Chapter 28Luckily for Michael, the bullet only got him in the shoulder, and he was rescued and sent home on a 'Blighty'. Poor James wasn't so lucky: he would never go home again.
In their absence the villages of Fricourt and La Boiselle were successfully taken. And four days later, another division, the 38th Welch, became engaged in the battle for Mametz Wood very nearby.
The fighting went on for seven days and was terribly ferocious and b****y. Around four thousand of our men went into the wood, and fewer than one hundred of them emerged unwounded at the end of the battle.
Michael spent a couple of weeks recuperating in the Bristol Royal Infirmary, after which he was sent home to convalesce. And it was then that he wrote the following letter to Louise's parents:
Dear Mr and Mrs Cassel
