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The French birth rate, at roughly 20 per 1,000, was below that of Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy, and Belgium when the war began, and fell to half that rate during the war. This disturbing card reflects a real social concern.
Happy New Year 1915! Bonne année! The New Year shoots down the Old over Paris. 1914 is represented by a German Taube, the New Year is loosely based on a French Blériot.
England's Distress: Postcard map of England and Ireland with the restricted zone Germany proclaimed around the islands, showing the ships destroyed by submarine in the 12 months beginning February 1, 1917.
Tsar Nicholas II of Russia and his wife Tsaritsa Alexandra, a detail from a portrait of the Russian imperial family in 'An Ambassador's Memoirs' by Maurice Paléologue, the last French Ambassador to the Russian Court.
Reverse of Christmas Greetings, 1916, an original pencil sketch of German soldiers relaxing in their dugout. Message dated 1916-12-20, from Dein ? Otto. © John M. Shea
"This young boy, whose earliest years were marked by his father's absence, was shaped by the Great War in yet another, and very significant, way. He was a child of the "hollow years." Born in 1916, he would be one of only 313,000 French children to possess a birth certificate inscribed with the year of Verdun. As he grew up, he would discover that fewer children were in his classes than in all other classes, and later fewer conscripts in his military cohort than France had ever known. In fact, so few children were born in the middle years of the Great War that fears arose for the future: twenty years hence, when the boys born in 1916 and 1917 came of military age, would France be able, should the need arise, to field an army large enough to defend itself?" ((1), more)
"Bonne Annee = Happy New YearFrance Dec. 21st 16Dearest Rose,This is the P.C. I mentioned in letter of above date.Alf Cornish tells me he will be going to England on about the 28th inst. Good luck to him. Wish I could go but of course I hope the war ends long before my turn for leave comes round. 'England's old in story' etc but Aussy for me. Best love from yours as ever Walter" ((2), more)
"In October 1916 Holtzendorff launched the restricted submarine campaign according to prize rules, which has been overshadowed by later events but was not devoid of results. Sinking had already risen sharply in September to 172 ships, representing 231,573 tons. This was largely due to the entry into service of the larger and more potent UB.II boats of the Flanders Flotilla, which could now operate well beyond the Channel into the western approaches or as far south as the Gironde. The Allied losses grew higher: in October 185 ships, 341,363 tons; in November 180 ships, 326,689 tons; in December 197 ships, 307,847 tons, and in January 1917, 195 ships, 328,391 tons. The Germans lost during this period only 10 boats (3 in the unhealthy Black Sea), giving an exchange ratio of 65 ships sunk for every U-boat lost." ((3), more)
"The Union of Zemstvos and the Union of Towns, the great private associations which have worked so hard together since the war began to supply the army and the civil population, were to meet in congress at Moscow next week. The police have just forbidden that congress, though the two Unions represent all that is most sound, sincere and energetic in Russian Society! . . .A friend of mine, who has come from Moscow and called on me yesterday, told me that the public there is furious with the Empress. In drawing-rooms, shops and cafés, it is being openly said that the Niemka, the 'German Woman,' is about to ruin Russia and must be put away as a lunatic. As to the Emperor, men do not stop at remarking that he would do well to reflect on the fate of Paul I." ((4), more)
"December 24th.—A most untimely draft has arrived; it unbalances our numbers and our provision for the men's Christmas dinner. The new men are dismounted Yeomanry, the best physically we have had since Spring. The evidence that they had had a year's training was far to seek." ((5), more)
(1) 'This young boy' was Serge Pireaud, whose father was away fighting in the war with an artillery unit that spent much of 1916 at Verdun. Serge's parents, Paul and Marie Pireaud, had actively tried to get pregnant during one of Paul's leaves. His mother nursed Serge through a difficult infancy. The French birth rate, at roughly 20 per 1,000, was below that of Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy, and Belgium when the war began, and fell to half that rate during the war. Cf. citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.707.2458&rep=rep1&type=pdf.
Your Death Would Be Mine; Paul and Marie Pireaud in the Great War by Martha Hanna, page 174, copyright © 2006 by Martha Hanna, publisher: Harvard University Press, publication date: 2006
(2) New's Year's postcard from Walter to Rose, written December 21, 1916. We know nothing of Walter, Rose, or Alf Cornish, but it seems Walter only recently arrived in France, and looks forward to returning to Australia. The war would not be over before his leave, but would continue for nearly two more years.
Happy New Year by E.M, back, publisher: Etablissements photographique de Boulogne-sur-Seine., publication date: 1916
(3) Admiral Henning von Holtzendorff replaced Alfred Tirpitz as head of the German Admiralstab on September 6, 1916 in a dispute over the conduct of Germany's submarine campaign, expanding it, but not yet moving to the unrestricted submarine warfare of 1917. Flanders, on the English Channel, is a region of Belgium and northern France. Germany occupied nearly all of Belgium and nearly all of its coastline including the ports of Ostend and Zeebrugge. The German U-boats were less successful in the Black Sea. The Gironde Estuary on France's southwest Atlantic coast is formed by the meeting of the Dordogne and Garonne Rivers.
A Naval History of World War I by Paul G. Halpern, page 335, copyright © 1994 by the United States Naval Institute, publisher: UCL Press, publication date: 1994
(4) Excerpts from the memoirs of Maurice Paléologue, French Ambassador to Russia, for Saturday, December 23, 1916. The Union of Zemstvos and the Union of Towns, along with the Russian Duma, offered alternatives and challenges to the Autocrat Tsar Nicholas II whose German-born wife, Empress Alexandra, was widely believed to be sympathetic to Germany. Russian Tsar Paul I was assassinated in 1801.
An Ambassador's Memoirs Vol. III by Maurice Paléologue, page 121, publisher: George H. Doran Company
(5) The entry for December 24, 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 near Bray, in the Somme sector. The Yeomanry were light cavalry, historically a volunteer force.
The War the Infantry Knew 1914-1919 by Captain J.C. Dunn, pp. 286–287, copyright © The Royal Welch Fusiliers 1987, publisher: Abacus (Little, Brown and Company, UK), publication date: 1994
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