Shrouds of the Somme

[Glass Half Empty]

Shrouds of the Somme

Calvert wrote: I imagine Geoffrey is talking about the politicians, Royals and army brass, Nick, not the poor saps who paid with their lives.

I don't think that trying to interpret the place of the Battle of the Somme in the national consciousness in class terms really stands up. Statistically the highest casualty rates were in the junior officers who were in large part very recent ex public schoolboys. Casualties came across the whole social spectrum including the Prime Minister's son Raymond Asquith. The awarding of VCs and other awards however was distinctly skewed.

[Calvert]

Shrouds of the Somme

Understand the point, but surely it's the lower classes who ultimately end up doing most of the fighting and dying.
I'd imagine there weren't that many in the ruling classes of all nations involved starving to death on the home front either.

[Amor de Cosmos]

Shrouds of the Somme

And this is about the first day, in fact really about the first few hours.

Indeed so. And there were several battles of the Somme, not just one.

The "Trail of the Caribou" from 1924 is perhaps my favourite philatelic commemorative. It names each of the battles where Newfoundland troops took part, interspersed with Ubique — "Everywhere" — the motto of all the Imperial Artillery regiments I believe, and the Royal Naval Reserve. Coincidentally today is Canada Day everywhere except Newfoundland, where it's Memorial Day.



(Click to enlarge)

[Glass Half Empty]

Shrouds of the Somme

If you consider the wider conflict in all it's aspects then you are absolutely correct but the Somme battle itself seemed share it's horror around in a reasonably evenhanded way.

[NickSTFU]

Shrouds of the Somme

I don't think any modern student of military history denies that the Somme was a series of battles involving a whole host of nationalities.

It was one long slog of attrition, and in many ways it was not unique in terms of purely infantry casualties. Gary Sheffield for example compares it to the Normandy campaign in the summer of '44, while Alan Allport compares WW1 the Italian campaign in WW2.

The big difference of course is that a lot more men were drafted into the infantry in WW1.

[Logan Mountstuart]

Shrouds of the Somme

There's an excellent, if meticulously detailed, book about the German army on The Somme by Jack Sheldon.

He also wrote one about Paaschendaele. It descends into an unbelievably miserable, factual tale of ultimate hell and is pretty tough going.

I've been walking The Somme and other battlefields for years. Admittedly often for therapeutic, contemplative reasons. If you know exactly what happened in various fields and woods it makes for a wonderful walk. I listened to the ceremony on 5 Live in the truck and some of it genuinely moved me. The Donald McDonald lament was sung beautifully.

But I wouldn't go near this bum -face, inbred fest with a bargepole. Stunning that Merkel wasn't there (invited?).

This was the day of great, patriotic, gullible innocence for the British army. So it's definitely a defining day in British history. Perhaps the beginning of the modern era for us.

One thing I can guarantee, is that by the end of the war, the huge majority of anyone lucky to survive would have given today's Tory party, (and certainly UKIP), very short shrift. So wrapping this up in any sort of national unity/ glory would be pretty obscene.

They should have had thousands of British, French and German Great Grand Children walking across the old Noman's land towards each other, and then having a huge peaceful, happy rave together. Not give it over to the bloody Alexander Hagues of our day.

We haven't learned much in a100 years, have we?

[NickSTFU]

Shrouds of the Somme

It was a day when a too rapidly expanded army that was ill-trained, ill-prepared and over confident learnt the lessons that would help it survive in 1918.

Alexander Watson is also good on the German Army on the Somme.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

Shrouds of the Somme

Calvert wrote: Poor bastards.

It's all about the SACRIFICE for US, ULSTER and more SACRIFICE for US and a bit more ULSTER, here today.

And still, no one to this day ever dares lay the blame for this at the proper doors. That'd be disloyal.

I heard a bit of this today, and the Nordie who was on was well on for acknowledging all the soldiers from the south. but everyone is hugging in a big spirit of trench ecumenism at the moment.

But this is a new thing and as diarmuid ferriter pointed out, the way that the Unionists commemorated this in the past, you'd think that they were the only people there. (while we pretended it had nothing to do with us)

[Duncan Gardner]

Shrouds of the Somme

The Awesome Berbaslug!!! wrote: the way that the Unionists commemorated this in the past, you'd think that they were the only people there. (while we pretended it had nothing to do with us)

To mutual advantage then?

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

Shrouds of the Somme

not really. We wiped a large chunk of our population out of history, and the unionists fail to realise that dying in massive numbers for no reason is a terrible thing.

[AMMS]

Shrouds of the Somme

The thing about the Somme though is its place in the culture of many parts of the UK. For example we were taught about the Somme in some detail in school, everyone was it was compulsory in S1 and S2, it formed a fairly major part of the history curriculum in Scottish schools in the 1980s at least. It was taught to us as the senseless slaughter it most certainly was and the effect it then had on the home front and on the people of the UK. Ultimately indirectly playing a part in the rise of the Labour movement, significant social change post WW1, partition in Ireland and probably a number of other events I've forgotten about now.

So whether the Somme deserves remembered more than Ypres or Verdun or Marne isn't really the point. It's been/was used in UK schools for generations and so holds a place in our collective conscious and our culture that other equally horrific events simply don't. There was an article on the BBC this week about how the Somme is barely known in France. I imagine that's simply because they've focussed in another event to teach the 'story'.

I've always felt that WW1 is seen and acknowledged as a horrific waste of life for no purpose by most people in the UK, no matter their class or upbringing and is rarely used for jingoistic or nationalist purposes unlike conflicts that have followed it. Maybe it's different in other parts of the country though.

[Geoffrey de Ste. Croix]

Shrouds of the Somme

NickSTFU,

Fighting the Japanese and then the Indonesian Nationalists in the Dutch East Indies after Japan’s collapse. My view is best summed up by calvert above.

AMMS,

I agree with you. The Somme distils nearly all popular conceptions/misconceptions of WWI in one event- industrial slaughter, lions led by lambs, incompetence and heartlessness of the top brass, censorship, innocence lost- it’s all there in the first morning of the Battle of the Somme.

As for what is taught in schools. I am not surprised by the almost total lack of knowledge of the worst day in British army history in the country it occurred in. Ask a British student about Verdun and you will get the same reaction. In French eyes, the Battle of the Somme was an ancillary of the Verdun mincing machine despite thousands of soldiers of the French Army fighting on the Somme.

Whereas for France, Verdun has become a national altar utilized and manipulated for the mood and political will of the times, the Somme for Britain is the enduring and unchanging cipher for "the pity of war".

[NickSTFU]

Shrouds of the Somme

Right, it's just that you said fighting the Japanese for 5 years.

There's a lot of revisionist scholarship around at the moment surrounding WW1, obviously. The aforementioned Gary Sheffield being a prime example.

As it happens, many military historians suggest that the surrender of Singapore was worst day of the British army.

[The Awesome Berbaslug!!!]

Shrouds of the Somme

hmm, I think that says a lot about the relative values they attach to pride, and hundreds of thousands of mangled bodies.

The coverage of this in Ireland has been interesting. There's been a neo-unionist "join the british army" tinge to some of it, particularly in the Irish times, which has been on this kick for a while. But in large part it's acknowledged that 90% of the irish volunteers signed up because they wanted home rule.

That just makes the senseless slaughter even worse, because those poor bastards wound up dying for nothing at all, and then they got written out of history for their considerable pains.

[multipleman78]

Shrouds of the Somme

AMMS wrote: The thing about the Somme though is its place in the culture of many parts of the UK. For example we were taught about the Somme in some detail in school, everyone was it was compulsory in S1 and S2, it formed a fairly major part of the history curriculum in Scottish schools in the 1980s at least. It was taught to us as the senseless slaughter it most certainly was and the effect it then had on the home front and on the people of the UK. Ultimately indirectly playing a part in the rise of the Labour movement, significant social change post WW1, partition in Ireland and probably a number of other events I've forgotten about now.

So whether the Somme deserves remembered more than Ypres or Verdun or Marne isn't really the point. It's been/was used in UK schools for generations and so holds a place in our collective conscious and our culture that other equally horrific events simply don't. There was an article on the BBC this week about how the Somme is barely known in France. I imagine that's simply because they've focussed in another event to teach the 'story'.

I've always felt that WW1 is seen and acknowledged as a horrific waste of life for no purpose by most people in the UK, no matter their class or upbringing and is rarely used for jingoistic or nationalist purposes unlike conflicts that have followed it. Maybe it's different in other parts of the country though.

Do you know if the Somme and WW1 are still subjects that are covered in Scottish schools?

I know that in my 6 years at secondary from 1990 onwards it was part of history class. As you say, it was taught as a senseless slaughter that had little or no glory to it.

[axolotl]

Shrouds of the Somme

The Awesome Berbaslug!!! wrote: hmm, I think that says a lot about the relative values they attach to pride, and hundreds of thousands of mangled bodies.

The coverage of this in Ireland has been interesting. There's been a neo-unionist "join the british army" tinge to some of it, particularly in the Irish times, which has been on this kick for a while. But in large part it's acknowledged that 90% of the irish volunteers signed up because they wanted home rule.

That just makes the senseless slaughter even worse, because those poor bastards wound up dying for nothing at all, and then they got written out of history for their considerable pains.

very well said. it's probably been the lot of most soldiers throughout history, i'd venture.

[NickSTFU]

Shrouds of the Somme

The Awesome Berbaslug!!! wrote: hmm, I think that says a lot about the relative values they attach to pride, and hundreds of thousands of mangled bodies.

I would suggest it is more to do with performance and the breakdown of morale and discipline. This after 2 years of army failure, after army failure, where the lessons of 14-18 were forgotten.

And look, battlefields leave mangled bodies, each is a personal tragedy regardless of the number. As I alluded to upthread British and Commonwealth infantry battalions were wiped out, reformed, wiped out, reformed in WW2 until there was a manpower crisis in the Corps of Infantry in late 44 into 1945.

[Paul S]

Shrouds of the Somme

Calvert wrote: Understand the point, but surely it's the lower classes who ultimately end up doing most of the fighting and dying.
I'd imagine there weren't that many in the ruling classes of all nations involved starving to death on the home front either.

About ten years ago I did a tour of the WW1 battlefields with my father. We used the Major and Mrs Holt guide which took us to some completely unexpected places. One of the best memorials was this one:

Thje Welsh Memorial park near Ypres

The Welsh soldiers were tasked with taking a ridge which they failed to do. In the local museum they had details of the inquiry the British army had into what went wrong. They absolved all the officers and senior ranks of any blame and instead issued the following statement:

"The men didn't try had enough"

It sums up the attitudes of the time.

[AMMS]

Shrouds of the Somme

multipleman78 wrote:

The thing about the Somme though is its place in the culture of many parts of the UK. For example we were taught about the Somme in some detail in school, everyone was it was compulsory in S1 and S2, it formed a fairly major part of the history curriculum in Scottish schools in the 1980s at least. It was taught to us as the senseless slaughter it most certainly was and the effect it then had on the home front and on the people of the UK. Ultimately indirectly playing a part in the rise of the Labour movement, significant social change post WW1, partition in Ireland and probably a number of other events I've forgotten about now.

So whether the Somme deserves remembered more than Ypres or Verdun or Marne isn't really the point. It's been/was used in UK schools for generations and so holds a place in our collective conscious and our culture that other equally horrific events simply don't. There was an article on the BBC this week about how the Somme is barely known in France. I imagine that's simply because they've focussed in another event to teach the 'story'.

I've always felt that WW1 is seen and acknowledged as a horrific waste of life for no purpose by most people in the UK, no matter their class or upbringing and is rarely used for jingoistic or nationalist purposes unlike conflicts that have followed it. Maybe it's different in other parts of the country though.

Do you know if the Somme and WW1 are still subjects that are covered in Scottish schools?

I know that in my 6 years at secondary from 1990 onwards it was part of history class. As you say, it was taught as a senseless slaughter that had little or no glory to it.

I'm afraid I don't know, I'm a long time out of school and my eldest is still a couple of years away from secondary school.

[Lang Spoon]

Shrouds of the Somme

My wee sister got the Big Wars 1 and 2 before Standard grade, as well as the War Poets in English (and bugger all else about European history/even Brit colonialism really). She's been out of school ten years though, doubt it'll have gone but, if anything the last few years have ramped up its prominence.