World War I — the bloody conflict that saw more than 60,000 Australians die in defence of the British Empire and create the legend that has influenced Australia's fighting spirit ever since.

This is the story of how Australia unquestioningly entered a conflict on the opposite side of the world. It is a chronicle of great bravery, when poorly trained and naive young men went to a war far from home and returned as Anzacs. Pitted against superior enemy forces, they matured into a cohesive force that played a major role in the ultimate defeat of the enemy.

In this book we see how the unprepared troops undertook the futile Gallipoli campaign and survived to fight again. We follow the Light Horse on its heroic campaigns against the Ottoman Empire in the Middle East and the triumph of the great cavalry charge at Beersheba. And then to the Western Front, the toughest of all the campaigns, where Australian forces showed they were the equal of the those they fought with and against.

World War I brought the new Commonwealth of Australia together in war for the first time. It showed Australians what they were capable of as a united people.