Life in the Trenches - A Soldier's TaleJune 12th 1944Dear Family, I've been sitting in this godforsaken pit for the last three years now. Life as a whole has hit a new low. The trench, with its deep cloying mud and stagnant water, soaks you day in, day out. The trench foot prevents me from even removing my boots, for fear my toes will also be removed in the process. The constipation causes agony from a strict diet of bully beef and biscuits and a severe lack of fruits and vegetables. The smell of both burning and rotten human flesh lingers throughout the battlefield, especially during the summer months, where the maggots and flies fester on the corpses of my fallen brothers. This is hell on earth. I want to be home with you; I miss you all so much. Yesterday, we attempted a takeover of a German trench. As we advanced, wave after wave of British men were gunned down by German machine gun fire. A mortar exploded just yards from my position as I negotiated the tangle of razor wire along the German trench border, allowing me to drop my grenade into a support tunnel. All this death and destruction is getting to me; I feel like I am losing my humanity. Why do I have to kill? Sure if I don’t kill them then they will kill me, but seriously why me? That is not the worse thing though. Oh no, the worst thing by far is the constant and relentless explosion of bombs dropping into the sloppy mud surrounding us. Only last week the supply trench between the frontline and us was hit directly, spewing acrid mud all around. The bombs are causing some of the men to go mad. At first they start screaming and rocking back and forth, and when they won't stop, the commanding officer heartlessly dislodges a bullet from his rifle straight into the poor man's skull. War is such a barbaric place; it’s changed me. I don’t like what I am becoming. I am now a trained killing machine, not a human being. Oh God, when will the madness end! My dear loving family, should I not make it out of this war then I want you to remember me as the man I was. A happy man who loved his family more than anything else in the world. The only thing that keeps me going these days is the knowledge that one day this war will be over, and on that day I will be coming home to you. I hope god hears my prayers, as I am praying for each and every one of you. I love you all so much. |