Back to the Around WWI calendar
Arguments, disagreements, small wars and bigger wars had been happening in Europe and around the world for many years. You may remember, or you can go and have a look here, that all the European powers had signed all sorts of agreements about who would be friends with whom. What's more, Otto von Bismarck, basically the German leader, had said at one of these meetings that “One day the great European War will come out of some damned foolish thing in the Balkans.” Otto was almost spot on because 32 years later a foolish thing started a war. Only it wasn't a great European War, it was the first world war.
The actual war that became the First World War happened because, on 28 June 1914, a terrorist called Gavrilo Princip shot the Archduke Ferdinand of Austria and his wife when they were in Sarajevo, which was at the time part of the Austria-Hungarian Empire, having been given to them in that 1878 Treaty of Berlin. The Archduke was the heir to the Austrian throne. Many people in the provinces of this Empire were unhappy and Gavrilo Princip was a Bosnian Serb. The Serbs had been unhappy about being a province and wanted independence. After the shooting, Austria made several demands on Serbia, most of which they agreed to but not the one where Austria wanted to be part of the trial against those guilty of the attack
On 28 July Austria declared war on Serbia and Russia took Serbia's side. Germany then declared war on Russia. A major war was now inevitable, party because of those alliances made back in 1906 and 1907. This is how quickly it all happened:-
- July 28 - Austria declared war on Serbia – Russia said it would support Serbia
- Aug 1 – Germany declared war on Russia – Russia asked for support from France and Britain
- Aug 2 – Italy, who were part of the Triple Alliance (see a bit later) declared it would be neutral and not fight.
- Aug 3 – Germany declared war on France and marched its troops into Belgium.
- Aug 3 – Britain told Germany to withdraw from Belgium
- Aug 4 – Germany didn't so Britain declared war on Germany
- Aug 13 – Japan declared war on Germany as the Japanese had signed an alliance with Britain in 1902
- Oct 29 – Turkey gives help to Germany in their fight with Russia
- Nov 2 – Because of this help, Russia declares war on Turkey
- Nov 5 – France and Britain declare war on Turkey too
In a little over three months all the major powers, except the United States of America, were involved in a massive war. The war had also spread to Africa where Germany had four colonies.
The two sides were known as the Triple Entente (Britain, France and Russia) and the Triple Alliance (Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy). However, as we said, Italy did not join its allies in declaring war on the Triple Entente and on May 23 1915 declared war on Austria-Hungary.
The first major battle in Europe involving the British Army was on August 23 at Mons in Belgium. 70,000 British soldiers faced 160,000 German troops and the British were forced to retreat. On 5 September another battle took place along the River Marne about 30 miles from Paris. This time the Germans were held and both sides began to dig in, literally.
This was a war unlike anything seen before. No longer did ranks of cavalry charge at each other; no longer did infantry soldiers fight hand-to-hand, sword-to-sword. Armies now had heavy cannon and machine guns which could fire rapidly and over a vast distance. So both sides started to dig trenches in which soldiers would be better protected. The soldiers would live in these trenches for weeks, soaked to the skin, tramping through and sleeping in inches of mud. Barbed wire would be put up between the armies.
Then, the officers in charge would decide to make an attack, blew a whistle, and men would climb out of the trenches, run toward the barbed wire..............and be shot at and killed by the other side. And this lasted for four years.
You need to remember that in 1914 the fastest way to transport armies around was by train. Cars and lorries were still quite new and planes were even newer and usually only had a maximum of 2 people in them. This sometimes caused more problems. For example when the Russian army attacked into eastern Germany they discovered that the railway lines in Germany were a different width apart from those is Russia. It made it almost impossible to get supplies to the army once they were in Germany. Later in the war some trains were converted into hospitals.
Forward to 1915AD
