The Great War - 1914-1918

On November 25, 1914, in the (London) Daily Telegraph, a letter from a German lady in London about the imprisonment of her compatriots in concentration camps (sic!) in England includes the argument that it is as much as for their protection from the mob when stirred up by the press as for the potential threat they pose as the enemy within.


The (already mentioned above) 25th November issue of the Feldblatt reports about the failed attempt of 2,000 Germans in the prisoner camp (sic! "Gefangenenlager") in Douglas/Isle of Man


This camp had been formerly a "Holiday Camp where young men from the mainland were accustomed to come and camp for their summer holidays".
It became an "accommodation for the immediate internment of alien enemies who had been arrested in London and elsewhere, and who were being temporarily interned in various buildings as a preliminary step" on the 22nd September, 1914.

I couldn't find any news confirming the Feldblatt-report but in "Ile of Man and the Great War (1922)":


The former Holiday Camp was split into three: a privilege camp for those who could afford to pay for extra facilities (and also employ a prisoner servant), a Jewish camp and an ordinary section.

Not far away from where I live was the Meschede POW camp, which opened in late 1914 ... and had up to 20,000 prisoners (the small town of Meschede had 3,000 at that time)


A panoramic view of the prison camp at Meschede, probably taken in the Spring or Summer of 1915. The quarantine camp where newly arrived POWs were housed is located to the lower left. At the bottom of the photograph is the railway line that transported prisoners and supplies to the prison camp.

>Link to complete report< by Baron Richardson Racey, Probationary Flight Sub-Lieutenant, Canadian Infantry/Royal Naval Air Service


Prisnoners being escorted through the town towards the camp - photo from November/December 1914

On 26th November 1914 HMS Bulwark, a 15,000 ton battleship, was moored at buoy number 17 at Kethole Reach on the River Medway. She was taking on coal from the airship base at Kingsnorth, on the Isle of Grain.



At 7.50am, as the crew were having breakfast, an explosion ripped the ship apart. The explosion was heard as far away as Whitstable to the south and Southend (in Essex) to the North. Eye witnesses stated that once the smoke has cleared, there was no sign of the ship. This evidence is supported by the fact that naval divers who investigated the wreck three days after the explosion found just two large fragments of wreckage - a section of the port bow as far aft as the sick bay, and 30 feet further away, a section of the starboard bow. Debris from the explosion fell up to four miles away.



In all, the explosion killed 745 men and 51 officers. Five of the 14 men who survived died later of their wounds, and almost all of the others were seriously wounded.



Although the local papers immediately suspected sabotage, the subsequent naval court of enquiry (held at the Royal Naval Hospital, Gillingham) found that much of the ammunition for the ships guns had been stored in the corridors between the 11 magazines, and that either a fault with one of the shells or overheating cordite

And in today's (26.11.1914) Daily Telegraph is a report by a commander brought down on the bombing raid on the Zeppelin factory at Friedrichshafen. He is quoted in the German press praising the Germans’ "devilishly good" shooting:

Last harvest and Thanksgiving day party in Germany (Saxony-Anhalt, 1914 or 1915, and Thanksgiving day is here on September 30)

On November 27, 1914, Paul von Hindenburg issues a triumphant proclamation from the battlefields of the Eastern Front, celebrating his army's campaign against Russian forces in the Polish city of Warsaw.

The German campaign against Warsaw, launched in early November 1914, aimed to draw Russian manpower and other resources away from their ferocious assault on the struggling army of Germany's ally, Austria-Hungary. In this it proved successful. The Germans scored several significant victories, most notably at the neighboring city of Lodz. Though the broader German assault ultimately failed, leaving Warsaw still in Russian hands, the Kaiser rewarded Hindenburg by promoting him to "Genaralfeldmaschall" (field marshal), the highest rank in the German army.


Hindenburg, his actual name was Paul von Beneckendorff und von Hindenburg, had been "Generaloberst" before, from 29.08.1914 onwards ...



Hindenburg enjoyed a long career in the Prussian Army:1859-1866 cadet education,1866 starting his carreer in the Prussian army, 1870/71 German/French war, retiring in 1911 as commanding general of IVth army corps in Magdeburg, recalled at the outbreak of World War I, came to national attention, at the age of 66, as the victor of the decisive Battle of Tannenberg in August 1914.

.... to become today, 100 years ago, a 'five-star-general'.

Question:

How did the Germans know who could afford the "privilege camp", and how did those who could afford it pay? I mean it's not like officers carried diamonds around with them in the trenches. So we're probably talking about some kind of money transfer. Through a Swiss bank, perhaps?

General officers wore ornamental collar patches. In most cases this was an ornamental gold tassel on a red background, as worn in the late 18th Century by the Alt-Larisch infantry regiment of the old Prussian Army. Generals from Bavaria, Saxony, and Wurttemberg, still nominally independent kingdoms within the German Empire, had different patterns for collar patches. After 1915, some generals, as well as other officers, chose simplified uniforms and rank insignia in keeping with the simplifications of enlisted men's uniforms.

The peacetime regulations provided that certain senior NCO's could be promoted to the rank of Feldwebel-Leutnant on mobilization, to fill positions as platoon commanders, for which commissioned officers were in short supply. This system was extended during the war, but only those who had retired as senior NCO's before the war, and were of good character, could be given this appointment. Some retired officers were also called up to serve as a Feldwebel-Leutnant. In practice the Feldwebel-Leutnant was given administrative duties, and generally did not serve on the front lines. To meet the demand for junior commanders in the field, the rank of Offizier-Stellvertreter (Deputy Officer), was created on similar basis, although such men could not rise above platoon command. They were treated as officers in the field, but were not entitled to the privileges of a permanent commissioned rank. With high casualty rates of junior officers during the war, there were occasions where an Offizier-Stellvertreter, or other senior NCO's of special merit, were promoted to Leutnant.

Both the Feldwebel-Leutnant and the Offizier-Stellvertreter wore the uniform of a Vizefeldweble with an officers sword. The Feldwebel-Leutnant wore an officer's shoulder board and NCO lace on the collar and cuff, as well as NCO buttons on the collar. The Offizier-Stellvertreter wore the enlisted man's shoulder board but with a lace edging, and with the regimental devise in metal instead of embroidery.

A Fähnrich (Officer Cadet) ranked between a Vizefeldwebel and a Sergeant. He wore the uniform of an Unteroffizier with an officer's sword knot on the bayonet, but did not wear an officer's sword until he had passed the prescribed examination. He then became a Degenfähnrich, ranking above a Feldwebel. Upon completion of training, the Degenfähnrich would be promoted to a Leutnant "temporarily without commission". After being approved by his fellow officers, the commission would finally be granted.

In cavalry, field artillery, and supply units, the Feldwebel became a Wachmeister. In Jäger battalions, the Unteroffizier became an Oberjäger.

It was a English camp (though on the Isle of Man). And as far as I know, privileged were mainly the (civilian) internees.
I suppose, the English authorities hadn't frozen all their bank accounts.

Officers usually had separate camps - we had had two camps for officers here as well: one for 1.700 persons, the other for 73 (!). I don't know what privileges they got there nor if they had to pay for them.

On November 28. 1914, the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) reopens for bond trading after nearly four months, the longest stoppage in the exchange's history.

The outbreak of World War I in Europe forced the NYSE to shut its doors on July 31, 1914, after large numbers of foreign investors began selling their holdings in hopes of raising money for the war effort. All of the world's financial markets followed suit and closed their doors by August 1.

Today (28/11/1914), the Frankfurter Zeitung [/ i] has several articled about the "Englische Sorgen" (English worries)


But even more interesting is a report on page three

"Cashless payment transaction in the army"

It is said that already paper notes have an advantage instead of using coins. But still, it would be difficult to transfer the money of or to wounded soldiers. And explains that there are even more difficulties with the money of fallen soldiers.

The argumentation follows what already had been started by quite a lot of saving banks in various German states and provinces and it really happened what that above report in the Frankfurter Zeitung said: "... this would smooth the way to get after the war a stronger enthusiasm for non-cash payments". (It happened in 1923 with the creation of several "Girozentrales" ["giro" is the method of transferring money by instructing a bank to directly transfer funds from one bank account to another without the use of checks].)

Today, November 29, 1914, the Frankfurter Zeitung publishes the promotion of von Hindenburg, his reply and the the promotion of Hindenburg's chief of staff, von Ludendorff, to general lieutenant.



The major part of the paper's frontpage, however, is about what happened in the Argon Forest/France ... and that it won't take long until Verdun would be taken by the Germans


"Look at the map" it says in that report, "just a few kilometres"


[I could post that map every day in the next years.]

Burgfriedenspolitik - literally translated"castle peace politics" but more accurately a political policy of "party truce" - is a German term used for the political truce the Social Democratic Party of Germany and the other political parties agreed to during World War I.

On August 4, 1914, the Social Democrats voted for the war - in contradiction to their original anti-imperialistic and pro-peace attitude.

Burgfrieden: the trade unions refrained from striking, the SPD voted for war credits in the Reichstag and the parties agreed not to criticize the government and its war.

Generally, true. But within in the SPD, the left still opposed it.
A crucial day was November 29, 19144 when the Reichtag's parliamentary group agreed to support more war credits.
They joined now completely the "hurrah-patriotism" as critics within the party said

This "patriotic discipline" (vaterländische Disziplin) led a few months later to party disciline punishments and in 1916/7 to the foundation of the 'USPD', the "Independent Social Democratic Party of Germany" (Unabhängige Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands

The frontpage of today's Washington Times shows ...



... the British and Belgian trenches.
As does this postcard showing a German trench


The German photographer was Alfred Kühlewindt, an official war photographer in the battles zone since autumn 1914 (the photo was taken in November 1914).
Many of the photographs of the front were posed, re-enacted, since the new type of warfare with long-range artillery and the no man's land between the fronts made photographing very difficult.
Pictures, like the above, often showed rather quiet scenes (where the exposure time wasn't a problem). These came a lot more into circulation than photos/postcards with active fighting.

Addendum:
The French paper Matin had in its issue from November 28 on the frontpage two photos of Belgian/French trenches, too

And The Daily Telegraph has photos of British trenches on November 30. 1914

Nothing really exciting happens on the front - so the newspaper enlarge small happenings to big stories. And with a different point of view in what country you read what paper.
And if this doesn't fill the paper, rumours are good story as well.

Obviously (I don't have access to the digital original source) the (London) Daily News reported in late November 1914, the the dismissed general von Moltke wasn't in a hospital to cure his illness but was imprisoned by the emperor.
French papers had a source from Copenhagen, which referred to the English source, and it was printed in various papers between November 27 (Le Temps) and December 3.
Pic from December 3, Journal de Meurthe et des Vosges) and New York Time, November 30.




According to his own memoirs, Moltke was in cure. And regarding the "information by his wife" in the NYT - she wrote differently. (Source

100 years ago, on December 1,1914, the airfield Großenhain was officially opened (Saxony).

From 1911 onwards, Saxon pilots were taught by the Königlich-Preussische Fliegertruppe ("Royal Prussian Aviation Troops") [as well those from Würtemberg]. In 1913, an own Saxon company (3. Königlich-Sächsische Kompanie/ 3rd Royal Saxon Company) was formed within the 1. Königlich-Preußischen Flieger-Bataillons ("1st Royal Prussian Flier Battalion"). And on December 1, 1914, the Flieger-Ersatz-Abteilung Nr. 6 (FEA 6) ("Flier Replacement Detachment No. 6") with a "Fliegerschule" ("flight school") and Fliegerbeobachter-Schule ("aerial observer school")




Group of student pilots in front of the airfield service station (1915)

Until 1918, 60,000 soldiers were schooled here - the most famous being Manfred Freiherr von Richthofen, the "Red Baron" (June/July 1915 at the aerial observer school)