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Numbering over five million men, Britain's army in the First World War was by far the biggest in the nation's history, Remarkably, nearly half of those men who served in it were volunteers. An astonishing 2,466,719 men enlisted between August 1914 and December 1915, many in response to the appeals of the Secretary of State for War, Field-Marshal Lord Kitchener. How did Britain succeed in creating a mass army, almost from scratch, in the middle of a major war? What impelled so many men to volunteer - and whir happened to them once they had taken the King's Shilling?
In the first part of this illuminating book, Peter Simkins describes how Kitchener's New Armies were actually raised and reviews the main political, economic and social effects of the recruiting campaign. In the second, he examines the experiences and impressions of the officers and men who made up the New Armies. As well as analysing their motives for enlisting, he explores how they were fed, housed, equipped and trained before they set off for active service abroad.
Drawing upon a wide variety of sources, ranging from government papers to the diaries and letters of individual soldiers, the author, a highly respected historian, questions long-held assumptions about the 'rush to the colours' and the nature of patriotism in 1914. Published in close cooperation and in association with the Imperial War Museum, Kitchener's Army is a masterly account of the raising of the New Armies which will be of great interest not only to those studying social, political and economic history, but also to general readers who wish to know more about the story of Britain's citizen soldiers in the Great War.
