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Portrait of British soldier Harry Mulvaney, son of Edith (Hughes) and Peter Mulvaney, who was killed in France aged about 19 years in the 1914-18 war.
A woman tramway worker operating a manual switch, changing the direction of her trolley. As men entered or were conscripted into the military, women took on unaccustomed roles.
Embossed postcard of the flag and coins of Mexico, with fixed exchange rates for major currencies including the German Mark, Austro-Hungarian Krone, British Shilling, Latin Monetary Union Franc, Dutch Guilder, Russia Ruble, Scandinavian Monetary Union Krone/Krona, and United States Dollar. Includes images for 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 25 and 50 Centavo coins, and 1, 5, and 10 Peso coins.
Embossed postcard of the flag and coins of Russia, with fixed exchange rates for major currencies including Germany, Austria-Hungary, England, the Latin Monetary Union, Netherlands, and the United States of America. The Russian Ruble equaled 100 Kopeks. Tsar Nicholas II is on the obverse of most of the gold and silver coins; Tsar Alexander III is on the 7 1/2 ruble gold piece.
The heck with the Zeppelins!Screw the Zeppelins!A French soldier and his lover couldn't care less about the Zeppelin raid in progress. It's hard to tell if he is holding a cigarette in his right hand, or giving a fig to the Zeppelin.
"A draft of a hundred and fifty 'proceeded' to France to-night. Most of them half-tight, except those who had been in the guard-room to stop them bolting (again), and the Parson's speech went off, to the usual asides and witticisms. He ended: 'And God go with you. I shall go as far as the station with you.' Then the C.O. stuttered a few inept and ungracious remarks. 'You are going out to the Big Push which will end the war' etc (groans). And away they marched to beat of drums—a pathetic scene of humbug and cant. How much more impressive if they went in silence, with no foolishness of 'God Speed'—like Hardy's 'men who march away . . . To hazards whence no tears can win us.'" ((1), more)
"The woman chauffeur has reached the height of her ambitions — she is to be allowed at last to drive the royal mail vans. A start will be made in London next Monday, beginning with the eleven o'clock night shift, when six women drivers, wearing the uniform of the Women's Volunteer Reserve, will drive the one-ton lorries which convey the outgoing mails from the G.P.O. to the railway stations, where they will wait for the incoming mails. The six are only the pioneers of a large number of women drivers wanted to drive the royal mail vans, in order to release as many as possible of the 300 men now employed. The first women drivers of H.M. Stationary Office wear uniforms of a military character." ((2), more)
"On the first of February we intend to begin submarine warfare unrestricted. In spite of this it is our intention to endeavor to keep neutral the United States of America.If this attempt is not successful, we propose an alliance on the following basis with Mexico:That we shall make war together and together make peace. We shall give general financial support and it is understood that Mexico is to reconquer the lost territory in New Mexico, Texas and Arizona. The details are left to you for settlement.You are instructed to inform the President of Mexico of the above in the greatest confidence as soon as it is certain that there will be an outbreak of war with the United States, and suggest that the President of Mexico, on his own initiative, should communicate with Japan suggesting adherence at once to this plan . . ." ((3), more)
"[Tsar] Nicholas pressed his head between his hands. 'Is it possible,' he asked, 'that for twenty-two years I tried to act for the best and that for twenty-two years it was all a mistake?'The question was astonishing. It was completely beyond the bounds of propriety for Rodzianko to answer, yet, realizing that it had been asked honestly, man to man, he summoned his courage and said, 'Yes, Your Majesty, for twenty-two years you followed a wrong course.'" ((4), more)
"I found spirits in the village greatly changed since my last home leave. The disaster in Romania, the dispatch of numerous forces to Salonika, the imminent call-up of the conscript class of 1918, the numbers of those exempted from service who had escaped the net of the recruitment boards, the shortages of sugar, coal, and transport—all these had turned a sunny optimism into somber pessimism, as eyes began to open to how things really were." ((5), more)
(1) January 17, 1917 entry from the diary of Siegfried Sassoon, British poet, author, Second Lieutenant in the Royal Welch Fusiliers, and recipient of the Military Cross for gallantry in action, then on convalescent leave in Britain. 'The Big Push' was used to describe the 1915 Battle of Loos and 1916's Battle of the Somme, neither of which ended the war, as the Big Pushes of 1917 would not. Thomas Hardy's poem 'The Men Who March Away' was published in The Times of London September 9, 1914, four days after Hardy wrote it with both Hardy and the paper foregoing copyright. The lines (line 5, repeated as line 33) Sassoon quotes, 'To hazards whence no tears can win us' is from the original. Hardy later changed it to, 'Leaving all that here can win us.' The first stanza from Hardy's Complete Poems, page 538:What of the faith and fire within us Men who march away Ere the barn-cocks say Night is growing gray,Leaving all that here can win us;What of the faith and fire within us Men who march away?
Siegfried Sassoon Diaries 1915-1918 by Siegfried Sassoon, page 120, copyright © George Sassoon, 1983; Introduction and Notes Rupert Hart-Davis, 1983, publisher: Faber and Faber, publication date: 1983
(2) January 18, 1917 item from the Daily Sketch, a British tabloid published in Manchester, on the breaking of another workplace barrier to women.
The Virago Book of Women and the Great War by Joyce Marlow, Editor, page 242, copyright © Joyce Marlow 1998, publisher: Virago Press, publication date: 1999
(3) Beginning of the 'Zimmerman Telegram' dated Berlin, January 19, 1917, a message from Dr. Alfred Zimmerman, Secretary of Foreign Affairs of the German Empire, to Heinrich von Eckhardt, German Ambassador to Mexico. The telegram, encrypted and delivered over American cables, was intercepted and decrypted by British Intelligence. Japan was allied against Germany, and had seized, in 1914, some of Germany's colonies in Asia including Tsingtau. The telegram was sent from Berlin to Johann von Bernstorff, German Ambassador to the United States, on January 16, and forwarded to Eckhardt on the 19th.
The Great Events of the Great War in Seven Volumes by Charles F. Horne, Vol. V, 1917, p. 43, copyright © 1920 by The National Alumnia, publisher: The National Alumni, publication date: 1920
(4) Part of an exchange between Russian Tsar Nicholas II and Michael Rodzianko, President of the Russian Duma, on January 20, 1917. In the last day's of the Russian Empire, Nicholas was given numerous warnings his throne was at risk. The assassination of Grigori Rasputin at the end of December 1916 struck at the heart of the royal family. British Ambassador George Buchanan warned the Tsar, on January 12, that most of the Russian army could not be relied on to defend the dynasty. Rodzianko focused on removing the Empress Alexandra, who was widely perceived to be pro-German, from all decisions and sending her to the Tsar's Black Sea estate.
Nicholas and Alexandra by Robert K. Massie by Robert K. Massie, page 395, copyright © 1967, renewed 1995 by Robert K. Massie, publisher: Random House, publication date: 2011
(5) Excerpt from the notebooks of French Infantry Corporal Louis Barthas, who came home to his village in Languedoc in southern France on January 21, 1917. The Allies had opened the Salonica Front in 1915 in a failed attempt to aid Serbia. By early 1916 there were over 500,000 Allied soldiers on the front. Romania entered the war on the side of the Allies in August, 1916, and were quickly defeated, the capital of Bucharest falling on December 6. The remains of the Serbian army was in the Allied line in the Balkans. What was left of Romania's army was in Moldavia, in the country's northeast, holding the front with the Russians. German troops held much of France's coal fields in northern France. The coal shortage was made worse due to rationing, a very cold winter, and its diversion to military uses. The shortage of coal and military demands of course affected transport.
Poilu: The World War I Notebooks of Corporal Louis Barthas, Barrelmaker, 1914-1918 by Louis Barthas, page 291, copyright © 2014 by Yale University, publisher: Yale University Press, publication date: 2014
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