Michael McGuire Trilogy

Found guilty of stealing bread to feed his starving family, Michael McGuire is offered the “Queen’s Hard Bargain”, go to prison or join the army. He chooses the army and, after training in Dublin Castle, his life is changed forever as he is selected to join the Gordon Relief Expedition that is being sent south of Egypt to Khartoum, in the Sudan.

Only just recovered from his wounds, Captain McGuire must now sail south to the confusion and error of the Boer War. After his return from the war in the Sudan, McGuire had expected to spend time recovering with his family. It was not to be, and his regiment is called urgently to South Africa to counter the threat from the Boers. Disparaged as mere farmers, the Boers were to administer a savage lesson to the British Army.

Michael McGuire has left the army, but as the First World War breaks out his country calls him again. At the start of the war the British expand their army rapidly, but there is a shortage of experienced officers and McGuire is needed. He is sent to Gallipoli in command of an Australian battalion that suffers badly in that debacle. He stays with them when their bloody road takes them to the mud and carnage of the western front.