World War One Sources Essay, Research Paper
How far do sources A and B agree about conditions on no
man?s land?? Explain your answer.? (6)??????????? Both sources show no man?s land in one way or
another.? Obviously both show extensive
use of barbed wire on the Western Front.?
Each source lacks any human life at all and makes no man?s land look
extremely grim and desolate.? I think
this is shown very well in source A because it shows a large stretch of no
man?s land and I think this picture was taken not as propaganda but to show
what war was really like.? It gives a
good judgement because you can see lots of craters, mud, ammunition boxes etc?? Source B shows the barbed wire to be impenetrable
but in source A you can see gaps and tracks of tanks, which suggests that a
tank has broken through barbed wire with some ease. ?Source A might not be a typical picture of no man?s land.? It might just be that that battle was
particularly long so the battleground would be a very grim one.? Source B might well be set up as well for
use as propaganda to lift morale at home and make the German defences look
extremely strong.? People might take the
view that if a British tank can?t get through the German defences then troops
will definitely not be able to. It also makes British tanks look weak etc? ?But we now know in hindsight that generally a
tank didn?t get stuck but many just broke down.? Another possibility is that the tank is not stuck but is breaking
through the German defences.? Source B
is a close up and selects detail, whereas A is a panoramic vision.? Source A is a bleak image without any human
life at all and shows neither side winning or losing.? Source B however, could suggest some achievement (trapping a
tank). ??????????? If a
soldier had tried to cross no mans land then they would have made very slow
progress cutting themselves through the wire.?
If a German gunman had seen them then they would have been sitting
targets and very easy to shoot. ??????????? The dangers
the Royal Engineers who laid the wire must have gone through were immense.? Also they had to maintain it.? This must have been a very precarious job.? When it was time to go ?over the top? the
engineers had to go out and cut the wire nearest them to allow their army to
get through and attack the enemy.? This
was also dangerous but if the enemy spotted you then they would be expecting
the attack. ??????????? Compared
to other sources such as H, I would say that sources A and B are very reliable
but there is a possibility that both are not typical of no-mans land. Question 2 Study Source C Use your knowledge of the
Western Front to explain why the government encouraged advertisements like
Source C to be published in Britain in 1915.?
(7)??????????? In 1915 smoking
was encouraged.? At that time it was
seen to be sophisticated and ?The thing to do? so much so that the government
actually handed out tobacco and cigarettes to people fighting in the Great War.? It is ironic that war and smoking were both seen
to be good but both however, killed many.?
In the picture the trenches are clean and there is no barbed wire.? The man standing up with his hand above his
eyes looks very smart and clean and looks like a real gentleman. Even the name
?Golden Dawn? gives a picture of a new beginning for the future.? The soldiers are smiling and one of them is
laughing. This all glamorised the war and made it look sociable.? In reality there would be sand bags, dead
bodies, barbed wire, heavy guns, churned up mud etc?However, this is all
missing and instead they have sparkling uniforms and clean trenches.? They would certainly not be talking about going
over the top so light-heartedly.? People
would be very attracted to this advertisement, especially young men.? This advertisement makes it look as though
the men are actually enjoying themselves, as we know this was far from the truth.? This advertisement would have been designed
to encourage people to sign up.? Also if
relatives of soldiers had been worrying about their loved ones then this advertisement
would have put their minds at rest (thinking it was really like this).? The government would have been very pleased
with this because it was 1915 and the war was supposed to have been ?over by
Christmas?.? People were beginning to
feel that it was dragging on.?
Conscription hadn?t begun yet in Britain so the government needed fresh
troops and this would have been ideal to encourage people to sign up. ??????????? Compared
to other sources such as H or even G you can see how far this advertisement is
from the truth.
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