Eyewitness: Loos Battlefield—"The Aftermath" by Sapper (H.C. McNeile)

Loos Battlefield from the Original British Line

LOOS, OCTOBER,  I915 

Away  in  front,  gleaming  white  through  the gathering  dusk  on  the  side  of  a  hill,  lies  the front  line.  Just  beyond  it,  there  is  another: the  Germans.  Down  in  the  valley  behind  that  white  line  a  town,  from  which  with  monotonous  regularity  rise  great  columns  of  black  smoke — German  heavies  bursting  again  and  again  on  the  crumbling  red  houses.  And from  the  village  there  rises  a  great  iron  construction with  two  girdered  towers,  a  landmark for  miles.  Periodically  German  crumps sail  overhead  with  a  droning  noise,  woolly bears  burst  on  one's  flank,  and  then  a  salvo coming  unpleasantly  near  makes  one  remember that  the  skyline  is  not  recommended by  the  best  people  as  a  place  to  stand  on,  and, getting  into  the  trench,  you  retire  again  to the  dug-out,  to  wait  for  the  night  to  cloak your  doings. 

In  the  line  of  trench  are  men — men  not there  to  fight,  not  even  in  support.  They are  there  to  clear  up  the  battlefield;  for  only a  few  days  ago  the  trench  in  which  you  are sitting  was  the  German  front  line.  The  bed on  which  you  lie  has  supported  a  stout  Teuton for  probably  ten  long  months  or  more; and  now  where  is  he  ?  My  predecessor  was addicted  to  the  use  of  a  powerful  scent  of doubtful  quality,  which  still  hangs  faintly  in the  air.  He  also  believed  in  comfort.  There are  easy  chairs,  and  cupboards,  and  tables, and,  as  I  say,  a  bed.  Also  there  are  mice, scores  of  them,  who  have  a  great  affection for  using  one's  face  as  a  racecourse  during one's  periods  of  rest. 

But  my  predecessor  was  absolutely  out  of it  with  another  fellow  along  the  trench.  His dug-out  was  a  veritable  palace,  boasting  of wall-papers  and  a  carpet,  with  a  decorated dado  round  the  part  where  dados  live,  and  a pretty  design  in  fruits  and  birds  painted  on the  ceiling.  Bookshelves  filled  with  the  latest thing  in  German  wit,  and  a  very  nice  stove with  flue  attached.  I  was  beaten  by  a  short head  trying  to  get  there,  which  was,  perhaps, as  well.     Mine  confined  itself  to  mice.  .  .  

Gradually  the  night  falls,  and  with  it  starts the  grim  task.  It  was,  as  I  have  said,  the German  line — now  it  is  ours;  the  change  is not  brought  about  without  a  price.  Turn around,  away  from  that  line  now  almost  invisible in  front,  and  look  behind.  There, over  a  mass  of  broken  pickets  and  twisted wire,  gleams  another  white  line — our  original front  trenches.  Between  you  and  it  lies  the no  man's  land  of  ten  months — and  there  on that  strip  of  land  is  part  of  the  price.  It  lies elsewhere  as  well,  but  a  patch  of  fifty  yards will  serve.  There  was  one,  I  remember,  where the  German  line  had  swung  out  at  right angles — a  switch — going  nearer  to  ours.  In this  bit  of  the  line  the  wire  had  run  perpendicular to  the  rest  of  their  trench  for  a  few score  yards.  And  in  the  re-entrant  a  machine gun  had  been  placed,  so  that  it  fired  along  the wire.  The  steel  casing  we  found  still  standing, though  the  ground  around  was  torn  to pieces.  That  machine  gun  paid  for  its  construction. .  .  

There  was  one  group  of  four  outside,  a subaltern  and  three  men.  They  were  lying on  the  ground,  in  one  close-packed  jumble, and  the  subaltern  had  his  arm  around  a  man's neck.     Just  in  the  torn  up  wire  they  lay — the  price  at  the  moment  of  victory.  Another five  seconds  and  they  would  have  been  in that  line;  but  it  was  left  to  some  one  else  to stop  that  machine  gun  firing.  And  so,  beside that  motionless,  distorted  group  a  hole  is dug,  and  soon  no  trace  remains.  One  phase of  clearing  the  battlefield;  there  are  many such  holes  to  be  made.  A  few  yards  away — this  time  on  the  parapet  of  the  trench — a Scotchman  and  a  German  are  lying  together. 

The  Scotchman's  bayonet  is  through  the German — his  hands  still  hold  the  rifle — and as  he  stabbed  him  he  himself  had  been  shot from  behind.  A  strange  tableau:  natural enough,  yet  weirdly  grim  to  the  imagination when  seen  by  the  dim  light  two  or  three  days after  it  took  place. 

One  could  elaborate  indefinitely.  Each  of those  quiet,  twisted  figures  means  some  one's tragedy:  each  of  them  goes  to  form  the price  which  must  be  paid.  And  at  no  time, I  think,  does  the  brutal  realism  of  war strike  home  more  vividly  than  when  in  cold blood  one  sees  before  one's  eyes  the  results of  what  took  place  in  hot  blood  a  few  days before.  Just  a  line  in  the  paper — a  name — no  more.     That  is  the  public  result  of  the price,  and  at  one  time  it  seemed  to  me  hard on  those  behind.  Unavoidable  of  course,  but hard.  No  details — nothing — just  a  statement. I  have  changed  my  mind:  there  are worse  things  than  ignorance.  .  . 

Then  from  the  trenches  themselves,  from the  dug-outs,  from  behind  are  pulled  out  the Huns.  Caught  in  their  deep  dug-outs,  with the  small,  slanting  shaft  going  down  to  great chambers  hewed  out  of  the  chalk  underneath — and  some  of  the  shafts  are  ten  to  twelve yards  long — unable  to  get  out  during  the bombardment,  they  were  killed  by  the  score. 

A  few  bombs  flung  down  the  shaft  and — voild  tout.  And  so  they  are  hauled  out  one at  a  time.  More  holes  to  be  dug — more  shell holes  to  be  utilised.  Apropos  of  those  Hun dug-outs,  a  little  incident  in  one  of  them  revealed yet  another  side  of  Tommy's  character. 

Truly  is  he  a  man  of  many  parts.  A  few cheery  sportsmen  having  worked  manfully and  well,  and  having  earned  their  rest,  found the  dug-out  they  had  marked  as  their  own was  occupied.  It  had  for  the  time  been missed  in  the  search  for  Germans;  that  was why  it  was  occupied.  Nothing  daunted, however,   they  piled  the  occupants  on  one side,  while  they  peacefully  went  to  sleep  on the  other.  There's  no  doubt  getting  a  dead German  up  those  shafts  is  weary  work,  and they  were  tired.  But  I'd  sooner  have  slept in  the  trench  myself.  However,  that  is  by the  way. 

Source

And  so  we  go  on,  wandering  in  perfect safety  over  the  ground  that  a  few  days  before meant  certain  death.  A  mass  of  rifles,  kit, bandoliers,  accoutrements  litters  the  ground, save  where  it  has  already  been  collected  and sorted  into  heaps.  Unexploded  bombs  lie everywhere,  clips  of  ammunition,  bayonets. All  has  to  be  collected  and  sent  back — another phase  of  clearing  the  battlefield. 

Then  there  is  the  road  where  some  transport was  caught  topping  the  rise.  There  the holes  have  to  be  bigger,  for  the  horses  have to  be  buried  even  as  the  men.  It  is  only rarely  the  process  is  already  done.  One horse  there  was,  in  a  trench  on  his  back, fifty  yards  from  the  road,  stone  dead.  How he  got  there,  Heaven  knows.  He  wasn't much  trouble. 

Then  there  was  another  mound  from  which protruded  an  arm,  in  German  uniform,  with its  ringers  pointing.     And  the  hand  was  black. A  morbid  sight,  a  sight  one  will  neyer forget.  Vividest  of  all  in  my  mind  remains the  impression  of  a  German  skeleton, near  the  edge  of  our  own  trench.  Dead  for nearly  a  year  perhaps,  shot  in  some  night attack,  trying  to  cut  the  wire.  A  skeleton hand  from  which  the  wire-cutters  had  long since  fallen,  crumbled  on  a  strand,  a  skull grinned  at  the  sky,  a  uniform  mouldered, 

That,  and  the  blackness  of  Death.  No peaceful  drifting  across  the  Divide,  but  blackness and  distortion. 

Thus  the  aftermath  :   the  price.  .  .

From The Lieutenant and Other Stories by Sapper (H.C. McNeile), who saw duty at Loos with the Royal Engineers in the aftermath of the September 1916 battle there.

Remembering a Veteran: Sir John D. Cockcroft, Royal Field Artillery, British Army

John D. Cockcroft

John Douglas Cockcroft (1897–1967) was one of the most productive and broadly valuable scientists of the 20th century. In 1914, he won a County Major Scholarship, West Riding of Yorkshire, to the Victoria University of Manchester, where he studied mathematics. When Cockcroft completed his first year at Manchester in June 1915. He joined the Officers' Training Corps there, but did not wish to become an officer.  He eventually enlisted in the British Army on 24 November 1915. On 29 March 1916, he joined the 59th Training Brigade, Royal Field Artillery, where he was trained as a signaller. He was then posted to B Battery, 92nd Field Artillery Brigade, one of the units of the 20th (Light) Division, on the Western Front.

Cockcroft participated in the advance to the Hindenburg Line and Passchendaele. He applied for a commission, and was accepted. He was sent to Brighton in February 1918 to learn about gunnery, and in April 1918, to the Officer Candidate School in Weedon Bec in Northamptonshire, where he was trained as a field artillery officer.  He was commissioned as a lieutenant in the Royal Field Artillery on 17 October 1918.  The war ended shortly afterwards and he was released from the Army in January 1919. After completing his education and serving an apprenticeship at Vickers Electrical, he began work under Lord Rutherford in the Cavendish Laboratory, Cambridge. He married Eunice Elizabeth Crabtree in 1925, and the couple had four daughters and a son.

Walton, Rutherford, and Cockcroft

He first collaborated with P. Kapitsa in the production of intense magnetic fields and low temperatures. In 1928 he turned to work on the acceleration of protons by high voltages and was soon joined in this work by E.T.S. Walton. In 1932 they succeeded in transmuting lithium and boron by high energy protons. In 1933 artificial radioactivity was produced by protons and a wide variety of transmutations produced by protons and deuterons was studied. In 1951 Cockcroft and Walton received the Nobel Prize in Physics for splitting the atom. 

In September 1939 he took up a war-time appointment as Assistant Director of Scientific Research in the Ministry of Supply and started to work on the application of radar to coast and air defence problems. He was a member of the Tizard Mission to the United States in the autumn of 1940, in which British breakthroughs on radar were shared with American scientists. 

World War II British Radar Unit

After this he was appointed Head of the Air Defence Research and Development Establishment. In 1944 he went to Canada to take charge of the Canadian Atomic Energy project and became Director of the Montreal and Chalk River Laboratories until 1946 when he returned to England as Director of the Atomic Energy Research Establishment, Harwell.  He is considered one of the founding fathers of the nuclear energy industry.

For the remainder of his life, Cockcroft held a number of distinguished posts and received honors and awards to numerous to list here. John Cockcroft died on 18 September 1967.

Sources: Nobel Prize Biography; Wikipedia; Moments of Discovery

German Torpedo Boats of World War I—A Roads Classic

The German torpedo boats of World War I were designed to execute torpedo attacks on bigger warships. While other nations like Britain started to increase the size and gun armament of their torpedo boats—or torpedo boat destroyers—and designed a ship that would later just be called "destroyer," the German Navy stayed with the idea of small craft that were to focus on their torpedoes as their main weapons.

Action

During the war, it became obvious that the artillery component of those boats had to be increased. Therefore, all torpedo boat classes laid down during wartime got more and larger guns—the climax were the large torpedo boats (Große Torpedoboote) of the Design 1916—with their four 15cm guns. At  over 2000 tons they were the biggest and most powerful ships of their kind at the end of the war. They were in many ways the equivalent of the contemporary destroyers in other navies (they were often referred to as such by their crews). 

Torpedo Boat G-136 at Sea

The combat effectiveness of the German torpedo boat squadrons, however, was not very impressive. In an early, October 1914, action off the Dutch coast, a British flotilla consisting of a light cruiser and four destroyers sank an entire squadron of torpedo boats causing German commanders to lose confidence in the vessels. As a direct result, there were very few further sorties into the Channel and the torpedo boat force was relegated to coastal patrol and rescuing downed pilots for fear of similar losses. Consequently, it is difficult to find accounts of the boats sinking Allied ships. The sinkings of a British minelaying sloop and a single destroyer, were all the editors could find

.

A Flotilla in Port

Germany built over 300 torpedo boats by the end of World War I, and 67l of them were lost because of enemy actions. Fifty of the most  modern ones were interned in Scapa Flow and scuttled there in June 1919; only a few of them were not sunk. Of the 114 boats left in Germany, only 24 were allowed to be kept after the Treaty of Versailles, but most of the remaining boats were of such a bad condition that it was difficult to keep even 24 of them running. Most of those boats were later reconstructed and several of them were even used for auxiliary duties during World War II.

Sources: german-navy.de; http://www.naval-history.net; Wikipedia

New Jersey, USA, and the Great War

World War I Memorial, Atlantic City

When the United States entered World War I on 6 April 6 1917, New Jersey joined other states in sending resources—human and material. But, as has been the case frequently in the history of the Garden State, its unique location on the busy Atlantic coast and diverse mixture of residents and resources led to other significant contributions to the national effort. From the outbreak of hostilities in Europe in 1914 until the 1918 Armistice, New Jersey was deeply involved in the war and America's national efforts.

Two notable events that preceded America's entry into the war are linked to the state of New Jersey.

• Prior to becoming president of the United States in 1913 and overseeing the American entry into World War I, Woodrow Wilson graduated from Princeton, served as the university’s president, and was elected the 34th governor of the State of New Jersey.

• On 30 July 1916, railroad cars packed with ammunition blew up at the Black Tom depot in Jersey City, killing seven people and spewing shrapnel that tore holes in the Statue of Liberty. The incident was part of a German plan to destroy military supplies for the Allies. (Article) 

Damage at Black Tom

Mobilizing the State

From the United States’ entry into the war in April of 1917 to the conclusion of hostilities, over 141,000 New Jerseyans served, including more than 1,000 women. New Jersey lost 3,836 people to combat, disease, and accident. Eight New Jerseyans were awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor, two of them posthumously.

What is now designated the Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst (New Jersey) in Burlington County has been serving America's Armed Forces since 18 July 1917, when its predecessor, Camp Dix, was officially established as a training and staging camp for troops destined for the battlefields of Europe. Camp Dix rapidly became one of the nation's largest military reservations as the 78th, 87th, and 34th Divisions and many smaller units trained for the war.

25,000 Men Training at Camp Dix in 1918

"Heaven, Hell, or Hoboken"

The City Hoboken proved to be one of America's most valuable assets during the Great War. The war’s effects were immediately felt there, home to major European shipping companies and numerous immigrants and foreign nationals. At the 1914 outbreak of war, the British Royal Navy acted quickly to blockade Germany. British warships rounded up German merchant vessels or drove them to port. 

A number of German ships were in port in Hoboken, the American home of the Hamburg American and North German Lloyd steamship lines. The ships would remain stuck in port until the American military seized them in 1917. At dawn on 6 April 1917, U.S. Army soldiers seized the German ships as they sat in port. Two weeks later the German shipping companies’ piers were taken over by the government and army encampments were established there. The prize ships of the Hamburg-American and North German Lloyd lines were turned into massive troop transports.

Hoboken's AEF Memorial

Soon after America's declaration of war, Hoboken was declared the main point of embarkation for the United States Expeditionary Force, as the forces heading to fight the war in Europe were called. Hoboken took a proud place in the American war effort, but many of the city’s residents and business owners would face hardship during the war. According to the 1910 U.S. Census, Hoboken had a total population of 70,324 people, of which 10,018 were German-born. Over the course of the war, many of Hoboken’s Germans were detained, evicted from their homes, lost their jobs, or saw their businesses shut down. High-level employees of the German shipping companies were among those arrested shortly after America’s entry into the war.  

Camp Merritt at Tenafly, NJ, a transit center, was under the control of the New York Port of Embarkation. It was created to assemble the troops leaving for France via nearby Hoboken and the other New York docks. Over 1.6 million men were sent to France via this route, including over a million through Hoboken and a comparable number would return after the Armistice.

The first convoy carrying American troops to war left Hoboken on 14 June 1917. Fourteen transport ships, carrying 11,991 officers, enlisted men, and civilians departed the city. A total of 936 voyages to France and England were made from Hoboken during the war. Many troops were brought overseas in German ships that had been captured in Hoboken. Among these ships was the USS Leviathan, formerly the Hamburg-American liner Vaterland.

General Pershing on a Postwar Visit to Hoboken to
Show His Appreciation

The Industrial Contribution to Victory

Companies, such as Johnson & Johnson, DuPont, Singer, and E.R. Squibb, produced essential munitions, uniforms, and medical supplies in New Jersey that sustained the United States and its allies during the war. As demand for military supplies increased, New Jersey’s strong industrial infrastructure made the state the largest supplier of munitions in America by 1918. 

New Jersey Women Supporting the War

As elsewhere in America,  New Jersey women entered the workforce in unprecedented numbers, working in fields like aircraft, optical goods, rubber goods, photographic supplies, leather goods, and electrical goods. With increasing demands for workers to meet the needs of military production and European immigration curtailed during the war, New Jersey industries sent labor agents south to recruit African American workers. The recruitment effort continued following the war's end as the economy prospered during the decade of the 1920s.

Memorable New Jerseyans from the War

Governor Edge

New Jersey has the singular history among American states of having the same individual, Walter Evans Edge, serve as its governor in both World Wars. A considerable part of Edge's efforts in his first term as governor involved the mobilization for World War I and postwar planning. Despite being a partisan opponent of Wilson when he was governor, the Republican Governor Edge vigorously supported the president's efforts to build the new camps and put the state's economy on a war footing. In the next war, however, the most memorable aspect of his World War II service as governor would be his series of battles with the state's Democratic machine.

Thomas Edison kept busy during World War I. He became a vocal proponent of military preparedness, faced the challenges of rebuilding his West Orange factory after a disastrous fire, chaired the Naval Consulting Board and conducted research aimed at helping the U.S. Navy respond to submarine warfare. His oldest daughter, Marion, spent much of the war behind enemy lines as the wife of a German Army officer, while his son William fought for the Allies in France as a sergeant in the U.S. Tank Corps.

Flying Sergeant Ronald Wood Hoskier of South Orange left Harvard to become a pilot with the Lafayette Escadrille. He fell in action near St. Quentin in April 1917 and is buried at the Lafayette Escadrille Memorial outside Paris.

Joyce Kilmer, one of the most famous Americans to serve during World War I, called New Jersey home. Born in New Brunswick, the soldier/poet had earned national recognition for his popular poetry before the war. He was killed in action during the Second Battle of the Marne and is buried at the Oise-Aisne American Cemetery in France.

Remembering the Sacrifice

The 313th Infantry, 79th Division Welcomed Home

Today there are over 160 World War I memorials in New Jersey, almost all installed during the interwar period. Recently,  New Jersey has been the main studio site for Sabin Howard, sculptor of the dramatic A Soldier's Journey, centerpiece of the new National World War I Memorial.

Historic Footnote

On July 1921, New Jersey was the site of the signing of the Knox-Porter Resolution by President Warren Harding to officially end American wartime involvement.

President Harding Signing the Resolution

Sources:   VisitNJ.org/WW1; Drew University archives; New Jersey History; NJ WWI Centennial; Monmouth Library 2015 Exhibit,  the New Jersey Almanac; Find a Grave; Hoboken in WWI

The Russian Revolutions of 1917 in Ten Steps

 

Third Anniversary Poster, "Down with Capitalism, Long Live the Dictatorship of the Proletariat!"

Telegram to the Tsar

Position serious. Anarchy in the capital. Government paralyzed. Arrangements for transport, supply, and fuel in complete disorder. General discontent increasing. Disorderly street firing. Part of troops firing on each other. Essential to trust someone who holds confidence of the nation with formation of a new government. There must be no delay. I pray God that in this hour responsibility will not fall on the wearer of the Crown.

Rodzianko, President of the Duma, 

26 February (11 March) 1917

1. January–February: Riots, Workers Strikes, Soldiers' Mutiny Trigger the February Revolution.

2. March: Tsar Nicholas II Abdicates.

3. March: Provisional Government Formed.

4. April: Lenin Returns from Switzerland and Publishes His April Theses.

5. June: Kerensky (Second Brusilov) Offensive Fails.

The war, it turned out, was an exam, and the tsarist government failed that exam again and again in the eyes of its citizens. Repeated efforts to alter the situation, from the very bottom to the very top of society, came to naught. The only real question was when and how the forces of opposition would finally get stronger than the forces of tsarist rule. What is astonishing in this regard is not that the tsarist government collapsed in 1917, but that it survived  1915.  

                                                                                    Joshua Sanborn, Imperial Apocalypse  

6. July: Armed Demonstrations of Workers and Sailors in Petrograd. Lenin Flees. Kerensky Becomes Premier.

7. August: Kornilov Mutiny Suppressed.

8. September: Bolsheviks Gain Control of Petrograd Soviet.

9. October: Lenin Returns. Bolsheviks Seize Power, Arrest Members of the Provisional Government—the October Revolution.

10. October: Lenin Issues Decrees Calling for the Abolition of Private Ownership and an Immediate Ceasefire. 

Churchill and the Turkish Battleships

Sir Winston Churchill
First Lord of the Admiralty, 1911–1915

From:  The War to End All Wars by David Fromkin

On the outbreak of war, Winston Churchill briefly became a national hero in Britain. Although the Cabinet had refused him permission to do so, he had mobilized the fleet on his own responsibility in the last days of peacetime and had sent it north to Scapa Flow, where it would not be vulnerable to a German surprise attack. What he had done was probably illegal, but events had justified his actions, which in Britain were applauded on all sides.

Margot Asquith, the Prime Minister’s wife, once wondered in her diary what it was that made Winston Churchill pre-eminent. “It certainly is not his mind,” she wrote. “Certainly not his judgment—he is constantly very wrong indeed…” She concluded that: “It is of course his courage and colour—his amazing mixture of industry and enterprise. He can and does always—all ways puts himself in the pool. He never shirks, hedges, or protects himself—though he thinks of himself perpetually. He takes huge risks [original emphasis].”

Mobilizing the fleet despite the Cabinet’s decision not to do so was a huge risk that ended in triumph. In the days following Britain’s entry into the war even his bitterest political enemies wrote to Churchill to express their admiration of him. For much of the rest of his life, his proudest boast was that when war came, the fleet was ready.

At the time, his commandeering of two Turkish battleships for the Royal Navy was applauded almost as much. An illustrated page in the Tatler of 12 August 1914 reproduced a photograph of a determined-looking Churchill, with an inset of his wife, under the heading “BRAVO WINSTON! The Rapid Mobilisation and Purchase of the Two Foreign Dreadnoughts Spoke Volumes for your Work and Wisdom.”

Sultan Osman I Under Construction

The battleships were the Reşadiye and the larger Sultan Osman I. Both had been built in British shipyards and were immensely powerful; the Osman mounted more heavy guns than any battleship ever built before. Each originally had been ordered by Brazil, but then had been built instead for the Ottoman Empire. The Reşadiye, though launched in 1913, had not been delivered because the Turks had lacked adequate modern docking facilities to accommodate her. With Churchill’s support, Rear-Admiral Sir Arthur H. Limpus, head of the British naval mission, had lobbied successfully with the Ottoman authorities to secure the contract to build docking facilities for two British firms—Vickers, and Armstrong Whitworth. The docking facilities having been completed, the Reşadiye was scheduled to leave Britain soon after the Sultan Osman I, which was to be completed in August 1914. 

Churchill was aware that these vessels meant a great deal to the Ottoman Empire. They were intended to be the making of the modern Ottoman navy, and it was assumed that they would enable the empire to face Greece in the Aegean and Russia in the Black Sea. Their purchase had been made possible by patriotic public subscription throughout the empire. The tales may have been improved in the telling, but it was said that women had sold their jewelry and schoolchildren had given up their pocket-money to contribute to the popular subscription.  Admiral Limpus had put out to sea from Constantinople on 27 July 1914, with ships of the Turkish navy, waiting to greet the Sultan Osman I and escort her back through the straits of the Dardanelles to the Ottoman capital, where a “navy week” had been scheduled with lavish ceremonies for the Minister of Marine, Ahmed Djemal, and for the cause of British-Ottoman friendship.

Churchill, who was reckoned the most pro-Turk member of the Asquith Cabinet, had followed with care, and had supported with enthusiasm, the mission of Admiral Limpus in Turkey ever since its inception years before. The British advisory mission to the Ottoman navy was almost as large as the similar German mission to the Ottoman army, led by the Prussian General of Cavalry, Otto Liman von Sanders. The two missions to some extent counter-balanced each other. British influence was thought to be strong in the Marine Ministry. German influence was strongest in the War Ministry. In London little was known of Middle Eastern politics, but Churchill enjoyed the rare advantage of having personally met three of the five leading figures in the Ottoman government: Talaat, Enver, and the Minister of Finance, Djavid. He therefore had been given an opportunity to learn that Britain’s conduct as naval supplier and adviser could have political repercussions in Constantinople.

The European war crisis, however, propelled the newly built Turkish vessels into significance in both London and Berlin. The Reşadiye and Sultan Osman I were battleships of the new Dreadnought class. As such,they overshadowed other surface vessels and, in a sense, rendered them obsolete. By the summer of 1914 the Royal Navy had taken delivery of only enough to give Britain a margin over Germany of seven dreadnoughts. Since the European war was expected to be a short one, there seemed to be no time to build more of them before battle was joined and decided. The addition of the two dreadnoughts built for Turkey would increase the power of the Royal Navy significantly. Conversely, their acquisition by the German Empire or its allies could decisively shift the balance of forces against Britain. It was not fanciful to suppose that the Reşadiye and Sultan Osman I could play a material role in determining the outcome of what was to become the First World War. 

Early in the week of 27 July 1914, as the First Lord of the Admiralty took precautionary measures in the war crisis, he raised the issue of whether the two Turkish battleships could be taken by the Royal Navy. The chain of events which apparently flowed from Churchill’s initiative in this matter eventually led to him being blamed for the tragic outbreak of war in the Middle East. In turn he later attempted to defend himself by pretending that he had done no more than to carry into effect standing orders. The history of these matters has been confused ever since because both Churchill’s story and the story told by his detractors were false. . .

HMS Erin (Former Reşadiye) at Sea

His version of the matter implied that he did not single out the Ottoman vessels, but instead issued orders applicable to all foreign warships then under construction; he wrote that the arrangements for the taking of such vessels “comprised an elaborate scheme” that had been devised years before and had been brought up to date in 1912.

This account was not true. Seizing the Turkish warships was an original idea of Churchill’s and it came to him in the summer of 1914. During the week before the war, the question of taking foreign vessels was raised for the first time on Tuesday, 28 July 1914, in an inquiry that Churchill directed to the First Sea Lord, Prince Louis of Battenberg, and to the Third Sea Lord, Sir Archibald Moore. “In case it may become necessary to acquire the two Turkish battleships that are nearing completion in British yards,” he wrote, “please formulate plans in detail showing exactly the administrative action involved in their acquisition and the prospective financial transactions.

[After consultation with the Foreign Office]  the Attorney-General advised Churchill that what he was doing was not justified by statute, but that the welfare of the Commonwealth took precedence over other considerations and might excuse his temporarily detaining the vessels.  A high-ranking permanent official in the Foreign Office took the same point of view that day but placed it in a broader and more practical political perspective. “I think we must let the Admiralty deal with this question as they consider necessary,” he minuted, “and afterwards make such defence of our action to Turkey as we can.”

On 31 July the Cabinet accepted Churchill’s view that he ought to take both Turkish vessels for the Royal Navy for possible use against Germany in the event of war; whereupon British sailors boarded the Sultan Osman I. The Ottoman ambassador called at the Foreign Office to ask for an explanation, but was told only that the battleship was being detained for the time being.

Toward midnight on 1 August Churchill wrote instructions to Admiral Moore, in connection with the mobilization of the fleet, to notify both Vickers and Armstrong that the Ottoman warships were to be detained and that the Admiralty proposed to enter into negotiations for their purchase.

Main Batteries of HMS Agincourt (Former Sultan Osman I)

[Editor's Note: The two ships would subsequently have remarkably similar and unspectacular careers.  Reşadiye was renamed HMS Erin and joined the Grand Fleet in September 1914.  At the Battle of Jutland it was the only British battleship not to fire her main guns. After the Washington Naval Conference the ship was listed for disposal and was broken up in 1923.  Sultan Osman I was renamed HMS Agincourt and also joined the Grand Fleet in September 1914. During the Battle of Jutland Agincourt fired 144 twelve-inch shells and 111 six-inch shells during the battle, although she is not known to have hit anything. She was also eventually disposed of as a result of the arms treaty.

Source:  The entire text of The War to End All Wars is available on-line HERE

The Remains of Company D: A Story of the Great War

Click HERE to Order

By James Carl Nelson

 St. Martin's Griffin, 2010

Reviewed by Bruce Sloan

The Remains of Company D is journalist and author James Carl Nelson's tribute to his grandfather and fellow Doughboys who fought in the first, and all the subsequent major battles of the AEF. It follows the story of the men of Company D, 28th Infantry Regiment, 1st Division, from enlistment to combat and beyond. Nelson spent years researching, interviewing surviving family members, and familiarizing himself with the Great War and Company D's history. As the Library Journal's reviewer aptly stated, "The author's meticulous and persistent research in tracking down the descendants of the combatants to uncover their letters and diaries makes his work the standard for research into the story of the American Expeditionary Force.”

Company D's involvement in the battles of Cantigny, Soissons, St. Mihiel, and the Argonne are well researched and written, from the perspective of history and of the soldiers themselves. The men come alive in the book, displaying their strengths, weaknesses, and incredible bravery. Continuing the attack when friends were falling or being blown apart; fighting on after being wounded; charging massed German machine guns; lying wounded in a shell hole until found at night; or single-handedly capturing fixed positions, these Doughboys showed their mettle.

 

Two Doughboys of Company D
Future Senator Sam Ervin and the Author's Grandfather, John Nelson

Finally, The Remains of Company D covers  the war's aftermath for those who survived and the effort to determine what happened to those who fell in the service of their country. Sam Ervin later served in Congress and gained fame during the Watergate hearings. Nelson's grandfather John, wounded at Cantigny , never fully recovered. Marvin Stainton, who couldn't wait to get in the war, fell in the Argonne when the war was nearly over, his remains undiscovered until 1924.

Although  many descendants of the soldiers were interviewed, there was very little of the combat they could tell, as those who were really in it did not talk while they were still alive. At first this reader felt that Mr. Nelson was slightly overindulging in prose and supposition, but further into the manuscript, it became clear that this was the result of his developed understanding of the individuals and their character.

Thank you, Mr. Nelson, for a very readable and fascinating slice of history. It definitely held my interest.

Bruce Sloan 

WWI Illustrations via the Recently Threatened Getty Villa Museum

The beautiful and sometimes controversial Getty Villa museum—modeled on the Villa dei Papiri of  Herculaneum that was buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD—came close last week to meeting a fate worse than its predecessor two weeks ago. The gorgeous building and grounds, and 44,000 Greek and Roman antiquities came under attack by the Pacific Palisades fire (77% contained as I write on 24 January). Wise design features, recent brush-clearing efforts, well-prepared staff, and much good luck are credited with saving the works from the fire that, otherwise, devastated the nearby neighborhood.

I've visited the replica Roman villa three times over the years and have always been thrilled by what feels like passing through a time portal. When I heard about its recent crisis I started looking online to refresh my memories of those visits, and I discovered some World War One material—shown below—that is new to me.  Apparently the museum sponsored a centennial program for the war in 2014, so these are probably not on display now.  In any case, though, if you're ever in the LA area I would recommend a visit to the Villa, although it's now closed indefinitely. If forced to choose, it's a pleasanter, human-scale experience than the more famous Getty Center in Brentwood and far less arduous to navigate. 

Click on Images to Enlarge

The Evil Genius, the Emperor, 1914

 

Henri Zislin (French, 1875–1958)

The Parents, 1922–1923

Käthe Kollwitz (German, 1867–1945)

The Ribbon of Victory, 1919

Louis Charles Bombled (French, 1862–1927)

Massacre, 1914–16

Henry de Groux (Belgian, 1867–1930)

The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, 1917

Ernst Ludwig Kirchner (German, 1880–1938)

Wilhelm's Carousel, 1914

Kazimir Malevich (Russian, 1878–1935)

I Have You, My Captain. You Won't Fall, 1917

Paul Iribe (French, 1883–1935)

Quiet Heroes, 1915

Waldemar Rösler (German, 1882–1916)

After the Execution, 1915

Paul Iribe, (French, 1883–1935)

After the Big Mine: The View from Hawthorn Ridge by John Masefield

Hawthorn Ridge Mine Detonates at 0720 hrs, 1 July 1916

Readers know that I love discovering personal connections (for friends, readers and myself) to the First World War.  So you can imagine how thrilled I was to discover I share a resume line with a one-time Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom.  Yes, the great writer, poet, and P.L. John Masefield and I both have written battlefield guides.  A frequent visitor to America, whose citizens were puzzled by the point of the great Dardanelles adventure, Masefield was somehow recruited to write a 314-page book titled  Gallipoli  explaining (and justifying) the failed campaign.  Such was his success that a year or so later he was asked to do something similar on the Battle of the Somme.  He terminated his work on this project when he discovered he would not be allowed to present the full details of what a blood-letting that struggle turned out to be.  He had, though, completed his description of the terrain and positions of the contending forces and published it at the end of 1917 as a 152-page book, The Old Front Line. [Both works are available at Project Gutenberg, by the way.] Below is an excerpt in which he beautifully describes how things looked from Hawthorn Ridge immediately after the mine detonation shown above.

By John Masefield

All that can be seen of it from the English line is a disarrangement of the enemy wire and parapet. It is a hole in the ground which cannot be seen except from quite close at hand. At first sight, on looking into it, it is difficult to believe that it was the work of man; it looks so like nature in her evil mood. It is hard to imagine that only three years ago that hill was cornfield, and the site of the chasm grew bread. After that happy time, the enemy bent his line there and made the salient a stronghold, and dug deep shelters for his men in the walls of his trenches; the marks of the dugouts are still plain in the sides of the pit. Then, on the 1st of July,  when the explosion was to be a signal for the attack, and our men waited in the trenches for the spring, the belly of the chalk was heaved, and chalk, clay, dugouts, gear, and enemy, went up in a dome of blackness full of pieces, and spread aloft like a toadstool, and floated, and fell down.

Find Hawthorn Ridge and Mine Site in Upper Left
Y-Ravine Is at the Top of the Gold Quadrilateral 

From the top of the Hawthorn Ridge, our soldiers could see a great expanse of chalk downland, though the falling of the hill kept them from seeing the enemy's position. That lay on the slope of the ridge, somewhere behind the wire, quite out of sight from our lines. Looking out from our front line at this salient, our men saw the enemy wire almost as a skyline. Beyond this line, the ground dipped towards Beaumont Hamel (which was quite out of sight in the valley) and rose again sharply in the steep bulk of Beaucourt spur. Beyond this lonely spur, the hills ranked and ran, like the masses of a moor, first the high ground above Miraumont, and beyond that the high ground of the Loupart Wood, and away to the east the bulk that makes the left bank of the Ancre River. What trees there are in this moorland were not then all blasted. Even in Beaumont Hamel some of the trees were green. The trees in the Ancre River Valley made all that  marshy meadow like a forest. Looking out on all this, the first thought of the soldier was that here he could really see something of the enemy's ground.

Location of Y Ravine and Newfoundland Memorial Park
from Hawthorn Ridge

It is true, that from this hill-top much land, then held by the enemy, could be seen, but very little that was vital to the enemy could be observed. His lines of supply and support ran in ravines which we could not see; his batteries lay beyond crests, his men were in hiding places. Just below us on the lower slopes of this Hawthorn Ridge he had one vast hiding place which gave us a great deal of trouble. This was a gully or ravine, about five hundred yards long, well within his position, running (roughly speaking) at right angles with his front line. Probably it was a steep and deep natural fold made steeper and deeper by years of cultivation. It is from thirty to forty feet deep, and about as much across at the top; it has abrupt sides, and thrusts out two forks to its southern side. These forks give it the look of a letter Y upon the maps, for which reason both the French and ourselves called the place the "Ravin en Y" or "Y Ravine." Part of the southernmost fork was slightly open to observation from our lines; the main bulk of the gully was invisible to us, except from the air.

A Surviving Section of Y Ravine

Whenever the enemy has had a bank of any kind, at all screened from fire, he has dug into it for shelter. In the Y Ravine, which provided these great expanses of banks, he dug himself shelters of unusual strength and size. He sank shafts into the banks, tunnelled long living rooms, both above and below the gully-bottom, linked the rooms together with galleries, and cut hatchways and bolting holes to lead to the surface as well as to the gully. All this work was securely done, with balks of seasoned wood, iron girders, and concreting. Much of it was destroyed by shell fire during the battle, but much not hit by shells is in good condition to-day even after the autumn rains and the spring thaw. The galleries which lead upwards and outwards from this underground barracks to the observation posts and machine-gun emplacements in the open air, are cunningly planned and solidly made. The posts and emplacements to which they led are now, however, (nearly all) utterly destroyed by our shell fire.

In this gully barracks, and in similar shelters cut in the chalk of the steeper banks near Beaumont Hamel, the enemy could hold ready large numbers of men to repel an attack or to make a counter-attack. They lived in these dugouts in comparative safety and in moderate comfort.  When our attacks came during the early months of the battle, they were able to pass rapidly and safely by these underground galleries from one part of the position to another, bringing their machine guns with them. However, the Ravine was presently taken and the galleries and underground shelters were cleared. In one underground room in that barracks, nearly fifty of the enemy were found lying dead in their bunks, all unwounded, and as though asleep. They had been killed by the concussion of the air following on the burst of a big shell at the entrance.

Road to Serre, Known as "Artillery Lane"

One other thing may be mentioned about this Hawthorn Ridge. It runs parallel with the next spur (the Beaucourt spur) immediately to the north of it, then in the enemy's hands. Just over the crest of this spur, out of sight from our lines, is a country road, well banked and screened, leading from Beaucourt to Serre. This road was known by our men as Artillery Lane, because it was used as a battery position by the enemy. The wrecks of several of his guns lie in the mud there still. From the crest in front of this road there is a view to the westward, so wonderful that those who see it realize at once that the enemy position on the Ridge, which, at a first glance, seems badly sited for  observation, is, really, well placed. From this crest, the Ridge-top, all our old front line, and nearly all the No Man's Land upon it, is exposed, and plainly to be seen. On a reasonably clear day, no man could leave our old line unseen from this crest. No artillery officer, correcting the fire of a battery, could ask for a better place from which to watch the bursts of his shells. This crest, in front of the lane of enemy guns, made it possible for the enemy batteries to drop shells upon our front line trenches before all the men were out of them at the instant of the great attack.

The old English line runs along the Hawthorn Ridge-top for some hundreds of yards, and then crosses a dip or valley, which is the broad, fanshaped, southern end of a fork of Y Ravine. A road runs, or ran, down this dip into the Y Ravine. It is not now recognisable as a road, but the steep banks at each side of it, and some bluish metalling in the shell holes, show that one once ran there. These banks are covered with hawthorn bushes. A remblai, also topped with hawthorn, lies a little to the north of this road.

51st Highland Division Clearing Y Ravine,
13 November 1916

From this lynchet, looking down the valley into the Y Ravine, the enemy position is saddle-shaped, low in the middle, where the Y Ravine  narrows, and rising to right and left to a good height. Chalk hills from their form often seem higher than they really are, especially in any kind of haze. Often they have mystery and nearly always beauty. For some reason, the lumping rolls of chalk hill rising up on each side of this valley have a menace and a horror about them. One sees little of the enemy position from the English line. It is now nothing but a track of black wire in front of some burnt and battered heapings of the ground, upon which the grass and the flowers have only now begun to push. At the beginning of the battle it must have been greener and fresher, for then the fire of hell had not come upon it; but even then, even in the summer day, that dent in the chalk leading to the Y Ravine must have seemed a threatening and forbidding place.

Source: The Old Front Line by John Masefield, Published December 1917; Wikimaps;  Wiki Commons