"My WWI reads"

[CINDERS]

Been plodding along with these over the last couple of months from my library;
1st Ed's H/C's

Backs to the Wall By G D Mitchell; (read it)
The Gallant Company By H R Williams; (read it)
Jacka's Mob By E J Rule MC MM; (Half way)
The Battle Book of Ypres By Beatrice Brice (Eeep to some Wipers to others, a later read)

Some great reading here what stands out by far apart from moments of sheer terror is the humor in the face of a nightmare.
What those fellows went through in that mud & blood bath called France really made Gallipoli almost look like a tourist destination not saying there weren't any desperate pitched battles on that peninsular, it was overshadowed by the protracted trench warfare that was France the Western Front.
I cannot imagine what those poor souls went through for years not days or months but years of death and destruction of mates brains being spattered over you.
Being buried or drowning in a shell hole foul with dead soldiers from both sides the narratives are given in the first person by one who was at the pointy end of which they do not pull any punches saying what it was like among that hell on earth.
Although in some paragraphs your quite splitting your sides with mirth at what the Aussies got up to with shinnangins both at the front and whilst on leave.

As a point of interest it is in either the 1st or 2nd book that the author received 10 days leave in England after 3 years of fighting now that really puts it into perspective yes they went to quiet sectors but more often than not they were subjected to long range artillery.
Their accommodation at times were animal pens and up the front just some dark damp hole scraped into the side of the trench that kept you perpetually wet or in a bunker 30'-40' underground with the real possibility of being entombed by a shell strike on the entrance.
The mud in the trenches was often knee deep or deeper with soldiers discarding kit so they could move in it others took the chance of walking along the top with some paying the price, food more often than not was cold or non existent the bread was usually covered in mud that the dead lay in!

The books ring true to the comrades in arms as everything was shared those lucky to get leave to England more often than not their mates gave them Francs of Pounds so one could live the life of Riley whilst there.

If you can get a hold of these titles even reprints (or Kindle) they are well worth the read.
As I get further along I will post other reads.

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