An embossed postcard of southern South America showing the Republics of Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay, southern Paraguay and Brazil, Cape Horn, and the Falkland Islands, a British territory claimed by Argentina as Islas Malvinas and the site of the Battle of the Falkland Islands on December 8, 1914.
Image text: Rep. ArgentinaCabo de HornosIslas MalvinasRep. ArgentinaCape HornMalvinas Islands / Falkland Islands
A Swiss postcard of 'The European War' in 1914. The Central Powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary face enemies to the east, west, and south. Germany is fighting the war it tried to avoid, battling Russia to the east and France to the west. Germany had also hoped to avoid fighting England which came to the aid of neutral (and prostrate) Belgium, and straddles the Channel. Austria-Hungary also fights on two fronts, against Russia to the east and Serbia and Montenegro to the south. Italy, the third member of the Triple Alliance with Germany and Austria-Hungary, declared neutrality, and looks on. Other neutral nations include Spain, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland, Romania, Bulgaria, and Albania. Japan enters from the east to battle Germany. The German Fleet stays close to port in the North and Baltic Seas while a German Zeppelin targets England. The Austro-Hungarian Fleet keeps watch in the Adriatic. Turkey is not represented, and entered the war at the end of October, 1914; Italy in late May, 1915.
Image text: Der Europäische KriegThe European WarReverse:Kriegskarte No. 61. Verlag K. Essig, BaselKunstanstalt (Art Institute) Frobenius A.G. Basel
A woman munitions worker carrying a shell apparently drops another one on the foot of a frightened man who clearly does not realize, as she does, that they are not in danger. No doubt his foot hurt.
Image text: La Femme et la Guerre.Leroy - Aux munitions.Women and the WarTo the munitions.Signed: FFLeroy?Reverse:No. 139 - P, J. Gallais et Cie, éditeurs, 38, Rue Vignon.Paris, Visé no. 139.No. 139 - P, J. Gallais and Company, publishers, 38 Rue Vignon.
Map of Syria, Palestine, Turkey, and Mesopotamia from the Baedeker 1912 travel guide Palestine and Syria with Routes through Mesopotamia and Babylonia and with the Island of Cyprus.
Image text:
"It must have been a very pretty picture. A blue cloudless sky, the atmosphere extraordinarily clear, the two battlecruisers forcing their way through a calm sea, white water boiling in their wakes, masses of black oily smoke from their funnels, against which the many white ensigns showed up in striking contrast. Ever and anon the roar from the forward turret guns and heaving masses of chocolate-coloured cordite smoke tumbling over the bows, a long wait, and tall white splashes growing out of the sea behind the distant enemy.""We got about fifty onboard. We were busy getting out clothes, etc for them, and by dinnertime we had several in the mess. Most of them could not sleep that first night, the scenes in their ships were so terrible. To see one's best friend rush on deck, one huge wound covered with blood, and just have time to send his love home, is terrible. But we were all good friends after the fight, and agreed that we did not want to fight at all, but had to. Over 2,000 of them must have been killed or drowned, but they fought magnificently, and their discipline must have been superb." ((1), more)
"By the end of 1915, with no sign of the promised breakthrough, morale was beginning to flag. 'It's maddening the way people think,' commented Alfred Joubert (124th Infantry) on 8 December. They've gone off the idea of war and many talk about surrendering. . . . Happily they don't suit action to the word.' Meanwhile Sous-lieutenant Pierre Masson (261st Infantry) wrote with considerable prescience: 'an immense weariness seems to be weighing on everyone and neither side can feel triumphant. We wondered if perhaps we were heading for a worse catastrophe: one of morale.'" ((2), more)
"England is very proud of the pluck, endurance, and determination of her munition girls—The twenty-six women who were killed and the thirty wounded in that explosion in a North of England factory on Tuesday night had, like thousands of other munitions workers, faced the possibility of that fate hourly, and probably faced it with jest. Yet knowing that, and realising their kinship with the men who keep their souls unshaken in the trenches, we may marvel at the courage, and above all at the perfect discipline, which after the disaster kept the other girls in the factory imperturbably at their work." ((3), more)
"On the morning of December 8th [1917] large numbers of the inhabitants, with the remaining religious chiefs, were personally warned by the police to be ready to leave at once. The extent to which the Turks were prepared to clear the city is shown by the fact that out of the Armenian community of 1,400 souls 300 received this notice. The tyrannical Djemal Pasha, when warned that vehicles were unavailable for the transport of the unhappy exiles to Shechem or Jericho, telegraphed curtly that they and theirs must walk. The fate of countless Armenians and many Greeks has shown that a population of all ages suddenly turned out to walk indefinite distances under Turkish escort is exposed to outrage and hardship which prove fatal to most of them; but the delay in telegraphing had saved the population, and the sun had risen for the last time on the Ottoman domination of Jerusalem, and the Turks' power to destroy faded with the day." ((4), more)
(1) Two statements from officers of the British battlecruiser Inflexible, the first by the Gunnery Officer, describing the Battle of the Falkland Islands. In the summer of 1914, German Vice-Admiral von Spee's East Asiatic Squadron, had sailed from Tsingtao, China, and made its way across the Pacific Ocean. On November 1, it defeated a British squadron off the coast of Chile in the Battle of Coronel. By December, nearly 30 British warships were searching for von Spee. On December 8, 1914, the German squadron approached the Falkland Islands off the southeast coast of Argentina. Several of the ships in the British squadron were coaling, and the British were fortunate not to be taken at anchor. Under the command of Vice-Admiral Sir Doveton Sturdee, the British squadron included Inflexible, Invincible, Canopus, and Glasgow, and outmatched the German ships. Between 4:00 PM and 9:30 PM, four of the five German ships and two colliers were sunk. Only Dresden escaped.
Naval Battles of the First World War by Geoffrey Bennett, pp. 102, 105, copyright © Geoffrey Bennett 1968, 1974, publisher: Pan Books, publication date: 1983
(2) And after sixteen months of war, German troops still held nearly all of Belgium and a large swath of northern France, including its industrial heartland. French commander Joseph Joffre's spring and autumn offensives had ended with little gain. Nor had France's allies fared well: A combined German and Austro-Hungarian offensive had driven the Russians from Polish Russia, and Italy's May entry into the war had failed to deliver on its promise and had not dislodged Austria-Hungary from any significant territory. In contrast Bulgaria's casting off of neutrality had assured the swift defeat of France's ally Serbia. The Franco-British invasion at Gallipoli was ending in defeat and evacuation. In both the home front and the trenches, there were French who believed a negotiated settlement was needed.
They Shall Not Pass: The French Army on the Western Front 1914-1918 by Ian Sumner, pp. 94, 95, copyright © Ian Sumner 2012, publisher: Pen and Sword, publication date: 2012
(3) Excerpt from the Manchester Guardian, December 8, 1916 referring to the explosion on the 5th at the Barnbow Munitions Factory near Leeds. As many as 35 women and 3 men were killed in the explosion. At its peak, the factory employed 16,000 women and 1,000 men. The women were sometimes called 'Barnbow Canaries,' because some of the chemicals they worked with turned skin and hair yellow.
The Virago Book of Women and the Great War by Joyce Marlow, Editor, pp. 171–172, copyright © Joyce Marlow 1998, publisher: Virago Press, publication date: 1999
(4) Excerpt from the account of 'an eye-witness within Jerusalem' of events in the city on December 8, 1917. After capturing the city of Gaza on November 6, in their third attempt, British forces had steadily progressed north through Palestine. During the war, Greeks and other ethnic and religious minorities of the Ottoman Empire had been roughly treated by government forces, but not with the genocidal frenzy unleashed on Turkish Armenians. Forced marches into hostile populations and the dessert were one of the government tools of genocide. The triumvirate of War Minister Enver Pasha, Minister of the Interior Mehmed Talaat, and Naval Minister Ahmed Djemal Pasha ruled Turkey and the Empire throughout the war. Talaat was the most implacable against the Armenians.
The Great Events of the Great War in Seven Volumes by Charles F. Horne, Vol. V, 1917, pp. 405–406, copyright © 1920 by The National Alumnia, publisher: The National Alumni, publication date: 1920
