I WISH TO particularly acknowledge the assistance of Paul Grasmehr of the Pritzker Military Museum & Library, Chicago, for his prompt and detailed assistance with the provision of background on Corporal Thomas Pope, Colonel Joseph Sanborn, and the 131st and 132nd Infantry Regiments prior to, during and following the First World War.
I also owe my cousin Craig Searle a debt of gratitude for preserving and sharing the letters, diaries and photographs of Viv, Ray and Ned Searle, my great-uncles. These records thoroughly fleshed out the background of the Searle brothers that my own family provided over the years. Craig also passed on several wartime stories that his grandfather Ned had shared with him. Thanks, too, to Les V. Holloway of Ballarat, for sharing his Western Front remembrances of his father, Vic Holloway, that I refer to in this work.
The staff of the Australian War Memorial, Canberra were, as always, extremely helpful in the research process. I also want to thank my publisher at Penguin Random House, Meredith Curnow, for her continued enthusiastic support, my editor at Penguin Random House, Patrick Mangan, for his always diligent assistance, and my New York literary agent, Richard Curtis. And for soldiering on beside me as always, I am eternally grateful to my CIC, my wife, Louise.