Ww1 Week 1 Trench Analysis

Men were living outside for days or weeks on end, with limited shelter from cold, wind, rain and snow in the winter or from the heat and sun in summer. Artillery destroyed the familiar landscape, reducing trees and buildings to desolate rubble and churning up endless mud in some areas. The incredible noise of artillery and machine gun fire, both enemy and friendly, was often incessant. Yet soldiers spent a great deal of time waiting around, and in some quiet sectors there was little real fighting and a kind of informal truce could develop between the two sides. Even in more active parts of the front, battle was rarely continuous and boredom was common among troops, with little of the heroism and excitement many had imagined before the war. The Italian infantry officer Emilio Lussu wrote that life in the trenches was ‘grim and monotonous’ and that ‘if there were no attacks, there was no war, only hard work’.[1] The order to attack – or news of an enemy assault – changed

The storm clouds were dark, gloomy and grim like a graveyard. They were near the surface of the earth. It was going to rain. They were lingering on. The soldiers’ uniforms were repeatedly buffeted by the howling gale. The sky was as black as a devil’s soul. A large boom echoed across the crimson battlefield as the lighting returned the thunder’s call. Endless calls for help could be heard. Then, the rain started pouring down, filling up the battle field, like a flood, as the constant sound of the rain pounding on the metal could be heard. Heavy boots pressed down on the wet mud, which would not be dry for the next week, due to the trenches. The trenches were six-foot-deep and reeked of dead bodies and human excrement.

The opposing armies were in a deadlock and trenches had become a dominate feature of the war (Page 63, 2nd paragraph). Some trenches were from 5 feet deep to 30 feet deep; they caused a stalemate that was almost impossible to break. If you break into their lines there is another one waiting for you. The trenches were hundreds of miles long, constantly fighting. Also they were filled with rats and frogs. Trenches were always in repair, they were reinforced with sandbags, with sheets of corrugated

The long period that the soldiers had to spend within the trenches,normally because dirty rain flood,with soaked shoes in mud puddles,rats and decomposing bodies,caused the

In this, we are given the impression that the Canadian troops were provided with adequate boots; however they did not fit properly. The evident lack of organization caused unnecessary anguish for Canadian troops and their misconception of the war. Canadian soldiers endured much pointless suffering through the appalling conditions they encountered. The worst experience for Canadians was in the trenches.

The retelling, dating to April of 1915, details the horrors of the new weapon: “Hundreds, after a dreadful fight for air, became unconscious and died where they lay – a death of hideous torture” (Document 4). This appalling use of chemical weapons would often be repeated in

Intro: The life for the average soldier in the WW1 trenches was pretty horrible. They had to live in mud, fellow dead soldiers and lots of rats, some the size of your hand. Life of a soldier was very tough, having to see your best mate get shot and he left to rot. Any soldiers that made it out of the war would have suffered either shell shock or post-traumatic stress disorder and living with either of these would have been terrible.

6 p.m. on a wednesday i hear the sound of the attack planes above my head as i try to sleep. Adolf has been bombing us conti for the past seven days. The soldiers in my squad are tired and we are barely holding on to any hope of making it out of this situation alive. We have been experiencing terrible sights seeing my best friend blown up in front of my eyes from the bombs above. I continue to try and keep my soldiers in a positive mindset and encourage them that although we are starving and terrified, because of the bombs that seem to never end and the constant sound of the tanks roaring across the ground.

On 22 April 1915 the second Battle of Ypres established the reputation of the Canadians’ being a fighting force. This was created through the Ypres Salient, which is where the British and allied line pushed into the German line in a concave bend. The Germans held the higher ground and were able to fire into the allied trenches from the north, the south and the east, but the Allies prearranged defense strategies: On the Canadian right was the British Expeditionary Force, and on their left was the 48th Algerian and 87th Territoral French, which were militia regiment enlisted into service a French division.3

In World War One, on the Western Front, soldiers served and lived in trenches for days, weeks or even months on end. Alone with the daily essentials needing to be done in these small, enclosed spaces, men also had to work hard in the mud and filth, sometimes for hours without rest, all the while being prepared for attacks or trench raids at any moment. This was what life was like for hundreds of thousands of soldiers during the period of World War One. This lifestyle throughout the First World War had an enormous effect on the European soldiers, both physically and mentally.

We all sleep and rest and eat in the trenches, but it’s not paradise. One night, the sound of loud booms woke us up. We were being attacked by some very dangerous artillery. We could feel every boom and every crack in the dirt above us. Many soldiers were not prepared for this and got sick. The attack come out of nowhere and frightened all of us.

The 11th battalion was officially denominated the 11th Reserve Infantry Battalion, CEF on April 29, 1915.14 As a Reserve Battlion, the whole of the 11th did not participate in Allied operations. However, sections of the 11th did reinforce in supplementary roles to other Battalions on the Western Front. Members of the 11th played significant parts in reinforcement during the battles at Ypres (1915,’17), Somme (1916), Arras (1917,’18), Vimy (1917), Passchendaele (1917), Amiens (1918), the Battle of the Drocourt-Quéant Line (1917,’18) and the battle of Canal du Nord. (1918).15 It is unclear in which campaigns Private Beckett personally participated in, though it can reasoned he was involved in the multiple Allied attempts at capturing the town of Souchez in the Pas de Callais region of of Northern France. This town will be examined further in the section Front of Postcard.

This was when people were in essentially big holes in the ground with barricades in front of them. Trench life was very hard because you watched your friends die, and had to just see them lie there when it wasnt safe to move their bodies, you were in the trenches for hours on end, and typically were attacked straight in the trenches instead of in the middle of the battlefield. There were rats that picked at human remains, and the smell of rotting flesh. "No Man's Land" was the land between two fronts, not claimed by either

The life of a soldier in the trenches during World War I was unimaginable to the people back home in Canada. Soldiers carried out their duty to their country in the most horrifying conditions. The trenches were rivers of mud and blood, food rations were very basic and designed only to keep the soldiers alive, hygiene was non-existent, and military direction was poor as these men fought for their country. Constant shelling and gas attacks made many soldiers feel that death was imminent and a great deal of men suffered from mental breakdowns due to the war.

Again the 3rd Division is short of its objective, but it secures additional ground and is now on drier land.