A Muddy Trench: A Sniper’s Bullet Hamish Mann, Black Watch, Officer-Poet, 1896-1917

BY JACQUIE BUTTRISS

PEN & SWORD BOOKS LTD

£25.00

Two siblings made a fascinating discovery when they opened a chest in their mother’s loft, which they found to be full of an Edinburgh soldier’s writings from World War One. The chest, which had lain unopened for 100 years, contained diaries, letters and poetry from the late Hamish Mann’s time in the trenches.

Robert and Rosie Stewart knew very little about their great-uncle when they made the discovery, but the heart-warming and often harrowing writings compiled into this book have given them a new insight into his life.

A Muddy Trench is a documentation of 21-year-old Mann’s short life, giving readers a unique perspective of World War One and the time Hamish served for Britain before falling fatally in Arras, France in 1917.