My favourite type of Great War book is the personal memoir. Whether they are contemporary or written well after the time, they help reduce the immensity and facelessness of a modern global conflict to the narrow and detailed - sometimes - erroneous - view of the individual concerned. It is perhaps not surprising that most memoirs are written by those at the sharp end: the men and officers who went over the top or fed the guns. There are relatively few that deal with life in "the logistic tail", and that in itself would serve to make this tale interesting. As it is, there is much more to justify your time in reading it.

John R. Hughes has compiled and edited the book from his grandfather's many letters. The book is very nicely produced, and John has managed an excellence balance of providing background information and comment, threading throughout the story as told by John McKendrick Hughes.

The letter-writer was a farmer, a family man who had been involved in the militia in Canada for years before the war. In common with many others he was persuaded in 1915 to enlist and became an officer, notably of 151st Battalion with which he moved to England. So far, so good. Immediately on arrival, the troops were despatched as much needed reserves to the Canadian units already on active service. The officers - the Unwanted of the book's title - were left to kick their heels in England, clearly with little of any merit to do. Hughes and the thousands of others were incandescent with rage. He is scathing of the ill-thought system that built so many complete battalions in Canada without thought to the method by which losses would be dealt with - a system that created a large officer surplus. The Canadian Minister Sam Hughes comes in for particular criticism, over that and his sponsorship of the Ross rifle.

The idle officers were eventually given the choice: go home or be demoted to Lieutenant. Colonels, Majors and Captains who had seen volunteer service in the Boer War, led militia units for years and then brought a battalion they had often personally recruited and trained, were to be dumped - and they did not like it one bit. Hughes stuck with it, despite the obvious hurt.

I must say that this officer surplus and the way they were dealt with is something completely new to me. Fascinating.

Then all at once, someone has a bright idea that many officers are needed for the sprawling lines of communication units: companies of the Labour Corps, railway troops, POW guard units, and so on. John McKendrick Hughes became an Agricultural Officer, first at Corps and then at Army level. He was in the area of Fletre - Caestre, before moving to Second Army HQ at Cassel. His job was to be a farmer: organise agriculture in the area by providing military skills and labour to either assist local farmers who had stayed, or cultivate ground where they had not. His mess at Army HQ was for "Spuds, Suds and Other Duds": agriculture, laundry, requisitions and courts martial officers.

All in all, a very interesting, unusual and insightful work. I could not put it down.