To the last Ridge - I

Reading the first world war memoirs of W.H Downing* (see current reading menu). I was given the book by my father with the recommendation that this was 'the best' Australian war memoir.
It is a deeply emotional experience to read this book.
I feel sympathy for the young men whose lives were shattered. I feel revulsion at the horror of war. I feel pride for their incredible courage. I feel fondness for their larrikin humour. I feel shame and anger over the reality of evil. I feel unworthy of their sacrifice. I feel challenged by their persistance and perseverance...

Here are some excerpts. Tell me how they make you feel.

Scores of stammering German machine-guns spluttered violently, drowning the noise of the cannonade. The air was thick with bullets, swishing in a flat lattice of death. There were gaps in the lines of men - wide ones, small ones. The survivors spread across the front, keeping the line straight. There was no hesitation, no recoil, no dropping of the unwounded into shellholes. The bullets skimmed low, from knee to groin, riddling the tumbling bodies before they touched the ground. Still the line kept on.

Hundreds were mown down in the flicker of an eyelid, like great rows of teeth knocked from a comb, but still the line went on, thinning and stretching. Wounded riggled into shellholes or were hit again. Men were cut in two by streams of bullets. And still the line went on.

*To the Last Ridge, W.H Downing. Duffy and Snellgrove, Sydney (1998).