Who were the men and women whose names are commemorated on war memorials around the country? Where did they live – and how and why did they die? Such questions usually go unanswered, but in War Memorial, Clive Aslet unravels, for the first time, the story of one war memorial, in the Dartmoor village of Lydford. Through original documents, Aslet traces in vivid detail the lives of the twenty-two men, and one woman, who made the supreme sacrifice fighting for Britain in the two World Wars, the Falklands and Iraq. The result is an intimate portrait of one corner of the countryside in the twentieth century, and an extraordinary tale of the endurance and bravery of otherwise ordinary people – farmers, masons, railway-workers, landowners, schoolchildren – who, but for the war memorial, would be forgotten. Clive Aslet tells us the story of the people who laid down their lives for us, and who will always be remembered.