The Western Front: Trench Warfare and New Military Technology

Why did the war get stuck?

Both sides expected a war of movement, with quick marches and cavalry charges. By the end of 1914 that hope was gone. New weapons made defending much easier than attacking. A few soldiers with a machine gun behind barbed wire could stop hundreds attacking across open ground. So both sides dug in. A line of trenches stretched from the North Sea coast of Belgium to the border of Switzerland: the Western Front.

Life in the trenches

Soldiers took turns in the front line, support trenches and reserve areas behind. In the front line they faced:

• Mud and water, which caused trench foot, a painful foot condition from standing in cold, wet conditions for days.
• Rats and lice, constant damp, poor food and little sleep.
• Shelling at any hour, and snipers if anyone looked over the top.
• Night work: repairing wire, digging, and raids into no man's land.
• Long stretches of boredom broken by sudden terror.

Many soldiers suffered shell shock. At the time, some officers and doctors treated it as weakness. Today we understand it as a serious psychological injury, related to what we now call post-traumatic stress.

New technology and what it did to soldiers (B1.2)

• Machine guns fired hundreds of rounds a minute. Attacking across open ground became deadly.
• Artillery (large guns firing explosive shells) caused more casualties than any other weapon. Shells destroyed trenches and wire, and the noise and fear caused shell shock.
• Poison gas. At Ypres on 22 April 1915, the German army released chlorine gas for the first time on the Western Front. Later came phosgene and mustard gas. Soldiers were soon issued gas masks.
• Tanks. Britain first used tanks in September 1916 at the Somme, in the attack on Courcelette, where Canadians fought. Early tanks broke down often, but by 1918 they helped break enemy lines.
• Aircraft. Planes began as scouts, photographing enemy trenches and spotting for artillery, then fought each other. Canadians served in the British air services; Billy Bishop of Owen Sound was credited with 72 victories and received the Victoria Cross.
• Submarines (U-boats) sank ships carrying soldiers, food and supplies across the Atlantic. In June 1918 a U-boat sank the Canadian hospital ship Llandovery Castle; 14 Canadian nursing sisters were among those killed.

Canada's own equipment problem: Canadian soldiers were first issued the Canadian-made Ross rifle. It jammed often in muddy conditions, and soldiers picked up British Lee-Enfield rifles when they could. The Ross was replaced in 1916.

Canada's early battles

Second Battle of Ypres (April 1915). Canadian soldiers in Belgium held their part of the line during the German gas attacks that began on 22 April. They suffered more than 6 000 casualties (killed, wounded or captured) in a few days. Canadians earned a reputation as tough soldiers, at terrible cost. After this battle, Canadian doctor and soldier John McCrae wrote the poem In Flanders Fields (May 1915).

The Somme (July to November 1916). On 1 July 1916, the first day of the British attack on the Somme, the Newfoundland Regiment attacked at Beaumont-Hamel. Of about 800 men who went forward, only 68 answered roll call the next morning. Newfoundland was not part of Canada then, but today 1 July is Memorial Day in Newfoundland and Labrador. The Canadian Corps joined the Somme battle in September 1916 and fought at Courcelette; by November it had suffered about 24 000 casualties. The whole Somme battle produced more than a million casualties on all sides, for a few kilometres of ground.

Consequences: these battles taught commanders that attacks needed far better planning, which shaped the Canadian success at Vimy Ridge in 1917 (next lesson). They also shocked Canadians at home and slowed the number of volunteers, which later led to the conscription crisis.