A lovely morning. Had a letter from Ursula who has measles, but is on the mend. Fortunately Aunt Ella is with her, so she is being properly looked after. At 2 I was told I could have the half day. As I was walking down High St, who should I see saluting me, but Goeffrey Coleridge, in the uniform of a sergeant. It was a surprise, so I walked down the street with him. He belongs to the OTC and is trying to get a commission in the Devons. He has come up for the day from Gloucestershire. Kalki does not suit him.
Mary & I had tea at the Ladies Club, with Mrs Drake, one of the clerks of our hospital.
There is a mystery about a transport ship which a Turkish boat tried to torpedoe, but failed, and yet 100 of our men were drowned. No information as to how they got drowned.
More accounts of the Meuve Chappelle battle. If only the arrangements made by Sir John French could have been carried out, it would have been a real victory. In the meantime the fighting has apparently ceased for a while. We hear the hospitals in France are half empty, & that is why we have had so few patients lately, & those that have come are very slight cases, & yet for all that, a fifth hospital is being formed in Exeter, near the Castle.
In April 1915 Angus`s father was on his way to Gallipoli on a ship called the Manitou, which was threatened with being torpedoed by a Turkish ship manned by Germans who ordered everyone to abandon ship – 3 torpedoes were fired but missed. so the British abandoned ship and 58 men drowned as there were not enough lifeboats. The Manitou sailed away and survived. The Turkish ship was chased by some British and French ships in the area and survived.