Kaiser Franz Joseph of Austria-Hungary starts in dismay at the approach of an Italian Army. Italy declared war on Austria-Hungary on May 23, 1915. The agreement the Emperor refers to was the Triple Alliance between Austria-Hungary, Germany, and Italy.
Image text: Ma i nostri patti giovanni perdio!!!But our agreement for God's sake, John!!!Reverse:Logo: CCM
French soldier standing next to an unexploded 420mm shell that fell on Verdun. March, 1916. It weighed 2,100 pounds empty.
Image text: Musée de L'ArméeObus de 420 tombé dans un coin des fossés de VerdunVerdun, Mars 1916Pois: 956 kilogr. vide420 shell fallen into a corner of the Verdun trenchesVerdun, March 1916Weight: 2,107 pounds emptyLogo: ELD
From a series on the Great War, a 1916 map on the the Sixth Battle of the Isonzo, Italian commander Luigi Cadorna's offensive in August of the same year. The Italians crossed much of the Isonzo, and took Gorizia. The Austro-Hungarians continued to hold high ground to the east. © The Great War
Image text: Map labels include:River Isonzo, Gorizia, Doberdo Plateau, Carso Plateau, Gradisca, Monfalcone, Gulf of PanzanoText:Area of General Cadorna's successful operations against Gorizia, August 1916. The Isonzo Valley forms the eastern line for the defense of Italy, and its possession was essential to the realization of Italian ideals. Gorizia, its main strategic position, was captured on August 9th, 1916, by the Italians, who thus secured possession of the key to Trieste.
Advertising postcard map of European Russia, with inset images of a mounted Cossack lancer, a troika, and St. Petersburg.
Image text: Text in French and Dutch:Il n'est pas de meilleur Amidon que l'Amidon REMY, Fabrique de Riz Pur.Er bestaat geenen beteren Stijfsel dan den Stijfsel REMY, Vervaardigd met Zuiveren Rijst.There is no better starch than Remy Starch, made of pure rice.Reverse:Demandez L'Amidon REMY en paquets de 1, 1/2 et 1/4 kg.Vraagt het stijfsel REMY in pakken van 1, 1/2 et 1/4 ko.Ask for REMY Starch in packages of 1, 1/2, and 1/4 kg.
"With unexampled treachery and greed the King of Italy has forgotten the fraternal obligations which were binding on him as an ally of our Monarchy. From the outbreak of the war, when he should have stood at the side of our brave armies, the treacherous king played the role of a masked trickster, acting with duplicity and all along maintaining secret contacts with our enemies. This treachery culminated on the night of 22/3 May in his declaration of war on our Monarchy. Our supreme commander is convinced that our ever valiant and glorious armies will answer this contemptible treachery of a faithless enemy with such a blow that the traitor will come to recognize that by starting war against us in this shameless and treacherous fashion he has encompassed his own destruction. We firmly believe that with the help of God the day will soon dawn when the plains of Italy will see once more the victors of Santa Lucia, Vicenza, Novarra and Custozza. We want to win, we must win and win we certainly shall!" ((1), more)
"Letter of an eyewitness: Verdun is impossible to describe. It is about 7 or 8 kilometers from here to Douaumont. Not a trench, not a communications trench, nothing but shell holes one inside another. There is not one piece of ground that is not turned up. To see what has been done here one could not imagine all the shells of all calibers that have been used. The holes made by the 300[-millimeter shells] could hold fifteen horses. There are no more woods. Shattered trees resemble telegraph poles. It is complete devastation. Not one square of land has been spared. One would have to come here to understand it. One cannot imagine such a thing.Everything has been brought together on this part of the front. The cannon are mouth to mouth and never cease firing there is not one second when the cannon cease. There are no attacks right now but still there are losses. Shells fall and mow down everyone and everything without pity.One can only go out at night to work this land that has been churned up a hundred times. The cadavers of swollen horses infect this immense battlefield. We make a trench, a shell lands, everything has to start over again if one is among the survivors. Attacks become impossible. When a troops wants to go out the artillery aim at it. There are too many guns everywhere. For as long as they are here both advance and retreat are impossible.You can be sure that Verdun will not be taken. Here it is extermination on the ground without seeing the enemy. Soon we will be relieved. I wonder how I am still standing after all of this one is completely numb.Men look at one another with wild eyes. It takes a real effort to hold a conversation." ((2), more)
"On the 23rd [May], the Third Army batteries belatedly opened the second phase of the battle. Although still lacking those 200 extra guns, the shelling was fiercer than anything before on the Carso. Supported from the air and by floating batteries at the mouth of the Isonzo, the infantry's surprise attacks on the 24th and 25th widened the salient, rolling over three Austrian lines to capture a band of territory two kilometres deep from the central Carso to the sea. The Austrians melted away in front of the Italian right. Habsburg prisoners reported a crisis of morale, yet the Austrians did not buckle." ((3), more)
"On May 23 [1918] the British War Cabinet had taken a decision to dispatch a 560-strong military mission to the port of Archangel, and a further six hundred men to Murmansk, to guard the British military stores there, that had earlier been sent through the Arctic as Britain's military contribution to the Russian army. The British also offered to train the hundreds of thousands of anti-Bolshevik Russians to defend themselves against any future Bolshevik assault. Three days later, in Siberia, 60,000 Czech troops, who had made their way through Siberia to the Far East of Russia after the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk had liberated all Austrian prisoners-of-war, turned actively against the Bolsheviks." ((4), more)
(1) Excerpt from Jaroslav Hašek's novel The Good Soldier Švejk. Švejk (or Schweik) was a foot soldier in an Austro-Hungarian Czech battalion on its way to the Russian front lines when his battalion learned that Italy had declared war on Austria-Hungary. The men are assembled, and their captain, 'in an unusually exalted voice,' reads them the order above. The speaker is Austro-Hungarian Emperor Franz Joseph, who is affronted not only by Italy, but by Italian King Victor Emmanuel. With Austria-Hungary and Germany, Italy was a member of the Triple Alliance, but had declared neutrality at the beginning of the war. The battles the Emperor refers to were Austrian victories over the Italians in the First Italian War of Independence in 1848.
The Good Soldier Švejk by Jaroslav Hašek, pp. 512, 513, copyright © Cecil Parrott, 1973 (translation), publisher: Penguin
(2) Letter from French Artilleryman Paul Pireaud to his wife Marie, May 23, 1916. Pireaud's unit, the 112th Heavy Artillery Regiment, moved into the Verdun sector in early April. French commander Pétain rotated infantry units roughly weekly, but it was much more difficult to do so with the artillery.
Your Death Would Be Mine; Paul and Marie Pireaud in the Great War by Martha Hanna, page 78, copyright © 2006 by Martha Hanna, publisher: Harvard University Press, publication date: 2006
(3) Italian commander in chief Luigi Cadorna's Tenth Battle of the Isonzo began with more artillery than he had been able to muster in any of his 1915 and 1916 offensives. It was still not enough. He had launched his offensive on May 12, 1917, and within two days it showed all signs of being another failure. With their Russian front quiet after the February Revolution, the Austrians had transferred reinforcements to the west. The defenders held the high ground, such as the Carso Plateau, and the Italians attacked, as they had for two years, an enemy oftentimes above them, oftentimes well entrenched.
The White War: Life and Death on the Italian Front, 1915-1919 by Mark Thompson, page 253, copyright © 2008 Mark Thompson, publisher: Basic Books, publication date: 2009
(4) Russia's inadequate railways resulted in many of the supplies France and Britain sent to support the Russian Empire's war effort never making it from their ports of entry on the Arctic Ocean and White Sea in northern Russia. With control of the railways, the Bolsheviks controlled the supplies. Britain, France, and the United States would send additional troops in an ultimately failed attempt to overthrow the Bolshevik government. The Czech Legion was prepared to fight for independence from Austria-Hungary, but had to cross Russia to the Pacific port of Vladivostok. In the course of their journey, the Bolsheviks tried to ensure the Czechs were not a military force that could turn on the Revolution and began to disarm them. The Czechs eventually resisted.
The First World War, a Complete History by Martin Gilbert, page 425, copyright © 1994 by Martin Gilbert, publisher: Henry Holt and Company, publication date: 1994
