Steph

“Two German-held villages, Mametz and Montauban, were captured on July 1, as well as a German strongpoint, the Leipzig Redoubt. The human cost of the day’s attack was higher than on any other single day of battle in the First World War. Just over a thousand British officers and more than 20,000 men were killed, and 25,000 seriously wounded.”
― Martin Gilbert, The First World War: A Complete History

“In such times one realises to what a sad species of animal one belongs.”
― Martin Gilbert, The First World War: A Complete History

“Have you forgotten yet? Look down, and swear by the slain of the War that you’ll never forget. Do you remember the dark months you held the sector at Mametz— The nights you watched and wired and dug and piled sandbags on parapets? Do you remember the rats; and the stench Of corpses rotting in front of the front-line trench— And dawn coming, dirty-white, and chill with a hopeless rain? Do you ever stop and ask, ‘Is it all going to happen again?’ Do you remember that hour of din before the attack— And the anger, the blind compassion that seized and shook you then As you peered at the doomed and haggard faces of your men? Do you remember the stretcher-cases lurching back With dying eyes and lolling heads—those ashen-grey Masks of the lads who once were keen and kind and gay?”
― Martin Gilbert, The First World War: A Complete History