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The modern town of Cambridge can be traced back to at least AD875 and in medieval times there were leather and woollen industries. In 1209 Oxford scholars, seeking refuge from hostile townspeople there, settled in Cambridge, and Peterhouse, the oldest of the Cambridge colleges, was founded in 1284. There has always been a certain amount of friction between town and gown, although the university has provided the main 'industry' for Cambridge over several hundred years. The University Library is one of only five copyright libraries in the UK. At the start of the 20th century it was a privileged life for some, but many in Cambridge knew that war was truly inevitable. Terrible rumours were rife, that the Germans would burn the University Library and raze King's College Chapel to the ground before firing shells along the tranquil 'Backs' of the River Cam until the weeping willows were just blackened stumps. Town and gown rivalries were put aside as the city united against the common enemy. Our book tells the story of the grim years of the Great War. Thousands of university students, graduates and lecturers alike enlisted along with patriotic townsfolk. The First Eastern General Military Hospital was subsequently established on the site of the present University Library and treated more than 80,000 casualties from the Western Front. Though the university had been the long-time hub of life and employment in the town, many people suffered great losses and were parted from loved ones, decimating traditional breadwinners and livelihoods, from the rationing of food, drink and fuel, to hundreds of restrictions imposed by DORA. As a result, feelings ran high and eventually led to riots beneath the raiding zeppelins and ever-present threat of death. The poet Robert Brooke, a graduate of King's College, died on his way to Dardanelles in 1915, but his most famous poem The Soldier became a pre-emptive memorial and the epitaph of millions. 'If I should die think only this of me, that there's some corner of a foreign field that is forever England.' Here is the city as the great focus for military, medical and mercantile interests within all the eastern counties of Cambridgeshire and the Isle of Ely during 1914-18. 128 page paperback, well illus. with archive photos.