John Christian Stephenson's 1915 war diary

During the night we opened fire twice. The enemy were reported to be retreating from Acmi Baba and massing in the Lone Pine ridge but nothing came of it. It is my birthday today and I turned 25. We had eggs and bacon for breakfast. Later the Tommies attack was more successful than expected. Heavy firing has been heard all day over in the narrows. The French are to advance at 5.00 this afternoon. Nothing doing today here until night when the enemy opened up a heavy fire on us and blew up two of our saps. One sapper was killed and a lot were knocked out with the fumes. Went in for a swim tonight and washed clothes.