The Classic Account of Passchendaele
- Reissued for the First World War Centenary The third battle of Ypres culminating in a desperate struggle for the ridge & little village of Passchendaele was one of the most appalling campaigns in the First World War A million Tommies Canadians & Anzacs assembled at the Ypres Salient in the summer of 1917 mostly raw young troops keen to do their bit for King & Country Lyn Macdonald's Passchendaele tells their tale of mounting disillusion amid mud terror & desperate privation yet it is also a story of immense courage comradeship songs high spirits & bawdy humour Passchendaele portrays the human realities behind one of the most disastrous events in the history of warfare' It is rare to find a history of the First World War which manages to convey the front-line soldiers' experiences & to describe what it was that enabled those who survived to get through it Lyn Macdonald has done just that' Sunday Times Over the past twenty years Lyn Macdonald has established a popular reputation as an author & historian of the First World War Her books are based on the accounts of eyewitnesses & survivors told in their own words & cast a unique light on the First World War Most are published by Penguin