LIFE CONDITIONS AT THE TRENCH

LIFE AT THE TRENCHES OF THE I.W.W.

Why do the soldiers of I.W.W. lived on the trenches?

THE START OF THE I.W.W.

During the first years of the war, the german army developed the blitzkrieg or “Lightning War” consisting on rapid surprise attack to gain terrain and arrive to the gates of Paris.Nonetheless, this attack known as the Plan Schlieffen was drastically sttoped by the British and the French and forced the German to quickly reatreat.

TRENCH WARFARE

With the stagnation of the "lightning" war, the positions were fixed at the end of the summer of 1914. This was a turning point in the war, and this led to conflict based on the establishment of the thousands of soldiers in the trenches. The trenches enabled that the war developed in stable fronts, far from the territories and the civilians. The main objetive of this plan was to keep the territory under control and avoid that the enemy could conquer the cities.

The line of the trenches during the in World War I extended from the Belgian coast through northeastern France to Switzerland. The borderline consisted of a series of two to six trench lines running parallel to each other and being at least 1 mile in depth. Each trench was dug in a type of zigzag so that no enemy, standing at one end, could fire for more than a few yards down its length.

HOW WAS LIFE DURING THE I.W.W?

The trenches were stinky because of the mud mingled with rotting corpses, lingering gas, open latrines, wet clothes and unwashed bodies. The application of chloride and lime to protect against disease and infection only added to the disgusting smell. Rats proliferated since they ate dead human bodies; they bred and grow to be "as big as cats". The rats damaged the soldiers' health as they led to these diseases that took a massive toll on the soldiers, with trench fever possibly pulling a soldier away from the front lines for months at a time.

Diseases: Trench fever

This disease is caused by the bacterium Bartonella quintana that lived in the human lice. Infection occurred when a louse carrying the bacterium defecated whilst feeding. I f the host scratched, the bacterium-infected feces would be spread across and into the small wound. The systoms were sudden fever, loss of energy, intense headache ans skin rash.

Diseases: trench foot

Other common disease was the trench foot which resulted from soldiers having their feet wet for long periods of time. The skin of the foot would break down and soldier’s feet would become infected. The infection led to an increase in the size of the foot and to a terrible pain. The condition would make it such that soldiers were unable to fight in the war. The main treatment mostly included amputation, so had a terrible impact on the ability of a soldier to continue to fight in the war and spoiled the armies of both sides.

Spanish flu

During the las months of the war, there was an outbreak of a new kind of influenza that inffected a third of the worlds population and caused the death of dozens of thousands. The devastation of the war served also to obscure the high mortality rates produced by the new virus. The strict censorship prevented the european press to inform about the disease. Only in Spain that was a neutral country in the conflict, the press could freely talks about the outbreak. That's why the pandemics was called the spanish flu.

Shell-shock

The term ‘shell-shock’ is what we currently name as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)- The soldiers of the war suffered headaches, nightmares, hallucinations, and distressing and intrusive memories – all symptoms we associate with war trauma today. But ‘shell-shock’ also included mutism and paralysis, amnesia, blindness, deafness and even ‘personality loss. Many soldiers were unable to sleep, and those that achieved it suffered so many nightmares that was impossible to distinguish between the truth and the reality.

LOOK HIS CRAZY SMILE

The psychiatrist failed to understand the shell shock. At first, was thought to be caused by the exposure to exploding shells that caused molecular damage to the brain. But when symptoms appeared among soldiers not exposed to artillery barrages, they realise that it was a nervous breakdown precipitated by stress of war. The most common treatment for shell shock was, at the time, electro-shock therapy.

Use of poison gas

The trench warfare of the Western Front encouraged the development of new weaponry to break the stalemate: poison gas. This changed the nature of the conflict turning into a total war France actually was the first to use gas - they deployed tear gas in August 1914. This sustance irritate the eyes and caused uncontrolled tearing. Large doses can cause temporary blindness. Symptoms usually resolve by 30 minutes after contact. Thus, tear gas was never very effective as a weapon against groups of enemy soldiers.

Use of poison gases by Germany

The German gas warfare program was headed by Fritz Haber (1868 – 1934) who achieved to synthesize these three gases: - Chlorine: which produces a greenish-yellow cloud that smells of bleach and immediately irritates the eyes, nose, lungs, and throat of those exposed to it. At high enough doses it kills by asphyxiation. Chlorine was deadly against unprotected soldiers. It is estimated over 1,100 were killed in its first use at Ypres - Phosgene was Haber’s next choice, a colorless gas, six times more deadly than chlorine gas but soldiers did not at first know they had received a fatal dose. After a day or two, victims’ lungs would fill with fluid, and they would slowly suffocate in an agonizing death. It is estimated that as many as 85% of the 91,000 gas deaths in WWI were a result of phosgene

Use of poison gases by Germany

• Mustard gas, a potent blistering agent become the most used duting the I.W.W. Like phosgene, its effects are not immediate. Hours after exposure a victim’s eyes become bloodshot, begin to water, and become increasingly painful, with some victims suffering temporary blindness.

Disfigured faces

The impact of metallic shards coming from the exploding bombs caused the worst facial wounds. They were the old soldiers who were so horribly facially disfigured that even they referred to themselves as the “broken gargoyles”. When they came back to their countries, they faced social rejection and isolation. That's why any others killed themselves or died in suspicious accidents.

The invention of plastic surgery

Nonetheless, the abundance of desfigurated faces led to the birth of plastic surgery. Harold Gillies was a New Zealand surgeon who had trained in England. Posted to France in 1915, he witnessed the rise in horrific facial wounds inflicted by this new style of warfare. Gillies achieved the establishment of a hospital to treat facial injuries, and he banned mirrors in some wards so the injured wouldn't be traumatized by their own unrecognizable faces.

He spent the war replacing lost skin and restoring jaws, noses and teeth to give thousands of veterans a chance to return to civilian life. During the process, Gilles firstly repaired the bone structure of the face and then insert flesh of other cartilage to restore the shape of the face.

Anna Coleman masks

I.W.W. war

Soldiers wrote letters in spare moments, sometimes from front line trenches or in the calmer surroundings behind the lines. Censorship dictated what servicemen were permitted to disclose in their letters. However, in practice, men often found ways to impart information, and their letters offer a powerful and highly personal insight into the experience of war.

Receiving letters from family and friends was also vital to morale, keeping men and women connected to the homes they had left behind. Letters written on the home front to family and friends are today a fascinating source of information.

Read about it!

https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/voices-of-the-first-world-war-trench-life https://www.nam.ac.uk/explore/birth-plastic-surgery https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/this-habit-cause-death-one-27416577?int_source=nba