Somme Mud

Private Edward Lynch enlisted in the army at just eighteen. As his ship set sail from Sydney, the band played 'Boys of the Dardanelles' and the crowd proudly waved off their fresh-faced men. Men who had no idea of the harsh reality of the trenches of the Somme; of the pale-faced, traumatised soldiers they would encounter there; of the innumerable contradictions of war.

Upon his return from France in 1919, Private Lynch wrote Somme Mud in pencil in twenty school exercise books, perhaps in the hope of coming to terms with all that he had witnessed. Published for the first time, Private Lynch's work is a rare, precious find. It vividly captures the horror and magnitude of the First World War, written from the perspective of ordinary infantrymen rather than officers.

Told with dignity, candour and surprising wit, Somme Mud is a testament to the power of the human spirit. Out of the mud that threatens to suck out a man's very soul rises a compelling story of humanity and friendship.