|
Books > History > World history > From 1900 > First World War
Afterlives documents the lives and historical pursuits of the
generations who grew up in Australia, Britain and Germany after the
First World War. Although they were not direct witnesses to the
conflict, they experienced its effects from their earliest years.
Based on ninety oral history interviews and observation during the
First World War Centenary, this pioneering study reveals the
contribution of descendants to the contemporary memory of the First
World War, and the intimate personal legacies of the conflict that
animate their history-making. -- .
• Designed to be concise yet comprehensive with the undergraduate
student in mind • Will serve as a companion to many secondary and
primary sources on Wilson • Contains primary source documents to
help bring the subject to life
The First World War was a truely global event that changed the
course of history in many participating as well as
non-participating countries. In East Asia, the war stimulated the
further rise of Japan as the leading power in the region during the
war, yet also its radicalization and social protests after 1918. In
China and Korea it stimulated nationalist eruptions, demanding
freedom and equality for the (semi)colonized countries and the
people living within their borders. All in all, the present book
offers a consice introduction of the history of the First World War
and its impact in East Asia.
Two views of the Great Retreat
Imperial Germany had long planned the conflict that was to become
the First World War, but when the onslaught came there was little
sign that the nations which would be embroiled were prepared for
the storm. Germany advanced in the east and west where French and
Belgian armies were forced to retire by overwhelming odds. The
small British Army, the 'B. E. F', was rushed to the continent with
most of its troops having less than a week between garrison life
and the firing line. Under Sir John French, it was allocated the
western end of the line, and at Mons it inflicted far more
causalities on the enemy than its numbers would suggest. No army of
its size, however, could stand against the German superiority in
men (at least five to one) or artillery and machine guns. An
envelopment was inevitable and so a stubbornly fought retreat was
ordered. Near Le Cateau, the British turned at bay and
Smith-Dorrien's determination to stand and fight undoubtedly saved
the British Army from annihilation. Many people imagine the First
World War as a stalemate of mud, wire and trenches, but in the
first six months it was a great European war fought in much the
same way that Napoleon, Wellington and Blucher had fought a century
before. This Leonaur Original edition contains two concise accounts
of the early campaign of the great conflict where the 'Contemptible
Little Army' of the B. E. F earned undying fame in the history of
military conflict.
Leonaur editions are newly typeset and are not facsimiles; each
title is available in softcover and hardback with dustjacket; our
hardbacks are cloth bound and feature gold foil lettering on their
spines and fabric head and tail bands.
An overgrown concrete bunker at Ypres; a rusting gun carriage in a
field in Flanders; perfectly preserved trenchworks at Vimy,
northern France; a rocky mountaintop observation post high in the
Tyrolean mountains. More than 100 years after the end of World War
I, the conflict's legacy can still be seen from Europe to the
Pacific. Abandoned Places of World War I explores more than 120
bunkers, trench systems, tunnels, fortifications and gun
emplacements from North America to East Africa. Included are
defensive structures, such as Fort Douaumont at Verdun, the site of
the Western Front's bloodiest battle; the elaborately constructed
tunnels of the Wellington Quarry, near Arras, designed to provide a
safe working hospital for wounded British soldiers; and crumbling
concrete pill boxes in Anzac Cove, Turkey. From the preserved
remains of the mighty Przemysl fortress to bunkers and observation
points high in the Slovenian Dolomites, Abandoned Places of World
War I features more than 180 striking photographs from around the
world.
A unique 1914 trilogy in one special edition
This Leonaur special edition, published to coincide with the
centenary of the outbreak of the First World War, collects three of
Edmund Dane's well regarded, concise histories of warfare Never
before published in this form, this substantial trilogy covers
events from the outbreak of hostilities in late July, 1914, to the
battle of Neuve Chapelle in early March, 1915-approximately the
first six months of the conflict. Germany had long planned this
war. It had its well equipped army's inexorable advance mapped out
in every detail, taking into account the French fortifications
along it's borders and the terrain to be traversed. German
commanders decided to march through the northern flank of Belgium
and present this as a 'fait de complete' to the Belgians, sweetened
by terms they thought would not be refused. However, the Belgians
and their small archaic army, fought back. This resistance, a story
of unparalleled bravery and tenacity has been substantially
forgotten due to the world-wide carnage that followed. The German
Army did, of course, advance through Belgium, into France and
towards Paris. The French Army fought as it stubbornly retired and
the small regular British Army was quickly transported to the
battle line. The B. E. F stood and fought at Mons, but could not
endure the seemingly endless supply of German troops thrown at it
or the vast superiority in well-served artillery at the disposal of
the invaders. A dogged retreat to the Marne was fought, with
actions around Le Cateau that saved the British Army from
annihilation. The British and French armies turned before Paris and
counter-attacked driving the Germans north over the Marne and
Aisne. Towards the end of the year the Germans stood at the First
Battle of Ypres-a pivotal engagement that marked the beginning of
the war of stalemate. From this point on the great armies of the
Western Front would gain little on the tortured battleground of
blood, mud and wire. Neuve Chapelle was the first of many
offensives that defined the conflict-typified by an appalling loss
of life for no significant gain. The days of mobility were over and
the armies began to dig into the ground for the long haul to
1918.
Leonaur editions are newly typeset and are not facsimiles; each
title is available in softcover and hardback with dustjacket; our
hardbacks are cloth bound and feature gold foil lettering on their
spines and fabric head and tail bands.
The outbreak of World War I saw the collapse of socialist
notions of class solidarity and reaffirmed the enduring strength of
nationalism. The workers of the world did not unite, but turned on
one another and slaughtered their fellows in what was then the
bloodiest war in history. There have been many efforts to explain
the outbreak of war in 1914, but few from so intimate a perspective
as LeBon's. He examines such questions as why German scholars tried
to deny Germany's obvious guilt in the war, and what explained the
remarkable resolve of the French army to persevere in the face of
unprecedented adversity.
To such questions, LeBon proposes answers built upon principles
well articulated in the larger body of his work. He transforms the
character of the debate by demonstrating how psychological
principles explain more persuasively both the causes of German
academic ignominy and the origins of French valor. Convinced as he
was that only psychology could illuminate collective behavior,
LeBon dismisses purely economic or political interpretations as
ill-conceived and inadequate precisely because they fail to
appreciate the role of psychology in the collective behavior of
national statesmen, prominent scholars, and ordinary soldiers.
The Psychology of the Great War provides a bridge to study both
crowd behavior and battlefield behavior by illustrating how
ordinary people are transformed into savages by great events. This
element in LeBon's thinking influenced Georges Sorel's thinking, as
he had seen the same phenomenon in those who participated in
general strikes and revolutions. And in a later period and
different context, Hannah Arendt gave this strange capacity of the
ordinary to be transformed into the extraordinary the name
"banality of evil." The book will be of interest to social
theorists, psychologists concerned with group behavior, and
historians of the period.
The First World War has often been understood in terms of the
combat experiences of soldiers on the Western Front; those
combatants who served in the other theatres of the war have been
neglected. Using personal testimonies, official documentation and
detailed research from a diverse range of archives, The British
Imperial Army in the Middle East explores the combat experiences of
these soldiers. The army that fought the Ottoman Empire was a
multinational and multi-ethnic force, drawing personnel from across
Britain's empire, including Australia, New Zealand, and India. By
taking a transnational and imperial perspective on the First World
War, this book ensures that the campaigns in Egypt and Palestine
are considered in the wider context of an empire mobilised to fight
a total and global war.
"This dictionary is a model of its genre in both form and content
and will likely become for all large libraries the standard source
on the subject in any language for decades to come." RQ
This is a comparative, interdisciplinary book which explores the
responses of the women's movement to World War I in all of the
major belligerent nations. Working in the fields of gender studies
and women's history, the contributors cover key topics including
women's relationship with the state and with the nation, the status
of women's war service, women's role as mothers in wartime, women's
suffrage, peace and the aftermath of war, and women's guilt and
responsibility.
This book examines the pictorial representation of women in Great
Britain both before and during the First World War. It focuses in
particular on imagery related to suffrage movements, recruitment
campaigns connected to the war, advertising, and Modernist art
movements including Vorticism. This investigation not only
considers the image as a whole, but also assesses tropes and
constructs as objects contained within, both literal and
metaphorical. In this way visual genealogical threads including the
female figure as an ideal and William Hogarth's 'line of beauty'
are explored, and their legacies assessed and followed through into
the twenty-first century. Georgina Williams contributes to debates
surrounding the deliberate and inadvertent dismissal of women's
roles throughout history, through literature and imagery. This book
also considers how absence of a pictorial manifestation of the
female form in visual culture can be as important as her presence.
This book covers the entire spectrum of military service during
World War I. It gives examples, including many photographs, from
almost every ethnic and national group in the United States during
this time. Including draft registration, induction and training,
stateside service, overseas service, combat, return home, and
discharge, learn the history of America's foreign-born soldiers
during World War I and how they adapted to military service to
become part of the successful American Expeditionary Forces.
The Great War in the Middle East
Those with any interest in the First World War know that its
principal field of conflict was in Europe, where from the English
Channel coastline to the Balkans it became a grinding stalemate of
attrition. However, this was a war between imperial powers and
during the nineteenth century, to one degree or another, each had
gained and secured dominions and colonies all over the globe. Thus
the war truly did embrace the world. Each side had its allies and
Germany had forged close ties with the now declining Turkish
Ottoman empire. The Turkish influence spread over the Middle East
around its own homeland, into Mesopotamia and through Syria to the
Holy Land. All combatants were aware of the value of the Suez Canal
in Egypt as a route to the east. It was a vital lifeline for men
and material to be defended or taken at all costs. The stage was
inevitably set for one of the Great War's most interesting
'sideshow' campaigns. The Palestine Campaigns are particularly
interesting to military students because they were fought over hard
terrain-often desert-and because in a time of wire and trenches
this was a comparatively fluid campaign that gave opportunities for
the last great manoeuvres of cavalry ever to take place on the
field of battle. This concise account was written shortly after the
war by an eyewitness to many of the events described and thus is an
excellent entry point for those for whom the history of this
theatre of war has become a subject of new interest.
Leonaur editions are newly typeset and are not facsimiles; each
title is available in softcover and hardback with dustjacket; our
hardbacks are cloth bound and feature gold foil lettering on their
spines and fabric head and tail bands.
The opening campaign of the Great War as seen by the German Army
History, it is said, is written by the victors and that is
generally true. It is therefore often difficult for the military
historian of later times to achieve a complete understanding of the
position on both sides of an engagement. Sources from the losing
side tend to be in shorter supply than those on the winning side.
There is now much interest in the opening campaign of the First
World War, not least because the outstanding defensive performance
of the hugely outnumbered 'Contemptible Little Army' is
particularly appealing to the sentiments of English speaking people
and has entered the annals of great military achievements. Also all
students of the period know that the war shortly became a
stalemate, a war of attrition with barbed-wire, trenches, mud and
blood that abided until the last phase of the war. This was the
fluid stage of the war, when experienced county infantry regiments
and cavalry fought in the way that colonial experiences had trained
them to fight. So this book, written by a member of the German
staff is especially interesting and vital for all students of the
period. It is, as one would expect, partisan in its perspective,
and reveals how the campaign of 1914 was perceived by the advancing
German force. It provides much detail of how the Germans saw the
actions of the B. E. F and this will be a revelation to many
readers. The English editor has included very useful passages of
explanation and verification which compare the German view with
what history has shown were the actual facts. Numerous footnotes
correct the German view of the size and disposition of enemy units,
the numbers of troops engaged and the ordnance the British and
their French allies had at their disposal. Verification of actual
Allied positions held, resources in reserve etc. are also given to
counterbalance the German view. A very welcome addition to the
library of anyone interested in this campaign.
Leonaur editions are newly typeset and are not facsimiles; each
title is available in softcover and hardback with dustjacket; our
hardbacks are cloth bound and feature gold foil lettering on their
spines and fabric head and tail bands.
The 'Hundred Days' campaign of 1918 remains a neglected aspect of
the First World War. Why was the German army defeated on the
Western Front? Did its morale collapse or was it beaten by the
improved military effectiveness of a British army which had climbed
a painful 'learning curve' towards modern combined arms warfare?
This revealing insight into the crucial final months of the First
World War uses state-of-the-art methodology to present a rounded
case study of the ability of both armies to adapt to the changing
realities they faced. Jonathan Boff draws on both British and
German archival sources, some of them previously unseen, to examine
how representative armies fought during the 'Hundred Days'
campaign. Assessing how far the application of modern warfare
underpinned the British army's part in the Allied victory, the book
highlights the complexity of modern warfare and the role of
organisational behaviour within it.
The year 1916 has recently been identified as "a tipping point for
the intensification of protests, riots, uprisings and even
revolutions." Many of these constituted a challenge to the
international pre-war order of empires, and thus collectively
represent a global anti-imperial moment, which was the
revolutionary counterpart to the later diplomatic attempt to
construct a new world order in the so-called Wilsonian moment.
Chief among such events was the Easter Rising in Ireland, an
occurrence that took on worldwide significance as a challenge to
the established order. This is the first collection of specialist
studies that aims at interpreting the global significance of the
year 1916 in the decline of empires.
|
|