Willy Johannes Wiedenhöft
Translated & transcribed by Sabina Wiedenhoeft Dugan

In the tradition of All Quiet on the Western Front and Goodbye to All That, this diary offers an unfiltered account of war from the front lines.

When war erupted across Europe in 1914, eighteen-year-old Willy Johannes Wiedenhöft marched toward the Western Front with thousands of others—confident, untested, and unaware of what lay ahead.What followed was not the swift victory many had imagined, but years of relentless trench warfare, shifting fronts, and the daily struggle to survive. From the muddy fields of Belgium and France to the chaos of the Somme and the final German offensives of 1918, Wiedenhöft recorded his experiences with remarkable clarity and immediacy.

Carefully translated and introduced by his great-niece, Sabina Wiedenhoeft Dugan, this diary offers a rare and deeply personal perspective on the First World War, capturing not only the violence and hardship of life at the front, but also the moments of camaraderie, resilience, and unexpected humanity that endured amid the devastation. Honest, direct, and deeply human, this is a powerful first-hand account of life as a German soldier—revealing not just the scale of the conflict, but what it felt like to live through it.


Sabina Wiedenhoeft Dugan is an historian and historic preservationist in Washington, DC, specializing in German American history. She published Americans Behind the Iron Curtain: Tales of Detention, Resilience, and Freedom in Cold War East Berlin about the plight of American political prisoners during the late 1960s. During her tenure at the Smithsonian Institution, she collabourated on a transatlantic research project on the German-born architect Adolf Cluss and his affiliation with Karl Marx, culminating in an exhibition and a coauthored book publication. She has a BA from the University of Colorado and a MS from the University of Vermont.


Pub date: 1 June 2026
ISBN: 978-1-0683111-3-0
Format: 152x229mm
Binding: Paperback
Extent: 104pp
Price: £12.99
Publisher: Tommies Guides
Imprint: Reveille Press

BIC Classifications:
First World War (HBWN)
First World War, 1914-1918 (3JJF) 

THEMA Codes:
First World War (NHWR5)
First World War, 1914-1918 (3MPBFB)