The Regimental Aid Post had no beds. That was the point of it. Roughly 650 metres behind the front line — in a dugout, a communication trench, a ruined house or a deep shell hole — a battalion's Medical Officer worked with five orderlies and sixteen stretcher bearers, and he had no holding capacity at all. Wounds were cleaned, dressed and dosed against pain, and then the man moved on: to an Advanced Dressing Station further back, sometimes routed through a relay post to keep the traffic from jamming, then a Casualty Clearing Station, then a base hospital. Nobody stayed here. If anyone stayed, nobody else got in.

The section is a length of trench with a dugout let into the wall — sandbagged entrance, timber revetting inside — and the earth-and-sandbag roof lifts clean off, which solves the problem every trench diorama has: an interior you can actually see into and light. Set the work party outside it, because someone dug this and it was them. Run the wounded out of the doorway toward the rear and the next stage of the journey. The man it exists for is 650 metres up the line, standing on watch.

W. Britain model 51016. 1/30 scale (approximately 60mm), matte finish. Five-piece set with a lift-off roof section, measuring 11″W × 13″D × 3.4″H. No figures are included. Boxed.