Young Raleigh (Tom Hackney) is fresh out of public school when he arrives in a dugout near St Quentin in March 1918. As avuncular officer Osborne (Graham Seed) remarks in a masterpiece of understatement: “Rugby and cricket seem rather a long way away from here.” By chance or manipulation – it’s never quite clear which – Raleigh’s commanding officer, Stanhope (Christopher Harper), was at the same school, and regarded as a hero by Raleigh. Their changing relationship will become crucial as a massive German advance begins.

R. C. Sherriff’s classic play Journey’s End is, first and foremost, a superbly written documentary of life and death in the trenches – Sherriff himself served as a captain in the First World War. It’s also a wry observation of the British class system of the time – the dugout is strictly officers only, and while the food may be revolting, dinner is still served by an orderly (Adam Best). Only the amiable Trotter (Gareth Davies) has risen from the ranks, as his accent reveals. Thirdly, Sherriff – amazingly for a play written in 1928 – deals with the mental scars of war. Hibbert (Rhys King) asks to go to hospital: “You’re a bloody funk,” roars Stanhope, who deals with his own demons via the whisky bottle. The possibility that Hibbert may actually be deeply troubled never occurs to him.

Journey’s End needs no adornment or interference, something that director Alastair Whatley plainly understands in this fine Original Theatre Company and Icarus Theatre Collective production. Aided by powerful ensemble acting, the words are left to speak for themselves. Sherriff wrote: “It’s a play in which not a word is against the war, and no word of condemnation is uttered.” But, of course, as tension mounts in the dugout and you wonder who will die first, you cannot banish your own views – or images of hearses passing through Wootton Bassett on their way to the John Radcliffe Hospital.

n Journey’s End is at South Hill Park, Bracknell, from March 17-20. Tickets: 01344 484123.