War Horse film review (photos + trailer)
Like the Duchess of Cambridge at the premiere, I wept. You probably will, too. Anyone in doubt whether this most theatrical of plays could make the transition to the more realistic medium of cinema can rest easy. Steven Spielberg, has fashioned Michael Morpurgo`s novel into a moving picture. There are many superb battle scenes, including a suicidal cavalry charge and the Battle of the Somme itself. But Spielberg never loses control of the horse`s story, or the human ones.
(dailymail.co.uk)
Somewhere in Blood Soaked France: The Diary of Corporal Angus Mackay, Royal Scots, Machine Gun Corps, 1914-1917 (book review)
The early 20th century was filled with `war and rumours of wars` and, like many young men of his day, Angus enlisted in the Territorial Army, joining the 5th Battalion of (Queen`s Edinburgh Rifles) Royal Scots. Angus caught measles just before his battalion embarked for the Middle East and therefore he missed the initial deployment to the Dardanelles and did not rejoin his compatriots until May 26, 1915. With a thousand men killed or wounded for every hundred yards of Turkish land captured, it was soon apparent there would be no easy way to knock Turkey out of the war and, on January 1, 1916, the High Command initiated a complete withdrawal from Gallipoli. Through all this Angus kept a diary.
(johnogroat-journal.co.uk)
The Blue Cross opens WWI war horse archive (photos and posters)
The Blue Cross opens First World War horse archive (photos and posters).
(bbc.co.uk)
Rare photographs showing the first tanks being tested in Lincoln fetch £4,600 at auction
A set of rare photographs showing the first tanks being tested in Lincoln has smashed its guide price at auction. The album, which contains 50 black and white press pictures of the First World War tank, fetched £4,600. The collection illustrates the development of the machine at Lincoln engineering firm William Foster and Co, which famously created the Mark I tank, nicknamed "Mother", in 141 days during 1916. Photographs of unusual prototypes and failed attempts to cross trenches are among the most revealing inclusions in the album.
(thisislincolnshire.co.uk)
Trench Warfare in color photos in a new book edited by historian Peter Walther
What the public remembers, it remembers in pictures. Wars, even more than other events, tend to survive in the popular imagination as an archive of images. When it comes to remembering the World War I, most of us have had to content ourselves with a visual inheritance limited to black and white photography. No longer. In a new book edited by historian Peter Walther, a set of color images from the wartime photographer Hands Hilderbrand will be published for the first time. The pictures force us to alter our impression of the war as a gray and cloudy affair, confronting us instead with an unsettling portait of devastating iridescence.
(spiegel.de)
33 World War I photos from U.S. National Archives
33 World War I photos from U.S. National Archives.
(upi.com)
French built replica Paris after first world war to fool German bombers
A second Paris complete with a replica Champs-Elysees was built at the end of WWI to fool German bombers. Details of the incredible creation emerged as the French capital prepares to commemorate the 93rd anniversary of the Armistice. According to archives, military planners believed German pilots could be fooled into destroying the dummy city rather than the real one. It was situated on the northern outskirts of Paris and featured sham streets lined with electric lights and replica buildings. But, despite such details, the replica Paris was not quite finished before the last German air raid in Paris, in September 1918, meaning it was never tested.
(dailymail.co.uk)
A WW1 wreck with 200,000 ounces of silver has been found in the North Atlantic
A British ship sunk in World War I with 200,000 ounces of silver, worth $19 million at today's prices, has been found in the North Atlantic, a treasure-hunting company says. Odyssey Marine Exploration said it found the wreckage of the SS Mantola, which sank on February 9, 1917, after being torpedoed by a German submarine. The Florida company said it discovered the shipwreck about 2500 metres beneath the surface and just 160km from the SS Gairsoppa, believed to be the most valuable shipwreck ever, with $US210 million in silver.
(smh.com.au)
Sex and the Somme: The officially sanctioned brothels on the front line laid bare for the first time
When Corporal Jack Wood was given a few hours of leave from waging war on the Western Front, he probably never imagined that he was about to shed yet more of his innocence. He had only recently arrived in France, but already had witnessed the travesty of friendly fire and been exposed to enemy shelling. Yet, as he strolled through the streets of a nearby town, there was another shock awaiting him: a brothel. Wood wrote in his diary of how "we had heard of the renowned Red Lamp with a big No 3 on it, but never thought of the reality of the thing. There was a great crowd of fellows, four or five deep and about 30 yards in length, waiting just like a crowd waiting for a football cup tie in Blighty. It was half an hour before opening time, so we had to see the opening ceremony."
(dailymail.co.uk)
France opens war museum thanks to collector Jean-Pierre Verney's militaria collection
French President Nicolas Sarkozy inaugurated a World War One museum on Armistice Day, bringing to light artifacts hidden away in the home of a private collector for decades. The museum in Meaux, 40km northeast of Paris, features tens of thousands of objects produced during the war, from rifles to crisply ironed uniforms, from photographs to toothbrushes. The collection, among Europe's most extensive, was put together by Jean-Pierre Verney, 65, an amateur archeologist who worked for years as a photographer before becoming an archivist at France's Ministry for Veterans.
(reuters.com)
The Beauty and the Sorrow: An Intimate History of the First World War by Peter Englund
The Beauty and the Sorrow resembles 20 mini-autobiographies or non-fiction novels, sliced salami-style and dropped in chronologically.
Twenty characters on both sides of the conflict come and go repeatedly; three of them did not make it to the end of the book – or the war. Kresten Andresen, a Danish soldier with the German army, was probably killed on the Somme, leaving behind the manuscript of a long prose poem entitled On Spring and Youth, at the bottom of which he had written, "Who knows when we shall return?"
(telegraph.co.uk)
Twenty-one German soldiers found in World War I tunnel in Alsace
Under the rich Alsatian soil lies a labyrinth of passageways buried into the Lerchenberg hills. Built 100 years ago, they were used by WWI soldiers to shelter from shelling. The 21 soldiers were found in passageway known as Kilianstollen, inside their almost untouched living quarters. In October 2010, construction near the town of Altkirch was disrupted by the 125-metre tunnel, which combat engineers had built 7 metres under the surface. After a skeletal foot and a camp bed were unearthed during digging, work on the road was stopped and archaeologists called in. Kilianstollen was located 150 metres behind the German front line. At 1.8 metres high and 1.1 metres wide, the tunnel was thought to be bomb proof and could offer up to 500 soldiers a break from the trenches.
(thelocal.de)
Over 4,000 secret WW1 documents surface at flea market in Turkish capital
4,221 documents from the First World War era have been found at a flea market in Ankara. Some of the documents bore the mark "secret" on them while others were entirely encrypted. The most prominent finds among the documents were ones belonging to Herbert Hoover, who later became the 31st president of the United States, and Spanish King Alphonso XIII.
(hurriyetdailynews.com)
Archaeological survey on Gallipoli`s front lines has turned up artifacts (photos)
The first archaeological survey of the Gallipoli battlefields, which began in 2010 and is still underway, has turned up artifacts and structures crucial to helping historians understand the landmark First World War campaign. Australian officials recently announced the research team's latest finds, including sleeping and eating facilities that offer a picture of soldiers` daily lives.
(history.com)
Pilot crash lands WW1 Fokker Dreidecker aircraft after gust of wind forces it into nosedive (photos)
This photograph shows the moment when a pilot was forced to land his WWI aircraft nose-first at an air display, after an unexpected gust of wind sent it plummeting vertically to the ground. The pilot had been flying the okker Dreidecker aircraft at the Flying Legends airshow at the Imperial War Museum in Duxford, Cambs. When he landed the fighter aircraft the breeze blew it on to its nose, leaving it in the awkward upright position.
(dailymail.co.uk)
Artillery in the Great War by Paul Strong and Sanders Marble (book review)
Artillery was the decisive weapon of the Great War, dominating the battlefields, tet the history of artillery during the conflict has been neglected. Authors describe how in theory and practice the use of artillery developed in different ways among the opposing armies, and they reveal how artillery men on all sides coped with the challenges that confronted them on the battlefield.
(militarymodelling.com)
The First World War (August 1914 to November 1918) is also known as the Great War, The War to End All Wars, World War I and WW1.
Many of the bloodiest battles in military history occurred during the First World War. In trench warfare hundreds of soldiers died for each yard of land captured. Artillery with fragmentation shells caused the most casualties and made massed infantry attacks futile.