First World War in the News -- WW1 History from causes to trenches

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The Marne, 1914: The Opening of World War I and the Battle That Changed the World (book review) 2theadvocate.com :: 2010-01-02 :: Causes & Origins - What started WWI
"The Marne was the most significant land battle of the twentieth century," writes Holger Herwig. Most military historians agree: if the French counterattack along the Marne River had failed in 1914, Germany would have gained hegemony over the European continent. When the Great War started, the first months revealed industrialized warfare with casualties previously unimaginable. The first battles went mostly in Germany's favor - and by September it was clear: France would fight, fiercely, on the Marne River. General Ferdinand Foch, the commander of the French 9th Army, wired: "Hard pressed on my right, my center is falling back, impossible to move, situation excellent. I attack." [Buy from Amazon: US, UK, CA, DE, FR]

Machine gun Collector donates 1,700 items to World War I museum navytimes.com :: 2010-01-02 :: National WW1 Museum in America
As Kansas City's Liberty Memorial has gained fame with its WWI museum, the flow of donated artifacts has also increased. But officials are still recovering from the immensity of a gift from the widow of a lifelong collector Carl H. Hauber. A semi-trailer truck brought in the 1,700 items, most of them related to the machine guns of that era. "It was like getting a whole other museum. Hauber collected like a curator. He was collecting the world of the machine gun. Not just the object but the context," explained Eli Paul, of museum programs at Liberty Memorial. It will take months, maybe years, to fully absorb the material.

America's "Ace of Aces" - Eddie Rickenbacker downed 21 German aircrafts in 2 months washingtontimes.com :: 2010-01-02 :: Airforces & Aviation
It was fortunate for Britain that the American Expeditionary Force arrived in France in June 1917. But well before that young Americans were fighting German pilots in the Lafayette Escadrille. Although not a member of that elite squadron, Eddie Rickenbacker earned himself a striking reputation. In two months of aerial combat, he downed 21 German aircraft and 5 balloons - and the Distinguished Service Cross Oak Leaf Cluster. His first victory took place on April 29, 1918, when he downed a Pfalz D.111. He shot his 7th aircraft, one of 13 Fokker DV11s, out of the sky on Sept. 14. By then, Rickenbacker was flying the greatly superior Spad X111.

Images of Great War's lost generation captured by the UK's first female Press photographer dailymail.co.uk :: 2009-12-20 :: Photographs, Pictures & Images
These photographs show members of a "lost generation" as they set off to do their duty for King and Country on the Western Front, where the life expectancy was 3 weeks. Among the images is a rare photo which shows Rudyard Kipling's son John in military uniform and wearing glasses. John had been refused a commission (poor eyesight), but his father pulled strings to make sure he became an officer. Just weeks later John was killed at the Battle of Loos in 1915, his death prompting his father to write the words: "If any question why we died/Tell them, because our fathers lied." This unique WW1 photo archive is the work of Christina Broom, Britain's first female Press photographer.

Red Baron death certificate discovered in Poland telegraph.co.uk :: 2009-12-20 :: Red Baron: Flying Ace von Richthofen
The death certificate of Baron Manfred von Richthofen, the legendary World War I German flying ace known as "Red Baron", has been discovered in Poland. 91 years after Von Richthofen died after being shot down near the River Somme in France, genealogist Maciej Kowalczyk found the document in the archives of the Polish town Ostrow Wielkopolski. The town, which in 1918 was part of Germany, issued the death notice in accordance to German law. In 1914 Von Richthofen, then a cavalry officer with the 1st Lancers, was stationed in Ostrow Wielkopolski and gave it as his last official address before shipped to the eastern front.

WWI animals get their due in an exhibition at Belgium's Royal Museum of the Armed Forces and Military History bloomberg.com :: 2009-12-20 :: Animals during Wartime
The First World War wasn't just history's first industrial slaughter: It was the last gasp of a pre-industrial age when the dogs of war were just as critical to the outcome as the men who commanded them. The dogs, pigeons, horses, mules, chickens, cows, even maggots of the war-to-end-all-wars get their due in an exhibition at Belgium's Royal Museum of the Armed Forces and Military History in Brussels. "HELP THE WAR HORSES: R.S.P.C.A. FUND FOR SICK AND WOUNDED HORSES" calls out a poster, a tribute to the 8 million horses which died 1914-1918. Carrier pigeons played an important role, often the only means of communication from the frontlines to distant headquarters.

First World War photostream by LAC / BAC flickr.com :: 2009-12-05 :: Photographs, Pictures & Images
World War I flickr photostream by LAC / BAC (Library and Archives Canada, Bibliothèque et Archives Canada).

Germany still paying off First World War reparations because of the Treaty of Versailles dailymail.co.uk :: 2009-12-05 :: German Soldiers - Army of Kaiser
Germany is still paying off the 'reparations' demanded from it after the end of the Great War. The German Finance Agency revealed tens of millions of euros are still being transferred to individuals holding debenture bonds as agreed under the Treaty of Versailles signed on June 28, 1919. The bonds were issued at the time to investors. With the signing of the Versailles accord Germany accepted blame for the war. Article 231 of the treaty - the war guilt clause - declared Germany and Austria-Hungary responsible for all "loss and damage" suffered by the Allies and laid out the basis for reparations. The treaty was hated by Germans and catapulted the Nazis into power.

Remembering the Halifax Explosion smujournal.ca :: 2009-12-05 :: Explosions
The First World War (1914-1918) became a reality for those living in Halifax on December 6th, 1917. The Port of Halifax was busy and the Harbour was filled with ships carrying various supplies. On December 6th, Belgian relief ship the Imo was moving out of the Bedford Basin the same time as the French munitions ship the Mont Blanc was heading into the Basin to join a convoy. When the ships passed each other the Imo struck the bow of the Mont Blanc - which was carrying 200 tonnes of TNT, 2,300 tonnes of wet and dry picric acid, 35 tonnes of benzyl, and 10 tonnes of gun cotton.

Great Silence Living in the Shadow of the Great War 1918-20 by Juliet Nicolson [book review] guardian.co.uk :: 2009-11-23 :: Home Front Civilians
At the end of the Great War 3,500,000 men were in the British army. Of these, all but the 900,000 needed to get home to their families as fast as possible. The government was unprepared: Lloyd George's promise of troops returning to "a land fit for heroes" was impossible to fulfil. Juliet Nicolson's book is a fascinating social study of the aftermath of the First World War. The prewar society could not be retained. Servants coming back from the war were reluctant to return to the other side of the baize door; wives who had held the homefront were no longer the submissive creatures left behind in 1914; And at least 41,000 men had lost at least one limb in the war. [Buy from Amazon: US, UK, CA, DE, FR]

Lord Ashcroft pays record price, nearly £1.5 million, for the only double Victoria Cross from the Great War telegraph.co.uk :: 2009-11-23 :: Victoria Cross Medal
The "ultimate" gallantry medal - the only double Victoria Cross from the Great War - has been purchased by Lord Ashcroft for a world record price of almost 1.5 million pounds. Captain Noel Chavasse - who served with the Royal Army Medical Corps, attached to the 10th King's (Liverpool Scottish) Regiment - was granted the second of his VCs during the third Battle of Ypres. After receiving a skull wound he still went, time and again, into no-man's-land to search for and attend the wounded. At least 12 memorials have been set up worldwide in his honour. Only 3 VCs and Bar (or double VCs) have been awarded since the medal was created by Queen Victoria in 1856.

A boy aged 12, who fought at the Battle of the Somme, is youngest British World War I soldier telegraph.co.uk :: 2009-11-10 :: United Kingdom
The child, too short to see over the edge of a trench, was recalled by another under-age WW1 soldier, George Maher, who was only 13 when he was sent to the Somme. Maher had told a recruiting officer that he was 18 to join the 2nd King's Own Royal Lancaster Regiment in 1917. But his true age was revealed when he broke down and started to cry under shellfire. Maher recalled: "I was locked up on a train under guard, one of 5 under-age boys caught serving on the front being sent back to England. The youngest was 12yo. A little nuggety bloke he was, too. We joked that the other soldiers would have had to have lifted him up to see over the trenches."

Military Censorship of Photographs in World War I [link to PDF document] fas.org :: 2009-11-10 :: Photographs, Pictures & Images
During the course of the First World War, tens of thousands of photos were withheld by the U.S. military. These included pictures that might have revealed troop movements or military capabilities, pictures that were liable to be used in enemy propaganda, or those that could affect military or public morale. The development of military controls on publication of photographs during WWI was described in a 1926 U.S. Army report that includes dozens of images that had been withheld. See "The Military Censorship of Pictures: Photographs that came under the ban during the World War - and why" by Lt. Col. Kendall Banning, U.S. Army Signal Reserve Corps, 1926.

The wreck of British naval submarine HMS E18 found in the Baltic Sea off the coast of Estonia bbc.co.uk :: 2009-10-26 :: WW1 Submarines
HMS E18, with 3 officers and 28 ratings, went out on patrol in May 1916 and was never seen again. The sub was one of a handful sent to the Baltic during the Great War by Winston Churchill, the First Lord of the Admiralty, to cut off German shipments of iron ore from Sweden and support the Russian navy. E18 left its base in the Russian port of Reval - now Tallinn - on 25 May 1916 and headed west. The following day she was reported to have engaged and torpedoed a German ship. A few days later she is thought to have hit a German mine and sunk with all hands. After the submarine's loss, Tsar Nicholas of Russia granted posthumous medals to the crew.

First World WAr training trenches preserved in field in Scotland bbc.co.uk :: 2009-10-26 :: Trenches and Fortifications warfare
A second set of trenches dug for training purposes during the First World War has been explored by experts in an area that saw heavy use in wartime. The line of three trenches lies 2 miles from where other remains were found to have survived in a field in Ross-shire in 2008. The Royal Commission on Ancient and Historic Monuments of Scotland (RCAHMS) have studied the site. RCAHMS were made aware of the trenches during a search through archive images of the area around Invergordon, an important port for the Royal Navy before, during and after the First World War.

The Unknown Ally: Bulgaria in WWI -exhibition at the Museum of Military History in Vienna cafebabel.com :: 2009-10-05 :: Minor groups and Areas
"Unknown ally" is a special exhibition which runs until February 2010 at the Museum of Military History (Heeresgeschichtliches Museum) in Vienna. The exhibit explores the role of Bulgaria, and its mostly unknown alliance with the Central Powers Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire. The Exhibition has assembled numerous military uniforms, militaria, weapons and insignias by the new Bulgarian army during the conflict, as well as documents and photographs bearing witness to the situation on the front. Maps of the campaign, battle plans, extracts of treaties, posters and articles are among the other documents on show.

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.

First World War in the News is an edited review of hand-picked World War I (1914-1918) articles - covering everything from the soldiers and generals to the trenches and militaria.