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I've killed many Germans, but never women or children. Original French watercolor by John on blank field postcard. In the background are indolent Russian soldiers and Vladimir Lenin, in the foreground stands what may be a Romanian soldier who is telling the Russians, 'You call me savage. I killed a lot of Boches [Germans], but never women or children!'
German postcard map of the Western Front in Flanders, looking south and including Lille, Arras, Calais, and Ostend. In the Battle of the Yser in October, 1914, the Belgian Army held the territory south of the Yser Canal, visible between Nieuport, Dixmude, and Ypres (Ypern). Further north is Passchendaele, which British forces took at great cost in 1917.
Postwar postcard map of the Balkans including Albania, newly-created Yugoslavia, expanded Romania, and diminished former Central Powers Bulgaria and Turkey. The first acquisitions of Greece in its war against Turkey are seen in Europe where it advanced almost to Constantinople, in the Aegean Islands from Samos to Rhodes, and on the Turkish mainland from its base in Smyrna. The Greco-Turkish war was fought from May 1919 to 1922. The positions shown held from the war's beginning to the summer of 1920 when Greece advanced eastward. Newly independent Hungary and Ukraine appear in the northwest and northeast.
Parted red curtains; in the center, in a trench, a German soldier, eyes closed, hands in overcoat pockets, leans against one side of a trench, smoking a pipe, his rifle resting on the other side of the trench. To the right, a Red soldier, red from red fur hat to red boots, holds two rifles. To the left, a Russian soldier casts away his his hat, backpack, and rifle. Across the bottom of the stage it reads, 1918. Operett: "Trockij", Operetta Trotsky. A watercolor postcard by Schima Martos.
Austro-Hungarian trench art pencil drawing on pink paper of a soldier in a ragged, many-times-patched uniform, labeled 'Bilder ohne Worte' (No Comment, or Picture without Words). Kaiser Karl who succeeded Emperor Franz Joseph is on reverse. The printed text on the reverse is in Hungarian and German.
"The last hope of coming to an understanding with Petersburg has vanished. An appeal from the Petersburg government to the German soldiers has been discovered in Berlin, inciting them to revolt, to murder the Kaiser and their generals, and unite with the soviets. Following on this came a telegram from Kaiser Wilhelm to Kühlmann ordering him to terminate negotiations at once by demanding, besides Courland and Lithuania, also the unoccupied territories of Livonia and Esthonia—all without regard to the right of self-determination of the peoples concerned.The dastardly behavior of these Bolsheviks renders negotiations impossible." ((1), more)
"February 8th [1918].—Drizzle. At Estaires: the front is 5 miles away, points of defence are being dug 5 miles in rear of the town. I looked up the Ambulance Mess of August 1915 in the wine merchant's house, and my billet above the bonnet shop. Everyone not already gone is preparing for an ordered flight, and bearing up bravely. The cutting down of trees is a greater sorrow to the old woman of a little stationery shop; her look when some limbers rattle past loaded with the trunks of elms, and the tone in which she said, 'There will soon be no trees left in Le Nord,' gave an unforgettable touch of poignancy to an impression of overhanging doom." ((2), more)
"Whereas the Ukrainian People has, in the course of the present world war, declared its independence, and has expressed the desire to establish a state of peace between the Ukrainian People's Republic and the Powers at present at war with Russia, the Governments of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey have resolved to conclude a Treaty of Peace with the Government of the Ukrainian People's Republic; they wish in this way to take the first step towards a lasting world peace, honourable for all parties, which shall not only put an end to the horrors of the war but shall also conduce to the restoration of friendly relations between the people in the political, legal, economic and intellectual spheres." ((3), more)
"We are removing our armies and our people from the war. Our peasant soldiers must return to their land to cultivate in peace the fields which the Revolution has taken from the landlord and given to the peasants. Our workmen soldiers must return to the workshops and produce, not for destruction but for creation. They must, together with the peasants, create a Socialist State.We are going out of the war. We inform all peoples and their Governments of this fact. We are giving the order for a general demobilization of all our armies opposed at the present to the troops of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Turkey, and Bulgaria. We are waiting in the strong belief that other peoples will soon follow our example." ((4), more)
"'I learn from a reliable source that France has issued the following notifications: We were already quite disposed to enter into discussion with Austria. Now we are asking ourselves whether Austria is still sound enough for the part it was intended to give her. One is afraid of basing an entire policy upon a state which is, perhaps, already threatened with the fate of Russia.' And Skrzynski adds: 'During the last few days I have heard as follows: It has been decided to wait for a while.'" ((5), more)
(1) Excerpt from the entry for February 7, 1918 by Count Ottokar Czernin in his In the World War. As Minister of Foreign Affairs, Czernin headed the Austro-Hungarian delegation to the Brest-Litovsk peace conference between Russia and the Central Powers. The negotiations came to a standstill over the German High Command's refusal to evacuate territory seized in the war, while claiming to believe in the right of self-determination of the peoples of that territory, while the Russians argued for self-determination for these same people while declaring this could not occur under occupation. Hoping for international revolution, hopes encouraged by hundreds of thousands of workers who had gone on strike in both Austria-Hungary and Germany in January, the Bolsheviks played for time. In calling for murder and revolt after weeks of prolonging the stalemate, the Russians had pressed German military commanders beyond their limits.
In the World War by Count Ottokar Czernin, page 277, copyright © 1920, by Harper & Brothers, publisher: Harper and Brothers, publication date: 1920
(2) Excerpt from the entry for February 8, 1918 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. With Russia negotiating a separate peace with the Central Powers in Brest-Litovsk, the Allies expect a massive German offensive on the Western Front bolstered by soldiers redeployed from the east. Estaires, France, is about 80 km southeast of Calais, 30 km south-southwest of Ypres.
The War the Infantry Knew 1914-1919 by Captain J.C. Dunn, page 443, copyright © The Royal Welch Fusiliers 1987, publisher: Abacus (Little, Brown and Company, UK), publication date: 1994
(3) Preamble to the Treaty of Peace between Ukraine and the Central Powers signed at Brest-Litovsk, February 9, 1918. Claiming to believe in the right of self-determination of peoples, Leon Trotsky, leading the Russian delegation to the peace negotiations at Brest-Litovsk, opened the door for an independent Ukrainian delegation. Struggling to reach a peace agreement with the Russians and desperate for food Ukraine could provide, the Germans and Austro-Hungarians reached an agreement with the Ukrainians. In the preceding days, the Red Army had taken the Ukrainian capital of Kiev, and then lost it.
Brest-Litovsk: The Forgotten Peace; March 1918 by John W. Wheeler-Bennett by John W. Wheeler-Bennett, page 392, publisher: The Norton Library, publication date: 1971, first published 193
(4) Excerpt from the February 10, 1918 speech by Leon Trotsky to the Central Power delegates at the Brest-Litovsk peace negotiations. Both the Russians and German civilian representatives claimed to believe in the right of self-determination of the peoples of occupied territory, but the German High Command refused to evacuate. Trotsky considered such self-determination none at all, and would not sign a 'peace of annexation.' His formula was to have the Russians leave the war, with no peace in place, thinking there was a good chance the Germans would not resume the war. In this he was mistaken.
Brest-Litovsk: The Forgotten Peace; March 1918 by John W. Wheeler-Bennett by John W. Wheeler-Bennett, page 226, publisher: The Norton Library, publication date: 1971, first published 193
(5) Excerpt from the entry for February 11, 1918 by Count Ottokar Czernin in his In the World War. As Minister of Foreign Affairs, Czernin headed the Austro-Hungarian delegation to the Brest-Litovsk peace conference between Russia and the Central Powers. Hundreds of thousands of workers in Austria-Hungary and then Germany went on strike in January, 1918 as hunger and war-weariness bit. With the German military refusing to evacuate occupied territory, and anticipating revolutionary activity across war-weary Europe, Russian representative Leon Trotsky had played for time through the month. On the verge of despair, Czernin recognized his country was on the verge of collapse.
In the World War by Count Ottokar Czernin, page 279, copyright © 1920, by Harper & Brothers, publisher: Harper and Brothers, publication date: 1920
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