Not restricted to the view of the front-line infantryman, this text also describes the experiences of the gunner, sapper, airman, medical officer, and nursing sister. The author explains how the Somme became scorched into the nation's heritage and into its historical consciousness, but with a distortion produced by a literary legacy as regrettable as it is understandable. In this book, Liddle takes issue with the judgement of some historians and with the commonly held verdict on the battle. Furthermore, in conclusion, he demonstrates how the morales of the British Expeditionary Force triumphantly survived such a long and demanding experience. The narrative draws extensiely on diaries, letters, reports, photographs and drawings from the Liddle Collection of the University of Leeds.