Charles Delvert was born in Paris in 1879. He was educated as a teacher at the École Normale Supérieure and then taught history in schools in the south of France. During the First World War he rose to the rank of captain in the French army and served with great distinction at the front, in particular during the Battle of Verdun where his company mounted a heroic defence of Fort Vaux. After the war he return to teaching in Parisian schools, and he died in 1940. His classic wartime journal Carnets d’un fantassin was first published in France in 1935.
