Experience of Soldiers
Extreme brutality
Coping with never before seen violence
Exhaustion
Poisonous gas
Trenches
Aerial bombardments
Soldier’s Journals
“I dove down beside that road…and recognized those
Boche helmets! In a twinkling I was passed
them…and came diving down upon them from the
rear. I just held both triggers down hard while the
fiery bullets flew streaming out of the two guns…I had
a vague confused picture of…rearing horses, falling
men, running men, general mess…I found myself
trembling with excitement and overawed at being a
cold-blooded murderer, but a sense of keen
satisfaction came too. It was only the sort of thing
our own poor doughboys have suffered so often.”
(Hamilton Coolidge)
Coping Mechanisms
• Camaraderie
• British Pals’ battalions
‘Those who joined together should serve
together’ = very popular
– Companies, businesses, towns & cities
formed their own battalions
– They trained & served together
– Over 300 battalions were formed in this
way & 250,000 men joined up
• Entertainment on the Front
• Writing Journals or Poetry
Soldier’s Journals
“I got within fifty feet of the German machine-gun nests when
a bullet plowed through the top of my skull…As I lay there I
could plainly see the German gunners and hear them
talking…They reloaded their gun and turned it on me. The first
three bullets went through my legs and hip and the rest
splashed up dust and dirt…That night…one of my
comrades…who later in the battle as himself killed, crawled out
and started to carry me back to the lines…The
Germans…turned their guns our way…Thinking it impossible for
him to get me to the lines alone, he piled up a half-dozen
bodies of my poor dead “buddies” and barricaded my
position. There I remained for several hours longer…the boys
piled up around me were my own camp-mates whom I
knew…Back of the lines the surgeons came out…and
exclaimed, “What, ain’t you dead yet?” (Joyce Lewis)
Wilfred Owens, English Poet
ANTHEM FOR DOOMED YOUTH
What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons*.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells;
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, –
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.
What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.
The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.
* Prayers
September - October, 1917
African-American and French
Comradeship
“We were fully equipped with French rifles and French
helmets. Our wagons, our rations, our machine guns and
everything pertaining to the equipment of the regiment
for trench warfare was supplied by the French Army.
It was considered that it would take us at least six weeks
before we would be able to march into line and take our
position on the front. Sergeants and non-commissioned
officers and different members of the machine gun
companies, Stokes mortars, were sent to the French
schools for an intensive training in the handling of these
implements of warfare. Daily, the other members of the
troop were taken out by the French interpreters and
instructed on trench warfare and formations for the
approach and advance in military maneuvers.
So rapidly did our boys learn the formations that in
less than three weeks the time the General in
command of the 61st Division recommended
that a battalion of our boys be moved and put
in the trenches alongside French soldiers for first
hand instructions. This move was hailed with
great joy by our boys.
There had sprung up between them and their
French buddies a great comradeship. The
French officers had taken our officers and made
pals out of them. The non-commissioned officers
in the French army who held a little more
elevated position than the non-commissioned
officers in our army by virtue of their long military
campaign, treated our boys with all the courtesy
and comradeship that could be expected.
Cheeriest of all was the good comradeship that
existed between our enlisted men and the
faithful old French poilu. You could see them
strolling down the road arm in arm, each hardly
able to understand the other, as our boys’
French was as bad as their English. In their souls
and in their breasts there seemed to beat the
same emotion. They were for one cause – liberty
and freedom.
Source: Noble Lee Sissle, Memoirs of Jim Europe, 1942
“A Street in Arras”,
John Singer Sergent 1918
“Oppy Wood”, John Nash, 1917
“Those that have lost their
names”
Albin Eggar-Linz, 1914
Turkish Genocide against
Armenians 1915-1923
Turkish Genocide Against
Armenians
A narrative by a witness and a survivor of the
Armenian Genocide, Kristine Hagopian, born
1906, Smyrna
“We had already been deported once, in 1915,
sent towards Der-Zor. But, my uncle’s friend had
connections in the government and he had us
ordered back to Izmir.
Orders came again that everyone must gather
in front of the Armenian church to be deported.
My father refused to go and told us not to worry.
He didn’t think the Turkish government would do
anything to him, since he was a government
employee himself.”
“Twelve Turkish soldiers and an official
came very early the next morning. We
were still asleep. They dragged (= trainer)
us out in our nightgowns and lined us up
against the living room wall. Then the
official ordered my father to lie down on
the ground… they are dirty the Turks…
very dirty… I can’t say what they did to
him. They raped him! Raped! Just like
that. Right in front of us. And that official
made us watch. He whipped us if we
turned away. My mother lost
consciousness and fell to the floor.”
“Afterwards, we couldn’t find our
father. My mother looked for him
frantically. He was in the attic, trying
to hang himself. Fortunately, my
mother found him before it was too
late.
My father did eventually kill himself—
later, after we escaped.”
• Video: Armenian Genocide
Making Peace
The Treaty of Versailles
After winning the war, the Allies
dictated a harsh peace settlement
that left many nations feeling
betrayed.
Hard feelings left by the peace
settlement helped cause World War
II.
Video: The Treaty of Versailles
Making Peace
Do you think the peace settlements at
Versailles were fair? Why or why not?
Consider the warring and nonwarring nations
affected. THINK ABOUT
•Germany’s punishment
• the creation of new nations
• the mandate system
Fair: Germany was punished for its aggression, and
numerous independence claims were addressed
through the creation of new nations.
Unfair: Germany was too harshly punished, and colonial
peoples did not get their independence.
Millions
of lives
lost
Land, towns,
and villages
destroyed
$338 billion
cost
Effects
of WWI
Widespread
disillusionment
Effects of the War on Civilians
• 5 million civilians perished from
disease and starvation (especially in
Russia and the Ottoman Empire)
• Submarines, naval blockades &
warplanes extended suffering of the
war beyond the front lines
• Aerial bombardments killed many
civilians (British and German cities
bombed by air raids)
Market in Lens, August 1919
WAR CASUALTIES FOR ALLIED AND CENTRAL
POWERS
Country
Population
Military
Deaths
Civilian
Deaths
%
Population
Military
Wounded
France
39.6 M
1.4 M
300,000
4.29%
4.3 M
Russia
175.1 M
2M
1.5 M
2%
4M
United
Kingdom
45.4 M
887,000
109,000
2.19%
1.7 M
U.S.
92 M
117,000
757
0.13%
206,000
Italy
35.6 M
651,000
589,000
3.48%
954,000
AustriaHungary
51.4 M
1.1 M
467,000
3.05%
3.6 M
Germany
64.9 M
2M
426,000
3.82%
4.2 M
Ottoman
Empire
21.3 M
772,000
2.2M
13.7%
400,000
TOTAL
525.3 M
8.93 M
5.6 M
19.36 M
1. What major changes do you see?
2. Which countries are created as a result of the
war?
3. Which countries’ borders are affected by the
outcome of the war?
Effects of the War in the U.S.
• US reverts to isolationism
– Harding (1920) campaigned on a return to
“normalcy”
• Red Summer
– Race riots in Northern Cities – Great Migration
• Fear of Communism
– 1st Red Scare
• Increase of Nativism
– 2 acts passed which severely reduced
immigration
– Desire to go back to the way things were
before
Reading Material World War I
Mastering Modern World History by
Norman Lowe
•The First World War and its aftermath, pp.
19-40
+Questions, p. 41
•The League of Nations, pp. 43-49
+Questions, p. 49
•Article on blog: “The Armenian Genocide”