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Weekly Times (Melbourne, Vic. : 1869 - 1954), Saturday 25 December 1915, page 15

DR. F. M. JOHNSON'S EXPERIENCES; VIVID PICTURES PAINTED

Though the Turks probably were un aware of the fact, they shelled an ambulance station at Gallipoli recently, and the incident is described in an interesting way by the late Dr F. Miller Johnson, in one of his last letters to his wife.

Dr. Johnson's death was announced last week. He was a captain in the Sixth Field Ambulance, and divisional sanitary officer at Gallipoli. He was about 51 years of age, and had practised at South Melbourne for nearly 30 years. His son is a member of the Australian forces in Egypt.

Dr. Johnson wrote as follows:—

GALLIPOLI. October 10.

"There have been one or two little brisk artillery engagements lasting half an hour or so, but nothing much more; generally a few isolated shells. Yesterday one gun made a series of attacks. I was doing my usual round of inspection, and had almost reached the head of a gully, when this gun opened fire on a unit on the other side of the gully on a hill: the shells got closer and closer, and the men around me thought it would be safer to get into shelter, so a corporal and I sat down in a vacant dug-out, looking down the gully. The gun lengthened its range, and began to drop the shells amongst another unit. I expect they know, all our arrangements from their aeroplanes. Here the road lies low naturally between two high banks, on one of which is camped this unit. On the level of the road is an intermediate station of this ambulance, cut out into the bank which is 10 or 12 feet high.

DESERTED AND IN RUINS

"As we watched the shelling we hoped it would not hit the ambulance station. Soon afterwards we saw two pieces of timber fly up into the air, and I thought it was from some of the work of the other unit. Presently a cry was passed up the gully for a doctor and stretcher bearers; so there was nothing to do for it but go down. It was not a rain of shells—perhaps one every two or three minutes. So I ran down the hill about a quarter of a mile; with my usual luck, the shells kept bursting on the bank above the road, only sending down little showers of earth. "When I got to the ambulance I found it deserted and in ruins; but round the next corner, against a sheltering group, was one boy lying on a stretcher, and two other wounded men with a group of dressers round them, and Captain ——, the medical officer of the unit above, who had come across to their assistance. The boy on the stretcher was badly hurt. He was one of our ambulance boys, a stretcher bearer. A. high explosive shell had by ill-luck slipped in between the sand and the last sand-bag, and had exploded in the dug-out.

"I ran across for a shell dressing to the unit above, and a man from it came half-way with it, and then went back for morphia, which he brought in a minute or two right across the line of fire. Of the other two, one was another stretcher-bearer, and was only slightly wounded. The third was from the unit, and also not badly wounded. Soon the shells began to pass further on, and as soon as it was comparatively safe we sent the wounded off to hospital. While we were waiting four stretcher-bearers and a sergeant came down from higher up than where I was, anxious to do their duty, and not a whit deterred by the possible danger. The badly wounded boy was operated on as soon as he was taken in, and in the afternoon was put on a hospital ship. He is in a very dangerous condition, and as he lay waiting to be taken away he held my hand and asked me what chance he had, and begged me to write to his cousin to tell him of the occurrence.

"BEACHY BILL," BUSY

"Because I happen to see these cases do not imagine me in any particular danger. My occupation makes me my own master, and I can go on or stop as I think fit; so that I am always able to take shelter. One day this week Beachy Bill opened a pretty severe fire. I was in the sap behind the grave yard. We always take this sap, although It is so much longer, because it is so much safer. Here, under its high bank, lay some 10 or more men and myself, while Beach's shells burst on the hill-side above us, some 30 yards away, quite harmlessly. The only thing that worried the men was the buzz—like huge flies—of the cap of the shell as it droned through the air, because one is never certain where it will fall. The shell you can generally guess.

"I think that during this week the Turks may have made one or two little feeble attacks, as a few were shot, and their bodies brought in; and on these nights the warships have been putting in some heavy shots. One night the heavy mortars on the monitor put in shot after shot so quickly that one heard the noise of the shell leaving the gun, the noise of the explosive, and the explosion of the shell as one almost continuous thunder.

GLORIOUS SUNSETS

"We have the most glorious sunsets and sunrises here, as I have told you; last night it was most magnificent: rather a dull evening, with the sun behind Imbros and the horizon all gold away to the north. Suddenly the little dark clouds overhead were tinged with rose, a large heavy cloud over Imbros itself, its surface broken up into little irregular squares, shone vivid red; and then all the long sweeping clouds in the sky to the' south and east became of the same glorious rose color, and the water was such a blue, with red reflections on its dancing little waves that no one would believe It. I have seen such pictures and thought them incredible. As the sunset died away at the far east of Imbros, it opened up a great space in the dark blue clouds, through which the gold red shone, lighting up a destroyer on the far horizon like a picture in a great, and glorious frame.

"The bathing was great after the storm, and the waves came rolling in over the pier. I was the only one to go in early, and had a most glorious swim. The Quartermaster and the Colonel always come down, but neither would go in this morning. Everyone here feels very disappointed about the outbreak of the epidemic of cerebro spinal meningitis among the camps and in Australia generally. It is quite possible it will lead to a very great delay in getting the troops away, and we should all be glad to see every man here who can come, because it is only with overpowering numbers of men and guns that in these days of trench warfare anything can be done. We only sit here in patience and wait and wait until the opportunity comes for making a push. To all those like myself outside the trenches, it is a very simple matter and almost like a picnic. But to those in the trenches, with confined, close air, the incessant watch and ward, the ever present danger and the monotony, it is a very different tale, and Australia would indeed be proud of her sons if she could really know how cheerfully they endure.

"NOT LIFE, BUT DEATH."

"There was a man visiting this ambulance the other day, and he said to his "cobbers': 'You fellows don't know what life is down here. You ought to be in the trenches. That's the place to see life. Why, they were digging a new sap, and came across two Turks!' 'That isn't life, that's death,' said the ambulance boy. 'But two of our fellows fainted, though,' retorted the visitor; and I believe he was very proud of the incident. He was quite correct, too, for I happened to be inspecting in this vicinity, and saw part of the affair, which consisted of two leg bones remaining even with the bank. There are plenty of such specimens about at odd places.

"Another story is told of an officer in charge of the howitzer mortar ship, which takes up a certain position each night and throws a beam of light up the gully, lighting up the position of the Turkish trenches so that any movement is visible. Unexpectedly he fired. When he was asked what he fired for, he replied that he could see a damned old Turk reading a newspaper by that search-light, and that he was not going to stand."