Postcard from a series on the Armies of the European War of 1914. The French Army included units from its African colonies including Morocco and Senegal, and the Départment of Algeria.
Image text: Guerre Européenne 1914Armée Française[Mounted]Dragon, Cuirassier, Spahi (petite tenue), Chasseur d'Afrique, Chasseur a cheval, Hussard, Gendarme[Foot]Artilleur morté, Train des Equipages, Garde Républicaine (grande tenue), Tirailleur Senégalais, Tirailleur Algerien, Zouave, Infanterie de ligne, Chasseur à pied, Matelot, Génie, Infanterie de marine, Chasseur AlpinDéposé J.C 8-9European War 1914 French Army[Mounted] Dragoon, Cuirassier , Spahi (field dress), African Chasseur, Mounted Chasseur, Hussar, Policeman[Foot] Gunner, Train Crew, Republican Guard (full dress), Senegalese infantryman, Algerian infantryman, Zouave, Line Infantry, Chasseur, Sailor, Engineer, Marine, Alpine ChasseurFiled J.C 8-9Reverse, handwritten:Un bon gros baiser pour le cher bijou de 11 mois.A great big kiss for the dear jewel of 11 months.
Two Venetian fishing ships meet, brilliant sails spread. On one, beneath Venice's Lion of St. Mark, the words "Adriaticus mare nostrum — the Adriatic, our sea." On the further blue sail, the cross and words "Pax tibi Marce [Evangelista meus] — Peace to you, Mark, my Evangelist."Postcard promoting Italy's VI National Loan for the war, with a quotation from Gabriele D'Annunzio's "La canzone di Mario Bianco":"E' questo, Italia,é questo il tuo fermento e il tuo cemento"And this, Italy,This is your ferment and your foundation.G. d'Annunzio
Image text: On one sail, the words, "Adriaticus mare nostrum — the Adriatic, our sea." On the further blue sail, the cross and words "Pax tibi Marce [Evangelista meus] — Peace to you, Mark, my Evangelist."Quotation from Gabriele D'Annunzio's "La canzone di Mario Bianco":"E' questo, Italia,é questo il tuo fermento e il tuo cemento"And this, Italy,This is your ferment and your foundation.G. d'Annunzio
Imperial Russian soldiers on parade in France.Message and postmark Marseille, April 22, 1916.
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Map of the 1918 German offensives on the Western Front from The Memoirs of Marshall Foch by Marshall Ferdinand Foch. © 1931 by Doubleday, Doran & Company, Inc.
Image text: German OffensivesOf Mar. 21 (Picardy)Of May 27 (Aisne-Marne)Of July 15 (Champagne-Marne)Of Apr. 9 (Flanders)Of June 9 (Compiegne)Front and situation of the German Armies March 20, 1918 (on the eve of the offensive)Front at the end of the offensiveScale of miles
"There was very considerable activity on the French front [from June to September 1915], with a number of encounters in which the French, like the British, were handicapped, though in a less degree, by lack of munitions and heavy guns.On the 7th June parts of the French XI. Corps attacked and captured the German salient of Touvent farm between Hébuterne and Serre on a front of a mile, and in fighting which continued up to the 13th June held it against counter-attacks. Further east, 6th–16th June, the salient south of Quennevières, between the Oise and the Aisne, was the scene of an attack on a front of four brigades, which brought a small gain of ground." ((1), more)
"Now the Austrian offensive began to weaken, for the Russian successes had compelled the transfer of Austrian troops from the Italian front to the Galician theater of war. This withdrawal enabled the Italians on June 9th to launch a counter offensive. Artillery duels were maintained along the whole front, and the invaders were pushed back in the upper Arsa Valley and along the western slopes of Monte Cengio. On June 10th, an Austrian attack at Monte Lemerle was repulsed with heavy losses. The Italian offensive was livening from the Adige to the Brenta.On the next day Austrian aeroplanes dropped bombs on the military hospital at Vicenza, and also attacked Venice, Thiere and Mestre with slight damage." ((2), more)
"Nor was rebellion confined to the French. As the mutinies avalanched onward, it became apparent that the two Russian brigades had become a serious menace. It was not the number of Russians in France that posed the danger—a mere fifteen or twenty thousand men were indistinguishable atoms in this war of millions—it was what they represented. For by the spring of 1917 it had been conclusively established that the Russian brigades in France were the breeding grounds of mutiny." ((3), more)
"Between Noyon and Montdidier on June 9 [1918], artillery preparation for the fourth drive in the Germans' spring offensive began at midnight, but the French, amply warned, began their counterpreparation ten minutes earlier. Though opportune, this fire did not disrupt the enemy's infantry assault, which occurred between 0300 and 0430 hours. Striking the left-center of Third Army, which occupied a forty-five-kilometer front, the Germans advanced seven kilometers on the first day and five on the second across a front of twenty-five kilometers." ((4), more)
(1) French Commander Joseph Joffre maintained an offensive posture through 1915, a strategy he called 'nibbling' at the enemy, and one that resulted time and again in heavy casualties. Although the French shell shortage was not as critical as that of Great Britain or Russia, it still left the French with inadequate ammunition and guns to counteract the artillery of the Germans and their defensive posture. Joffre conducted major offensives in the first half of 1915 in Artois and Champagne, but also smaller attacks along the entire front. In the attack at Quennevières, French losses were 134 officers and 7,771 men.
Military Operations France and Belgium, 1915, Vol. II, Battles of Aubers Ridge, Festubert, and Loos by J. E. Edmonds, page 109, copyright © asserted, publisher: Macmillan and Co., Limited, publication date: 1928
(2) Austro-Hungarian Commander-in-Chief Conrad von Hötzendorf's Asiago Offensive had shifted the primary Italo-Austro-Hungarian theater of war from the Isonzo River in northeastern Italy to the Trentino in northern Italy on May 15, 1916, surprising the Italians and threatening to drive them from the mountains to the Italian plain, potentially isolating the bulk of the Italian army. In part responding to increasingly urgent pleas from Italy, Russian General Alexsei Brusilov launched his planned offensive on June 4, one month earlier than he had planned. His careful preparations and imaginative tactics were successful, and the Austro-Hungarian defense in Galicia and Bukovina collapsed.
King's Complete History of the World War by W.C. King, page 232, copyright © 1922, by W.C. King, publisher: The History Associates, publication date: 1922
(3) After the failure of French commander in chief Robert Nivelle's 1917 spring offensive — the Second Battle of the Aisne, begun on April 16 — an offensive that Nivelle had asserted would provide the breakthrough of the German line that would lead to victory, mutinous incidents broke out in the French army, particularly among the troops that had suffered the highest rates of casualties in the offensive. The mutinies were of greater or lesser severity, beginning in April, with increasingly disruptive incidents in May, and the most violent and serious in the first weeks of June. Four brigades of Russian soldiers were sent two France in the spring of 1916, two of them immediately being sent to the Salonika Front. The Russian Revolution of March provided a model for some soldiers.
Dare Call it Treason by Richard M. Watt, pp. 205–206, copyright © 1963 by Richard M. Watt, publisher: Simon and Schuster, publication date: 1963
(4) The fourth of German's five 1918 offensives, the Noyon-Montdidier Offensive, began on June 9, in an attempt to build on the success of the Aisne (Blücher) Offensive begun on May 27. But the French were not surprised as they had been in May, and had reserves ready.
Pyrrhic Victory; French Strategy and Operations in the Great War by Robert A. Doughty, pp. 457–458, copyright © 2005 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College, publisher: Harvard University Press, publication date: 2005
