Nothing of Importance A record of eight months at the front with a Welsh battalion, October, 1915, to June, 1916

This last sentence was spoken in a quick undertone, as the prisoner stepped out of the door into the road. I was filling up the column headed “Punishment awarded” on a buff-colo...

Rumours were rife again, and mostly right this time. “The C.O. knew the part we were going to: a chalk country ... rolling downs ... four or five weeks’ rest ... field training...

The six privates awoke from a state of inert dreaming, or lolling against the barn that flanked the gateway of battalion headquarters, to stand in two rows of three and await or...

Throughout October and November our battalion was in the firing-line. This meant that we spent life in an everlasting alternation between the trenches and our billets behind, ju...

The snow was coming down in big white flakes, whirling and dancing against a grey sky. I shivered as I looked out from the top of the dug-out steps in Maple Redoubt. It was half...

Lance-Corporal Allan was killed on Tuesday the 6th of June. For the rest of that day I was all “on edge.” I wondered sometimes how I could go on: even in billets I dreamed of ri...

This is a chapter of maps, diagrams, and technicalities. There are people, I know, who do not want maps, to whom maps convey practically nothing. These people can skip this chap...

The train had long ago recovered from the shock of its initial jerk; a long steady grinding noise came up from the carriage wheels, as though they had recovered breath and were...

“Poor devils on sentry,” said Dixon. He shut the door quickly and came over to the fire. Outside was a thick blizzard, and it was biting cold. He sat down on the bed nearest the...

It was a slumbrous afternoon in September. My wound had healed up a month ago, and I was lazily convalescent at my aunt’s house in one of the most beautiful parts of Kent. The s...

We laughed, for the whole of our establishment was wood. We were sitting on a wooden seat, leaning our hands against wooden uprights, eating off a wooden table, and resting our...

“Oh! that you, Adams? Well, look here--about this mine going up to-night. Got your map there? Well, the mining officer is here now, and he says.... Look here, you’d better come...

It must not be imagined that I at once grasped all the essential details of our trench system, as I have tried to put them concisely in the preceding chapter. On the contrary, i...

As I write I feel inclined to throw the whole book in the fire. It seems a desecration to tell of these things. Do I not seem to be exulting in the tragedy? Should not he who fe...

It was ten o’clock as I came in from the wiring-party in front of Rue Albert, and at that moment our guns began. We were in Maple Redoubt. The moon had just set, and it was a st...

On this leave I most religiously visited relations and graciously received guests. For one thing, I felt it my duty to dispel all this ignorant pessimism that I found rolling ab...

“Going on patrol,” was the reply. “Oh, by the way, you probably know something about this rotten sap opposite the Quarry. I’m going out to find out if it’s occupied at night or...

each side was a succession of berths in three tiers. On the top tier you must have felt very high and close up to the roof; on the centre one you got a good view out of the wind...