The Compensations of War: The Diary of an Ambulance Driver during the Great War
This remarkable chronicle of one man’s rite of passage through the crucible of WWI offers a vividly detailed account of life on the Western Front.
 
In 1917, shortly after the United States’ declaration of war on Germany, Guy Emerson Bowerman, Jr., enlisted in the American army’s ambulance service. Like other young ambulance drivers―Hemingway, Dos Passos, Cummings, Cowley―Bowerman longed to “see the show.” For seventeen months, until the armistice of November 1918, Bowerman kept an almost daily diary of the war.
 
Only twenty when he enlisted, Bowerman was an idealistic young man who exulted that his section was made up mostly of young “Yalies” like himself. But he expected the war to change him, and it did. In the end he writes that he and his compatriots scarcely remember a world at peace.
 
Bowerman’s unit was attached to a French infantry division stationed near Verdun. Sent to halt the German drive to Paris in 1918, the division participated in the decisive counterattack of July and tracked the routed Germans through Belgium. Then, “unwarned,” Bowerman and his comrades were “plunged into . . . a life of peace.” Into this life, he writes, they walked “bewildered,” like “men fearing ambush.”
"1113819106"
The Compensations of War: The Diary of an Ambulance Driver during the Great War
This remarkable chronicle of one man’s rite of passage through the crucible of WWI offers a vividly detailed account of life on the Western Front.
 
In 1917, shortly after the United States’ declaration of war on Germany, Guy Emerson Bowerman, Jr., enlisted in the American army’s ambulance service. Like other young ambulance drivers―Hemingway, Dos Passos, Cummings, Cowley―Bowerman longed to “see the show.” For seventeen months, until the armistice of November 1918, Bowerman kept an almost daily diary of the war.
 
Only twenty when he enlisted, Bowerman was an idealistic young man who exulted that his section was made up mostly of young “Yalies” like himself. But he expected the war to change him, and it did. In the end he writes that he and his compatriots scarcely remember a world at peace.
 
Bowerman’s unit was attached to a French infantry division stationed near Verdun. Sent to halt the German drive to Paris in 1918, the division participated in the decisive counterattack of July and tracked the routed Germans through Belgium. Then, “unwarned,” Bowerman and his comrades were “plunged into . . . a life of peace.” Into this life, he writes, they walked “bewildered,” like “men fearing ambush.”
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The Compensations of War: The Diary of an Ambulance Driver during the Great War

The Compensations of War: The Diary of an Ambulance Driver during the Great War

The Compensations of War: The Diary of an Ambulance Driver during the Great War

The Compensations of War: The Diary of an Ambulance Driver during the Great War

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Overview

This remarkable chronicle of one man’s rite of passage through the crucible of WWI offers a vividly detailed account of life on the Western Front.
 
In 1917, shortly after the United States’ declaration of war on Germany, Guy Emerson Bowerman, Jr., enlisted in the American army’s ambulance service. Like other young ambulance drivers―Hemingway, Dos Passos, Cummings, Cowley―Bowerman longed to “see the show.” For seventeen months, until the armistice of November 1918, Bowerman kept an almost daily diary of the war.
 
Only twenty when he enlisted, Bowerman was an idealistic young man who exulted that his section was made up mostly of young “Yalies” like himself. But he expected the war to change him, and it did. In the end he writes that he and his compatriots scarcely remember a world at peace.
 
Bowerman’s unit was attached to a French infantry division stationed near Verdun. Sent to halt the German drive to Paris in 1918, the division participated in the decisive counterattack of July and tracked the routed Germans through Belgium. Then, “unwarned,” Bowerman and his comrades were “plunged into . . . a life of peace.” Into this life, he writes, they walked “bewildered,” like “men fearing ambush.”

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780292749184
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Publication date: 02/24/2022
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
Pages: 201
File size: 3 MB

About the Author

Mark C. Carnes is Professor of History at Barnard College.

Table of Contents

IntroductionDiaryMapsAppendix 1: Complete Roster of S.S.U. 585 from August 7, 1917, to April 23, 1919Appendix 2: Station List, Section 585Glossary
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