Edward was a 17-year-old clerk when he enlisted in 1913, and by February 1915 found himself in France as a Private in the 5th battalion of the Nottinghamshire & Derbyshire Regiment, the Sherwood Foresters. He describes in detail the process of going over the top and running through no man's land, past dead and dying comrades, under the merciless fire of the enemy. He remains haunted by the memory of an injured comrade he didn't stop to help when making the precarious journey back to the British trenches.
