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As full lines of battle could not be handled through the thick wood, I ordered the advance of the six brigades by heavy skirmish lines, to be followed by stronger supporting lines.

Damaged people gravitate towards damaged people.

From each one of them rose separate columns of smoke, meeting in a pall overhead, and through the smoke came stabbing flashes of fire as German shells burst with thudding shocks of sound. This was the front line of battle.

If the javelin had hit me 10cm to the left, it would have punctured my lung, 20cm higher the throat, which would have been the worst-case scenario. Just 1cm higher and it would have hit bone, muscle and tendon and that would have been the end of my sporting career.

After this urgent protest against entering into battle at Gettysburg according to instructions - which protest is the first and only one I ever made during my entire military career - I ordered my line to advance and make the assault.

The more violent the storm, the quicker it passes.

In our time, there are still many, like those in the Good Samaritan story, who being of the religious classes in that time, purposely crossed to the other side of the road, and passed by the injured and bleeding.

In March 1915, at the Battle of Neuve Chapelle, the British fired more shells in a single 35-minute bombardment than they had during the whole Boer War.