Letter · 18 Nov 1914 · Red Sea, Egypt
Passing the time
Fabian wrote this letter as he travelled from NZ to Egypt. At that time, he was a Trooper with the Auckland Mounted Rifles. By the end of the war, he was a gunner with the Army Service Corps.
Extracts from this letter
"Then some of the men, they were not Mounted men, came rushing up on deck to get lifebelts in a terrible fright. They get well laughed at I can tell you. ... I think it is plenty of time to get frightened when there is something to make a man think his end has come..."
"We are getting our bayonets nice and sharp, I wonder if we will ever use them. I expect so, before it is all over..."
"They have started to give us boat drill now ... Everything about it is done with a laugh, though if anything did happen we would all be a bit more grim about it than we are in practising it. It seemed so funny to think that you were up working last night when I was on guard at midnight and that it was day away back in NZ. ... There is great excitement over it, we might be going to have a go at the Turks."
