Month: February 2018 (Page 1 of 2)

The Mark I helmet, a design by Latvian-born British inventor John L. Brodie (b. Leopold Janno Braude), was the standard steel helmet used by the British Empire troops in WW1, as well as by the American and Portuguese forces. It protected soldiers’ heads from shrapnel bullets, shell fragments, and other flying debris on the battlefield. Brodie’s design using hardened manganese steel (the type A) entered service in the fall of 1915.  It was criticized widely.  The improved Mark I version entered service in May 1916 and was used by a number of armies up through the 1960s. ...read more

In the early months of WW1 all of the combatants were wearing headgear better suited for parade grounds rather than in artillery barrages. French soldiers wore a cloth cap, called the képi, which was actually a ‘Franco-cized’ spelling of the German word kappe.  ...read more

When Gen. John Pershing was setting up the infrastructure of the American Expeditionary Force in France it was determined that they needed women to operate the switchboards, just as was the case back home. These operators had to be fluent in French and English. ...read more

Just about every Doughboy who went to France aspired to return home with two things: a Pickelhaube and a Luger. There was no wonder why. Both items were very distinctly German and so had become iconic in newspaper and magazine cartoons as well as propaganda posters, such as the famous ‘Destroy This Mad Brute’, originally released by the British but also used in 1917 by the U.S. Army.  Also, there seemed to be an endless flow of photographs of the Kaiser wearing a Pickelhaube – he was so fond of his uniforms. ...read more

A previous article has discussed the approximately 40,000 American who served with the Canadians in WW1, and another has featured an American in the Foreign Legion. There were also a few Americans who served in the British army.

One of these was 2^nd Lieut. Henry Augustus “Harry” Butters, RFA (1892 – 1916), who was killed during the Battle of the Somme in 1916. You can read his full story here. ...read more