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Having stopped unrestricted submarine warfare after sinking the Lusitania in 1915, Germany resumed the policy on January 31, 1917. The campaign peaked in April 1917, and helped bring the United States into the war.
Looking like a model or a piece by Yves Tanguy, a photograph of part of the destroyed city of Lens, France dated September 18, 1918.
Verdun Ossuary and Cemetery, France. © 2015 John M. Shea
A Sanke postcard of a captured British Sopwith Triplane being wheeled along.
The department of the Marne in Champagne was some of the most contested land during the war, site of the initial German invasion, the Battle of the Marne, the First and Second Battles of Champagne, the Champagne-Marne Offensive, Rheims Cathedral, Épernay, Châlons, Vitry-le-Francois, Ste-Menehould, and Perthes-les-Hurlus (First Champagne).
"I am getting impatient. The Mediterranean beckons with her transport steamers, so much the more inviting since now there are no more restrictions. And I want to arrive in good time for the final effort.Then I am asked 'affectionately' if my boat will be ready soon, especially by those who have been moored for years.But the work is actually delayed It is quite similar to Penelope's tapestry: mysterious forces impede the construction. The crew is suspicious.There are many Czechs in the arsenal known to be capable of sabotage. In the mess they sit together and speak Czech and every time a setback occurs on the front, their faces beam. At the American declaration of war, they supposedly really celebrated, but you can't pin anything on them." ((1), more)
"With each day, the bombardment became more intensive, and it soon seemed all but certain that an attack must follow. On the 27th [April], at midnight, I had the following telegraph message: '67 beginning 5 a.m.', which in our code meant that from five o'clock tomorrow we were to be on a heightened state of alert.I promptly lay down right away, so as to be up to the anticipated exertions, but as I was on the point of sleep, a shell struck the house, smashed the wall against the basement steps, and filled our room with rubble. We leaped up and hurried into the shelter." ((2), more)
"— The 28th. The thousandth day of the war. We see a certain number of marriages between elderly, but wealthy, hospital nurses and blind soldiers. At first sight that seems shocking. But after all, the ladies will enjoy what they would not otherwise enjoy. And their husbands will never see the marks of age. . . .— One ought to say: One and a half million dead young men." ((3), more)
"[Royal Naval Air Service Sub-Lieutenant Robert A.] Little fought his way out of this melee right above Jasta 11's base, to share his victory with Minifie—who also returned. Interviewed later in life, Minifie explained, 'Yes, they nearly had me down on Douai aerodrome, about 200–300 fee off it. But luckily my Triplane was just that little shade faster than they were. I was going low for home, and they let me go and get a lead of about 500 yards on them. So that was that—they just couldn't catch me.' Minifie, Naval 1's youngest ace at age 19, went on to be the squadron's top Triplane pilot, scoring 17 of his 21-victory total in that type." ((4), more)
"Days later, the [Second Battle of the Aisne] resumed in earnest. On 30 April the Nineteenth Infantry Division launched a concentrated assault on Mont Blond and Mont Cornillet. To clear the way the artillery unleashed a 'cannonade more terrible than anything [Paul had] ever seen even at Verdun.' Indeed the barrage was so formidable that he wondered how the Germans could survive it; they certainly weren't returning fire. I think that everything that we are sending over to them they hardly have the time' to retaliate. Yet the infantry made little progress, gaining only five hundred meters of ground and suffering heavy losses." ((5), more)
(1) Excerpt from the memoir of Austro-Hungarian Captain Georg von Trapp, whose U-boat was being repaired in Pola, one of Austria-Hungary's ports on the Adriatic Sea. In April, 1917, he had been awaiting a refurbished ship since late 1915. His boat, U-14, had been the French submarine Curie, captured in December, 1914 and already refurbished once. Earlier in his book, von Trapp had complained of a Czech crewman not following protocol: responding 'yes' to an order rather than repeating the order. On at least one occasion the result may have been the firing of an unarmed torpedo. The 'restrictions' he references had been lifted on February 1, 1917 when Germany (and Austria-Hungary) began its expansion of unrestricted submarine warfare which led to the United States' declaring war on Germany, but not on Austria-Hungary, on April 6, 1917. Von Trapp was Austria-Hungary's most successful submariner, later famous as the father of the Von Trapp Family Singers, portrayed on stage and screen in The Sound of Music. Penelope was the loyal and ingenious wife of Ulysses.
To the Last Salute: Memories of an Austrian U-Boat Commander by Georg von Trapp, pp. 92–93, copyright © 2007, publisher: University of Nebraska Press, publication date: 2007
(2) German Lieutenant Ernst Jünger was in Fresnoy-en-Gohelle, France, in April, 1917, during the Battle of Arras. In his memoir he comments on the dogfights overhead, imagining they include Manfred von Richthofen who was then enjoying deadly success in the Arras sector. Much of the chapter on his time in Fresnoy is about the terrific bombardments he survives, one of them by a naval gun, some he finds 'pedantic preliminary bombardments' by the British that leave 'ample time to vacate the target area,' and another which reaches 'an extraordinary pitch.' He leaves Fresnoy 'a maelstrom of devastation.'
Storm of Steel by Ernst Jünger, page 135, copyright © 1920, 1961, Translation © Michael Hoffman, 2003, publisher: Penguin Books, publication date: 2003
(3) Entries from April 28, 1917 from the diary of Michel Corday, French senior civil servant, living and writing in Paris. The French offensive in the Second Battle of the Aisne, was already a failure when Corday wrote. Earlier in the month he wrote against jingoists who wanted the war to continue 'to victory' at all costs, against the censorship the government imposed on the French press, and in favor of those who could speak truth about the war, both as it was in progress and after it ended. Germany declared war on France on August 3, 1914.
The Paris Front: an Unpublished Diary: 1914-1918 by Michel Corday, page 248, copyright © 1934, by E.P. Dutton & Co., Inc., publisher: E.P. Dutton & Co., Inc., publication date: 1934
(4) On April 29, 1917 Manfred von Richthofen's squadron, Jasta 11, and Royal Naval Air Service Squadrons 1 and 8 were flying over the Arras battlefield when they began a dogfight sometime after 7:25 PM. Von Richthofen had already downed three planes, killing five men that day, his victories 49, 50, and 51. The Jasta included Manfred's brother Lothar, also an ace. Its planes were painted red. Von Richthofen was flying an Albatros DIII when he had his first encounter with the Sopwith Triplane, a fast and maneuverable British plane that would become the model for the Fokker Dr.I triplane von Richthofen later flew. Von Richthofen downed one of the Sopwith Triplanes for his 52nd victory. According to his biography, von Richthofen's father, a German cavalry officer, was visiting his sons on April 29. Australian pilot Robert Minifie flew with RNAS Squadron 1.
The Origin of the Fighter Aircraft by Jon Gutman, page 142, copyright © 2009 Jon Gutman, publisher: Westholme Publishing, publication date: 2009
(5) Excerpt from Martha Hanna's Your Death Would Be Mine, based on the letters of Paul and Marie Piread during World War I. On April 30, 1917, Paul Pireaud was serving with the 112th Heavy Artillery Regiment, his battery then attached to the Fourth Army, which was engaged in the Battle of the Hills, or the Third Battle of Champagne, attacking east of Reims in an action part of the Second Battle of the Aisne, itself part of Robert Nivelle's great spring offensive of 1917. Paul had fought in the Battle of Verdun in 1916.
Your Death Would Be Mine; Paul and Marie Pireaud in the Great War by Martha Hanna, page 205, copyright © 2006 by Martha Hanna, publisher: Harvard University Press, publication date: 2006
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