'Well I am getting on topping: today we have been on a brigade field day round a place called "The Devils Punch bowl" It's a piece of land about 3 miles round the top. The top is flat for about 3 yards and then slopes down to an awful depth. A sailor was murdered there in 1756, as he was going to Portsmouth by an highway man. They buried the sailor, and erected a stone telling all about the barborous murder. About 50 yards away there is a stone cross which the highwayman was hung on. The murdered sailor was a Witney man. On another old stone near our camp its got Portsmouth 33 miles, and Hyde Park Corner 36 miles, which shows that we are not so far from the seaside or London. It always seems curious to see such names on a mile stone.'