'Surplus to Military requirements (having suffered impairment since entering the Service)'. Discharge certificate for Private James Cross, 2nd Battalion, the Gloucestershire Regiment, 1919

Many men injured by the fighting lay in the No Man's Land between trenches for hours, until they could be moved. Many died of their injuries before help arrived. But for others time spent waiting meant that infection set in - and a minor wound became major and could lead to the amputation of a limb.

Private James Cross was one of the luckier ones. The 2nd Battalion, the Gloucestershire Regiment was involved in fighting near Ypres in January 1915. Soldiers spent two or three days at a time in the waterlogged, muddy trenches. James got frostbite, bad enough to be sent to a war hospital in Bristol. He spent the rest of the war based at Horfield Barracks, unable to fight, and was discharged from the Army as 20% disabled.