This is the companion to John Giles' earlier volumes covering the Somme and the Ypres–Passchendaele sector. With The Western Front Then and Now the coverage is extended to include all the other main British battle areas of the Western Front between 1914 and 1918. Starting with the spark that ignited the war, the outline of events brings the operations of the British Army in France and Flanders full circle: from the BEF at Mons in August 1914 and the retreat beyond the Marne to the victorious advances of the forces of the British Empire and their re-entering the town in November 1918. It is impossible not to marvel at the triumph of nature over the obliteration of the landscape. As for the men who experienced the horrors of war in the shell-torn,trench-riven wasteland of the Western Front, they were, as John Giles writes of them, a breed apart.

COMPLETE CONTENTS

• 1914
• THE ROAD TO WAR
• THE FIRST MOVES
• THE BATTLE OF MONS
• THE RETREAT FROM MONS
• THE BATTLE OF LE CATEAU
• THE RETREAT CONTINUES
• THE NERY AFFAIR
• THE TIDE TURNS
• THE BATTLE OF THE MARNE
• THE BATTLE OF THE AISNE
• THE MOVE NORTH
• 1915
• THE BATTLE OF NEUVE CHAPELLE
• THE BATTLE OF AUBERS RIDGE
• THE BATTLE OF FESTUBERT
• THE SECOND ACTION OF GIVENCHY
• THE BATTLE OF LOOS
   
• 1916
• ALLIED PLANS FOR 1916
• THE STRUGGLES FOR VERDUN
• 1916 IN RETROSPECT AND PLANS FOR 1917
   
• 1917
• THE GERMAN WITHDRAWAL TO THE 'HINDENBURG LINE'
• THE BATTLES OF ARRAS 1917THE CAPTURE OF VIMY RIDGETHE FIRST BATTLE OF THE SCARPETHE SECOND BATTLE OF THE SCARPETHE THIRD BATTLE OF THE SCARPETHE FIRST BATTLE OF BULLECOURTSECOND BULLECOURT
• THE BATTLE OF CAMBRAI
   
• 1918
• LUDENDORFF'S OPERATION 'MICHAEL':THE SOMME BATTLES OF 1918
• THE BATTLE OF THE LYS:LUDENDORFF'S OPERATION 'GEORGETTE'
• THE ALLIES TAKE THE INITIATIVE
• THE BATTLE OF AMIENS 1918
• MAINTAINING THE PRESSURE
• THE ST MIHIEL SALIENT
• THE BATTLE OF THE ST QUENTIN CANAL
• THE ADVANCE CONTINUES
• APPENDIX 1:THE AIR WAR 1914 - 1918 AND THE AIR 'ACES'
• APPENDIX 2:THE BATTLES OF THE SOMME 1916