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ground was to be given up even if it meant walking over the oppositions’
corpses.
Despite the well organized medical supports
the losses caused by
illness
and diseases
were a substantial number, particularly in Gallipoli where
the terrain caused obvious difficulty to soldiers living in close quarters. In
Flanders poor winter weather, soggy waterlogged trenches and prolonged
periods in wet boots meant the development of “Trench Foot” a medical
condition that could lead to the amputation of feet.
It also seems to me that AIF soldiers suffering mental anxieties and
physical ill reactions to the horrors of war were treated with more
compassion than their British and French allies. (Even AIF soldiers going
AWL were more likely to be punished by pension penalties than court
martials.)
12. A very significant number of
casualties were caused by artillery
fire
. In particular, shrapnel splinters could cause random damage to
individuals behind the front lines. The random and destructive damage
done by artillery fire can be demonstrated by the Red Cross eye witnesses
at the death of Stanley Victor Dalkeith Bowd.
Stanley Victor Dalkeith Bowd (2857), a driver with the 15
th
Field
Ambulance, was killed in random artillery fire “ by a shell close to me on
August 10 near Villers Bretonneux” according to an informant for the Red
Cross , Edwin Rogers (6167). Similarly , Private Lawrence reported that
“I saw him killed by a shell while leaning over packing his gear in his
wagon prior to moving off to an advanced dressing station …….. he was
killed instantly.”
British Captain F. C. Hitchcock in
Stand To : A Diary of the Trenches
describes intense artillery fire at the Somme where “every now and then a
shell would blow pieces of mortality, or complete bodies……………….
slap into one’s Trench.”
Carlyon on page 17 of his authoritative and comprehensive book,
The
Great War
indicates that at the beginning of the war Vladimir Lenin said
the war was the “ epoch of the bayonet” but as Carlyon said it was in
factual terms “the epoch of the howitzer” Many of the soldiers who are
mentioned in this publication died when hit by shellfire from giant
howitzers.
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