More than eight million young men perished during the First World War—a staggering figure. The natural reaction to such a great loss of humanity was to forget the individuals and recast the conflict into one of faceless armies and battles commemorated in stone and metal monuments. War Letters of Fallen Englishmen was published following the war in order to remind the living of those who were lost in the name of the British crown—brothers, husbands, fathers, sons. This collection provides, in the very words of those who participated and died in combat, the closest approximation possible to the experience of war. Carefully selected from thousands of letters, those in this collection are poignant, powerful, and graphic and were chosen for their depth of perception, the intensity of their descriptions, and their messages to future generations. This edition contains a new foreword by the distinguished World War I historian Jay Winter.

Originally appearing at the same time as the pacifist novel All Quiet on the Western Front, this powerful collection provides a glimpse into the hearts and minds of an enemy that had been thoroughly demonized by the Allied press. Composed by German students who had left their university studies in order to participate in World War I, these letters reveal the struggles and hardships that all soldiers face. The stark brutality and surrealism of war are revealed as young men from Germany describe their bitter combat and occasional camaraderie with soldiers from many nations, including France, Great Britain, and Russia. Like its companion volume, War Letters of Fallen Englishmen, these letters were carefully selected for their depth of perception, the intensity of their descriptions, and their messages to future generations. "Should these letters help towards the establishment of justice and better understanding between nations," the editor reflects in his introduction, "their deaths will not have been in vain." This edition contains a new foreword by the distinguished World War I historian Jay Winter.

Selection of more than 300 letters published by The Times newspaper between 1914 and 1918, as its readers and the nation alike endured the ordeal of the First World War.

Wartime letters include correspondence of Union and Confederate sympathizers and soldiers of all ranks. Authentic illustrations accompany insightful missives by Lincoln, Grant, Lee, Whitman, Davis, and many of their contemporaries.

When war broke out in 1914 conscription seemed unnecessary; there was no shortage of volunteers ready to lay down their lives for their country. In this fascinating book, illustrated with contemporary drawings and photographs, Caroline Dakers explores exactly what their 'country' meant to the men and women who fought, died, survived. She suggests that, with a little subliminal help from literature, art and propaganda, the British volunteer, whether factory worker, farm hand or public school boy, felt that he was fighting for old England - village, church, meadow and carthorse, rather than city, factory, commerce and motor car. Drawing on a wide range of unpublished papers and family archives, Dr Dakers recreates the world of the countryside at war. There are chapters on agriculture (literally 'the home front'), and life and death in the manor house, vicarage, school and farm. And while all this was being fought for, The French countryside was smashed into a quagmire. This is the most complete picture yet of the impact of the First World War on rural England; a war which, if only in the ubiquitous village war memorials, still reverberates across the decades.

A powerful account of life and loss in the Great War, as told by British soldiers in their letters home