Three Collections of War Poetry Reviewed
(The Independent, 1919)
A review of three volumes of World War One poetry: From the Front
1919
Articles from 1919
Life in a Trench
(What the Boys Did Over There, 1919)
Corporal Frank Sears of the American Expeditionary Force put pen to paper and explained for all posterity the unsanitary conditions of <b.living in a W.W. I trench in France:
Life in the trenches is made up of cooties, rats, mud and gas masks…
We became so used to mud up in the lines that if our chow did not have some mud, or muddy water in it we could not digest it. It was just a case of mud all over: eat, drink, sleep and wash in mud.
The Versailles Treaty and the German Colonies
(Leslie’s Weekly, 1919)
Half way through the year of 1919, editorials like this one began to appear in many places which served to inform the English-speaking world that the Germans were peacefully handing over their African colonies (as they were obliged to do in article 119 of the Versailles Treaty):
Germany renounces in favor of the principal Allied and Associated Powers all her rights and titles over her overseas possessions.
Rudyard Kipling Condemned
(Current Opinion, 1919)
The author of The White Man’s Burden
An article about the Muslim opinion concerning colonialism can be read here…
The New Objectivity
(Current Opinion, 1919)
A review of the paintings and sculptures from the Weimer Republic and the manner in which that new art served to reflect the social upheaval that was taking place in Germany at that time. The article concerns itself primarily with one art exhibit in particular, the Spring Exhibition of the Berlin Secession (1919) and the two art factions who participated: there were the artists of Der Sturm a movement that existed prior to the war and a newer, post-war tribe; the November Group. Also displayed were the works of two painters who served in the Kaiser’s army and did not return; Franz Marc (1880-1916) and August Macke (1887-1914).
It is hoped by the German Expressionists and the artists of the New Objectivity that their art will serve as a tool for the destruction of Germany’s old order.
Click here to see a few trench war images by German Expressionist Otto Dix.
Click here to read about Expressionist woodcuts.
The New Objectivity held up a mirror to the political crises that was playing out all over Germany, click here to read about it…
A French Village Welcomes the Ninety-Second Division
(The Crises, 1919)
This is a lovely piece, originally written in French for a village paper, in which a journalist describes the collective excitement of the townsfolk in welcoming the Americans to their sleepy hamlet during the First World War, and how astonished they were to find that the arriving Doughboys were all of African descent!
Read an Article About American intervention in W.W. I and the Gratitude of France.
The Mining of the Seas
(Sea Power, 1919)
Naval mines had been around for centuries, in one form or another – and this article pertains to the particular type of anti U-boat mines that were put in place along those well-traveled sea lanes known best by that kind of German warship.
Click here to read about one of the greatest innovations by 20th Century chemists: plastic.
The Evolution of the Tank
(NY Times, 1919)
A three page article concerning the development of tanks during the First World War. While they were being created on the drawing boards of Britain’s W. Foster Company, the code name for these land dreadnoughts was water tanks; hence the name.
The first armored battle cars, or tanks were a British invention developed from an American automobile tractor used for agricultural purposes on the Western prairies. They made their initial appearance at the battle of the Somme (Flers), September 15, 1916.
However, it should be known that they were first used to greatest effect in the Battle of Cambrai (November 20 through December 7, 1917).
Click here to see a diagram of the W.W. I French Renault tank.
Read about the Patton tank in Korea…
W.E.B. Du Boise and the Documents of U.S. Army Prejudice
(The Crises, 1919
This historic article first appeared in a 1919 issue of The Crisis and served to document the official discrimination against African-Americans who served both in the ranks and as officers in the American Army during the First World War. The article includes the communications from high-ranking American officers to the French military authorities, conveying their suggestions as to how America’s black Doughboys were to be treated.
In the War’s Aftermath Came Spiritual Disillusion
(Current Opinion Magazine, 1919)
At the thirty-fifth annual Church Congress of the Protestant Episcopal Church (1919), clergy members seemed to agree that Christian leaders were needlessly complicit
Christianity has betrayed itself body and soul.
If you would like to read about the spirit of disillusion that permeated post-war literature, click here.
Victory and Paris Fashion
(Vogue Magazine, 1919)
The Paris Victory Parade celebrating the end of the 1914 – 1918 war was a long awaited and much anticipated fashion event and Mme. Parisienne was not going to miss it for all the crepe de Chin in China. This VOGUE correspondent contrasted the Paris that existed a short time earlier, the gray, deserted Paris with the Paris of the 1919 Victory Parade and notes how eager the natives were to recreate that mirthful, light-hearted Paris of 1913 that they all remembered so well. There is a great sense of joie de vivre throughout the article, but it very rapidly becomes a laundry list concerning who-wore-what-where.
The New England National Guard: Twenty-Sixth Division
(The Stars and Stripes, 1919)
An illustration of the insignia patch and a brief account of the origins, deployments and war-time activities of the U.S. Army’s Twenty-Sixth Division
(a.k.a. the Yankee Division
)during World War I.
American Colleges During W.W. I
(Home Sector, 1919)
Here is a book review of The Colleges In The War And Afterward (1919) by Parke Rexford Kolbe:
One obtains a very clear picture of our educational institutions during the war and a definite feeling of the difficulties encountered when agencies which were quite individualistic, quite self-dependent, suddenly found themselves mere sub-departments of the War Department submitting to a command from higher authority as if they had been used to it all their lives…
Sam Brown Belts: Two Short Notices
(The Stars and Stripes, 1919)
Aside from barb wire, poison gas, machine guns and trenches, the untested American officer corps had one other alien item to contend with: the Sam Brown Belt. Worn by all the officers in the allied armies and widely recognized as the premiere emblem of authority along the front lines, many American officers were of mixed minds concerning this military fashion accessory.
W.B. Yeats Gripes About the Theater-Going Bourgeoisie
(Theatre Arts Magazine, 1919)
Poet and playwright W.B. Yeats (1865 – 1939) had his say on the matter of theater-subscriber-book-of-the-month-club types who are more likely to attend performances because they feel they should, rather than attending for their own reasons of personal enjoyment:
And the worst of it is that I could not pay my players, or the seamstresses, or the owner of the building, unless I could draw to my plays those who prefer light amusement, or who have no ear for verse and literature, and fortunately they are all very polite.
W.B. Yeats Gripes About the Theater-Going Bourgeoisie
(Theatre Arts Magazine, 1919)
Poet and playwright W.B. Yeats (1865 – 1939) had his say on the matter of theater-subscriber-book-of-the-month-club types who are more likely to attend performances because they feel they should, rather than attending for their own reasons of personal enjoyment:
And the worst of it is that I could not pay my players, or the seamstresses, or the owner of the building, unless I could draw to my plays those who prefer light amusement, or who have no ear for verse and literature, and fortunately they are all very polite.
Designs of the Italian Futurists
(Current Opinion Magazine, 1919)
Already the young architects of Italy are looking forward to a new renaissance of building, toward the production of a new style based upon modern methods of building and adapted to modern needs. The impulse to this new movement came from the brilliant Futurist Antonio Sant’Elia, who carried the ideas of the Italian innovators into the field of architecture, but whose development was cut short by his heroic death in the war… Nevertheless, his influence upon the younger architects has been great. Fortunately, they have been able to adapt his ideas to the exigencies of practical building, and in some instances to avoid a complete severing with the traditions of the past.
Chateau-Thierry: Setting the Record Straight
(The Literary Digest, 1919)
Rumor has it that when the U.S. Army’s senior staff officers had learned of the victory that the U.S. Marines had achieved at the Bois de Belleau in the summer of 1918, one of them had remarked, Those head-line hunting bastards! When reading this next piece you will immediately get a sense that the army was fed-up with the folks at home believing that the same Marines were responsible for the Army’s success at Chateau-Thierry. The war was already over by the time this piece appeared, making it clear to all that Chateau-Thierry was a feather in the cap for the Army, and no one else.