Introduction Henry Williamson Knihy

This Diary was written actually during the war by a young soldier who went out in 1914 with the London Regiment. In 1915 he was gazetted to a regular battalion of a famous Scottish regiment, serving with them during the battles of Loos and of the Somme.He was wounded and decorated; and at the end of 1916 was seconded to the Royal Flying Corps, with whom he saw out the War. It is an absorbing narrative, writes author and fellow veteran Henry Williamson, and there must be tens of thousands of men, like myself, between thirty and forty years of age, who want to live again in those years, and will be enabled to do so because of the authentic details and experiences which fill the pages. This is a fragment of the true history of the War.

Edited and introduced by Henry Williamson, who had been to school with Bell & served with him in the London Rifle Brigade 1914-15. Bell was commissioned in the Seaforth Highlanders in April 1915 and quickly wounded at Hill 60. Returned to the front for Lo