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Y Ravine Cemetery, Beaumont-Hamel, France. © 2013 John M. Shea
Greetings from Austro-Hungarian Landsturm Battalion 171. A pencil sketch of the sun rising between mountains and over a forested hill, dated October 14, 1916, postmarked two days later. In the center an oak-leaf crown of victory above the Hapsburg flag encircles the battalion identifier. The year before the drawing, the battalion had been in the Sugana Valley (Valsugana), Trentino, in the Alps.
'December snow.' Hand-painted watercolor calendar for December 1917 by Schima Martos. Particulates from a smoking kerosene lamp overspread the days of December, and are labeled 'December höra,' 'December snow.' The first five days or nights of the month show a couple at, sitting down to, or rising from a lamp-lit table. The rest of the month the nights are dark, other than four in which the quarter of the moon shows through a window, or Christmas, when the couple stands in the light of a Christmas tree.
Italian troops marching into the mountains where Italy fought much of its war against Austria-Hungary. A poster postcard encouraging the purchase of war bonds yielding 5.55%.
An artillery crew dragging and pushing a field howitzer forward. From a painting by Anton Hoffmann. On the back is a message dated January 6, 1916. The card was postmarked the next day.
"Recollection paints these autumn weeks in the Beaumont Hamel sector as a tranquil time. Naturally, there at the edge of the Thiepval inferno, there were ungentle interludes. One night in particular the front line was stubbornly pounded with minenwerfers (it was a 'minnywafer' sector, and one often turned cold in the firetrench as one heard the approaching swish of these monsters). As we had little or no wire in front, and as the line now lay exposed and helpless, Harrison anticipated a German raid, and Cassells and I lay most of the night waiting for it in the new shell-holes, with a set of the trustiest soldiers, fingering bombs in a contemplative fashion. . . ." ((1), more)
". . . on Saturday of the following week (October 14) the Allies attacked again. It was a ghastly shambles. Meeting uncut wire, the French and Russians came to a halt and, as they tried to hack their way through, the Bulgarian machine guns opened up on them. In one afternoon the French lost nearly 1,500 men and the Russians 600. And still the Bulgarian lines remained inviolate. On the extreme right of the valley, the burning village of Brod showed that the Serbs, at any rate, had fulfilled their mission." ((2), more)
"Theodor Wolff, editor of the Berliner Tageblatt, also noted the mounting misery. In October 1916, 371 smugglers and profiteers including 126 fruit and vegetable sellers were arrested in Berlin. Special 'profiteering courts' (Wuchergerichte) handled up to 4000 cases per month." ((3), more)
"October 14th.—Rossignol Wood is off. Things are not going well farther south. At a divisional lecture on 'Tanks and their October 16th.—Tactical Use,' we were told that the Rossignol Wood affair was just to have been a feint: as things are Fritz is having to shorten his line." ((4), more)
"'The food problem,' [Trepov] said, 'has certainly become very worrying; but the opposition parties misuse it to attack the government. I'll tell you frankly what the position is. In the first place, the crisis is far from being general; it attains serious proportions only in the towns and certain rural areas. But it is true that the public is nervous in certain cities, Moscow for example. On the other hand, there is no shortage of food, except certain products which we used to import from abroad. But the means of transport are inadequate and the method of distribution is defective. . . .''There is now a deadlock on the Russian front, from one end to the other,' [Wrangel] said. 'You must not expect any further offensive on our side. In any case we're helpless against the Germans; we shall never beat them.'" ((5), more)
(1) Excerpt from Edmund Blunden, English writer, recipient of the Military Cross, second lieutenant and adjutant in the Royal Sussex Regiment, writing of autumn, 1916, while in the Battle of the Somme. Hamel had seen the ruin of the Newfoundland Regiment on July 1, the first day of the Battle. Thiepval Ridge is the site of the Memorial to the Missing of the Somme, engraved with 60,000 names, and was taken by the British in September and October, 1916. The Minenwerfer was an accurate, high-trajectory mortar with a range of about 1,000 yards.
Undertones of War by Edmund Blunden, pp. 107–108, copyright © the Estate of Edmund Blunden, 1928, publisher: Penguin Books, publication date: November 1928
(2) The Allies attacked on the Salonica Front in September and October, 1916 in attempts to aid Romania which was falling back before Central Power armies. The Allied army, commanded by French General Maurice Sarrail, included French, British, Russian, and Serbian troops. The offensive would not save Romania.
The Gardeners of Salonika by Alan Palmer, page 86, copyright © 1965 by A. W. Palmer, publisher: Simon and Schuster, publication date: 1965
(3) Food shortages were an increasing problem in Germany and Austria-Hungary as 1916 went on, and ration cards were required. Holger Herwig, author of today's quotation, notes that cheese had disappeared in November, 1915. In the summer of 1916 a weekly ration included two eggs, two pounds of bread, and 1/16th of a pound of butter.
The First World War: Germany and Austria Hungary 1914-1918 by Holger H. Herwig, page 291, copyright © 1997 Holger H. Herwig, publisher: Arnold, publication date: 1997
(4) Entries for October 14 and 16, 1916 from the writings — diaries, letters, and memoirs — of Captain J.C. Dunn, Medical Officer of the Second Battalion His Majesty's Twenty-Third Foot, the Royal Welch Fusiliers, and fellow soldiers who served with him. The Battalion was then serving in the Somme sector. Rossignol Wood is north of Thiepval where the fighting was very heavy in September and October.
The War the Infantry Knew 1914-1919 by Captain J.C. Dunn, pp. 263–264, copyright © The Royal Welch Fusiliers 1987, publisher: Abacus (Little, Brown and Company, UK), publication date: 1994
(5) Excerpts from the diary entry for October 17, 1916 of Maurice Paléologue, French Ambassador to Russia, host of a farewell dinner for Japanese Ambassador Viscount Motono who had been appointed Japan's Minister of Foreign Affairs earlier in the month. The first speaker is Russian Minister of Communications Trepov; the second General Wrangel, aide-de-camp to Grand Duke Michael, the brother of Tsar Nicholas II. Throughout the war Russian forces were frequently successful against both Austria-Hungary and Turkey, but not against Germany.
An Ambassador's Memoirs Vol. III by Maurice Paléologue, pp. 59, 60, publisher: George H. Doran Company
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