AUSTRALIAN MILITARY World War I
In 1996, when clearing out his grandparents’ house, Fraser Gregg discovered fourteen weather-beaten diaries tied together neatly with red ribbon. These diaries were written by his grandfather Eric Evans during his tour of duty in France in World War I.
Eric’s vivid and honest descriptions tell of a young soldier and his emotions as he struggles to come to terms with the glory, futility and horrors of war. What keeps him going is his powerful yearning for his sweetheart back home in Sydney.
When 19 year old Sergeant Eric Evans embarked on a troop ship bound for France in 1917, he was already a Galliopoli veteran and a seasoned campaigner. But nothing could prepare him for the horrors of the Western Front. During the next two years he was wounded twice, badly gassed and saw countless friends and comrades die in nightmarish circumstances. In diaries that he kept throughout his ordeal, vivid and honest descriptions of life as an infantry Sergeant are mingled with an overpowering yearning for his sweetheart Dorothy Wright, patiently awaiting his return to Sydney. His thoughtful writing captures a young soldier’s life in all its contradictions. From practical jokes and flirtations with nurses to politics to the misery of life in the trenches, it adds a unique and authentic voice to the annals of Australians at war. None of this was known until Fraser gregg chanced upon a suitcase belonging to his father, Eric Evans. Fascinated by this unknown story and realising the historical value of the diaries he engaged an editor, Patrick Wilson, who prepared them for publication.
- ix, 266 p., [8] p. of plates : ill., maps, ports. ; 23 cm. #151124
- Evans, Eric S., 1897-1985 — Diaries
- World War, 1914-1918 — Personal narratives, Australian
- Soldiers — Australia — Diaries