Remember our nameless heroes

When the history of the First World War was written, it was done by the poshos. The ones with titles and rank. Even today, when everyone on a frontline has a smartphone and social media accounts, our heroes still tend to be those who someone has chosen to notice.

Yet there are many nameless heroes who deserve to be remembered, too.

One of them was William

Bull, who survived four years of carnage and never fired a shot.

A builder by trade from Maidstone in Kent, he was one of 389,000 men ordered to join the Labour Corps – digging trenches within reach of enemy shells, armed only with shovels.

He returned home to meet a little girl who was born nine months exactly after he had left – my grandmother.

This Sunday I’ll be thinking of Grandad Bull and what he endured, while poshos wrote a history that ignored men like him.