5th December 1915 Sunday
Pleasant morning. Took Church Parade. Footling sermon by [?]Ram on Hope in which he went through all our hopes from childhood up to our training in England hoping to be sent out as soon as possible. He stopped just short of saying what our hopes are here!! Curious the difference between our Church parade and the Lancashire Fusiliers. They had 2 majors, four captains and about 10 subalterns. We had 1 major, and 4 subalterns – a ?sub in command of each coy.
Went out both morning and afternoon on Anderson’s horse in the morning with Doctor Nelson and Bryson and in the afternoon with Bloore. In the afternoon I had to look up D ?Coy at 6pm – a frontage of about three miles for one company. Desperate mist made it very hard to find our way. Patrols galore got lost for an hour at a time, signal lamps could not be seen and the mist drenched everyone. Tea left camp in dixies at 11pm. Reached 14 – at a distance of 2 miles at 1 am and 16 at about the same time. Never found 15 and 13 platoon’s orderly men were found still wandering at 6.30 am on our return journey to camp.