Not all men won a medal or raided a trench. For many there are no Iron Crosses or Commendations to allow us to trace their service.

Sometimes all that remains of a military career are a few letters or a diary.

In this section we will show what the soldiers penned themselves.

The first text is a short biographical note wriiten by Adolf Büschenfeld (thanks to Tony Neal).

A most beautiful death.... the last letters of Hermann Koopmann, written from Flanders