TIME SLIP
There is another supposed paranormal event from the
Middle East, dated a bit later. It turns up in Chapter 30 of
The Desert Column, an account by the Australian writer Ion
L Idriess of his war service with the Australian Light Horse.
Idriess enlisted early in the war, and landed at Gallipoli in
May 1915, a few weeks after the first landings. He was
wounded and evacuated, and he returned to his unit to serve
in the Palestine campaigns of 1915, 1916 and 1917. At the
end of 1917 he was wounded again, and this time he was
evacuated home to Australia. Idriess's unit, the 5th Light
Horse Regiment, was in reserve during General Sir Archibald
Murray's offensive against the Turkish advanced posts at
Maghdaba and El Arish in December 1916.
In The Desert Column, in his entry for 25 December, Idriess
gives a short account of what he had heard about the battle
he had just missed. "....Turkish losses were immeasurably
heavier than ours although our fellows were attacking from
the open desert and the Turks were snug in deep trenches
supported by machine-guns. All the garrison were captured
with their Krupps. Our wounded were collected in the dark,
little fires were lit beside them so that they could be picked
up by the stretcher-bearers groping across the desert. Then
came a dreadful march back, for columns of Turkish
reinforcements from Shellal were hurrying on Maghdaba.
The wounded had a fearful time in the dreaded cacolets.
"Later - A very peculiar story is being discussed throughout
the Desert Column. It appears that the troops when riding
back the thirty miles from Maghdaba were enveloped in
blinding clouds of dust. Nearly the whole column was riding
in snatches of sleep; no one had slept for four nights and
they had ridden ninety miles. Hundreds of men saw the
queerest visions - weird looking soldiers were riding beside
them, many were mounted on strange animals. Hordes
walked right amongst the horses making not the slightest
sound. The column rode through towns with lights gleaming
from the shuttered windows of quaint buildings. The country
was all waving green fields, and trees and flower gardens.
Numbers of the men are speaking of what they saw in a
most interesting, queer way. There were tall stone temples
with marble pillars and swinging oil lamps - our fellows could
smell the incense - and white mosques with stately
minarets..." |
