Life in the trenches was extremely hard considering the circumstances. This is because of the living conditions that soldiers were forced to live in.
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We already fought a couple of battles here at the Western Front. In most of those battles, both sides used trench warfare, in which soldiers hide inside deep trenches. These trenches were dug in rows with sandbags lined at the top – side facing the “no-man’s land”. No-man’s land was basically where all the battle happens. The countryside mire was filled with landmines, covered with barbed wires on the surface. Several of my surviving comrades from the previous battle, the Somme, were shell-shocked, probably from the disaster. I still couldn’t forget the ‘Blood Bath’ that happened there. Trench life has been far worse than the life at camp 2 years ago. There was still the awfully wet mud surrounding and the cold air filled our lungs. Our boots were always wet, and we were given whale oil to cover our feet every day. Some people refuse or forget to do it, thus they developed trench foot. It’s a condition where one’s feet are rotting, and more often than not, accompanied by swelling and a painful infection. The trenches were filled with lice and rats which caused diseases, when they sneaked around the supplies. I managed to avoid the lice because I kept the silk you gave, around my torso as an undershirt. Anyways, a few days before the battle, General Arthur Currie made thorough plans for the attack. The planes scouted the enemy front lines and the terrain, and spotted the snipers and machine gun positions. We built a…
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The guns were automatic that made it really easy to kill the people when they tried to go from one trench to the other. Also the gases that they used were very fatal. The gas caused many of the soldiers to get incredibly sick and die, if the gas was exposed to their skin they would get many terrible sores. Also the tunnels they built from one trench to the other.…
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During World War I, there were many issues that surrounded the health of troops. The lack of medical advancement and the knowledge of it, then the struggle of keeping ones self-healthy throughout combat were key points to survival. During World War I in less than a year, American troops suffered more than 318,000 injuries 120,000 were counted as casualties. The front line soldiers are always at the highest risk in any war. With World War I though, trench warfare was a dangerous place to be considering they were always at risk for disease or infection because they were in the poorest conditions. During World War I, the Black Plague was one of the most drastic plagues in history. The troops would try anything and everything to help the disease not run like a wild fire. Soldiers would use herbs to blow away bad smells of the sewer and clean the contaminated air. During the war, soldiers would…
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Rotting carcases lay around in their thousands. For example, approximately 200,000 men were killed on the Somme battlefields, many of which lay in shallow graves. Overflowing latrines would similarly give off a most offensive stench. Men who had not been afforded the luxury of a bath in weeks or months would offer the pervading odour of dried sweat. The feet were generally accepted to give off the worst odour. Trenches would also smell of creosol or chloride of lime, used to stave off the constant threat of disease and infection. Add to this the smell of cordite, the lingering odour of poison gas, rotting sandbags, stagnant mud, cigarette smoke and cooking food yet men grew used to it, while it thoroughly overcame first-time visitors to the front. So trench life was horrible people called it hell however people got used it and many people thank the trenches as that is what saved their…
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Trenches were built to protect yourself from the enemy(s). Trenches were generally around two meters deep and two meters wide. There was three rows. The first row was called the frontline trench. The frontline was the closest to no mans land (the land controlled by neither side of a war), it was also the most dangerous because that was were most of the fighting went on. The second row was called the support trench. It was back-up to the frontline, just in case the enemy got passed. The third and last row was called the reserves. This is were they kept all the supplies and equipment. Also there was communication tunnels connecting the trenches, they were used to transport supplies and messages to the other trenches. Trenches were very unhealthy. Lice, rats and all sorts of vermin occupied the trenches. There was little to no running water, the bathrooms consisted of a bucket in the trench. Also there was dead bodies covering all of the land. Worst of all, there was rats. They would eat dead bodies, or eat out the eyes and live in the bodies of the dead. Rats would nibble the living while they slept or when they were wounded. The other horrible parasite was lice. Lice is hard to get rid of…
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During World War I warfare was carried out using one the most familiar elements of modern warfare and soldiers were forced to live in the extremely horrible living conditions of The Trenches. A trench warfare is a kind of fight where each side digs deep trenches down in the ground to defend themselves against the enemy. The trenches of World War 1 stretched for miles in order to enable one side to get the upper hand on the other. The trenches were dug by soldiers themselves they would make the trenches by digging directly down into the ground which speeded up the digging process , but at the same time left the soldiers exposed to be fired on by the enemy as they dug. These trenches were sometimes even formed in places where you couldn’t break…
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Many of the trenches men died of disease because it ran rampant in it. Life during trench warfare was highly boring as the soldiers had to sit there and basically nothing to do if there was no fighting going on. Many of them had nothing to do but clean their weapons and the life in the trenches showed that many of them hated it. Many of the men believed that they were going to die in the trenches and not make it back home. Many soldiers had to live in the filth and the muddy conditions. Many of the soldiers in the trenches contracted trench foot which was an infection of the feet because they are in the water and wet so often. In the winters the trenches would freeze with ice and in the summers it would fill with water. Front line soldiers were told to and had to cross no man’s land to attack the enemy which almost always failed and thousands died. Poisonous gases such as mustard gas, and many others were one of the many attempts to break the deadlock , basically a standstill and sometimes it proved effective if they were catching the enemy off guard and the wind was blowing in the right direction. Many diseases affected the men in there because of the cramped and poor hygiene. Lice and rats were there and many died of…
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The life in the trenches were horrible. There was all sorts of pest living in the trenches including rats, lice, and frogs. Soldiers slept in dug outs. The trenches were dirty and due to the weather they would be filled with water and they also became muddy. Soldiers would usually be covered almost up to their ankles because of the mud. There was 200,000 men dead. Over time the rats would eat the corpses. The smell was revolting. The dead bodies plus the clogging of toilets was mainly why the smell was so strong. The soldiers would get trench foot. Which was by insanitation and cold conditions that they would go through. As shown in document 4, in the image it shows the soldiers are struggling with trench…
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