491 
WITH THE TURKS. 
Bivouac for 
the night. 
Scene of 
battle of 
Dhomokos 
neit day. 
the fighting gradually accumulated, with ammunition and pack- 
animals and wounded in rear of the ridge and on the road, a scene of 
confusion, which can be imagined, ensued. 
Our first thought was to seek out the Head-Quarters Staff, but after 
wandering about in the fields in the dark for some time, in search first 
of it and afterwards with equal unsuccess of the Divisional Staff, we 
decided to bivouac near the road for the night and soon afterwards 
coming across the Herman and Austrian attaches, who had succeeded 
in lighting a fire by the roadside, we joined their party and made a 
frugal meal off Greek brandy (water was not to be had) and a ham 
which my dragoman had succeeded in buying at Yolo. The arrival of 
various wounded officers and men, attracted by the fire, did not improve 
the appetite; the German attache, Captain Morgen, performed the 
operation with a pair of small scissors out of Colonel de la Tour’s 
pocket-knife of removing the remains of a Turkish soldier’s finger 
(which had been shattered to pieces by a bullet), the man looking on 
with almost perfect indifference. 
Having paid a visit to the newspaper correspondents, who were 
encamped in a ditch hard by, and who gave me a single mouthful of 
dirty water, for which I shall be ever grateful, after removing a few 
of the more obstrusive clods (we were bivouacked in a ploughed field), 
I turned in at about 11 p.m. and slept well enough. 
At daylight on the 18th it was reported that their right flank having 
been turned, the Greeks had evacuated Dhomokos during the night 
and part of that town was seen to be in flames (this, however, might 
well have been occasioned by the artillery fire of the previous day). I 
subsequently heard that the Turks had entered it at 4 a.m. 
Having adjourned for a time to the deserted village of Yardali, about 
a mile east of the road where there was a small stream, we made a 
very superficial toilette and a cup of tea, whilst our orderlies went in 
pursuit of abandoned poultry, &c., and presently returned with a couple 
of live fowls and some onions, eating the latter only for their breakfast. 
The unfortunate horses also enjoyed about half an hour for refreshment 
on the banks of the stream. 
We then proceeded to examine the field of battle, keeping a little to 
the east of the road over the ground which had been occupied by the 
artillery, but finding little trace of the fight beyond the carcasses of a 
few dead horses. The Turkish burying parties were now busy and we 
able to call their attention to one or two corpses wdiich we came across 
hidden in the corn. I noticed also a number of dead mules and ponies, 
no doubt ammunition ones. In one place a Greek trench was being 
utilised as a grave for 20 or 30 bodies. Altogether on the one line 
that we traversed we must have seen about 50 dead and at the time 
I estimated the Turkish loss in this one frontal attack alone at 200 
killed and 800 wounded. 
Passing some of the Greek trenches near the road, which appeared 
to me to be admirably made and placed for defence, we proceeded to 
examine the position of the two batteries of artillery which had borne 
the brunt of the fighting on the Greek side as far as that arm was 
concerned. 
