WAR HORSE

war horse i a really great book about a young horse called joey who was sent off to the army to raise the family a bit of money, Albert,  the horses 16 year old owner wanted to join the army to help him but he was too young.
Joey had me another horse called topthorn who rode alongside him in battle, after a year or two joey and topthorn stopped working as cavalry and started working as farm horses on the local french farms and then not too long after that they werent even needed for that either and they were taken by a young girl called emilie and her grandfather and were needed for nothing.  one year later a group of germans came along and said that they needed them to transport the guns around and after short farewells they working again twice as hard as before. an old man named "Friedrich",  who was very fond of topthorn, was walking them up to the front line of the war every day and one day "topthorn"  joeys friend wasnt as jolly as usuall and was tripping over every root and falling in every pot hole  until after a while he fello over and didnt get up, joey was knocking him to get hip up but he wouldnt. he was dead,  Friedrich was very upset and him and joey stayed for as long as they could until they heard the rattling of machine guns and banging of rifles getting louder and louder and then saw a tank heading straight for them which mad joey run, after about half a mile of hard galloping he turned around, which was  his mistake, there were now 3 or 4 tanks all heading straight for him and then he galloped again and didnt turn back.  he found himself lost quite quickly and ended up in the trenches with the germans on one side and the english on the other,  he was quickly taken by a welshman and taken to the vets to get his cut sorted out by albert, his old owner,  joey knew and tried to tell albert but after five or so minutes he realised it was him.
joey was unwell and needed sorting out,  the vet  did all he could and albert and his freind "david" did all they could and they got him better.
the war soon ended and the men were to go back to england by boat and sadly the horses were to be auctioned in france,  the horses were groomed and washed for the sell day,
joey was one of the last to be auctioned and he was about to go to  a twiggy, scrawny, spotty middle aged man when emilies grandfather came in and beat him on the auction,  albert talked to him and the old man said to him, "i'll make you a deal , you give me one english penny and promise me to look after old joey and i'll give you the horse."
the next morning albert and joey rode into their home village met by all their family and  "maisie" alberts girlfreind.


H.H