Most people suffered from trench foot. Trench foot was caused by feet being damp all the time. When it rained soldiers foot will be soak in water for ages, the water will soon root away the skin and inner side of the foot, later your feet will be swollen up, three times as big as normally. Many soldiers had to cut off their foot, because it was so painful, but when it was chopped of they felt no pain, not even the sharp bayonet could be felt because it was so swollen.
The loud noise caused by the shells exploding gave many soldiers shell shock. Once you get shell shocked you start to shake, your mouth vibrates and you look as if your in a coma, just dazing through the day. You also become deaf and dumb. Many soldiers who had shell shock was killed if they was in the coma for too long, because its wasting other people time to look after you, and its also a waste of food.
Rats grew as big as cats because they feasted on the dead bodies. Each rat produces 880 offspring in a year. So imagine after 4 years how many rats will you have, exactly 599,695,360,000,000,000,000 rats. Many soldiers woke up and found themselves lying next to 10 rats, the only way to keep away from the rats, is to be clean and tidy and your shelter should have a lot of ventilation.
Lice’s was very common, because the soldiers clothes were washed only once a week, after being in muddy water, rats and sewage. The soldiers all share a tub of water, so it’s around 100 soldiers per a tub, they take it in turns to wash, so if your first you’ll get clean water, if your last you get all the left over from the other soldiers. Even if your first to clean, you will still have to get back to your old and dirty uniform.
People think that soldiers suffer most from hunger, but no. The soldiers actually have plenty to eat; it’s just the way the food is served that puts you off. So if you was a tramp and starved from hunger, you may want to join the army where you get free food. Here is the list of food that 1 soldier get per a day:
Meat 1lb = 453g
Bread 1.25lb = 567g
Bacon 0.25lb = 113g
Tea 0.5oz = 14g
Sugar 2oz = 56g
Jam 2oz = 56g
Cheese 1oz = 28g
Butter 0.75oz = 21g
Potatoes 0.75lb = 340g
Salt 1oz = 28g
Pepper 0.027oz = 0.7g
Mustard 0.05oz = 1.4g
The most difficult thing about cooking is that you’re cooking inside a small trench, with a little fire, and you could be attacked any moment. You’re trying to enjoy your food, but then you hear you commander shout, attack.
Here is what a soldier would eat daily:
Meaty beef with biscuits, plum and apple jam biscuits, washed down with tea flavour from previous meal, cooked in the same dirty old pan.
Disgusting, same pan, left over tea, same cutlery, dirty hands…
Daily Routine
A daily routine for a soldier is extremely boring and horrific. As the soldiers wake up they see 20 rats crawling around him, he itches his back scratching all the lice’s, then he gets up and step outside, all he see are rats feasting on his mate. You go to the naffie to collect your food; you put it back inside your trench to go for a wash in the dirty water. You come back a see rats all over the food. You forget about it and use the dirty pan to boil the water. You cook your meat in the cramp hole. You finally get to enjoy your meal with the same crusty cutlery. Your feet are damp, your body is itching, and you’re very tired. After the meal you either look out for Germans until lunch or do some chore that you have been ordered to do, for example filling up the sandbags, fixing the duckboards, etc.
Its lunch, you cook again, and eat again. As you finish you see one of your soldiers die. All the rats make a pile on top of him hoping to get a bit of his flesh. After lunch you look out for Germans again!
It’s the evening, you have your meal, and you start to attack…As you walk across the bodies on no mans land, your friend beside you got shot right in the face five times, and your covered with blood. Two minutes later you hear your commander shout retreat…you quickly come back as fast as you could.
You was luckily you didn’t die, but a couple of your friends did, today was your shift to do the lookout, and you are really tired. At the end of the day, if you’re lucky you will get a couple hours of sleep.
Conclusion
In the essay I think that the most important bit was the daily routine, because it’s what every soldier has to go through every day, it must be so tiring!!! Imagine if we had another World War like that, I can’t imagine how it will feel, would you? All the big rats crawling over you.
The most interesting part of my essay would probably be the rats paragraph, just imagine all the rats. Also the food they had, same cutlery, same pan, food washed in left over tea, disgust!!! Overall I think I would give myself 10/10, because I’ve done my best and it couldn’t be better!!!
Bibliography
Resources I used were the internet and a book:
Life in the Trenches by
