Letter Home

Letter Home

By: Alec Winsor

Dear Mom and Dad,

               How have things been going? Hopefully better than they are over here. The war has been pretty rough on all of us, but we will get through it and win it. At least it's not as bad as I thought it would be, after all, I'm not dead yet. The only part of the whole thing that actually scares me is when we get sent into the trenches. All of the artillery fire raining down is enough to break a man, but mixed in with all gunshots and people dying, it's no wonder that dozens of our men get evacuated because of shell shock. Oh yeah and the rats and disease will kill you even if the bad guys don't! The rats are everywhere! Always around your feet, scurrying about on the ground and swarming around our wounded. I'm also worried that if we have an outbreak of the flu or something, that it will kill us all. I've heard some rumors that the Germans have lounges in their bunkers with like cushioned seats, sofas and that sort of thing. I wish we had it that good over here on the other side of no mans land, I mean, if you're lucky, you get to sit on a piece of wood. Well at least I'm healthy enough to write this and keep in the fight. Say hi to the rest of the family for me and I hope you all are doing good.

     Love,

               Alec

WWI Causes

World War I Causes

By: Alec Winsor

The four main causes of World War I were militarism, the alliance system, imperialism, and nationalism. 

• Militarism: The British had the strongest navy in the world,and the Germans, along with other countries were trying to establish their own so they would be ready for any conflict.
• Alliance System: An alliance is an agreement between two countries, like the U.S. and Britain or Germany and Austria-Hungary, for support during times of war. This can be bad because if one country goes into war, then all their alliances has to help them, tying up many countries into an conflict originally between only two nations.
• Imperialism: Imperialism is building power of a nation by taking over smaller colonies. Before WWI, countries were fighting about colonies that they both wanted to claim, so they decide to go to war over them.
• Nationalism: Nationalism is extreme passion for your home country. What  triggered WWI was when a member of a Serbian nationalist group called the Black Hand, named Gavrilo Princip, killed the Archduke of Austria-Hungary. He was showing nationalism because at the time, Austria-Hungary controlled Bosnia, and he wanted freedom for the people.

During June in 1914, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir of the Austro- Hungarian throne, was assassinated by Gavrilo Princip, a Bosnian revolutionary, while he and his wife drove through the streets of Sarajevo. With Serbia's alliance to Russia and Austria-Hungary with Germany, the two countries went to war. Eventually many more countries would become involved in this dispute, including the U.S and Britain, because of the alliance system.

1. Unrestricted Submarine Warfare started in 1915 and continued until 1918. During this time the Germans were the main country doing, this using their U-boats to sink British and American cargo and passenger ships claiming that they thought they were undercover battleships.
2. The sinking of the RMS Lusitania took place on May 7th, 1915. The ship was shot down by a torpedo from the German U-boat U-20. It sunk 11 miles off of the coast of Ireland,killing 1,198 people and leaving 761 survivors.
3. The Sussex Pledge was a promise made by Germany in 1916, saying that they would not target passenger ships, and merchant ships would not be sunk unless weapons were identified and the passengers and crew had to be kept safe.
4. The Zimmerman note was a proposal sent from Germany to Mexico in 1917, to join the Central Powers. The note was intercepted by British intelligence, decoded, and shown to the U.S. which caused war to be declared on Germany.   

Shell Shock

Shell Shock in WWI

By: Alec Winsor

               Shell shock was a reaction to the stress of war that affected some soldiers. It especially was common with soldiers that faced a certain event, such as, stabbing someone in the stomach or the face, being bombarded by artillery, or just witnessing killing in general. Some men that bayonetted  Common symptoms include fatigue, tremors, confusion, nightmares, and impaired sight and hearing. Different doctors had different theories as to what causes shell shock, including hidden damage to the brain, and poisoning from the carbon monoxide from explosions. It was later concluded that it was from emotional damage, versus physical. After World War I, the term shell shock was replaced with combat stress reaction, which was used through World War II and present day.

               During earlier stages of the war, shell shock victims were immedietly removed from the front lines mainly from fear of their unpredictable nature. But as the war went on, and the number of men able to fight decreased, the question of what to do with shell shocked soldiers became a bigger issue to authorities. Officials became more concerned with this situation and had a hard time returning these men to battle. If a man was uninjured physically, it was easier to redeploy him. Because of this, they had to devote more time and effort to understanding and attempting to treat shell shocked victims.

 

Sources:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shell_shock

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/shellshock_01.shtml