I read this book about 1-Apr-2007. This is the first time I've read this book. The book is copyright 1916. This note was last modified Monday, 09-Jul-2007 07:33:13 PDT.
Well, John Hay Beith writing as Ian Hay, anyway. And the full title is The First Hundred Thousand, being the Unofficial Chronicle of a Unit of "K (1)" . And I am reading it courtesy of Project Gutenberg, and have no ISBN for this title.
This is the Major Ian Hay that Heinlein refers to in Glory Road (#3) ("surprise party department, practical joke department, fairy godmother department"). Heinlein paraphrases the quote considerably, in ways that make it work better for a modern American audience. What Hay actually said was:
So far as our researches have gone, we have been able to classify Olympus, roughly, into three departments—
- Round Game Department (including Dockets, Indents, and all official correspondence).
- Fairy Godmother Department.
- Practical Joke Department.
This book takes the unit up through its first major battle. The rate of loss is rather understated, and there isn't anything of the feeling that I have, looking back with 20/20 hindsight, that the "big push" was hopeless from the beginning, and part of a pattern of throwing away lives with no hope of gain. But then the modern perspective on WWI is very different from the early contemporary one.
It's quite a period piece; written by a British officer commanding Scottish troops, I believe, and at a time when they believe the war is vital. Although I suspect some of the heavily understated complaints hit a lot harder when read by their original audience.