The nature of trench warfare and life in the trenches dealing with experiences of Allied and German soldiers…
The first battle was an attempt by the BEF to halt the rapid advances made by the Germans in 1914. The second battle was notable for the first use of poison gas that was invented by the Germans, in 1915. However, it is the long-planned offensive of July 31, 1917, that holds the most significance. This battle was fought in the Western Front. The Battle of Ypres was a combination of over-ambitious aims and appalling weather conditions. The horror of the battle was when men drowned in liquid mud. By the time offensive was called off total casualties for both sides had been approximately…
The Nature of Trench Warfare and Life in the Trenches Dealing with Experiences of Allied and German Soldiers:…
The nature of trench warfare and life in the trenches dealing with experiences of both allied and German soldiers.…
In Canada, there were many pilots being trained to fly airplanes. Billy Bishop was Canada’s top air ace in the First World War, due to the fact he shot down 72 enemy planes. He was the second best air pilot second to Manfred von Richthofen also known as The Red Baron. When the French and Canadian troops went to war in the Belgian town of Ypres on April 22, 1915 the German’s attacked with chlorine gas. Many soldiers suffocated or choked to death from the deadly fumes. This was the Battle of Ypres, where more than 6000 Canadians were killed, wounded, or captured. Even with the Germans using their chlorine gas, the battle lasted for a month, but neither side gained much advantage. The Battle of the Somme was near the Somme River in France in July, 1916. Canada had 24,000 casualties at the Somme. Both sides suffered heavy losses. Despite all the casualties, the Canadian troops distinguished themselves as brave soldiers during the battle of the Somme. In the Battle of Vimy Ridge, Lieutenant-General Julian Byng led Canadians to an astounding victory. The Canadian Corps captured German position, gaining more ground, and capturing more artillery than most of their allies. In this battle there were 3,598 men killed. The Battle of Vimy Ridge gave Canadians a sense of national pride and the reputation of being an elite fighting force. When the Canadians captured Passchendaele, with Canadian general Arthur Currie, the “victory” resulted in more than 200,000 casualties on each side. This included 15,000 Canadians. On August 8th to November…
This eventually showed unsuccessful in moderating the well-entrenched defenders. On 19th July 1916 at 6pm, the 5th Australian and 61st British Divisions troops attacked and suffered severely from the hands of German machine gunners. The 8th and 14th Australian Brigades managed to take over minor portions of the German trenches, however exposed to violent counter attacks and lacking of nearby support, they were soon strained to withdraw. The battle of Fromelles ending at 8am on 20th July 1916, was recorded to have suffered a total loss of 5,533 In the 5th Australian Division and 1,547 sufferers in the 61st British Division. As to the Australians that were suffering from tremendous amounts of losses in one night; it was recorded to be the foulest 24hrs in Australia’s armed history. However, the German fatalities were little more than 1,000. Overall, the battle of Fromelles ended up being a complete disaster as the German troops comprehended within just a few hours that it was purely just a trick. Hence took negative effect in any way to the advancement of the Somme…
Colonel Maxwell’s battalion the 12th Middlesex were going to attack from the front the 11th royals on the left flank. They were tasked with attacking the most fortified positions of Thiepval. The attack began with artillery bombardment such as July 1st attack. Maxwell’s men were using the new tactic creeping barrage basically it started with shooting in no mans land and as the infantry were pushing forward they field artillery would be advancing in order to keep the German heads down so the British infantry could advance and attack.…
The Battle of the Somme took place during 1916 to take pressure off the French at Verdun and the Russians on the Eastern Front. The French were under heavy fire at Verdun and had been since February, and the army itself was close to cracking. The Russians had fought gallantly on the Eastern Front to try and avert the German Forces away from the Western Front. After launching many small offensives the Russians had gained very little ground for the amount of lives lost. This essay is going to explore; 1st Day of the Battle of the Somme, the Pals Battalions used during the Battle and the tactics developed after the Battle of the Somme was over. Each of these key areas contribute because the first day of the Battle of the Somme had the highest casualty rate the British Army had ever suffered, Pals Battalions were inexperienced in the art of battle, and the tactic used before the battle were inconclusive in helping with the battle overall.…
Source B proposes that although the British were organized and everything was going according to their plan, the first line, which had nearly reached the German front line, were shot down due to machine-gun fire. The soldiers were caught in the open with no shelter and didn’t stand a chance. The machine guns were unexpected because Haig predicted that since the Germans had been bombarded with shells for a week, they would all be dead and their weapons would have been destroyed. Haig was complacent and this cost him dearly, the Germans had dug outs which provided shelter, these were often 40 feet in depth.…
Yet the effectiveness of the machine gun made up in a sense for the limited training. It dehumanized and the fact that 1300 rounds could be fired off within a minute it was more or less the act of pulling the trigger and not letting go towards the direction of the enemy. Since the French and the Germans were at a stalemate, they knew that the only way to protect themselves from the enemy was to dig, leading to trench warfare (Keegan, 258). The trench warfare became a game of sending men across no-man’s land in order to gain some leverage over the enemy. Conditions in the trenches was revolting with bodies of dead men and feces creating the perfect condition for disease, as well as trench foot caused by prolonged exposure of the feet to damp, unsanitary, and cold…
The source is a short excerpt from some a piece of writing about the first day. Despite the catastrophic events of day one (with so man deaths as noted in Source B) the writer of this source has written about it from a different perspective than what we are used to. The extract focuses on the heavy artillery bombardment of the German trenches with constant attacks of ammunition. The negative impacts on Britain are not really mentioned in this section however the author does talk about the ‘immediate effect on the Germans’ and how it caused a ‘transfer of 60 heavy guns’ and also the movement of ‘two infantry divisions from Verdun to the Somme’. This shows some success as it is now known that this battle was mainly a way to free up French soldiers in Verdun and to distract the Germans from Verdun to stop their motive which was to ‘bleed France white’.…
Dear Mother, It’s been a long time since I had the opportunity to sit down and write you a letter. I miss you and father a lot. I am overjoyed to be writing this letter to you. The mood here is one of jubilation. Our assault on Vimy Ridge began at 5:30 am on Easter Monday, eight days ago. We lost a lot of good boys but I am so very pleased to inform you that the Canucks got the job done! What the French couldn’t do for two years and the Brits too we, Byng’s Boys did in three days. I was assigned to the front line in the trenches as part of the 7th Canadian Infantry Brigade attached to the 4th Canadian Division. This is actually the first time all four divisions got to work together as a unified Canadian Corps. They practiced us to death. The Captain kept going over and over and over every detail of our attack. It got to a point that we could have attacked those Germans in our sleep and you know how much I love my sleep Mother. The morning arrived. The weather was vile. A sleet storm fell on the plains of Douai making the already treacherous ground a quagmire of mud and puddles. Then we unleashed heaven’s fury on the Germans. I cannot describe adequately the sound of the artillery barrage we put upon the Huns. I can only compare it to what an ant might experience sitting on the muzzle end of a machine gun. The unbearable thunder of the shells and the rattle of the machine guns made it unable to hear my own thoughts let alone the chap next to me in the trench. If you looked up Mother, the sky was a carpet of red hot metal. Consistent firing of bullets and shells created an area above the ground where nothing could survive. As a matter of fact I believe I heard that four of our own airplanes were shot down because they flew too low into the onslaught.…
On the night of August 18th, almost 240 ships left British ports, carrying Allied troops to a raid that was supposed to gather intelligence, destroy German-controlled coastal defences, and show that capturing a port was possible. The next morning, the attack started at 5:00AM. Things started going wrong from the beginning. Ships carrying the No. 3 Commando operation ran into a German convoy that alerted coastal defences of an attack, and ended up being scattered. Most of the troops from those ships never reached shore, but the few who did were almost immediately overwhelmed. Two kilometres east of Dieppe, troops from the Royal Regiment of Canada approached Puys, a small seaside village. Because they were behind schedule, they lost the advantages of the cover of night and the element of surprise. Most of the soldiers were shot coming out of the boats, and were killed before they even hit the water. The few who made it to the wired seawall were forced to surrender after a few hours of pointless resistance. There where three platoons of reinforcements from the “Black Watch”, or the Royal Highland Regiment of Canada, who suffered the greatest loss of life by a Canadian battalion in a single day in the entire war. 200 men were killed at the scene, 20 died later from their wounds, only 33 made it back to…
Wave upon wave of soldiers were mowed down before they new what hit them, and although a few units arrived at the German trenches, what to do next was futile, and in turn were driven back and most-likely killed. Britain’s ‘Pal’ battalions, who enlisted from the same towns and served together, suffered greatly. Entire battalions were wiped out instantly, and more followed over the coming weeks. Local newspapers would be filled with lists of the dead, wounded and…
The battle of Ypres began, during the first week of April 1915 (Warmuseum.com). Many Canadian’s troops were sent to the city of Ypres. “During the battle German soldiers were advancing fast, they gathered and covered the North, South and East sides”. On April 22th 1915, Germans introduced there new and powerful weapon that can wipe out most soldiers, it was a poison gas (Warmuseum.com). Many media and people thought that Canadians would have died but many survived and some escaped. The soldiers survived because the leaked on their cloth and covered there face, to survive the gas. During the battle Canadian soldiers would have serious trouble, sometimes there rifle wouldn’t work and get jammed due to the muddy conditions. After a formidable fight, Canadian prime minister received many congrats messages from many countries stating that it was a smart play by the Canadian. Canadian soldiers managed to survive for 48 hours after they were recalled to recruit back (Veterans.gc.ca). It was one of the biggest defining moments in Canadian history.…