world war i history

It seems to me like the more I learn about the Great War, the more I end up wondering if I can blame it on the slow rise in IQ during the 20'th century, or on lead water pipes. I don't even mean the start of the war, but stuff like: - the French enter the war in red pants, blue coats, and with...

Today is the hundredth anniversary. A couple of interesting articles I saw this morning: RMS Lusitania sinking: Incredible new undersea images shows WWI shipwreck that claimed 1,200 lives Nurse knew best when the Lusitania went down Note that the above article contains a couple of factual...

I was browsing and came across a nice little set of WWI photographs, including some from underground cities that I'd never seen before. Thought I'd throw in the link here. Hidden worlds of WWI From that page you can link to more, or go straight to this one for far more pictures...

OK I'm a couple of days late and I'm aware that the Zeppelin raids were arguably not the first aerial bombing (i.e. the Italian War of Independence, the First Balkan War and the Mexican Revolution) however I believe that these raids were the true beginning of aerial bombardment as a part of war...

The German built a gun they used to shell Paris during WWI. The gun is represented below and a map of hits (in red) is compared to bomb damage (in black) from. Source.

I just read The Guns of August. Great WWI book covering the leadup to the war, and the first month. I want to know more. What I'd really like to read is Hew Strachan's 3-volume work on it. But he's only finished the first one as of 2003. What I'm looking for is something with historical detail...

Just found this link. How accurate are the claims? Have they been made or are they strawmen? What was the true reason for WW1? Was it justified? http://stopwar.org.uk/news/ten-lies-we-re-told-to-justify-the-slaughter-of-20-million-in-the-first-world-war They are:- 1. The war was fought in...

First major declaration of War in the First World War. You can argue that Aug 28 1914 was the starting point because on that day Austria Hungary declared war on Serbia,but the German declaration of war on Germany ended any possibility that the war could be "localized".

In the 100 years ago today thread Craig B and I went a bit off topic onto speculations about the likely consequences of a world without the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo on the 28th of June 1914. Assuming the plotters had failed, for whatever reason1 what do people think...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/27637906 The air display above Sonisphere will feature nine aircraft, all exact replicas of planes used in combat in World War One. Bruce Dickinson, a trained transport airline pilot, will be flying his own Fokker Dr1 Triplane, the same model used by German flying...

Wow. Today is the day it all started. Sarajevo marks 100 years since killing of Archduke Ferdinand Perhaps the most pivotal day in history in the last 100 years or longer?

Hello, Recently went to the Champagne region and found a newly painted cross in a wood that read "HOUSSET Louis, Mort pour la France, 4 Septembre 1914" It also had "64 RI" on it, which I take to be the 64th Regiment D'Infantrie. I suspect this lad got killed as part of the battle of the Marne...

OK, so I'm likely off for to Reims for the easter weekend. Most of this will have to spend with other friends sampling Champagne but I want to see some battlefields when I'm there. Is Verdun worth a visit? Chemin des Dames? Any other locations? Will probably stop off somewhere further north...

http://themetapicture.com/if-wwi-was-a-bar-fight/ LOL

The 1914 centenary mini-series has just finished, it was excellent. Anyone else catch it?

http://www.livesofthefirstworldwar.org/ A head's up for the above project from the Imperial War Museum. My company's part is we've scanned all the records from the UK's old Midland Bank and we're beta-testing a crowdsourced transcription service. They're quite short entries, name, rank...

From a BBC article, published a few days ago http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-25776836 1. It was the bloodiest war in history to that point. The Taiping Rebellion in China had killed more. 2. Most soldiers died. For British soldiers it was 11.5%, less than during the Crimean War. 3. Men...

I want to visit the Menin Gate and the In Flanders Fields Museum this summer. For me, it's about a 4 hour drive. I plan on driving there on a Saturday, visit the Menin Gate, stay overnight, and visit the museum on Sunday, before heading back home again. Any forumites interested to visit there...

I'm currently re-reading (for the first time in decades) the reprint version of the old British comic 'Charley's War' the story of a man (boy really) who enlists underage in 1916 just in time for the Somme. I followed the original thirty odd years ago as a kid, and it's fascinating how parts of...

I've read that she was railroaded and wrongly convicted. I've also read that she would have been found innocent like Dreyfus if she had had a benefactor like he did.

I was watching All Quiet on the Western Front last night on TCM. (Great movie BTW). I noticed the German helmets, they are (for lack of a better description) like the Colonel Klink helmet, with a point on the top. Does anyone know if the point had a real purpose or is it a vestige of something...

I am currently sorting 6 or 7 moving boxes with all the family photos, and several more with family history, from postcards to genealogies. Among these are two small photo albums with photos taken during World War 1. My great-uncle had landed a position with aerial reconnaissance, as he was one...

Can anybody suggest titles of books covering German-occupied France in World War One? Also Belgium? (In English would be nice.) I've seen mention of some pretty draconian occupation policies, but I want more detail. The Germans staged such a baroque comeback performance that the period isn't...

Secret of the Lusitania: Arms find challenges Allied claims it was solely a passenger ship By Sam Greenhill Last updated at 1:16 AM on 20th December 2008 Her sinking with the loss of almost 1,200 lives caused such outrage that it propelled the U.S. into the First World War. But now divers...

Passchendaele Lest we forget. Ha, ******* ha.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7038095.stm So which historians say what? I was under the impression that most historians had decided it was genocide. I realise that passes a judgement on the motives of the Turkish government at the time, rather than just the consequences of their...

I'm reading a biography of Colette. She spent much of WWI in Paris and near the front visiting her husband. The book says that so many men died during the fighting that the French government made "contacting the dead" against the law. It seems that too many people were being taken advantage...