It is not without its redeeming features – there are several
passages of mildly interesting, if unoriginal, description of the structure of
the British Army in 1914-18. I also learnt something I hadn’t known before about
the role of horses in the war. If the author had just exercised some self
control this would have been such a better book. I suspect he knows that, and
decided to include the offending content, which I am getting to, to boost sales.
Just to be completely clear, revisionist history is a
good thing. It is absolutely right that the assumptions we make about what
we think we know about the past are challenged in the light of new evidence as
it emerges. Lazy stereotypes need to be confronted, even when on examination
they turn out to be broadly correct. So I have no problem that Corrigan decides
that everything ever written about the Great War is wrong, that it was not a bloodbath,
that life in the trenches was usually jolly good fun, and that we beat the Boche
through force of character and a jolly good British stiff upper lip. Although
of course this is parody, Corrigan really does write like this. The British
Army was and is the best in the world, and anyone who suggests otherwise is
unpatriotic. Oh, and by the way, Blackadder 4 wasn’t historically accurate.
The technique here is simple and very badly done. Step 1 – make a general observation, unsupported by any reference or evidence whatsoever, about the popular perception of the Great War – for example that the trenches were full of very large rats.
Step 2 – claim with little or no evidence to the contrary that they weren’t
Step 3 – claim that there may in fact have been some true in the popular perception after all – but argue that the rabbits were larger in the French trenches, that the Tommies enjoyed the company of the rats, and who minds the odd rat anyway other than lefty pinkoes?
Just to emphasise – this is Corrigan’s approach, chapter
after chapter, not a parody. Take one example. In chapter 3 he says that “The
perception of soldering in the Great War is of a young patriot enlisting in
1914 to do his bit…Arriving at one of the Channel Ports he marches to all the
way up to the front, singing “Tipperary” and smoking his pipe.” (Page 74).
I am not aware of anyone every suggesting that soldiers
marched all the way from the Channel Ports to the front line. Nor apparently is
Corrigan, because this perception is not evidenced in any way. Nevertheless,
having set up this straw man, he points out that trains, motor vehicles, mules
and horses were all in abundance in 1914 Belgium. Point made, straw man
demolished. Yet a sense of honesty compels him to admit only a few lines later
that “The pre-war army was …well accustomed to marching. The reservists were
not so lucky. Reservists sitting by the side of the road, boots off, and feet
bleeding were a common sight (75). Again, no authority is provided, but it is
hardly surprising if the common perception of soldiers having to march an
unreasonably long way grew up if this was a common sight on the roadsides of
Northern France and Belgium. There is an opportunity here for some serious historical investigation to be done. The Army stands accused of not looking after its solders very well, of making them march long distances in uncomfortable footwear, and of not providing enough motor and equine transport. So is that true? What does the evidence say? What did other armies do with regard to moving their troops about, in the circumstances where transport was limited and the need to move troops around urgent? Was transport taken seriously as a military discipline? I don’t know, but neither, apparently, does the author.
The First World War was a terrible, shocking bloodbath. Hundreds
of thousands of men marched to their deaths in circumstances that remain
distressing to this day. I have written elsewhere about the “thankful villages”
– Corrigan references these as evidence that not every community lost someone
during the war, missing the point that so very few did so. In denying the
enormity of the shock of the war – there was no lost generation, not that many
people died compared to other conflicts, that the only people with a problem
were poets “who wrote for money” (!!!! – the monsters) – he insults the memory
of those that fought and died, and denies them a voice. There are so many
powerful records – diaries, letters, etc. - of the time telling us what the war
was like, but Corrigan ignores these voices and relies on distorted statistics
and a relentless refusal to accept that any concern about the war and its conduct
could possibly be wrong.
Finally, Corrigan is at pains to let the reader know he is a
retired soldier. If the numerous reminders of this are not sufficient, he uses
playground language – “wedding tackle”, “willy”, and “dirty water” – at times
in a way that is utterly inappropriate in a serious work of historical inquiry.
But perhaps that is the point. 
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