The author Max Arthur scored a considerable hit in 2002 with "Forgotten Voices", a compilation of the words of those who took part in the Great War, taken from the archives of the Imperial War Museum. Some 60,000 copies were sold. Since then, I have certainly seen similar volumes for the Second World War, Scottish Voices, Navy, RAF and so on. Mining a profitable seam, it would appear.

This review is based on a 16 page extract from the forthcoming "Last Post - The final word from our First World War soldiers". Arthur has interviewed 21 surviving veterans since the publication of "Forgotten Voices" and regrettably most are already dead. By the time this volume will be published in November 2005, no doubt we will be down to the very last.

Having read the testimony of half a dozen of them contained in the extract, I shall not be rushing out to buy the book. These fine gentlemen have been interviewed numerous times especially in the last decade, their words used frequently on TV and in books, and inevitably there is little that is new here. Beware if you intend to use the book for serious study, for memory is a funny thing and there are some clear instances of the mind of men aged over 100 years not matching up to the actual facts of the terrible age they lived through.

For the mildly interested who have not heard these men before, the book would appear to be a good read and reasonable value.

See too the very similar "Britain's Last Tommies" by Richard Van Emden.