Remembering Gallipoli: Interviews with New Zealand Gallipoli Veterans

Abstract

Before I began my series of books about the Second World War, based on interviews that I and others did with veterans of that conflict, the project was discussed at an advisory body meeting of the History Group (as it then was) of the Ministry for Culture & Heritage. One of the people present wondered how it would be possible to tell the story of the war through interviews as most of the people who knew what had happened – he meant officers – were dead. In Remembering Gallipoli, Chris Pugley and Charles Ferrall have shown that everyone who experiences war knows what happens. They may not have an overview of tactics and plans, but my word, do they understand what it was like to be there. What richness the testimonies in this book add to our understanding of war.