Trench Fever

For Chris Moore the Great War developed from a childhood fascination to a full-blown obsession, both with the actuality of the war - its archives and its archaeology - and its abiding influence on English language, manners and customs. Exasperated with the emphasis most war literature places on the officers and political leaders, Moore set out to trace the wartime experiences of one man - one personal history among the 6,000,000 voiceless ranks of Britons in uniform. He chose Private Walter Butterworth, 5th Battalion, Leicestershire Regiment, an obscure infantryman in a disparaged outfit of amateurs that somehow managed to win one of the greatest battles of history - who also happened to be Moore's grandfather. In this book Moore retrieves his grandfather's war-song by following (with reluctant family in tow) the three-year march of the 5th Leicesters through France and Flanders.