APRIL 23 St George's Day my father took part in an attack on the Somme.

German lines had been shelled for three days, reinforcements told there would be no resistance. In a short while about 20,000 men were killed or wounded.

My father reached the German trench, fearing a counter attack men of the Worcesters were told each man for himself.

Making his way to English lines dad was badly wounded in his back.

He told us about terrible life in the trenches, once unable to be maintained with food for three days and in heavy rain, knee deep in water, weaker men slipped down and drowned others too exhausted to help.

Dad, a Kidderminster man, son of HE Pritchard & Son plumbers, Brook Street opened a garage on the Birmingham Road, Kidderminster. Later we moved to Barneshall, Worcester where he had a garage for a number of years.

One of his little ditties, either you were killed or wounded he was fortunate to survive. Dad a man not given to much laughter or playing with us three children, some mornings at breakfast we would get a knowing look from mother. Dad would look tired and say 'I was in the trenches last night'.

A generation of men who, even though they may have escaped its shells, were destroyed by war.

Quote. All quiet on the Western Front. Erich Maria Remarque.

That applied to thousands who returned like my father. He died aged 77. Brother Bob went over with the Second Front returned safely after war ended. I served two and a half years in the Army. Sister Mary at the city of Bath with mother staying on high ground looking over the city in the valley went outside during the German air raid and level with the bombers could see the pilots quite clearly against the lights of the city fires.

JOHN G PRITCHARD Ethiopia