Shot and shell,

Blown to hell,

And to think it had all begun so well.

Consigned to death and its mouldering stench,

Close companions in a mud-filled trench.

The whistles blow,

Away they go,

Over the top in frantic show

Towards an enemy yet unseen

Through air of bilious yellow and green.

The rat-a-tat-tat

Soon tells them that

They will grow neither old nor fat;

They will never live to remember

Their charge took place on the Tenth of November.

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