#wwi history

[asidian]

One of the things I love so much about Dead Boy Detectives is how much attention is paid to detail, even on little things, even when they didn't need to go that hard.

Take the very first case. This WWI ghost?

Was killed by chemical warfare.

If you've done any reading on WWI, one of things that comes up again and again was that it was the first major conflict where chemical warfare and gas attacks were employed against soldiers on the ground.

Soldiers on both sides were terrified by it. They had gas masks with them all the time, when there were enough to go around, but sometimes the gas masks failed.

And if someone was hit by a gas attack, what were some of the symptoms? Blistered skin, blisters in the lungs, and irritated eyes, up to and including blindness.

This man was killed by a gas attack, probably mustard gas, and likely when his gas mask failed.

They never mention it in the dialogue. Maybe Edwin and Charles don't even know.

But the show runners did the research and designed his makeup accordingly and slipped in that little nod for anyone who knows the history.

God damn. This series was made with so much care, and it shows.

[cid5]

Two German Soldiers NCOs tooled up and ready to go, probably on a trench raid against the French or British, Western Front, c.1916.

[cirr0stratus]

Erich Maria Remarque you have ruined me

[k-wame]

HUGH DANCY as Ellis Ashmead-Bartlett 2015 · Deadline Gallipoli · S1·EP1 · dir. Michael Rymer

[lonestarbattleship]

Crew conducting drills aboard USS TEXAS (BB-35), likely in Firth of Forth, Scotland.

Photographed in early 1918.

source

[victusinveritas]

British troops returning from leave, Mailly Maillet, Somme.

November 1916.

The group of soldiers includes men of the Lancashire Fusiliers, York and Lancaster Regiment, and the Duke of Wellington's Regiment (West Riding).

Image: IWM (Q 1601)

Colourised by Doug

[lonestarflight]

Naval Air Factory N-1 floatplane (A2282) conducting a test run from the Philadelphia Naval Aircraft Factory.

Date: May 24, 1918

source

[wandering-cemeteries]

"Died for France on 29 April, 1916." Monastery de Cimiez Cemetery, in Nice, France.

[historynerd1945]

All Quiet on the Western Front doodles

[little-candy-store-of-horrors]

I bet on losing dogs

References under the cut

[cid5]

WWI, 1 May 1918; A Machine Gun Corps post in a barn near Haverskerque, The Battle of the Lys (Operation Georgette).

[wandering-jana]

Between the Tidal Basin and the Lincoln Memorial is the D.C. War Memorial. It was built in 1931, a few years before WWII, and dedicated to soldiers from D.C. that were lost in WWI.

Explore:

[the-cricket-chirps]

David Henry Souter

Australian Red Cross Poster: Help

ca. 1914-1918

Printed by William Brooks & Co. Ltd, Sydney

[lonestarbattleship]

HMS AGINCOURT underway.

Photographed in 1916

source

[researchinggustavfrohlich]

Can you imagine leaving home (yes, it was a foster family placement, but it was still technically ‘home’) at 14 years old to volunteer in the Great War as a war correspondent and traveling all the way to Belgium, one of the worst-hit countries during the First World War? And then remaining there for years, completely on your own, suffering from extreme hunger and poverty while working as a journalist and starting out as a stage actor?

Well, Gustav did all of that. All I can say is that though I do realize that times were different back then and people grew up a lot quicker, it must have really taken balls of steel.

Here is an extremely rare photo of Gustav in 1916 in Bruxelles, wearing his volunteer uniform. Unfortunately I don’t know who the older guy is, a brother in arms I guess - but look at that smile… it was already there.

14, on your own since childhood and at war. Wow.

[pisupsala]

It snowed when I went to Bastogne earlier this year, and then it rained in Passchendaele today. Fingers crossed for my birthday in Dunkirk later this week.