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.
Bilder ohne WorteNo Comment
"The next day the Austro-Hungarians brought up reserves to expand their bridgehead over the Piave and to take Papadopli island in the centre of the river. Day after day the battle raged, and the fierce Italian defence steadily destroyed the Habsburg army. Throughout the battle the Italian air force had command of the sky and strafed the desperate soldiers below. On 22 June Boroević decided his troops were incapable of any further offensive and started to withdraw them to defensive positions on the east bank of the river. The island of Papadopli was held to cover the retreat."
The Second Battle of the Piave was launched by the Austro-Hungarians on June 15, 1918 along a front from the Asiago Plateau to the Adriatic Sea. General Franz Conrad von Hötzendorf commanded the northern mountainous sector. With support from French and British troops, particularly artillery, the Italians stopped Conrad's offensive after two days, allowing them to transfer reinforcements to the southern Piave River sector where the battle still raged, the Austro-Hungarians there under the command of Field Marshal Svetozar Boroević.
Caporetto and the Isonzo Campaign: The Italian Front 1915–1918 by John MacDonald with Željko Cimprić, page 181, copyright © John MacDonald, 2011, 2015, publisher: Pen and Sword Books, publication date: 2011
1918-06-22, 1918, June, Battle of the Piave, Piave, Italian Front, Bilder ohne Worte
