military base camp and supply depot. Kantara had grown, due to the British war effort, into something resembling a modern metropolis, with miles of railway sidings, workshops, tarmac roads, electric light, cinemas, hospital facilities, churches and even a golf course. There were clubs, including a very efficient YMCA establishment, and Dalton records that he had a ‘lovely breakfast’ in the officers lounge there. Dalton was disappointed to find that most of his kit that had been put in storage at Kantara had disappeared, but he was issued with a tent and other items from the stores, including silk pyjamas. He was particularly pleased with the latter, describing the pyjamas, in the parlance of the day, as ‘top hole’. After lunch in the mess, Dalton bade farewell to his travelling companions as they continued on their way ‘in very good spirits’ to Cairo.37
Dalton took a train to El Arish, with just one other officer in the carriage. Nurses got on at a stop en route and eventually Dalton tried to break the ice with the ‘nicest looking’ of them by offering her his ‘British warm’ – an officer’s great coat – as it was cold. He was rebuffed, instantly regretting that he had spoken at all. However, another nurse asked him where he was going, leading to a general conversation that developed into a sing song which helped to pass the time.38 It was late when Dalton arrived at El Arish. He began his duties at the school of instruction on 18 February, but found that his own services as a lecturer were not required until a new course started. He was told to assist Lieutenant Springay for the remaining week of the current course – Springay was giving a class on observation. Meanwhile, Dalton decided to take advantage of the golfing facilities at El Arish. On 23 February there is a simple entry in his diary, ‘Played Golf’. This is the first record of Dalton playing the game that would take on a highly important role in his life. He played regularly during his stay in El Arish, and he would recall later that it was in Egypt that he played golf for the first time.
He had some leave and decided do some sightseeing. On 24 February he travelled to Cairo by train via Kantara, and checked into the luxurious Grand Continental Hotel on Opera Square. The Continental was then one of the great hotels in Cairo, renowned for its spacious and very elegant terrace area, where patrons could relax over drinks or a meal. The hotel was popular with members of the British armed forces – earlier in the war, as a young 2nd Lieutenant working in intelligence, T.E. Lawrence had resided there. Having spent a long period of storms and heavy rain living in a tent, Dalton must have revelled in the luxury of a comfortable bed in a good hotel. He records in his diary that he had breakfast in the hotel after a good night’s sleep ‘and a lovely hot bath’.39 He went out to see the exotic sights of Cairo, and the following day continued with his sightseeing, visiting the other great hotel in Cairo, the historic Shepheard’s Hotel, and also the fashionable café, Groppie’s. Some of his fellow officers were also on leave, and he went about ‘buying stuff’ with ‘Timmins and Billie Martin’. Some nurses from Alexandria, where important military hospital facilities were located, were also staying at the Continental, and Dalton had tea and dinner with them. He became particularly friendly with one of the nurses, Sister O’Brien, and he went for a [horse-drawn] garry drive with her, getting half-way to the pyramids. Dalton enjoyed the outing enormously, commenting in his diary that he had a ‘top hole’ time. He and his companion had coffee back at the hotel ‘and went to our respective rooms’.40 The next morning he took it easy in the hotel, playing a game of billiards. He met up with another officer from the 6th Leinsters who was also on leave, Captain Alan Brabazon (22) from a well-to-do Church of Ireland farming family in County Westmeath, and went to Groppie’s for tea. (Brabazon was destined to die the following month from a sniper’s bullet.) Dalton had lunch with another officer called Fry, and in the afternoon went to a social event organised by the wife of General Allenby.
Dalton records in his diary how he was introduced to Lady Allenby ‘and had the pleasure of procuring a cup of tea for her’.41 Probably impressed by Dalton’s charm, she introduced him to Countess Hariaina Pacha, who was accompanied by her daughter. Dalton, who had an eye for attractive young women, was probably more interested in the daughter and he asked her to dance. As they took to the floor the young woman seemed to be mistaken about the identity of her dancing partner. She appeared to think Dalton was a French aristocrat, causing him some embarrassment by addressing him as ‘Monsieur le Duc’. However, he admits that he did not really mind the fact that she was labouring under a slight delusion ‘which my poor knowledge of French was unable to allay’.42 (It is also possible that the young woman was having some fun at Dalton’s expense.)
After his interesting break in Cairo, Dalton returned to El Arish. He resumed his instructor duties, and on 4 March, he mentioned in his diary his twentieth birthday. He felt ‘lonely’ but ‘busy’. He would remain busy over the following weeks, although he still found time to play golf from time to time. As he concentrated on work, the entries in his diary became shorter and less detailed. The topics covered in the courses he gave included observation; scouting; intelligence summaries and aerial photographs. The latter topic indicated a particular interest on Dalton’s part in air reconnaissance, and during the Irish Civil War he would show a particular interest in using aircraft to gain intelligence on opposing forces.
In an offensive in April, when the 6th Leinsters was tasked with taking a high peak area near the village of Kefr Ain, the battalion came under Turkish artillery and machine gun fire and suffered casualties. Among the injured were some of Dalton’s officer colleagues, Lieutenant Hogan, 2nd Lieutenant McDonnell and Captain Powell. Dalton’s sojourn at the school in El Arish meant that he missed out on these engagements with the enemy. While he probably would have wished to be where the action was, El Arish was a safer place in which to be located. Once again, from the point of view of survival, his luck had held out.
Dalton appears to have pleased his superiors in the way he performed as an instructor in the sniping school. A memorandum dated 22 May 1918 drawn up by Captain Percy H. Manbey on behalf of the Major commanding the El Arish School of Instruction, of which the sniping school was part, declared that Lieutenant Dalton has given ‘entire satisfaction’.43 The fourteen-week stint as a sniper instructor inspired Dalton to write a poem, The Sniper. He wrote it on 19 May, towards the end of the course during which he essentially taught men to stalk and kill the enemy. The poem is a grim reflection on the heavy responsibility on the shoulders of a marksman whose job it is to kill an enemy soldier. He knows that his shot will cause a woman’s tears, and that a mother’s heart will be torn apart. But he is also conscious that a comrade died at his side at dawn [at the hands of an enemy sniper], ‘died with a gasp and nothing more…’ He reflects that we are all marked with the hand of Cain. ‘Thus shall it be, a life for a life…’44 He closes with the Latin motto of the Royal Dublin Fusiliers, Spectamur Agendo – ‘Let us be judged by our acts.’
Return to France
The British Army decided that it needed the 6th Leinsters on the Western Front. On 23 May Dalton and his battalion boarded the vessel Ormonde at Port Said and sailed for France, arriving in Marseilles on 1 June. The battalion travelled by train to Aire in northern France, near the border with Belgium, and set up camp. The usual training and fatigue work was carried out, and anti-malaria quinine treatment was administered.45 One of the great advantages of the transfer of the 6th Leinsters to northern France was that all ranks became eligible for leave – some had been serving continuously abroad for three years.46 Dalton was promoted to Captain on 3 July, and was also given the opportunity to visit Ireland on leave.
In the meantime Dalton’s skills as an instructor were called on once again – in July he gave a Lewis gun course to newly-arrived American troops at the Samer Training Area near Boulogne.47 They were part of the rapidly expanding American Expeditionary Force preparing to fight on the Western Front. It was decided that those American units deployed on the British front would use certain British weapons, such as the Vickers and Lewis machine guns, as opposed to their own American-supplied weapons. As a result, American officers and non-commissioned officers needed instruction in the British weapons so that they could, in turn, instruct their own men. Captain Dalton, ever conscious of his American birth, was clearly very pleased to meet the American military men he instructed. To ease them
