We have finally made it to the Somme, France. The life in trenches was horrible. Each trench was about 10 feet deep; half way up was a ledge where people would shoot from. Sometimes we would look over the top with a periscope normally. We would sleep in the holes dug into the sides of the trench. Front line trenches were separated by an area called no-man’s land that could vary in width from a new hundred yards to a mile. Each side protected their trenches with masses of barbed wire. Behind the trenches were the heavy guns of artillery, designed to obliterate the enemy before an attack.
Many men killed in the trenches were buried almost where they fell. If a trench subsided, or new trenches or dugouts were needed, large numbers of decomposing bodies would be found just below the surface. These corpses, as well as the food scraps that littered the trenches, attracted rats. One pair of rats could produce 880 offspring in a year and so the t
Men in the trenches suffered from lice. The lice also created a sour, stale smell. Various methods were used to remove the lice. A lighted candle was fairly effective but the skill of burning the lice without burning your clothes was only learnt with practice. As well as causing frenzied scratching, lice also carried disease. This was known as trench fever. Although this disease doesn’t kill, but it will prevent soldiers from fighting.
The war has affected me very much. There are rats, lice everywhere. Soldiers are dying from disease. Some of us suffered from the trench foot. We got crappy stale food. We sleep in holes, and still we have to keep our guards up in case of enemy’s attack. This is nothing like home. I never met a condition like this before; I never thought would be this hard. I thought would be easy; I thought I would kill bunch of germens and go home get a medal for War Hero. The War has definitely affected me.
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