Reseña del libro "Lions Savaged by Donkeys (en Inglés)"
It is one hundred years since the First World War, and there is renewed interest in finding out exactly what took place on the Western Front and whether there was justification for the high casualty rates. The German infantry had a great respect for the British Infantry calling them the 'Lions'. This was because of their courage and tenacity. They nicknamed the British Commanders, the 'Donkeys'. This explains the title of the book. The Germans, facing the British Regiments, couldn't believe what they were seeing at times. Thousands of brave men, emerging from the trenches and then walking across No-Man's Land, at a slow march, in broad daylight, with huge packs on their backs. The majority were going to certain death. Even though they knew that they would most likely lose their life as a result of crazy instructions, they always obeyed orders. The 'Lions' did the fighting while the 'Donkeys' did the ordering. My Grandfather was killed on the 16th April 1916, in a frontline trench on the battlefield at Arras. I have, therefore, a personal interest in trying to understand what occurred in those four dreadful years. In respect of his memory, I have vowed to visit his grave at least once a year and I also visit the World War 1 battlefields whenever I can. Visiting his grave last year, I walked around the cemetery and had a look at the names on the gravestones. I wanted to obtain a better picture of those who had lain close to my Grandfather for the past century. Officers and Privates lay beside each other. What shook me most was the fact that a lot of those buried there were teenagers, some as young as eighteen years of age. To say that I was upset by what I saw is an understatement. I was horrified and amazed at how this had occurred and how the carnage had been accepted back in England. Who was to blame? On my last visit to his grave, I made a commitment to my Grandfather and to all those young men buried in the Faubourg d'Amiens Military Cemetery in Arras that I would find out why it had happened and whether blame could be apportioned for their deaths. This book is an attempt to explain what went on in the 1914 - 1918 War and whether the Politicians and the Generals can be held responsible for the carnage. While carrying out my research, I was given an unpublished manuscript written by a Private who served in the Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment. He fortunately survived the war. It describes, very accurately, what happened in his life after he enlisted, together with his brother, on the 26th. August 1914. He was twenty-two years of age at the time, and his brother was nineteen. Things started going wrong for Sid Kemp shortly after he enlisted. Britain was totally unprepared for war, and there weren't even the facilities in place to train the recruits. Once they got to France, it was still a shambles with the materials required to fight a war not being available. Sid's day to day account is fascinating but also amusing in places where he describes the interaction between the people he encounters. As it is his personal account and actually happened, it is all very believable. What comes across, as his story unfolds, is how Sid got more and more disheartened as day after day he lost so many of his friends. In 1914 his Platoon was made up of people he knew from the locality of Kent he grew up in. By 1917 they were all strangers to him as the majority of those he knew had been killed or wounded. What upset him the most was the fact that the large number of deaths that occurred during the various offensives like Loos and the Somme, hadn't brought any significant military successes. He could see no justification for the deaths. It is a very moving story with a humorous twist. After reading it, the reader will have enough facts to be able to come to their own conclusion as to who they should blame for what happened.
