October 2026
I was very pleased to see this piece of work in print. It is an ‘outtake’ from my forthcoming book Civilian Armies: The Experience of British and Dominion Soldiers in the two world wars. Of course I will be covering officer recruitment and training in the book, but I have reached the editing stage and I’m having to make painful cuts as the book is currently longer than War and Peace and Lord of the Rings combined! Or so it feels. So some material which doesn’t make the cut into the final book will be appearing in the form of articles. Some will be published conventionally, like this one, others will be standalone pieces on this website.
Gary Sheffield, ‘Before and After the Somme: Providing Officers for the Amies of the British Empire’,
Stand To! The Journal of the Western Front Association, number 143, September 2026, pp.15-21.
Download the PDF here: Before and After the Somme
