#the Battle of the Somme

[theworldofwars]

Canadian infantry in a front line breastwork in Ploegstreet Wood, October 1915.

[in-memoriam-mcmxiv]

A German trench occupied by British soldiers of the Cheshire Regiment near the Albert-Bapaume road at Ovillers-la-Boisselle, July 1916, during the Battle of the Somme

[thunderstruck9]

Herbert James Gunn (British, 1893-1964), The Eve of the Battle of the Somme, 1916. Oil on canvas, 80 x 87 cm. The Fleming Collection, London

[henk-heijmans]

The Battle of the Somme took place between 1 July and 18 November 1916. It was one of the largest battles of the First World War, in which more than a million men were wounded or killed, making it one of the bloodiest battles in human history - by John Warwick Brooke (1886 - 1929), English

[vakarians-babe]

Prithee, love, when I am gone, do not weep.

Narmeleth and Lathuilas, in Eregion during the Second Age.

[captain-price-unofficially]

Men of the Wiltshire Regiment advancing to the attack through the wire, Thiepval, 7 August 1916.

[scrapironflotilla]

Clearing of Captured Trenches The complete clearing up of captured trenches in which there are deep dug-outs requires a considerable amount of careful arrangement. The following method is suggested:- A party of men should go forward with each of the leading lines. The men with the first line should remain in the front trench captured. The men with the second line should remain in the second trench captured and so on. These men should act as ‘Caretakers’ to the trench until the arrival of the proper clearing up party. They should all be supplied with P[hosphorous] bombs, which they would thrown down into all dug-outs in their portions of the trench. It is believed that the 7th Division used these P bombs with great effect, as they set fire to the dug-outs and the occupants were burnt alive, asphyxiated or forced to come out. The ‘Caretakers’ should take no prisoners. The reason for this is that should the enemy’s barrage prevent our supporting lines following up the leading lines, captured Germans might be able to empower their guards and then shoot our leading men in the back. They actually did this more than once e.g. La Maisonnette, where a whole position was recaptured by the prisoners. Larger parties should advance with the supporting lines and carry out a systematic clearing up of captured trenches.

17/9/16 – II Corps – G. 339. Miscellaneous Notes gathered from Divisions who have taken part in recent offensive operations.

A British No 26 white phosphorous grenade, or P Bomb. Literally just a tin can filled with white phosphorous and intended to produce a smoke cover. Troops also found them very useful for clearing German bunkers.

Headquarters of all units and formations had the responsibility to collect reports and analyse them for lessons that could be learnt from each of the operations they undertook. Every so often documents such as this, compiled from subordinate units, would be disseminated by corps or army headquarters. They're not really official doctrine or rules to be followed, but points for discussion and analysis by commanders. This one covers the first couple of months of the Battle of the Somme.

One of the key issues new units ran into was not "mopping up" positions they'd just captured and a lot of effort was put into remedying this after 1916.

[lumi-waxes-poetic]

Some Tolkien affirmations to help you along when the darkness seems too much and everything seems lost

"The world may be grim, but there's always hope. Even in the darkest of days, there may be one bright star to guide you."

—Elrond

"It is not despair, but only the handing on of a torch."

—Aragorn

"The greatest good returns at last to those who share it freely."

—Gandalf

"It is not by sorrow and by suffering that we grow. It is by the choice we make when faced with sorrow and suffering."

—Fëanor

"The world is changed because I am in it."

—Bilbo Baggins

bonus round (Tolkien never actually wrote this — Peter Jackson did — but it's a good fucking line and Tolkien would have 100% agreed with it):

“Saruman believes it is only great power that can hold evil in check, but that is not what I have found. I found it is the small everyday deeds of ordinary folk that keep the darkness at bay. Small acts of kindness and love."

— Gandalf

[bantarleton]

Unlikely friendships between two footbal clubs.

Leyton Orient 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 & Edinburgh’s Heart Of Midlothian 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿

A friendship that dates back the early part of The Great War (1914 ~ 1918). Players of Hearts and then-named Clapton Orient led the way as the first professional footballers to volunteer en-masse for what became known as the “Pals’ Battalions”. Both Battalions suffered terrible losses and heavy casualties, with three Orient players and three Hearts players killed on the first day of the Battle of the Somme alone.

To celebrate 150 years of Heart Of Midlothian, next year the Scottish club will host Orient in a pre season friendly at Tynecastle Park. ⚽️

[stairnaheireann]

#OTD in Irish History | 18 November:

1657 – Death of Franciscan friar and historian, Luke Wadding, in Rome. Born in Co Waterford, Wadding founded the Pontifical Irish College for Irish secular clergy in Rome. In 1900, Wadding’s portrait and part of his library were in the Franciscan friary on Merchant’s Quay, Dublin. Through Wadding’s efforts, St Patrick’s Day became a feast day. 1703 – The Commons hears a petition from Sir Kildare…

[littleschneeleopardsworld]

Stupid thing 😂😂😂

[theworldofwars]

Canadian dispatch riders prepare to train across Salisbury Plain with their Douglas 2.75 horse-power motorcycles, 28 January 1915.

[illustratus]

Edward III Crossing the Somme by Benjamin West

[arda-marred]

Tolkien challenged existing attitudes to the poem in a 1953 paper, “Ofermod”, published with his verse drama The Homecoming of Beorhtnoth Beorhthelm’s Son in Essays and Studies. “The Battle of Maldon” tells how Beorhtnoth, an Anglo-Saxon leader, led his men in a doomed defence against a Viking attack. The Vikings were on a tidal island in the river; but crucially Beorhtnoth decided to let this marauding force across a causeway (pictured above). Battle was joined, and the English were slaughtered. The poem seems to celebrate what has been called “Northern courage”, a spirit of dogged bravery even in the face of certain defeat. But the poet also describes Beorhtnoth’s decision as the product of ofermod, the meaning of which isn’t entirely clear. Tolkien argued that the Old English word means not simply “daring” but “overmastering pride”. This could be taken to reverse the sentiment of the poem, turning it into a critique of an irresponsible act of leadership. Stuart, whose book The Keys of Middle-earth (written with Elizabeth Solopova) provides a guide to Tolkien’s medieval sources, has been looking at Tolkien’s manuscript notes on the poem, from when he was an undergraduate onwards. And it turns out that Tolkien breathed not a word of criticism of Beorhtnoth for many years – not until around the start of the Second World War. This, Stuart suggests, undermines any supposition that Tolkien’s view of “The Battle of Maldon”, as expressed in his “Ofermod” essay, indicated a “lions led by donkeys” attitude shaped by First World War experiences. I’d agree that Tolkien’s view of the Great War military leaders wasn’t as black-and-white as all that. But I’d certainly argue that his trench experiences gave him some reason to feel very ambivalent about the leaders. As I said at the end of Stuart’s talk, there is the case of one company commander in Tolkien’s battalion who led a company on a night raid that overshot its goal – so when the sun rose, they were sitting ducks for the German machine-gunners and for the British artillery (unaware of their position), and most of the men were wiped out. This fatally over-extended advance by a military leader seems echoed in quite a few incidents in Middle-earth, including the charge by Théoden at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields. Tolkien’s writing displays a range of attitudes to the different incidents – implying, I think, that he felt deeply ambivalent about such acts of courage from leaders responsible for others’ lives. In a talk which also covered a number of other interesting points from the manuscripts at the Bodleian Library, Stuart cautioned against looking to Tolkien’s life or to contemporary events to explain the change in Tolkien’s views on “The Battle of Maldon”. The Second World War itself could have led to a shift in Tolkien’s view – perhaps because he saw ofermod at its worst in Hitler. And as I pointed out, his later view might have been coloured by the fact that two of his sons were in the forces, and facing mortal danger, whereas Tolkien himself had to sit on the sidelines powerlessly. However, Stuart‘s point was not about the creative writer but the rigorous scholar. As he said in a later email exchange, whatever Tolkien felt about the military leadership of 1914-18 (a debatable question), “he was entirely at liberty to overlay these views onto scenes or characters in his fiction, of course, and did so I believe; but he was too great a scholar to allow his own personal feelings and experiences in the 20th century to colour his views of the tenth.” That’s a persuasive argument.

[wulfhall]

we are truly in the fucking trenches

[captain-price-unofficially]

Indian cavalry await the order to advance on the Somme, 14 July 1916