Operation War Diary

One hundred years ago today, Britain declared war on Germany, and the world found itself sucked into a vortex of conflict which centred for many on the battlefields of the Western Front. Every unit which slogged its way through the awful years which followed kept a war diary describing their experiences. Official accounts of movements, actions and casualties, their authors often allowed something of themselves into the pages as well, leaving behind a link to their fears and concerns, hopes for the future, even flashes of humour amongst the darkest of days…. At Operation War Diary, we’ve set ourselves the task of tagging over one million of these diary pages. We want to make the information contained within them accessible to all, while preserving the legacy of the men and women named within them. So far, our volunteers have completed the classification of 90,000 pages, but we’re still a long way from finishing! Join us today and find out what life was like as troops were mobilised in 1914 and shipped out to France. —Operation War Diary.