From a soldier's Diary

The beginning

My name is David Dreicher, but my friends call me Dwalin, after a dwarf in Norse mythology, why? because that I was short and had a large beard.
I remember the event as if it were yesterday. It was in 1914, and i was only 25 at the time. I plowed the fields when my son played around. We lived near the Belgian border, one of the reasons that we saw the ones we saw. Battalions of German soldiers Stadium against Belgium to carry out their "Schlieffenplan" which was the invation of Paris via the Netherlands and Belgium. I knew it was wrong so I took my hunting guns, a knife, some supplies and an axe to follow after them. Of the Marne they had stopped and started to dig the strange pits in long loops in front of each other, I saw them French troops and ran, something that I regret, crude today.
I came up to the Allied troops, and explained what I was doing there. They asked me to stay to help them and I couldn't say no. I got a uniform and arms so I could atleast get a chance to survive. On 5th of september did the Germans attacked and there was a trench warfare. We fought forever, I think we lost count after a few hours. On the twelfth day of september, eight days later, the Germans surrendered and the allies won. But losses va devastating, about 1 million soldiers lost their lives, about 500,000 on each side, we lost many kindred. It was a bloody mess, a fucking hell. A hell people later would call the World War I.