The year 1916 was the year of the Battle of the Somme.

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Kushal Garala 10PY

The year 1916 was the year of the Battle of the Somme. As the year opened, the two great opposing armies remained deadlocked in a line of trenches which stretched 966 kilometres from the Belgian coast through France to the frontiers of Switzerland. Here, men faced each other over the strewn, decaying wastes of No Man's Land, and confronted the realities of dirt, disease and death.

                    Source A is taken from a book about the trench warfare by an English historian who was published in 1976. As shown in the provenance, the extract has been published in 1976, exactly 60 years from the Battle itself. It may have been written to commemorate the 60th Anniversary of the Battle and think of the soldiers who had died to honour for their country. The extract may have been written by an English historian in order for him to be critical of the Battle.

    In the starting sentence of the paragraph, it shows a meaningful way of describing the life of the soldiers by the word, “bleak”. The word is recounting the life the soldiers are leading and at many times, leaves the soldiers bored, which then leads onto tiredness. Every day, just before dawn approached, the men manned the fire-step in case the enemy mounted a dawn attack, this procedure was known as the Stand- to. The Stand- to system made the soldiers feel wide awake as the procedure was just after their sleep, though many of them weren’t able to catch up on much sleep as some of them were on guard duty. After the Stand- to, breakfast was served and many of them had to try and wash regularly in order to not attract flies and lice which were a main hazard during their “journey”. The quote, “…as best as they could”, shows us that the men did not have time to shave and wash perfectly as operations were carried out every so often and that properly shaving and washing would waste valuable time. There were hardly any quiet days for rest and if there was, it would only last a few hours. Relaxation was difficult as many of the men were either watching guard or hoping that the shells launched by the enemy would miss and pass over them. The quote, “relaxation was difficult”, shows us that many of the men were frightened and afraid that a shell would have hit them and anxiety would take its toll. We also know that there was hardly any time to relax as “inspections, guard duty and work detail” took up most of the day showing that not only did they not get any sleep and relaxation period, but they also had to stay neat and many of them had to go on guard patrol. Most of the nights were taken up by the soldiers carrying out the operations, moving into the front lines,  repairing the wire-bags and dug-outs, moving in military weapons and most importantly, going across No Mans Land, trying to capture enemy spies or even spy on enemy tactics. A disadvantage to the extract is that it is only one paragraph long, showing that the historian may have only selected appropriate sentences in order in get the point across, this shows that the whole extract may show us more into the lives of the soldiers living in the trenches. The Source does not show us about trench foot, lice, smell, rats or in summer, flies. This would have given us more evidence into the life of a soldiers, showing how “bleak” and deprived of their lives.

                 

Source B and C support the evidence given in Source A though there are some limitations in the supporting of the extract. The reasons why there are some limitations are because each Source is different. Source A is an extract from a book, Source B is a photograph and Source C is a table, this shows that the Sources aren’t actually accurate as they are all different.

                     Source B supports the evidence given in Source A because in the picture it relates to Source A, because it shows the men trying to relax after Stand – to, though this would be very difficult because the men are on guard and they are looking for enemy spies trying to approach them. This is slightly different as the soldier on guard is situated at the back of the trench and the fire – step is on the opposite side, thus showing us that the trench has been captured by British troops. The trench is a German trench because the trench is very deep and wide and we know that the Germans were the first soldiers to get to the battlefield and create larger trenches. Source A is associated with Source B because it quotes in the extract, “relaxation was difficult”. This is linked with the picture because the picture is showing one of the men on guard and the rest of them sleeping, although at any time the men could get up if they were under attack. In Source B it doesn’t show any fighting as we can relate this to Source A, shown in the extract as the paragraph doesn’t talk about any fighting, but what the men do in their spare time e.g. washing and shaving. In Source A it doesn’t quote about other aspects of the negative sides such as, trench foot, lice, stench, and rats and in summer, flies. In Source B it doesn’t show the negative sides of the Battle for example, the picture does not show any injured or the dead casualties. The picture only shows a limited amount of the trench, not showing other phase of the trench and in the extract it only shows a part of the book, thus showing a comparison between Source A and B.

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Source C is related to Source A, because on the table it shows the actual heavy fighting which took place and before the French soldiers started to fight because the table only states the British casualties and not the allies. The Source also shows us that the British conscripted their soldiers and had a keen interest to see how they have coped throughout the war and how many survived. Source C though does has similarities with Source A but also contradicts the paragraph by showing the deaths of the soldiers rather than in the paragraph where it shows the “life” ...

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