Uniforms of the British Army, 1914, from a series of postcards of uniforms of the combatants in the 1914 European War.
Image text: Guerre Européenne 1914Armée AnglaiseDragon guardsScots greysHussardGendarme de campagneLancierOfficier du génieGénéralLife guardsVolontaireVolontaire AustralienVolontaireGrenadier guardsScots guardsColdstream guardsColstream guards (pet. tenue)Kings Royal RiflesRifles brigradeScottish RiflesCameron highlandersHighlanders (officier)Royal Scots fusiliersCorps ExpéditionnaireInfanterie anglaiseTroupes de l'IndeRégiment de Cippayes West India (officier)Déposé J.C 8-9European War 1914 British Army Dragoon guardsScots GreysHussarMounted PolicemanLancerEngineering OfficerGeneralLife GuardsVolunteerAustralian VolunteerVolunteerGrenadier GuardScots GuardColdstream GuardColstream Guards (service dress)Kings Royal RiflesRifle BrigadeScottish RiflesCameron HighlanderHighlanders (Officer)Royal Scots FusiliersExpeditionary CorpsEnglish InfantryIndian troopSepoy Regiment West India (Officer)Filed J.C 8-9Reverse:J'espere bien que cette carte plâira à sa petite majesté, elle a été achetée à son intention . . .I hope that this card will appeal to his little majesty, it was purchased for him. . .
A Senussi column near the site of an attack on the British in Egypt. The Senussi first rebelled against Italian forces in Libya after Italy seized the territory from the Ottoman Empire. Supported by Turkey in Libya and later by Germany, the Senussi began a guerrilla campaign against the British in Egypt in late 1915, tying down 20,000 troops for over a year.
Image text: Balkan Kriegsschauplatz: Zu den erfolgreichen Angriffen der Senussi auf die Engländer in Agypten.Serie 31/3Balkan theater of war: At the successful attacks of the Senussi on the British in Egypt.Series 31/3Reverse:Ausgabe des Kriegsfürsorgeamtes Wien IX.Zum Gloria-Viktoria AlbumSammel. u. Nachschlagewerk des VölkerkriegesWar Office Assistance Edition, Vienna IXFor Gloria Victoria albumCollection and reference book of international war
Entrenched German soldiers behind sniper plates at Slota Gora, September 26, 1916. Slota (or Zlota) Gora was in Polish Russia, west of a line running from Warsaw to Cracow. An original watercolor (over pencil) by O. Oettel, 12th company of Landwehr, IR 32 in the field. A sketch in pencil and red crayon is on the reverse.
Image text: Slota Gora26.9.16O.Oettel 12L.32.I. FeldeZlota GoraSeptember 26, 1916O. Oettel, 12th Landwehr 32nd RegimentIn the Field
A mass of German troops bear an enormous egg striped in the black, white, and red of the german flag. Atop the egg, a cannon is fired by troops with a Hungarian flag. The target, diminutive in the distance, is Paris, Eiffel Tower gray against the brown city.The watercolor is labeled,Husvét . Páris piros tojása . 1918Easter . Red eggs for Paris . 1918The front of the card is postmarked 1918-04-05 from Melököveso.The card is a Feldpostkarte, a field postcard, from Asbach Uralt, old German cognac. Above the brand name, two German soldiers wheel a field stove past a crate containing a bottle of the brandy under the title Gute Verpflegung, Good Food. Above the addressee is written Einschreiben, enroll, and Nach Ungarn, to Hungary. The card is addressed to Franz Moritos, and is postmarked Hamburg, 1918-03-30. A Hamburg stamp also decorates the card.A hand-painted postcard by Schima Martos. , Germany on registered fieldpost card, 1918, message: Red Egg for Paris, Easter, 1918.The German advance in Operation Michael in the March, 1918 nearly broke the Allied line, and threatened Paris, putting it once again in range of a new German supergun capable of hitting the city from 70 miles away.
Image text: Husvét . Páris piros tojása . 1918Easter . Red eggs for Paris . 1918The front of the card is postmarked 1918-04-05 from Melököveso
"They soon gave us practical proof that they could shoot, for in the first few engagements our battalion was reduced to about half. . . . We were at once struck with the great energy with which their infantry defended itself when driven back and by the determined efforts made by it at night to recover lost ground. In this it was well supported by its field artillery which, like the French, is at least as good as ours. . . . The main strength of the British undoubtedly lies in the defence and in the utilization of ground. Their nerves undoubtedly react better than those of the Germans, and their sporting instincts render them easier than our men to train in shooting, and in the use of ground and patrolling. The hardiness of their infantry was very apparent near Ypres." ((1), more)
"On November 14 a new war zone was opened, one of the least remembered of the war. On that day, in the deserts of Italian Libya, which before 1912 had been part of the Ottoman Empire, the Senussi tribesmen rose up in revolt against the Allies. Supported by the Turks, the Senussi opened fire at a British-Egyptian border post at Sollum. Two days later, three hundred tribesmen occupied the Zaura monastery at Sidi Barrani. British troops were sent into action, but the tribesmen, with the desert as their hiding place, continued to cause considerable aggravation." ((2), more)
"Put that bloody cigarette out." ((3), more)
"The 14th. The Painlevé Ministry fell on the 13th at ten o'clock in the evening. It is the first Cabinet during the war to be defeated on a division. Painlevé has fallen a victim to his friendships." ((4), more)
(1) Excerpt on the strengths of the British infantry- and artillery-man from the Berliner Tageblatt around mid-November, 1914, by an editor who was serving as a lieutenant in the German Reserves in Flanders. Soldiers of the British Army were trained to fire 15 accurate rounds per minute.
Military Operations France and Belgium, 1914, Vol. II, October-November by J. E. Edmonds, pp. 456, 457, copyright © asserted, publisher: MacMillan and Co., Limited, publication date: 1925
(2) Italy had seized Libya in the Italo-Turkish War of 1911-12. Encouraged by the defeated Turks, the Senussi rebelled against the Italians, and later attacked the British forces in Egypt. The Senussi attack on Sollum failed, but the British evacuated it on November 23. After having strengthened their position, the British re-occupied Sollum in March, 1916. The Senussi managed to tie down as many as 20,000 British Empire troops for much of 1916.
The First World War, a Complete History by Martin Gilbert, page 210, copyright © 1994 by Martin Gilbert, publisher: Henry Holt and Company, publication date: 1994
(3) Last words of H.H. Munro, the author Saki, killed November 14, 1916 in the attack begun the previous day, one of the last in the Battle of the Somme, against the villages of Beaumont Hamel, Beaucourt, and St. Pierre Divion on the Ancre River.
The Lost Voices of World War I, An International Anthology of Writers, Poets and Playwrights by Tim Cross, page 13, copyright © 1989 by The University of Iowa, publisher: University of Iowa Press, publication date: 1989
(4) Entry for November 14, 1917 from the diary of Michel Corday, a senior civil servant in the French government. French President Raymond Poincaré served through the entire war, but the prime ministers and their governments were less stable. Stable or not, they maintained a Union Sacrée across the political spectrum. The fall of Paul Painlevé's government was different, and came after mutinies in much of the French army in May and June and the Bolshevik Revolution a week before Corday wrote, in a storm of charges of collaboration with Germany and outright treason directed against pacifists, socialists, the leftist press, and some close to Painlevé.
The Paris Front: an Unpublished Diary: 1914-1918 by Michel Corday, pp. 292–293, copyright © 1934, by E.P. Dutton & Co., Inc., publisher: E.P. Dutton & Co., Inc., publication date: 1934
