TCD MS 10516 folio 25 recto
[14th September 1916] talion would join. For the purpose of secrecy the event was called a route march but the O.C. explained that it was only so in name to add greater concealment to military plans, and that the real object was an attack by the 12th and 42nd Brigades on a powerful body of hostile Arab tribes who were collecting at the village of As Sahilan in the neighbourhood Nasiriyah. They were to be dispersed, punished as severely as possible and the village destroyed. We were to expect a determined opposition by some thousands of the enemy, were to be prepared to march at 3.45 a.m., were to maintain secrecy and allow the men to imagine that only a route march was the intention of the day. A little work followed that evening; arranging transport, making sure that first field dressings, stretchers,