The Mission It was June 1916 and the waves crashed violently towards the boat. The spray from the sea hit the soldiers faces and the icy wind blew down hard.

There were around 200 men that were on the landing dock but now there were only 50 that made it onto the beach. The Germans in the towers shot at the men trying to pinpoint their bodies through the fog. Even more bullets fired, to the left side of the beach a grenade was launched and flung the soldiers into the air and shrapnel in their direction, which meant sudden death. Mud was lifted into the air about 50ft as Peter took cover from the shrapnel. Bombs were fired; one hit a soldier directly impacted on him and blew both his arms and legs off. It was a horrific sight as there were men with missing limbs screaming in agony for help or in some cases because the pain was excruciating they would want to be shot. As Peter advanced up the boggy pools of sand he fell to his knees from all the gunfire and fear of being shot. Peters face was as harsh as an old stone as the icy water dripped off his face. He looked at the other men just in front, as one soldier was crying curled up in a ball hoping he wouldn’t be next in line for the Germans. Just as he was about the forward up the beach there was an almighty bang as 3 British soldiers were on fire, their skin blistering every second the unbearable pain as their skin melted away from their small bones. They lay to perish on the ground as their bodies turned to ash. Peter lifted his helmet from the floor filled with watered down blood and placed it on his head. Peter saw across one of his commanding officers shouting but couldn’t hear his voice as like a boiling kettle his ears came to pick up the sounds and the cries from the men “What should we do now?” the soldiers began to question their mission in hand, he replied “Just keep edging forward we’ll break their defenses soon!” The soldiers trudged on in a big herd. As they passed several bodies one soldier was alive. He had his hand on his abdomen trying to prize back his organs that have erupted from his body. The piercing screams and shouts overwhelmed Peter as he blocked himself behind a barrier and reloaded his rifle from a dead troop. The medic ran round frantically healing both German and British troops. It seemed the more the soldiers progressed towards the Germans the more men seemed to be dying and injured. It made it feel impossible to survive there, it was like the world had stopped and wouldn’t start again until the war had ended.

Peter shrunk onto the cold icy floor and thought about his family. His emotions were running high as it felt like weeks since he had last seen anyone or for that matter had a warm meal. The conditions where the soldiers sleep in the trenches are horrendous. There were wooden planks of where the men slept at least 2ft away from the water and urine just underneath. There was no warm blanket they had to sleep in soggy damp clothes, with their boots on for the fear of not catching trench foot. Peter slept next to Andrew who had suffered with fleas in his clothes so he had to take his boots off and now his feet are slowly deteriorating and eventually he will have no leg. There is no alcohol to numb the pain the only cure would be to put a bullet through your head.