Old Comrades

Ghosts of WW1

In this age when you can kill a person without seeing them through the use of technology; one of the most moving events in my life was standing in the trenches at Verdun.

There are few men who fought in World War 1 alive, soon this will apply to World War 2.

At the beginning of WW1, the British went to war thinking the Empire would see the war over by Christmas, the war was the biggest social upheaval of its time.

Many of the wealthy familes sent sons, brothers, and husbands to war as officers, while the workers went as enlisted men. However, a bullet knows no social boundary, and will kill the rich as easily as the poor. 

The war brought the end of what was known as "The lads regiments," these were regiments fromed from men from the same town, or city. So many died, the whole social stratus collapsed.

The title of my short sory refers to how the UK viewed life before and after The Great War, then men went to war with the sound of Edward Elgar's "Pomp and Circumstance March" urging them on, and returned to the mournful "The Lark Arising" by Ralph Vaughan Williams, thankful they had got back when so many died.