Soldier writing a letter home, 1914. Letters from home were
often painful because of their naïveté. The ironies jumped out
at the soldier: “Try not to get wounded!” or “We are having a
hard time, too!” “My God! From what?!” was Delvert’s response.
The soldier’s sensation, on reading such comments from home, was
often one of complete isolation. The troops might as well have
been on the moon. They lived and fought in a place beyond
understanding, beyond imagination, even beyond feeling. “The
Army fights on its own” was Garfield Powell’s conclusion during
the Somme offensive.” -Modris Eksteins, Rite of Spring: The
Great War and the Birth of the Modern Age. “Fighting Mad” from
History and Rhymes of the Lost Battalion by “Buck Private”
McCollum (1921).