animals in war: 'they had no voice'

Uncle Ben in his WWI uniform

In 1916, almost ninety years before the Animals in War monument was erected on Park Lane, London this World War I soldier was awarded the Military Medal for bravery during the Battle of the Somme. Under heavy shell fire, he managed to reach the barn and unlock the door for the terrified horses inside 'to obey their instincts and flee'. His is one of three Military Medal awards on which the poem 'Polished and Proud' in my book Aftermath is based.

'A righteous man regardeth the life of his beast'
- Proverbs 12, 13

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