The white Russian bear, dyed red with Austro-Hungarian blood, triumphs over the Habsburg Eagle. Russian was victorious in Galicia in 1914 and early 1915. A postcard by Bianchi.
Image text: l'orso biancothe white bearReverse:Proprieta artistica riservata - N. 88Artistic ownership reserved - No. 88
Postwar postcard map of the Balkans including Albania, newly-created Yugoslavia, expanded Romania, and diminished former Central Powers Bulgaria and Turkey. The first acquisitions of Greece in its war against Turkey are seen in Europe where it advanced almost to Constantinople, in the Aegean Islands from Samos to Rhodes, and on the Turkish mainland from its base in Smyrna. The Greco-Turkish war was fought from May 1919 to 1922. The positions shown held from the war's beginning to the summer of 1920 when Greece advanced eastward. Newly independent Hungary and Ukraine appear in the northwest and northeast.
Image text: Péninsule des BalkansÉchelle 1:12.000.000Petit Atlas de Poche Universel25 Édition Jeheber GenèveReverse:No. 20 Édition Jeheber, Genève (Suisse)BalkansRoumanie(Royaume.)Superficie . . . 290 000 sq. km.Population . . . 16 000 000 hab. (50 par sq. km.Capitale: Bucarest . . . 338 000 hab.Bulgarie(Royaume.)Superficie . . . 100 000 sq. km.Population . . . 4 000 000 hab. (40 par sq. km.)Capitale: Sofia . . . 103 000 hab.Grèce(Royaume. Capitale: Athènes.)En Europe (y compris la Crète et les iles) 200 000 sq. km. 6 000 000 hab. 30 p. sq. km.En Asie mineure . . . 30 000 sq. km 1 300 000 hab. 43 p. sq. km.Total 230 000 sq. km. 7 300 000 hab. 32 p. sq. km.Ville de plus de 50 000 habitants:Smyrne (Asie) . . . 350 000 hab.Athènes . . . 175 000 hab.Salonique . . . 150 000Andrinople . . . 70 000 hab.Pirée . . . 70 000 hab.Turquie d'Europe(Empire Ottoman.)Superficie . . . 2 000 sq. km.Population . . . 1 100 000 550 par sq. km.Capitale: Constantinople 1 000 000 hab.AlbanieSuperficie . . . 30 000 sq. km.Population . . . 800 000 hab. (27 par sq. km.)Villes: Scutari . . . 30 000 hab.Durazzo . . . 5 000 hab.YougoslavieVoir le tableau des statisques de ce pays, ainsi que la carte de la partie occidentale de la Yougoslavie, sur la carte d'Italie.Inst. Géog. Kummerly & Frey, Berne.Balkan PeninsulaScale 1: 12,000,000Little Univeral Pocket AtlasRoyaume - KingdomSuperficie - AreaEn Europe (y compris la Crète et les iles) - In Europe (including Crete and the islands)En Asie mineure - In Asia MinorYugoslaviaSee the table of statistics of this country, as well as the map of the western part of Yugoslavia, on the map of Italy.
A woman munitions worker carrying a shell apparently drops another one on the foot of a frightened man who clearly does not realize, as she does, that they are not in danger. No doubt his foot hurt.
Image text: La Femme et la Guerre.Leroy - Aux munitions.Women and the WarTo the munitions.Signed: FFLeroy?Reverse:No. 139 - P, J. Gallais et Cie, éditeurs, 38, Rue Vignon.Paris, Visé no. 139.No. 139 - P, J. Gallais and Company, publishers, 38 Rue Vignon.
Shared headstone of Paul Wiegandt, Unteroffizier (Sergeant), died June 3, 1918, and Heinrich Balg, Musketier (Infantryman), died June 6, 1918, Dormans German Cemetery, Dormans, France. © 2014 by John M. Shea
Image text: Paul WiegandtUnteroffizier [Sergeant]† 3.6.1918Heinrich BalgMusketier [Infantryman]† 6.6.1918
"A combined Austro-Hungarian-German force advanced against Przemyśl and on 3 June [1915] Bavarian units entered the fortress. Captain Otto Kohler of the 9th Pioneer Company, Bavarian 11th Infantry Division, remembered the assault that dawn in bright sunshine. His men advanced over fields littered with dead soldiers, their guns and their kits. The troopers of the 11th Division decorated themselves with oak leaves and made bouquets in the Bavarian blue-white colors from corn-flowers and wind-flowers. Unfurling their regimental banners and Bavarian flag, they entered Przemyśl lustily singing. The remaining German residents threw flowers at their feet." ((1), more)
". . . the French gendarmerie took over the railway installations, all postal and telegraph services and established a censorship of the newspapers published in Salonika. Milne, unwilling to advertise his disapproval of Sarrail's actions, put units of the British military police under the command of the French gendarmerie.Salonika thus became an occupied city, as effectively under alien military administration as Brussels or Warsaw or Belgrade; and, not unnaturally, there were demonstrations against the Entente Powers in Athens. But the French had not yet finished chastening the Greeks for the Rupel incident. A blockade was imposed on all the Greek ports, and a squadron of Allied warships, under a French admiral and with one of Sarrail's brigades aboard, sailed from Salonika from the Cyclades to put pressure on the government in Athens. The French and British demanded demobilization of the Greek Army, new elections, the replacement of the allegedly pro-German Government of Skouloudis by a 'neutral' ministry and the dismissal of police officials who had tolerated insults to the Allied diplomatic representatives. With battleships and cruisers anchored in the bay of Melos and thus able to appear off Athens at eight hours' notice, the Greeks gave in." ((2), more)
"The strikes of the trade unions had also become an increasing problem to the harassed government. The day before, Poincaré himself witnessed a strike demonstration by several thousand women armament workers. In a mob they marched down the Champs Élysée, turned off on the Avenue Alexandre III and demonstrated outside the Élysée Palace. 'Their clamors rose up for more than two hours,' he wrote in his diary. . . . Vastly more important than strikes, pacifism or the growing agitation by the left-wing political parties, however, was the menace of the mutinies. The night before, the government had received a report from Colonel Herbillon, its military-liaison officer, that fresh mutinies were breaking out in the XXIst Corps—'the troops refuse to go into the trenches.'" ((3), more)
"The 7th Machine-gun Battalion held the Germans at bay, and gradually the attack died down. Meanwhile the 4th Infantry regiment relieved the French in the town of Château-Thierry. On June 3, the 9th Machine-gun Battalion of the 3rd Division relieved the 7th Machine-gun Battalion and on leaving the town for its short rest, the latter unit was given the highest praise by the French in orders:"The episode of Château-Thierry will remain one of the most remarkable deeds of this war. It is a pleasure for us all to know that our valiant allies have shared with us there."Contrary to popular belief, there was no gap in the line at Château-Thierry as there had been after March 21 in front of Amiens. The French lines were intact and the German drive had reached its limit." ((4), more)
(1) Begun on May 2, 1915, the German-Austro-Hungarian Gorlice-Tarnow Offensive continued to push back the Russian Army on an increasingly broad front, and threatened to encircle the Russians holding the great fortress of Przemyśl in Austria-Hungary's northeast province of Galicia. The Russians, who had taken the city on March 23, 1915, evacuated it on June 2, evading capture. On June 3, German and Austro-Hungarian forces entered, welcomed by ethnic Germans, less so by Polish.
The First World War: Germany and Austria Hungary 1914-1918 by Holger H. Herwig, page 142, copyright © 1997 Holger H. Herwig, publisher: Arnold, publication date: 1997
(2) In 'the Rupel incident', the garrison of Fort Rupel near the Bulgarian border in northeast Greece surrendered the fort, on orders of the Greek Government, to a German-Bulgarian force. The loss of this defensive barrier in ostensibly neutral Greece threatened the Allied troops in Salonica, and made blatant the pro-German position the Greek Government. On June 2, 1916, the Russian Foreign Minister told the French Ambassador to telegraph Paris that the French and British, Russia's Entente Allies, should take whatever means they considered necessary to deal with the Greeks. Brussels, Belgium had been occupied by German forces in the first days of the war, and Warsaw in the advance into Russia in 1915. Austro-Hungarian troops took Belgrade, capital of Serbia, on October 9, 1915. French General Maurice Sarrail commanded Allied forces in Greece; Lt. General George Milne was the commander of British forces. Athens was, and remains, the capital of Greece.
The Gardeners of Salonika by Alan Palmer, pp. 68, 69, copyright © 1965 by A. W. Palmer, publisher: Simon and Schuster, publication date: 1965
(3) After the failure of French commander in chief Robert Nivelle's 1917 spring offensive — the Second Battle of the Aisne — mutinous incidents broke out in the French army beginning in April. As the mutinies worsened in May, as many as 100,000 workers also went on strike. The strikes continued into June, and the most violent and serious of the mutinies occurred in the first weeks of the month. Women workers struck for the 'semaine anglaise,' an English work week, one that ended at noon on Saturday. The French were becoming sick of the war, of the government's refusal to consider a peace other than victory, of soldiers being denied leave, of soldiers being thrown into barbed wire and machine gun fire. Raymond Poincaré was President of France throughout the war; the Élysée Palace is the official residence of the nation's president.
Dare Call it Treason by Richard M. Watt, page 201, copyright © 1963 by Richard M. Watt, publisher: Simon and Schuster, publication date: 1963
(4) American machine gunners and French colonials held the town of Château-Thierry on May 31, 1918 during the German Aisne Offensive, the third German offensive of 1918. The defenders prevented German forces from crossing the Marne River, blowing the bridge over it. The first German offensive, Operation Michael, had been launched on March 21 against British forces which, though driven back, held Amiens.
The History of The A.E.F. by Shipley Thomas, page 90, copyright © 1920, by George H. Doran Company, publisher: George H. Doran Company, publication date: 1920
