Try to imagine this:
60,000 men – dead or injured all in one day ~ I find it hard….
On July 1st 1916 at 0730, the British Army attacked the German entrenched positions in the Department of the Somme – France, This was a line some 18 miles long.
The British divisions marched slowly over no-mans land, carrying 66 pounds of kit each, in wave after wave of extended lines. The week previously, the British artillery bombardment from 1,350 guns expected to annihilate the barbed wire, trench defense and artillery, but as the British crossed no mans land, they found this was not the case – struggling through uncut barbed wire, they were cut down by German machine guns – 19,000 of them killed.
The pages on this site should help you understand what happened and why it happened
The part that the Sherwood Foresters played
A Map of the Somme with highlighted sectors
Links to other web sites with a WW1 flavour