Propaganda postcard of General Paul von Hindenburg as Colossus astride East Prussia and Russian Poland. Hindenburg commanded German forces in East Prussia.
Image text: Nur über meine Leiche geht Dein Weg 'Koloss'Your way goes only over my corpse — 'Colossus'Reverse:Künstler-Karte; logo: CAES DresdenCarl A. E. Schmidt, Künstverlags-Anstalt, DresdenUnser Hindenburg
To the Dardanelles! The Entente Allies successfully capture their objective and plant their flags in this boy's 1915 war game, as they did not in life, neither in the naval campaign, nor in the invasion of the Gallipoli peninsula.
Image text: Aux Dardanelles; Victoire; Vive les AlliésLogo and number: ACA 2131Reverse:Artige - Fabricant 16, Faub. St. Denis Paris Visé Paris N. au verso. Fabrication Française - Marque A.C.A
Zeppelin Kommt! Children play a Zeppelin raid on London. Holding his bomb in the gondola is a doll of the airship's inventor, Count Zeppelin. The other children, playing the English, cower, and the British fleet — folded paper boats — remains in port. Prewar postcards celebrated the imposing airships and the excitement they generated with the same expression, 'Zeppelin Kommt!'. Postcard by P.O. Engelhard (P.O.E.). The message on the reverse is dated May 28, 1915.
Image text: P.O.E.? EnglandLondonZeppelin Kommt!Reverse:Message dated May 28, 1915Stamped: Geprüft und zu befördern (Approved and forwarded) 9 Komp. Bay. L.I.N. 5
1918 German pen and ink drawing of the road to Cambrai, France. Two smaller trees seem to serve as the good and bad thief on either side of the crucified Jesus Christ.
Image text: Strasse nach CambraiEKIECBJR?
"Army Order at the Eastern Front, November 27, 1914, by Field-Marshal von HindenburgIn the course of severe fighting lasting several days my troops have brought to a standstill the offensive of a numerically superior Russian Army.I am proud at having reached the highest military rank at the head of such troops. Your fighting spirit and perseverance have in a marvelous manner inflicted the greatest losses on the enemy. Over 60,000 prisoners, 150 guns, and about 200 machine guns have fallen into our hands, but the enemy is not yet annihilated. Therefore, forward with God, for King and Fatherland, till the last Russian lies beaten at our feet. Hurrah!" ((1), more)
". . . no one—and certainly not the meteorologists who had been saying that November was the best month of the year—could have anticipated the horror and severity of the blizzard that swept down on the Dardanelles on November 27 [1915]. Nothing like it had been known there for forty years.For the first twenty-four hours rain poured down and violent thunderstorms raged over the peninsula. Then, as the wind veered round to the north and rose to hurricane force there followed two days of snow and icy sleet. After this there were two nights of frost." ((2), more)
"I flew toward the Zepp and flew at right angles to and underneath him amidships, firing as I went under. I then turned sharply east, the Zepp turning east also. We then flew on a parallel course for about five miles and I fired 71 rounds at the Zepp. I estimated his ground speed to be approximately 70 mph. I was aiming at his port quarter and noticed first a small patch become incandescent where I had seen tracers entering his envelope. I first took it for a machine gun firing at me from the Zepp, but this patch rapidly spread and the next thing was that the whole Zepp was in flames. I landed at 12 midnight (British Time), engine and machine O.K. The Zeppelin which fell into the mouth of the Tees was still burning when I landed." ((3), more)
"'I think no man may look into it now and live after his view—neither an English soldier nor a German soldier—because the little narrow streets which go between its burnt and broken houses are swept by bullets from our machine-guns in the south and from the enemy's in the north, and no human being could stay alive there for a second after showing himself in the village . . . Men fought in the streets and in the broken houses and behind the walls and round the ruins of the little church of Notre Dame.'So Philip Gibbs, a Daily Telegraph war correspondent at the time, described the fight on November 27 to take Fontaine, the village which had been captured once and allowed to fall back into German hands because it was thought it would be an easy objective to take again." ((4), more)
(1) Army order from German Commander Paul von Hindenburg on November 27, 1914, during the Battle of Lodz. The order reproduced a telegram from Kaiser Wilhelm promoting von Hindenburg to the rank of Field Marshal in recognition of his protection of the German eastern frontier. By mid-November he had been victorious in the Battle of Tannenberg, and twice led his troops (as yet unsuccessfully) to seize Warsaw.
The Great Events of the Great War in Seven Volumes by Charles F. Horne, Vol. II, 1914, pp. 410, 411, copyright © 1920 by The National Alumnia, publisher: The National Alumni, publication date: 1920
(2) The storm that struck the Dardanelles and the Gallipoli Peninsula began with torrential rain on November 26. By the 27th it had become a blizzard that lasted through the 28th.
Gallipoli by Alan Moorehead, pp. 318, 319, copyright © 1956 by Alan Moorehead, publisher: Perennial Classics 2002 (HarperCollins Publications 1956), publication date: 2002 (1956)
(3) Account by British Second Lieutenant Ian V. Pyott of his destruction of Zeppelin LZ 34 late on the night of November 27, 1916. Eight Zeppelins set out to bomb industrial targets in the British Midlands on the 27th, a stormy night in which the airships were visible in the glare from the cities and the aurora borealis. One of the eight never made the crossing of the North Sea. Max Dietrich, commanding LZ 34, was flying at 9,800 feet and in the beam of a searchlight when Pyott sighted him. Dietrich and his crew were all killed, Dietrich on his 46th birthday. Early the morning of the 28th, a second Zeppelin, LZ 21 was shot down by airplanes 10 miles east of Lowestoft and fell into the sea with no survivors.
The Zeppelin Fighters by Arch Whitehouse, page 159, copyright © 1966 by Arch Whitehouse, publisher: New English Library, publication date: 1978
(4) The British tank and infantry offensive in the Battle of Cambrai began on November 20 and met with unexpected success on the first day as the tanks and infantry trained to work with them cooperated in the advance. On the second and subsequent days, the British did not have reserves to continue the offensive, and could only proceed with fewer tanks, and weary soldiers who had not been trained for tank warfare. The British took much of the key objective of Bourlon Wood, but could not capture and hold the village of Bourlon north of the woods or Fontaine-Notre-Dame to the east. As the battle extended into its second week, it was another infantry action, with tanks having little presence or effect. Fontaine-Notre-Dame was the last village on the road from Bapaume to Cambrai, an important communications center and a key objective of the British offensive.
The Battle of Cambrai by Brian Cooper, page 176, copyright © Bryan Cooper 1967, publisher: Stein and Day, publication date: 1968
