The First World War

1
The First World War
2
The Armies

• 1914 British Expeditionary Force
• 1915 Territorials
• 1916 Volunteers
• 1917 Conscripts

3
The Schlieffen Plan
4
Stalemate
5
Technology
The Lee-Enfield Rifle
6
Technology
The Machine Gun
7
Technology
A Howitzer
8
Technology
Aerial Warfare
9
Technology
Mark V Tank
10
Technology
Mustard Gas
11
Tactics

• At the beginning of the 20th century most
  military commanders placed a great deal of
  emphasis on using the infantry for massed bayonet
  charges supported by the cavalry and mobile field
  artillery. Leaders of the French Army were
  particularly keen on this approach and favoured
  sending its infantry into action without
  equipment for entrenchment. Their commanders
  argued that defensive precautions were
  unnecessary as repeated waves of massed assault,
  delivered with sufficient speed and aggression,
  could not fail.

12
Tactics

• Infantry tactics had to be reassessed after
  armies suffered heavy casualties during attacks
  against machine-guns. The French infantry were
  forced to retreat during the invasion of Lorraine
  and the Germans experienced heavy losses when
  storming the fortress at Liege during August
  1914.
• Despite the support of Preliminary Bombardment,
  Chlorine Gas and Flame-Throwers, the infantry
  failed to achieve a breakthrough on the Western
  Front during 1915. The following year, new
  tactics such as the creeping Barrage and tank
  attacks, also failed to breakdown entrenched
  defences. The same was also true of the
  infiltration tactics tried by the Germans in
  1917.
• It was only at Amiens in 1918 that 412 tanks
  followed by soldiers and supported by over 1,000
  combat aircraft that the Allies managed to
  breakthrough the German frontline on the Western
  Front.

13
Trench Warfare
After the Battle of the Marne in September, 1914,
the Germans were forced to retreat to the River
Aisne. The German commander, decided that his
troops must at all costs hold onto those parts of
France and Belgium that Germany still occupied.
He ordered his men to dig trenches that would
provide them with protection from the advancing
French and British troops. The Allies soon
realised that they could not break through this
line and they also began to dig trenches. After
a few months these trenches had spread from the
North Sea to the Swiss Frontier.
14
Attacking a Trench
15
Tunnelling
16
Life in the Trenches

• 'We was just having an argument as to whether
  it's best to kill the old (lice) or the young
  ones, sir. Morgan here says that if you kill the
  old ones, the young ones die of grief but Parry
  here, sir, he says that the young ones are easier
  to kill and you can catch the old ones when they
  go to the funeral.' He appealed to me as an
  arbiter 'You've been to college, sir, haven't
  you?
• Robert Graves Goodbye to All That

17
Life in the Trenches

• During the winter of 1914-15 over 20,000 men
  in the British Army were treated for trench
  foot.The only remedy for trench foot was for
  the soldiers to dry their feet and change their
  socks several times a day. By the end of 1915
  British soldiers in the trenches had to have
  three pairs of socks with them and were under
  orders to change their socks at least twice a
  day.

18
Life in the Trenches
Between 1914 and 1918 the British Army identified
80,000 men (2 of those who saw active service)
as suffering from shell-shock. A much larger
number of soldiers with these symptoms were
classified as 'malingerers' and sent back to the
front-line. In some cases men committed suicide.
Others broke down under the pressure and refused
to obey the orders of their officers. Some
responded to the pressures of shell-shock by
deserting. Sometimes soldiers who disobeyed
orders got shot on the spot. In some cases,
soldiers were court-martialled
19
Life in the Trenches

• 'Peace upon earth!' was said. We sing it,
• And pay a million priests to bring it.
• After two thousand years of mass
• We've got as far as poison gas.
• Thomas Hardy

20
Propaganda

• The British War Propaganda Bureau (WPB) was set
  up in 1914 but it was not until 1935 that its
  activities became known to the general public.
  Pamphlets and books promoting the government's
  view of the war were printed commercially.
• One of the first pamphlets to be published was
  Report on Alleged German Outrages, that appeared
  at the beginning of 1915. This pamphlet attempted
  to give credence to the idea that the German Army
  had systematically tortured Belgian civilians.
• The first installment of the Nelson's History of
  the War, appeared in February, 1915. A further
  twenty-three editions appeared at regular
  intervals throughout the war.
• Only two photographers, both army officers, were
  allowed to take pictures of the Western Front.
  The penalty for anyone else caught taking a
  photograph of the war was the firing squad.
• Early in 1918 the government decided that a
  senior government figure should take over
  responsibility for propaganda. On 4th March Lord
  Beaverbrook, the owner of the Daily Express, was
  made Minister of Information.
• The fiercest critic of the propaganda scheme was
  Charles Nevinson. Some of Nevinson's paintings
  such as Paths of Glory, were considered to be
  unacceptable and were not exhibited until after
  the Armistice.