One Boy's War

Set at the outset of war in 1914, the book tells the story, much of it in the form of letters, of 16-year-old Sydney, who is determined to sign up to ‘get a crack at the Kaiser!’. Fired up by the recruiting posters and by the departure of his Dad, he lies about his age and succeeds in convincing the recruiting sergeant. Training is hard, but reality really kicks in when he reaches the trenches and experiences the rain, the mud and the never-ending noise. The sketchy watercolours give a strong impression of the conditions of the trenches and the battlefield. This may be a picture book format, but it tells a sombre story based on fact. Sydney Dobson was a real young man who died in a muddy field in Belgium. In a postscript the author gives more information about the First World War, about other young boys, some only 13 years old, who joined ‘Pals’ Battalions’, sometimes made up of all the young men from an estate or a village. The loss of such battalions left villages desolate, an entire generation of young men wiped out.