Beefy German Landsturm — national or territorial guard — laugh at the notion that Great Britain's blockade would starve them or their country.
Wat, uns will England aushungern?What, England wants to starve us?Reverse:Message 1915-07-26, and postmark: Berlin, 1915-07-27 to Montevideo, Uruguay
". . . sergeants rule by sarcasm. Never can there have been an Army without its Falstaffs and its Pistols. During the War some were hit, many were 'invalided with rheumatism,' others were sent to jobs by a tactful C.O. Some breathed life enough into their men in buckram to get away with a decoration, and some did earn one; not a few got promotion, which might be repeated, at home or in some eddy overseas."
Extract from the entry for August 19, 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, then serving in the Somme sector. Falstaff and Pistol are characters in Shakespeare's Henry IV, Parts I and II, The Merry Wives of Windsor, and Henry V, Falstaff in the first three, Pistol in the latter. Drunken, lecherous, boisterous friends of Prince Hal, they are banished from his company when he assumes the throne as King Henry V.
The War the Infantry Knew 1914-1919 by Captain J.C. Dunn, page 252, copyright © The Royal Welch Fusiliers 1987, publisher: Abacus (Little, Brown and Company, UK), publication date: 1994
1916-08-19, 1916, August, Falstaff, Pistol, Landsturm, merry Landsturm
