Two German marines, of the IX and XI Marine Artillery, watching in the dunes along the North Sea or Baltic Sea coast.
Lieb Vaterland magst ruhig seinDünenwache.XI and IX Matrosen ArtillerieDear fatherland, you want to be quietDunes guard.XI and IX sailors artillery
"It was, moreover, very clear that the Germans had early realized that the war was to be one calling for colossal supplies of munitions; supplies, indeed, upon such a stupendous scale as the world had never before dreamed of, and they also realized the vital necessity of heavy artillery. They began with an inferior field gun, and they never stopped to remedy this defect, but directed all their energies, from the first, to developing their heavy artillery."
Excerpt from the chapter 'Ammunition', in the memoir 1914 by Sir John French, Commander-in-Chief of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF), the British forces on the continent, from August 1914 to December 1915. Britain was not only short of ammunition, but also of field and heavy artillery. Both France and Germany responded much more quickly than Great Britain to the need of the war for guns, machine guns, and munitions. Sir John documents some of his exchanges with the War Office, dating them back to September 28, 1914, in which the War Office suggested he be more economical in his use of ammunition. The British shell shortage would lead to a coalition government in the spring of 1915.
1914 by John French, pp. 359, 360, copyright © 1919, by Houghton Mifflin Company, publisher: Houghton Mifflin Company, publication date: 1919
1915-02-09, 1915, February, artillery, shell shortage
