Major-General Louis Jean Bols, intimating that in future I was only to address the Commander-in-Chief through the ordinary channels of communication. It was evident from this that the Chief of Staff was not pleased that the Commander-in-Chief should have any sidelight from me on Jewish affairs. Of course this had long been apparent, for anything I had previously written through the ordinary channels—no matter how important to the welfare of the battalion—had invariably been returned to me with the remark[123] that it was not considered necessary to refer the matter further. Some months after my interview with the Commander-in-Chief yet another thousand men arrived from England, and altogether there were over five thousand Jewish soldiers serving in the Jewish units in Palestine. The formation of a Jewish Brigade had been the definite policy of the War Office, and an intimation to this effect had been sent to General Allenby. The Commander-in-Chief of the E.E.F. had himself written to me to say that a Jewish Brigade would be formed, yet this promise, which meant so much to the comfort and efficiency of the men and to the prestige of Jews the world over, was never fulfilled; instead, we were pushed about from Brigade to Brigade and from Division to Division in the most heart-breaking manner, with the result that we got all the kicks and none of the traditional halfpence! In the space of three months we were shunted about like so many cattle trucks and found ourselves, in that brief period, attached to no less than twelve different formations of the British Army! General Chaytor gave a great lift to the spirit of the battalion when he conferred the Military Medal on Privates Sapieshvili and Gordon for their gallant conduct on the night patrol already mentioned. We had a special parade in "Salt" post redoubt, after Divine Service on the first day of the Jewish New Year (7th September, 1918). Before all their comrades the General recounted their gallant deeds, pinned the coveted ribbons on their breasts, and then ordered the battalion to march past and[124] salute—not himself, but the two men whom he had just decorated. From this moment General Chaytor had with him the heartfelt devotion of every man in the unit. A small thing can win the respect, goodwill, and devotion of a Regiment, but it is not every General who has the knack of gaining it. <hr class="chap" /> [125] <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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