Tom Mather

The Wakefield's at War Tom Mather

This book traces the lives of an ordinary working class family in the North West of England during that traumatic period in our history referred to as the Great War. The story which deals with the exploits of three brothers who fought in the war and the parents left behind to worry is a 'faction'. All of the military details that surround the service of the three brothers is as true and correct a record as can be gleaned from the relevant war diaries of the Regiments in which they served. Each of the brothers in their own way served King and Country while it is true to say the parents who sat at home also served. Harriet Wakefield took solace in her strict Wesleyan beliefs early in the war but found her faith seriously challenged as the war progressed. Her God unfortunately provided her with one great and even more challenge with the war almost at its end. It is a story that is probably repeated in many families up and down the country but it is still a story that needs to be told even though we are 100 years on from those tragic events. I feel sure the reader will associate the feelings, sense of loss and futility that Harriet and Joseph Wakefield felt in their own family history.