Fromelles: Our Darkest Day

AUSTRALIAN MILITARY
One hundred years ago, on 19 July 1916, in the French village of Fromelles, Australia suffered its worst ever military defeat when a British officer ordered 15,000 of Australia’s best and bravest to go ‘over the top’ and attack the German lines. Eight hours later more than 5500 Diggers lay dead or wounded – the equivalent of all Australian casualties from the Boer, Korean and Vietnam wars combined. Many of those who died disappeared from the official record, their fate remaining unknown for close to a century. In this evocative and enthralling retelling, Patrick Lindsay takes us back to the killing fields of northern France.

1. The brewing storm
2. At the crossroads of history
3. The Anzacs’ Journey
4. To the ‘nursery’
5. An Austrian lance-corporal
6. In the presence of death
7. Loose thinking
8. Hopping the bags
9. Lost in the fog of war
10. Don’t forget me, cobber!
11. Counting the cost
12. The cover-up
13. We are the dead
Epilogue: Harry Willis’ story.

lii, 248 pages : illustrations, maps, portraits, facsimiles ; 24 cm #091122
World War, 1914-1918 — Campaigns — France — Fromelles. | World War, 1914-1918 — Campaigns — France. | Fromelles, Battle of, Fromelles, France, 1916. | World War, 1914-1918 — Biography. | World War, 1914-1918 — Participation, Australian. | World War, 1914-1918 — Missing in action — France. | Soldiers’ bodies, Disposition of — France. | Australian