troyer torpedoed by a submarine,
but the marks of the Navy's hard hitting were on and about Gaza, and
we heard, if we could not see, the best the ships were doing. On one
day there was a number of explosions about Deir Sineid indicating the
destruction of some of the enemy's reserve of ammunition, and while
the Turks were still in Gaza they received a shock resembling
nothing more than an earthquake. One of the ships--the _Raglan_, I
believe--taking a signal from a seaplane, got a direct hit on an
ammunition train at Beit Hanun, the railway terminus north of Gaza.
The whole train went up and its load was scattered in fragments over
an area of several hundred square yards, an extraordinary scene of
wreckage of torn and twisted railway material and destroyed ammunition
presenting itself to us when we got on the spot on November 7. There
was another very fine example of the Navy's indirect fire a short
distance northward of this railway station. A stone road bridge had
been built over the wadi Hesi and it had to carry all heavy traffic,
the banks of the wadi being too steep and broken to permit wheels
passing down them as they stood. During our advance the engineers had
to build ramps here. A warship, taking its line from an aeroplane,
fired at the bridge from a range of 14,000 yards, got two direct hits
on it and holed it in the centre, and there must have been thirty or
forty shell craters within a radius of fifty yards. The confounding of
the Turks was ably assisted by the Navy.

CHAPTER IX

CRUSHING THE TURKISH LEFT

Now we return to the operations of XXth Corps and Desert Mounted Corps
on our right. After the capture of Beersheba this force was preparing
to attack the left of the Turkish main line about Hareira and Sheria,
the capture of which would enable the fine force of cavalry to get
to Nejile and gain an excellent water supply, to advance to the
neighbourhood of Huj and so reach the plain and threaten the enemy's
line in rear, and to fall on his line of retreat. It was proposed
to make the attack on the Kauwukah and Rushdi systems at Hareira on
November 4, but the water available at Beersheba had not been equal
to the demands made upon it and was petering out, and mounted troops
protecting the right flank of XXth Corps had to be relieved every
twenty-four hours. The men also suffered a good deal from thirst. The
weather was unusually hot for this period of the year, and the dust
churned up by traffic w