World War One

Find old World War 1 articles here. Find information on uniforms, women, gas warfare, prisoners of war and more.

It was a Second Rate War (The American Mercury, 1924)

In the conflict which some still persist in calling the Great War, though it was great only in size, there was so much jumble and muddle and half-hearted experiment and so little visible military skill and ingenuity that a far-seeing and keen-thinking British colonel has declared that if the nations of the earth will only use their brains, the inevitable next war will show combat so transformed and reformed that the struggle of 1914 – 1918 will seem, by comparison, little more than a clash ‘between barbaric hordes…’


Click here to read about the new rules for warfare that were written as a result of the First World War – none of them pertain to the use of poison gas or submarines.

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Submarine Warfare: The First Seven Months (NY Times, 1915)

Information released from the British Admiralty concerning the number of British merchant and fishing vessels lost to German U-boat attacks during the first seven months of the war. The article names eight non-military ships sunk during March 1915. In addition, the Admiralty also stated the total number of British merchant and fishing vessels lost through German naval attacks from the start of the war through March 10, 1915.


Click here to read about the new rules for warfare that were written as a result of the First World War – none of them pertain to the use of poison gas or submarines.

Submarine Warfare: The First Seven Months (NY Times, 1915) Read More »

The Future of War and Chemical Weapons (Current Opinion, 1921)

Read this article and you will soon get a sense of what busy bees they must have been over at the United States Department of War within that year and a half following the close of World War One. General Amos A. Fries and the lads attached to the Chemical Warfare Service had been applying much cranium power to all matters involving mustard gas, tear gas, Lewisite and White Phosphorus. Much of the post-war dollar was devoted to making ships impervious to gas attacks, masks and uniforms suited to withstand nerve agents and offensive aircraft capable of deploying chemical bombs.

As to the effectiveness of phosphorous and thermit against machine-gun nests, there is no recorded instance where our gas troops failed to silence German machine-gun nests once they were located…In the next war, no matter how soon it may occur, a deadly composition called Lewisite will be used with far more devastating effect than that of mustard gas.

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The Blessings of Poison Gas (Literary Digest, 1927)

Having examined the collected data from the First World War, scientists and soldiers alike were drawing surprising conclusions as to the inefficiency of chemical agents in warfare. No doubt, it was articles such as this that lead to the decision not to use gas in the Second World War:

Poisonous gas as used in warfare is ‘a blessing, not a curse,’ and makes for the future security and peace of the world’, declares J.E. Mills, of the U.S. Chemical Warfare Service

…Theoretically one ton of mustard gas could kill 45,000,000 men. Actually one ton of mustard gas as used at the front caused about twenty-nine casualties, of which one died.

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Reconsidering Poison Gas as a Weapon (Current Opinion, 1925)

An article about J.B.S. Haldane (1892 – 1964), formerly a British combatant of the Great War who became a chemist (and pioneer geneticist) during the inter-war years studying not merely the effectiveness of poison gas but the question as to whether the weapon was more humane than bullets and artillery shells:

The future lies with poisonous smoke made from arsenic compounds and with mustard gas. Of the latter, he says, it kills one man for every forty it puts out of action, whereas, shells kill one for every three.


His musings concerning atomic energy are referred to as are some of his quack-theories regarding the effects of gas warfare on people with dark skin.

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Germany’s Discomfort Over the War-Guilt Clause (Literary Digest, 1929)

The Treaty of Versailles was signed ten years before the printing of the attached article, and within that time the German press had literally published hundreds of thousands of editorials objecting to the treaty’s clause that placed all blame entirely on Germany for the start of the war. In order to mark this anniversary, the editors of The Literary Digest decided to run this article that reported on how that country felt about the war-guilt lie.

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The French Army Moves into the Ruhr Valley (Literary Digest, 1923)

When Germany’s post-war government failed to remit a portion of the 33 billion dollars it owed under it’s obligations agreed to in the Versailles Treaty, France lost little time deploying her army into the coal rich regions of the Ruhr Valley. This article, illustrated with cartoons and maps, offers a collection of assorted observations and editorial opinions gathered from from across Europe concerning the event:

Premiere Poincare remarked, ‘the French troops will remain in the Ruhr as long as may be necessary to assure the payment of reparations, but not a single day longer.’

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