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The imperial children bathing in the Black Sea at Livadia, the Tsar's palace in Crimea. Anna Viroubova, the Empress's confidante, holds Tsarevitch Alexie on her lap. The Tsar's four daughters are in black. A nurse sits on the upper step. Photograph from Viroubova's 'Memories of the Russian Court.'
Happy New Year 1915! Bonne année! The New Year shoots down the Old over Paris. 1914 is represented by a German Taube, the New Year is loosely based on a French Blériot.
Color postcard map of Belgium, its provinces, railroad lines (?), major towns and cities, and North Sea coast and borders with the Netherlands, Germany, Luxemburg, and France. Insets show City Hall in the capital of Brussels, a view from the water of the port of Antwerp, and the Remy factory.
The battlefield near Verdun, the Meuse River (Maas), and the Argonne Forest, viewed from the German line looking southwest. During the 1916 Seige of Verdun, the road and a light rail line from Bar-le-Duc were the sole source of supply for the besieged city.
A Swiss postcard of 'The European War' in 1914. The Central Powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary face enemies to the east, west, and south. Germany is fighting the war it tried to avoid, battling Russia to the east and France to the west. Germany had also hoped to avoid fighting England which came to the aid of neutral (and prostrate) Belgium, and straddles the Channel. Austria-Hungary also fights on two fronts, against Russia to the east and Serbia and Montenegro to the south. Italy, the third member of the Triple Alliance with Germany and Austria-Hungary, declared neutrality, and looks on. Other neutral nations include Spain, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland, Romania, Bulgaria, and Albania. Japan enters from the east to battle Germany. The German Fleet stays close to port in the North and Baltic Seas while a German Zeppelin targets England. The Austro-Hungarian Fleet keeps watch in the Adriatic. Turkey is not represented, and entered the war at the end of October, 1914; Italy in late May, 1915.
"Princess R_______ said to me when I was discussing the imperial court with her recently :'Isn't it grievous to think that the masters of Russia live in such an atmosphere? It's as if they lived in rooms which are never aired. Just think, no one — I mean it, no one — ever sees them alone or lunches with them or goes for a walk with them or dines with them or spends an evening with them . . . not a soul except Anna Vyrubova! . . . [The courts of Alexander II and Alexander III had] some life about them. The monarchs were approachable; you could talk quite freely with them so that they learned a good deal. In turn you got to know — and like them. But now . . . what a contrast, what a lapse!'" ((1), more)
"Little by little we edged our trenches forward from the side of the wood toward the road from Servon to Vienne-le-Château. By the end of December we reached the road. From there we could see a broad horizon. In front of us, just beyond the slope where the lines of the enemy trenches became clearly visible against the darker surrounding soil, we could see the belfry of Binarville pointing to the sky. When we wanted to speak of a great struggle or a brilliant offensive, we would not say, 'When we are at Mézieres' or 'at Lille,' but 'When we are at Binarville.' I believe that we are not there yet." ((2), more)
"In an hour's time 1914 will be over. . . .This afternoon, however, I had a long and frank talk with the Swiss Minister, Odier. . . . We came to the conclusion that Germany made a serious mistake in thinking she could finish the war straight off; that it will be a very, very long struggle and that victory will ultimately rest with the most tenacious of the combatants.The war will thus become a war of attrition and the attrition, alas, must be complete, involving the exhaustion of food supplies, industrial machinery and products, man power and moral forces! And it is plain that it is the moral forces which will bring about the decision in the last desperate hour." ((3), more)
"Brussels, December 31, 1914 — Here is the end of the vile old year. We could see it out with rejoicing, if there were any prospect of 1915 bringing us anything better. But it doesn't look very bright for Belgium." ((4), more)
"Cursed be those whose pride, ambition or squalid self-interest have unleashed such a plague upon Europe, plunging us into such terrible suffering, and ruining so many of the towns and villages of our beautiful country, perhaps forever! . . . But today you too, my dear friends, have your duty laid out before you. Consider this — you are the hope of tomorrow. Yours is the young generation which will have to replace those killed on the field of honour . . . Whatever the outcome of the terrible conflict, the genius of the French people must live on. Those of us who have willingly sacrificed our lives and who tomorrow will perhaps be dead . . . confidently leave this task to you." ((5), more)
(1) Entry from the memoirs of Maurice Paléologue, French Ambassador to Russia, for Tuesday, December 29, 1914. The Russian Empress was German, and on October 14, the Ambassador had written that, 'the Empress and those about her are suspected of carrying on a secret correspondence with Germany.' Anna Vyrubova was lady-in-waiting, confidant, and friend to Empress Alexandra, and spent many evenings alone with the royal family. She was imprisoned during the first Russian Revolution in 1917.
An Ambassador's Memoirs Vol. I by Maurice Paléologue, page 230, publisher: George H. Doran Company, publication date: 1925
(2) Excerpt from the memoir of French historian Marc Bloch, a sergeant in the 272nd infantry regiment in the line in Champagne. Mézieres, the chief town of the Ardennes, had a population of 9,393. Lille, a major manufacturing center, one of 205,602 (Baedeker's Northern France, 1909), Binarville a few hundred at most.
Memoirs of War 1914-15 by Marc Bloch, page 152, copyright © Cambridge University Press 1988, publisher: Cambridge University Press, publication date: 1988
(3) Entry from the memoirs of Maurice Paléologue, French Ambassador to Russia, for Thursday, December 31, 1914. Paléologue and Odier agree that Germany made a serious mistake in thinking it could end the war quickly. But Paléologue worried that his Russian ally did not have the 'moral force' to see the war through to a successful conclusion. He concludes by quoting Russian physician and writer Anton Chekhov: 'Why do we tire so soon? How is it that after squandering so much fervour, passion, and faith we almost always go to ruin before the age of thirty? And when we fall how is it that we never try to rise again?'
An Ambassador's Memoirs Vol. I by Maurice Paléologue, pp. 231, 232, publisher: George H. Doran Company, publication date: 1925
(4) The December 31, 1914 entry from the journal of Hugh Gibson, Secretary to the American Legation in Brussels, Belgium.
A Journal from our Legation in Belgium by Hugh Gibson, page 344, copyright © Copyright, 1917, by Doubleday, Page & Company, publisher: Doubleday, Page & Company, publication date: 1917
(5) Excerpt from a letter from Adjutant Henri Boulle of the French 76th Infantry who was killed in the Argonne on January 1, 1915. A teacher before the war, he wrote the letter to his students the prior day, December 31, 1914.
They Shall Not Pass: The French Army on the Western Front 1914-1918 by Ian Sumner, pp. 44, 45, copyright © Ian Sumner 2012, publisher: Pen and Sword, publication date: 2012
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