The story of how Gouraud had lost his arm was legendary. While leading French forces at Gallipoli four years earlier, he had been badly injured by an exploding Turkish shell, and one of his wounds became infected. ‘It’s a sure sign of gangrene, General: you’ll have to agree to us amputating it, or you could die this evening,’ he was told in the field hospital. ‘What an odd request,’ Gouraud answered, managing a smile. ‘I know no one who wants to die this evening. You neither, I don’t doubt.’
