author
Gilbert Nobbs
A British officer and World War I memoirist, he wrote with unusual immediacy about the Battle of the Somme, severe wounding, and captivity in a German prison camp. His books stand out for their firsthand detail and the plainspoken way they record life at the front.
1 Audiobook
On the right of the British line
by Gilbert Nobbs
About the author
Gilbert Nobbs, also listed in some sources as Henry Gilbert Nobbs, was a British Army officer associated with the London Rifle Brigade. He is remembered chiefly for his World War I memoirs, which draw on his service on the Western Front and his time as a prisoner after being badly wounded during the Somme fighting.
His best-known work first appeared in 1917 as On the Right of the British Line, and later editions have been published as In Battle and Captivity, 1916–1918. Another memoir, Englishman, Kamerad!, also reflects on his wartime experience. The appeal of his writing lies in how directly it brings readers into trench warfare, injury, survival, and captivity without losing sight of the human side of the story.
Reliable biographical detail on Nobbs is limited in the sources available here, so it is safest to describe him as a soldier-writer whose reputation rests on vivid personal accounts of the First World War rather than on a large literary career.