EYRE (Giles E.M., ex-Rfmn. R/9885)
Somme Harvest: Memories of a P.B.I. in the Summer of 1916.
1st Ed., 255pp., portrait frontis. VG in worn dw. Jarrolds.
1938
#65547
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A very fine & rare account of front line combat with 2nd Bn. KRRC on the Somme & elsewhere in 1916 until the author was taken PoW at Pozieres on 23rd July, including the battalion's diversionary attack on 'The Triangle,' a fortified arrangement of trenches near Loos on 30th June, when Eyre was one of a band of 40 bombers specially selected & trained to lead the assault: "we were upon them with bayonet, club & trench-knife, & in a few instants we were pounding on over their dead bodies..." he wrote. The sleeve notes record that the author, one of the few survivors of the Messina earthquake, enlisted in the KRRC in 1914 when he was 18 years old, served with the 7th (S) Bn. in 1915, when he was wounded, and was "a journalist, wanderer in the far corners of the Empire, sailor before the mast... lecturer & propagandist, supporter of lost causes." Orig. blue cloth, gilt, cloth marked & faded in parts, generally VG in very worn (but also scarce) dw, with much loss to top & tail of sp. See illustrations on our website.
£120
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