Armistice | Iconic Photos Iconic Photos Famous, Infamous and Iconic Photos Posts Tagged ‘Armistice’ with 3 comments On November 8th 1918, the German delegation crossed the frontlines to negotiate an armistice to end the First World War. Instead of directly driving them to where the Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces, Marshal Ferdinand Foch was waiting, the French gave them a 10-hour tour of the ruined countryside. The talk took three days and the terms from the United States included the abdication of Kaiser Wilhelm II. This was agreed and Wilhem abdicated on Novemeber 10th while Germany slowly descended into riots and unrest. Foch appeared only twice in the three days of negotiations: on the first day, to ask the German delegation what they wanted, and on the last day, to see to the signatures. The armistice was formally signed in Foch’s carriage on 11 November. Above is the only picture of the signing ceremony. The armistice initially ran for 30 days but was regularly renewed until the formal peace treaty was signed at Versailles the following year.

Before the Treaty of Verseilles, the Allies kept their armies ready to begin hostilities back again within 48 hours. In 1940, Hitler exacted revenge by forcing the French to sign an armistice in the same railway carriage. The Nazis destroyed the building housing it, the Clairiere de l’Armistice and took the carriage to Berlin. With the Allied advance into Germany, the carriage was removed to Ohrdruf, where it was destroyed. More information about armistice, see here . Rate this: with 3 comments “On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month” of 1918, an armistice was signed, ending “The War to End All Wars”. With the military morale in its ebb and revolution brewing at home, Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated two days before on 9 November. The German government had decided to negotiate an armistice with the Allies starting 7th November, when the German Army Chief of Staff Paul von Hindenburg exchanged a series of telegrams with the Supreme Allied Commander Ferdinand Foch.

In the forest of Compiègne, In the railcar given to Foch for military use by the manufacturer, Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits, the armistice was signed. The photograph was taken after reaching an agreement. The diplomatic situation was terse: The German signatory, Matthias Erzberger made a short speech, protesting the harshness of the terms, and concluded by saying that “a nation of seventy millions can suffer, but it cannot die”. Foch then refused to shake Erzberger’s hand and said, “Très bien“.) Although it was signed at 5 am, the terms of the agreement didn’t come into effect until six hours later at 11 am. The hour was chosen by Admiral Sir Rosslyn Wemyss, First Sea Lord and Britain’s official delegate to oversee the Armistice. He was explicitly ordered by his Prime Minister David Lloyd George to delay the terms until 3 pm to coincide with parliment sitting so that PM could get the credit of announcing it officially to the house on the hour. Weymss thought the delay would cause unnecessary killing and decided that the eleventh hour would add to the poignancy of the date. Lloyd George was furious.

Erzberger, too, was not kindly received back–he was assassinated later by a right-wing extremist group, Organisation Consul for signing the Armistice. Foch on the other hand was elected to the Académie des Sciences on the very day of the Armistice [and ten days later, to the Académie française]. In the above picture, front row from left to right: Rear-Admiral George P.W. Hope, Wemyss’s deputy; General Maxime Weygrand, Foch’s righthand man and one who read out the armistice conditions; Wemyss; Foch and Royal Navy captain JPR Marriott, attache to two admirals. On the train, clockwise from top right: Interpreter Laperche, Captain le Mierry, Commander Riedinger, and General Desticker, Foch’s ADC. The German delegation was notably absent. The photo was taken at 7:30 am as Foch was about to return to Paris with the signed documents in his briefcase. Although Germany had insisted that it would only enter into negotiations on the understanding that U.S.

President Woodrow Wilson’s so-called ‘Fourteen Points’ would form the basis for a settlement, the armistice terms were nevertheless punitive. The Allies agreed to an armistice only on the basis that Germany effectively disarm herself; the cause preventing the latter from renewing hostilities backfired spectacularly: her ignominious “reparations” agreement sowed the seeds for the rise of a nationalist movement and subsequently the Second World War.

Rate this: A History of the First World War in 100 Moments: Peace without magnanimity - the summit in a railway siding that ended the fighting | The Independent History of the First World War in 100 moments A History of the First World War in 100 Moments: Peace without magnanimity - the summit in a railway siding that ended the fighting John Lichfield on the strange meeting in the forest of Compiègne that culminated in the signing of the Armistice Thursday 10 July 2014 17:29 BST Click to follow The Independent Online The interior of the railway carriage in which the Armistice ending the First World War was signed Hulton/Getty On 8 November 1918, two trains came to a halt in adjoining sidings at Rethondes in the forest of Compiègne, 40 miles north of Paris. One, formerly the imperial train of Emperor Napoleon III, contained German civilian politicians and obscure, senior military officers. They were untidy and exhausted after travelling overnight, in the greatest secrecy, through the front lines in northern France.

The other train was the permanent home of the commander-in-chief of the allied armies, Marshal Ferdinand Foch. His guests included the British First Lord of the Admiralty, Sir Rosslyn Wemyss. The German delegation, led by Matthias Erzberger, a moderate politician, shambled across the 100 metres to Foch’s dark-blue wagon-lit. The marshal leaned across to his interpreter and said: “Ask these gentlemen what they want.” Erzberger said that he had come to hear armistice proposals from the Allies. Foch replied: “I have no proposals to make.” Count Alfred von Oberndorff, from the German foreign ministry, said in French that his delegation was there to seek “the conditions for the Armistice”. Foch replied: “I have no conditions to offer.” The German delegation rapidly grasped the situation. After four years and three months of the most terrible war yet known to man, there were to be no negotiations. The Germans were to grovel. They were to be humiliated. They were to ask for an armistice. The terms would be dictated by the Allies. And so they were.

But it still took another three days – and many thousands of deaths as the fighting raged on – before the Armistice was signed.

In pictures: A history of the First World War in 100 moments In pictures: A history of the First World War in 100 moments 1/133 First World War Supporting troops of the 1st Australian Division walking on a duckboard track near Hooge, in the Ypres Sector Getty Images 2/133 First World War Final moments: The Archduke of Austria Franz Ferdinand with his wife Sophie in Sarajevo minutes before his shooting AP 3/133 First World War Arresting Princip’s fellow conspirator Nedeljko Cabrinovic after a failed attempt to kill the Archduke on the same day Getty Images Crowds in central London cheer Britain’s declaration of war on Germany Getty Images The innocents: New recruits, with bicycles, training with the British Army in 1914 Getty 6/133 First World War 1914: A lone soldier with a bicycle stands amid the remains of a German motor convoy which lines a country lane after an attack by French field guns in the battle of the Aisne in France Topical Press Agency/Getty Images Troubled waters: The Cambridge eight included John Andrew Ritson (fourth from cox) Museum of London

, Christina Broom 8/133 First World War Museum of London, Christina Broom 9/133 First World War Musuem of London; Christina Broom 10/133 First World War German infantry advance through Belgium in August 1914 Getty Images 11/133 First World War Civilians near the Austrian lines in Serbia are strung up – probably as a reprisal for guerrilla resistance to the invaders Miroslav Honzík/Hana Honzíková Captured soldiers of the Russian 2nd Army after their defeat at the Battle of Tannenberg Getty Images Wounded and exhausted British and Belgian soldiers retreating after the Battle of Mons Getty Images Crowds gather outside a recruitment office Getty Images 15/133 First World War French General Joseph Joffre (second right), Commander- in-Chief of the French Armies, and General Michel Joseph Maunoury (right) on the front during the First Battle of the Marne.

Six hundred scarlet taxis were requisitioned, at a cost of Fr70,102, to ferry reservist troops to the Battle of the Marne in 1914 Getty Images A French firing squad escorts a deserter to his execution in November 1914 Getty One of the trenches from which deserters tried to escape Getty German soldiers in Wirballen, a border town between the German Reich and Russia Mary Evans Picture Library Carl Hans Lody, who spied in Britain Popperfoto/Getty 20/133 First World War Up to 12 million letters a week were sent to the front line via the wooden sorting office hastily set up in Regent’s Park in 1914 Royal Mail 21/133 First World War Survivors from SMS ‘Gneisenau’ in the sea off the Falkland Islands, with HMS ‘Inflexible’ in the background, 8 December 1914 Getty Images The ruins of the cloth hall and cathedral in Ypres during WWI Getty Images 23/133 First World War Margot Asquith, the Countess of Oxford and Asquith and the wife of Britain’s wartime leader Getty Images 2

4/133 First World War Russian artillery positions outside Przemysl, during the six-month siege of the heavily fortified Austro-Hungarian city, part of present-day Poland Hulton Archive/Getty Images 25/133 First World War German infantrymen attack through a cloud of poison gas.

By the end of the war, both sides had employed various kinds of gas Getty A pile of skulls from the Armenian village of Sheyxalan AFP/Getty 27/133 First World War Cunard liner RMS Lusitania, after secret Whitehall misgivings about the official account of one of the most controversial and tragic episodes of the First World War were revealed in newly-released government documents.

Almost 70 years after the Cunard liner RMS Lusitania was sunk by a German U-boat off the coast of Ireland, some officials expressed concern that the truth was still being covered up PA Wire 28/133 First World War The RMS Lusitania sailed from New York on 1 May 1915 on her last voyage; the liner was sunk off southern Ireland on 7 May Getty Images French troops line up for inspection on a trench on the Western Front Getty Images German military prisoners, at Southend-on-Sea, on their way to Knockaloe Print Collector/Hulton Archive/Getty Images 31/133 First World War The railway line running the length of the access road into Knockaloe, the biggest camp in the British Isles 32/133 First World War Survivors of the sinking in Cobh, Co Cork Getty Images 33/133 First World War 2nd Lieutenant John Kipling is thought to have been killed in The Chalk Pit, in Loos, France, on 27 September 1915 Wikimedia Creative Commons Laid to rest: Edith Cavell circa 1905 Getty Her funeral cortege

 in London in May 1919 Getty George Samson is celebrated on a cigarette card of the time 37/133 First World War Flora Sandes, who rose from private to sergeant-major in the Serbian army, playing chess with her Serbian comrades.

After the war ended, she was promoted to lieutenant 38/133 First World War Italian light infantry of the 1st Alpini Regiment on Monte Nero, during the Isonzo campaigns Universal History Archive/UIG/Getty Images As Italian as mozzarella cheese: Giuseppe Ungaretti 40/133 First World War French troops under shellfire during the Battle of Verdun Getty Images The Pavilion was meant as a seaside home for the Prince Regent Royal Pavilion and Museums, Brighton & Hove 43/133 First World War Fun and games were vital Royal Pavilion and Museums, Brighton & Hove 44/133 First World War Patients get some sea air Royal Pavilion and Museums, Brighton & Hove 45/133 First World War Royal Pavilion and Museums, Brighton & Hove 46/133 First World War Britain saw the Easter Rising as a stab in the back and the rebels, pictured here being led to captivity, as traitors.

Subsequent executions made them into national heroes Rex A steamer hit by a torpedo during the First World War Getty 48/133 First World War The Ottoman army besieged the British forces for 147 days until they surrendered on 29 April 1916 Getty Imperial War Museum 51/133 First World War Siegfried Sassoon as a second lieutenant in the Royal Welch Fusiliers.

His bravery won him the Military Cross in July 1916, but he later turned against the war Getty Images The sinking of the ‘Queen Mary’ Getty Images Admiral John Jellicoe, commander of the British fleet Getty Images German destroyers off the English coast Getty Images One of the architects of the revolt: Sharif Hussain, religious leader of Mecca Getty Images One of the architects of the revolt: Sir Henry McMahon, British minister in Cairo Getty Images 57/133 First World War Emilio Lussu, who fought in the battle with the Italian Army, on the side of the allies, against the Austrians, who sided with Germany 58/133 First World War Field Marshal Horatio Herbert Kitchener, whose face appeared on the recruitment poster ‘Your Country Needs You’ Getty Conscientious objectors at a protest on Dartmoor in 1917 Getty 60/133 First World War Objectors were forced to cultivate the soil although many were said to have spent much of their time "strolling on the moors, reading, smoking and talking" Getty 61/133 First World War British conscientious objectors leaving Dartmoor Prison under a gateway

 inscribed with the words "Parcere subjectis" ("Spare the conquered") Getty Going over the top during the Battle of the Somme in 1916 PA Canadian troops prepare for the charge Hulton Archive/Getty Images Remains of the German airship shot down over Cuffley Popperfoto Captain William Leefe Robinson received the VC for his courage Hulton/Getty Images A British Mark 1 tank on the Western Front Topical Press/Hulton/Getty 67/133 First World War A British soldier covers a dead German on the firestep of a trench near the Somme Hulton/Getty Images 68/133 First World War Carnage on the road to Romania’s Turnu Rosu Pass.

A German NCO stands beside an Italian-made cannon and the body of what may have been a gun crew member 69/133 First World War Edward Thomas, a Second-Lieutenant in the Royal Garrison Artillery, at home on leave in early 1917 Edward Thomas Fellowship Edward’s wife Helen with two of their three children, Merfyn and Bronwen 71/133 First World War May Bradford writing a letter for an injured soldier in a French hospital 72/133 First World War Composer and poet Ivor Gurney (left) and the artist Paul Nash Getty Images 73/133 First World War Filling shells at the Vickers munitions factory, Barrow-in-Furness.

Strikers’ grievances included the use of female labour BAE Systems Submarines 74/133 First World War The moment that ushered in the American century: President Woodrow Wilson asks Congress to ratify a declaration of war against Imperial Germany AP 75/133 First World War Supporters greet Lenin on his arrival at Finland Station, Petrograd, on 16 April 1917, after a week-long journey by sealed train from Switzerland Everett Collection/Rex Images War effort: Women war workers at Cross Farm, Shackleton, Surrey, in 1917 Getty 77/133 First World War French ‘poilus’ at Chemin des Dames, where the bloody Nivelle Offensive of 1917 pushed many into mutiny Rex 78/133 First World War An early colour photograph of the crater left by the biggest of the blasts beneath German positions near Messines on 14 June 1917 Getty British sappers laying the mines Heritage Images/Getty The remains of a German trench Alamy 81/133 First World War Ernst Jünger’s German platoon overcame the enemy forces with his ‘mastery of the situation and

 iron command’ 82/133 First World War Siegfried Sassoon was sent to Craiglockhart Hospital to be treated for ‘shell shock’ following his protest Getty Images 83/133 First World War Erich Maria Remarque (1898-1970), whose 1929 novel, ‘All Quiet On The Western Front’, was based on his wartime experiences.

Here he is seen with Carl Laemmle of Universal Pictures (left) Getty Images 84/133 First World War The conscription of reserve soldiers in Greece to fight on the Salonika front in 1916. The Greek city was ravaged by a fire the following year, which devastated the area and left thousands homeless Getty Images 85/133 First World War Allied troops marching down the Boulevard de la Victoire in Salonika in 1916, the year before the great fire which devastated the Greek city Getty Images 86/133 First World War Women leaving a munitions factory on Eiswerder Island in Spandau, near Berlin, at the end of their shift, in around 1917. They are crossing the bridge over the river Havel TopFoto Female workers of the Spandau factory getting their dinner during the midday break TopFoto 88/133 First World War Wet weather plagued the Third Battle of Ypres, which included the battles of Langemarck and Passchendaele.

Perhaps 70,000 Allied soldiers died between 31 July and 10 November Getty Getty 90/133 First World War German prisoners on a duckboard track at Yser Canal, Belgium, on the opening day of the battle Getty 91/133 First World War 3rd September 1917: Veterans of the American Civil War at the opening of the Eagle Hut Getty 92/133 First World War US Ambassador Page greeting veterans of the American Civil War at the opening of the Eagle Hut Getty 22nd December 1917: Christmas preparations at the Eagle Hut Getty 94/133 First World War Albin Köbis, who was shot as one of the ringleaders of the German naval mutiny in 1917 Alamy Stokers of the SMS Prinzregent Luitpold in 1913 Alamy 96/133 First World War Allied troops in what is now Zambia, in vain pursuit of the forces of the elusive German general Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck Getty Images Genius in the art of bush warfare: German general Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck Getty German women and

 children queue for food rations Alamy 99/133 First World War Crowds at Petrograd’s Winter Palace during the October Revolution.

(Russia still used the Julian calendar, in which the West’s 7 November equated to 25 October) Getty The Mayor of Jerusalem (with walking-stick) had tried to surrender the city to them Imperial War Museum 101/133 First World War Allenby walks into Jerusalem: Sergeants James Sedgwick and Frederick Hurcomb of 2/19th Battalion, London Regiment, outside the city two days earlier AP 102/133 First World War Artist John Nash not only painted the ordeals of Britain’s front line troops: he experienced them first-hand 103/133 First World War A British housewife with her grocery items after the introduction of rationing.

The government feared hunger might lead to revolution Rex Edmund Morel as an MP after his release Topham Picturepoint A suffragist rally in Hyde Park Hulton/Getty A newly enfranchised woman votes for the first time in 1918 Hulton/Getty 107/133 First World War Masked doctors and nurses treat flu patients lying on cots and in outdoor tents at a hospital camp during the influenza epidemic of 1918 Hulton Archive/Getty Images 108/133 First World War The immense long-range naval gun which was used to bombard Paris from behind the German lines in Picardy TopFoto 109/133 First World War The immense naval gun was manned by 80 German sailors.

It launched its shells from behind the German lines TopFoto 110/133 First World War Walter Tull, left, Britain’s first black Army officer, in a photograph handed down to his great-nephew Edward Finlayson 111/133 First World War Tull was singled out for his "gallantry and coolness" following a daring raid across the frozen river Piave in January 1918 112/133 First World War The German air ace Baron Manfred von Richthofen Hulton/Getty Baron Manfred von Richthofen's 'flying circus' Hulton/Getty Dogs at the British War Dog School in Essex Mary Evans Picture Library Tweed, far left, with his handler Private Reid 116/133 First World War A dog courier runs through barbed wire and mines to deliver a message Corbis Piete Kuhr, pictured in 1915 Memoria Hürth Vera Brittain became a nurse during the war Hulton/Getty The aftermath of the explosion at the munitions plant in Chilwell Nottingham City Council 120/133 First World War Remains of a soldier on the Western Front, where millions

 were killed or wounded, or went missing Getty From left, Marshal Joffre, President Henri Poincaré, King George V, General Foch, and Field-Marshal Haig Time life pictures/Getty Captured German officers receiving orders from a French officer Universal Images Group/Getty Images 123/133 First World War American troops advance on a German position on the Saint Mihiel salient, north-eastern France, in 1918 124/133 First World War American soldiers of the 18th Infantry Machine Gun Battalion advance through the ruins of St Baussant on their way to the St.

Mihiel Front Getty A group of captured Germans being marched through St Mihiel Salient Getty 126/133 First World War Wilfred Owen in uniform as a 2nd Lieutenant. The poet was teaching in France when the war began Fotosearch/Getty Images 127/133 First World War The poet Rainer Maria Rilke, circa 1920. The poet describes to his wife the rising tide of popular unrest in Munich Hulton/Getty 128/133 First World War The interior of the railway carriage in which the Armistice ending the First World War was signed Hulton/Getty The Allied delegation was led by France’s Marshal Ferdinand Foch (front row, second right) Getty Images The Royal Family appear on the balcony Getty Images People celebrate in the streets in 1918 Getty Images Crowds in London celebrate the end of hostilities on 11 November 1918 Getty Images World War 2 Stories From Wikipedia The armistice between the Allies and Germany was an agreement that ended the fighting in the First World War.

It went into effect at 11 am on 11 November 1918, and marked a victory for the Allies and a complete defeat for Germany, although not technically a surrender. The Germans were responding to the policies proposed by American President Woodrow Wilson in his Fourteen Points. The actual terms, largely written by French Marshal Ferdinand Foch, included the cessation of hostilities, the withdrawal of German troops to behind their own borders, the preservation of infrastructure, the exchange of prisoners, a promise of reparations, the disposition of German warships and submarines, and conditions for prolonging or terminating the armistice. On 29 September 1918 the German Supreme Command informed Kaiser Wilhelm II and the Imperial Chancellor Count Georg von Hertling at army headquarters in Spa, Belgium, that the military situation facing Germany was hopeless. Generalquartiermeister Erich Ludendorff, probably fearing a breakthrough, claimed that he could not guarantee that the front would hold for another 24 hours and demanded a request be given to the Entente for an immediate ceasefire.

In addition, he recommended the acceptance of the main demands of US President Woodrow Wilson (the Fourteen Points) and put the Imperial Government on a democratic footing, hoping for more favourable peace terms. This enabled him to save the face of the Imperial Army and put the responsibility for the capitulation and its consequences squarely into the hands of the democratic parties and the parliament. As he said to officers of his staff on 1 October: "They now must lie on the bed that they've made for us." Thus was born the "Stab-in-the-back" notion that the army had not failed, only the civilians. On 3 October liberal Prince Maximilian of Baden was appointed Chancellor of Germany instead of Georg von Hertling in order to negotiate an armistice. On 5 October 1918 Germany asked Wilson to negotiate terms. In the subsequent two exchanges, Wilson's allusions "failed to convey the idea that the Kaiser's abdication was an essential condition for peace.

The leading statesmen of the Reich were not yet ready to contemplate such a monstrous possibility." As a precondition for negotiations Wilson demanded the retreat of Germany from all occupied territories, the cessation of submarine activities and the Kaiser's abdication, writing on 23 October: "If the Government of the United States must deal with the military masters and the monarchical autocrats of Germany now, or if it is likely to have to deal with them later in regard to the international obligations of the German Empire, it must demand not peace negotiations but surrender." Ludendorff, in a sudden change of mind, declared the conditions of the Allies unacceptable. He now demanded to resume the war which he himself had declared lost only one month earlier. However the German soldiers were pressing to get home. It was scarcely possible to arouse their readiness for battle anew, and desertions were on the increase. The Imperial Government stayed on course and replaced Ludendorff with General Wilhelm Groener. On 5 November the Allies agreed to take up negotiations for a truce, now demanding reparation payments.

A much bigger obstacle, which contributed to the five-week delay in the signing of the armistice and to the resulting social deterioration in Europe, was the fact that the Entente Powers had no desire to accept the Fourteen Points and Wilson's subsequent promises. As Czernin points out: The Allied statesmen were faced with a problem: so far they had considered the 'fourteen commandments' as a piece of clever and effective American propaganda, designed primarily to undermine the fighting spirit of the Central Powers, and to bolster the morale of the lesser Allies. Now, suddenly, the whole peace structure was supposed to be built up on that set of 'vague principles,' most of which seemed to them thoroughly unrealistic, and some of which, if they were to be seriously applied, were simply unacceptable. Painting depicting the signature of the armistice in the railway carriage. From left to right are German Admiral Ernst Vanselow, German Count Alfred von Oberndorff of the Foreign Ministry, German General Detlof von Winterfeldt (with helmet), British naval officer Captain Jack Marriott, and standing in front of the table, Matthias Erzberger, head of the German delegation.

Behind the table are two British naval officers, Rear-Admiral George Hope, First Sea Lord Admiral Sir Rosslyn Wemyss, and the French representatives, Marshal Ferdinand Foch (standing), and General Maxime Weygand. The armistice was signed in a carriage of Foch's private train, CIWL #2419 ("Le Wagon de l'Armistice"). It was later put back into regular service with the Compagnie des Wagons-Lits, but after a short period it was withdrawn to be attached to the French presidential train. From April 1921 to April 1927, it was on exhibition in the Cour des Invalides in Paris. In November 1927, it was ceremonially returned to the forest in the exact spot where the Armistice was signed. Marshal Foch, General Weygand and many others watched it being placed in a specially constructed building: the Clairiere de l’Armistice.

There it remained, a monument to the defeat of the Kaiser’s Germany, until 22 June 1940, when swastika-bedecked German staff cars bearing Adolf Hitler, Hermann Göring, Wilhelm Keitel, Joachim von Ribbentrop and others swept into the Clairiere and, in that same carriage, demanded and received the surrender armistice from France. The allied representatives at the signing of the armistice. Ferdinand Foch , second from right, seen outside his railway carriage in the forest of Compiègne. During the Occupation of France, the Clairiere de l’Armistice was destroyed and the carriage taken to Berlin, where it was exhibited in the Lustgarten. After the Allied advance into Germany in early 1945, the carriage was removed by the Germans for safe keeping to the town of Ohrdruf, but as an American armoured column entered the town, the detachment of the SS guarding it set it ablaze, and it was destroyed. Some pieces were however preserved by a private person; they are also exhibited at Compiègne.

After the war, the Compiègne site was restored, but not until Armistice Day 1950 was a replacement carriage, correct in every detail, re-dedicated: an identical Compagnie des Wagon-Lits carriage, no. 2439, built in 1913 in the same batch as the original and present in 1918, was renumbered no. 2419D. Compiegne museum WWI In July 2007 my wife and myself were visiting a friend in Compiegne, northern France. One of the must-see places there is the "Clearing in the forest" where the allies and the Germans agreed to end the first world war in November 1918. The Armistice was signed in a railway carriage that was part of Marshall Foche's train, parked on a military branch line in the Compiegne Forest. The carriage is an adapted dining car of the Compagnie Internationale des Wagons Lits et des Grandes Express Européens. In 1940 Hitler insisted on getting it out again to sign the French surrender.

The original was destroyed in an allied air raid over Germany but the carriage in the museum is one of the same series. They have built a museum around the carriage. Inside, the tables are set out with the places of the main participants marked. Facsimiles of the documents are there, and even an ashtray claimed to contain a cigar butt smoked by Foche. I found it curious that, although the French and British were represented on the allied side, there was no mention of any Americans. Were there none at the Armistice talks? In the museum there are graphic images of the horrors of the war with a series of photograph collections of many aspects of the war. Outside the museum there are huge memorials to French "gloire" and especially to Marshall Foche, who was the supreme commander on the allied side. Personally, I wished there had been some mention of the European Union whose main purpose is to prevent this kind of horror ever happening again. The Wagon Lits diner where the allied representatives held talks with the Germans and signed the armistice.

WWI | Iconic Photos Iconic Photos Famous, Infamous and Iconic Photos Posts Tagged ‘WWI’ with 7 comments During the First World War, drafts created the armies that were drawn from remarkably similar societies for the first time in modern warfare. Along the Western Front, on both sides there were industrial workers and farm laborers. On both sides there were aristocratic senior officers and middle-class junior officers. For Catholics, Protestants and Jews fighting for separate armies, they sometimes identified more with their religious brethren on the opposing side than with their fellow soldiers. The soldiers, Englishmen, Frenchmen, Germans and Italians were equally irreverent about what they were supposedly fighting for. Over the longer period of trench warfare, a kind of ‘live and let live’ attitude developed in certain relatively quiet sectors of the line; war was reduced to a series of rituals, as with the Greeks and Trojans. English pacifist Vera Brittain noted about a Scottish and a Saxon regiment that had agreed not to aim at each other when they fired. They made a lot of noise and an outsider would have thought the men were fighting hard, but in practice no one was hit.

Robert Graves — in his pivotal memoir of the Great War, Goodbye to All That — recollected about letters arriving from the Germans, rolled up in old mortar shells: “Your little dog has run over to us, and we are keeping it safe here.” Newspapers were fired back and forth in the same fashion. Louis Barthas spent some time in a sector where the Germans and the French fired only six mortar rounds a day, ‘out of courtesy’. Nothing symbolized this easygoing attitudes more than the informal Christmas truce of 1914, when opposing soldiers in many sectors joined together to sing carols, and exchange Christmas greetings and gifts. Soccer games were played in no man’s land with makeshift balls. Of course, there were some who refused to participate in the truce; among those was a German field messenger named Adolf Hitler, who grumbled, ““Such things should not happen in wartime. Have you Germans no sense of honor left at all?” At Diksmuide, Belgium, the Belgian and German soldiers famously celebrated Christmas Eve together in 1914, drinking schapps together. One year later, ad hoc ceasefires took place again, this time in northern France.

No man’s land was suddenly transformed into ‘a country fair’ as lively bartering began for schnapps, cigarettes, coffee, uniform buttons and other trinkets. More worryingly for their superiors, the soldiers sang the Internationale. Yet socialist hopes that soldiers would ultimately repudiate their national loyalties for the sake of international brotherhood were proven to be futile. Christmas Truce was almost the last hurrah of a bygone era; as the war went on, mutual hatred grew, expunging the common origins and predicament of the combatants. War, too, has lost its mystique; soon, only fools would celebrate it or enter it with excited patriotic fervor. After August 1914, when thousands of red-trousered Frenchmen and white-gloved officers in full dress and plumes were decimated by German machine guns, France eschewed her pride and switched to neutral-colored service uniforms — the last world power to do so. Soon, there will be no more sabres and Sam Browne belts, no more centuries-old habits of chivalry, no more leaving civilians out of war.

Rate this: with 6 comments The above is one in a series of pictures a Royal Canadian cameraman took during the Battle of Vimy Ridge in 1917. The photo is regarded as one of the greatest war photos — although its origins are obscure. Some note that it was taken during “pre-battle” training behind the lines. This is not unusual. Because of the primitive photographic equipment available in the field, most photos purporting to portray actual ‘combat action’ during World War I in fact showed troops during pre-war training exercises. Some however note that the soldier going over the top was making a gesture expressing his contempt for the Germans by putting his thumb to his nose. (There is a website refuting this here ). No matter what the battle of Vimy Ridge on April 9, 1917 was considered as a pivotal moment for Canada as a nation; four Canadian Army units fought together as one for the first time. Three thousand five hundred and ninety eight Canadian soldiers were killed during the battle, and four Victoria Crosses were awarded. Indeed, the Canadians captured a strategic area, but it was a minor victory for the losing Allies that spring, and had a negligible effect.

The Globe and Mail noted that “if French or British rather than Canadian troops had driven the German enemy off Vimy Ridge, history probably would have forgotten about it.” Yet, the victory at Vimy become inseparable from the Canadian identity. When there were rumors that the Vimy memorial had been destroyed by Germans during the WWII, the Canadians were whipped fury and hatred so much so that Adolf Hitler’s advisers thought it was necessary for the Nazi leader to be photographed in Vimy at the monument to demonstrate that it was still intact. Rate this: with 23 comments The above photo showed Adolf Hitler in the huge crowd which heard the announcement of the First World War outside Field Marshals’ Hall, Munich on 2 August 1914. After the Nazis came to power, Hitler mentioned being outside the hall when the war was declared. A German photographer went back and looked through his photos and found the above picture. At the outbreak of war, 25-year old Adolf Hitler was an aimless drifter and failed artist in Munich and had previously failed army entry tests because he was too weak to carry weapons.

Yet, during the wartime, Germany needed soldiers and Hitler was able to enlist in the Bavarian army; although he was not considered for further promotion because of ‘a lack of leadership qualities’, he was awarded the Iron Cross First Class, an honour rarely given to a lance corporal (which showed that he did not lack courage). The Great War ended for Hitler inside a hospital where he was being treated for temporary blindness caused by chlorine gas. There he heard the news of German surrender, deeply incredulous; he came to believe, like many other nationalists, that the army, “undefeated in the field,” had been “stabbed in the back” by civilian leaders and Marxists back home. Hitler returned to Munich after a short failed stint as a borderguard and joined a nationalist group German Workers’ Party (DAP), which was formed by extremists and anti-Semites as a counterforce to Bolshevism. He rose quickly through its ranks and in July 1921, he took over its leadership renaming it the National Socialist German Workers’ Party. The rest as they say is history.

Rate this: with 3 comments On November 8th 1918, the German delegation crossed the frontlines to negotiate an armistice to end the First World War. Instead of directly driving them to where the Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces, Marshal Ferdinand Foch was waiting, the French gave them a 10-hour tour of the ruined countryside. The talk took three days and the terms from the United States included the abdication of Kaiser Wilhelm II. This was agreed and Wilhem abdicated on Novemeber 10th while Germany slowly descended into riots and unrest. Foch appeared only twice in the three days of negotiations: on the first day, to ask the German delegation what they wanted, and on the last day, to see to the signatures. The armistice was formally signed in Foch’s carriage on 11 November. Above is the only picture of the signing ceremony. The armistice initially ran for 30 days but was regularly renewed until the formal peace treaty was signed at Versailles the following year. Before the Treaty of Verseilles, the Allies kept their armies ready to begin hostilities back again within 48 hours.

In 1940, Hitler exacted revenge by forcing the French to sign an armistice in the same railway carriage. The Nazis destroyed the building housing it, the Clairiere de l’Armistice and took the carriage to Berlin. With the Allied advance into Germany, the carriage was removed to Ohrdruf, where it was destroyed. More information about armistice, see here . Rate this: with 3 comments “On the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month” of 1918, an armistice was signed, ending “The War to End All Wars”. With the military morale in its ebb and revolution brewing at home, Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated two days before on 9 November. The German government had decided to negotiate an armistice with the Allies starting 7th November, when the German Army Chief of Staff Paul von Hindenburg exchanged a series of telegrams with the Supreme Allied Commander Ferdinand Foch. In the forest of Compiègne, In the railcar given to Foch for military use by the manufacturer, Compagnie Internationale des Wagons-Lits, the armistice was signed. The photograph was taken after reaching an agreement.

The diplomatic situation was terse: The German signatory, Matthias Erzberger made a short speech, protesting the harshness of the terms, and concluded by saying that “a nation of seventy millions can suffer, but it cannot die”. Foch then refused to shake Erzberger’s hand and said, “Très bien“.) Although it was signed at 5 am, the terms of the agreement didn’t come into effect until six hours later at 11 am. The hour was chosen by Admiral Sir Rosslyn Wemyss, First Sea Lord and Britain’s official delegate to oversee the Armistice. He was explicitly ordered by his Prime Minister David Lloyd George to delay the terms until 3 pm to coincide with parliment sitting so that PM could get the credit of announcing it officially to the house on the hour. Weymss thought the delay would cause unnecessary killing and decided that the eleventh hour would add to the poignancy of the date. Lloyd George was furious. Erzberger, too, was not kindly received back–he was assassinated later by a right-wing extremist group, Organisation Consul for signing the Armistice.

Foch on the other hand was elected to the Académie des Sciences on the very day of the Armistice [and ten days later, to the Académie française]. In the above picture, front row from left to right: Rear-Admiral George P.W. Hope, Wemyss’s deputy; General Maxime Weygrand, Foch’s righthand man and one who read out the armistice conditions; Wemyss; Foch and Royal Navy captain JPR Marriott, attache to two admirals. On the train, clockwise from top right: Interpreter Laperche, Captain le Mierry, Commander Riedinger, and General Desticker, Foch’s ADC. The German delegation was notably absent. The photo was taken at 7:30 am as Foch was about to return to Paris with the signed documents in his briefcase. Although Germany had insisted that it would only enter into negotiations on the understanding that U.S. President Woodrow Wilson’s so-called ‘Fourteen Points’ would form the basis for a settlement, the armistice terms were nevertheless punitive.

The Allies agreed to an armistice only on the basis that Germany effectively disarm herself; the cause preventing the latter from renewing hostilities backfired spectacularly: her ignominious “reparations” agreement sowed the seeds for the rise of a nationalist movement and subsequently the Second World War. Rate this: leave a comment » In 1922, West African and French dignitaries place flowers on the tomb of the unknown soldier in Paris. The Senegalese statesman Blaise Diagne stands at the center with hat in hand. Photo by Roger Viollet for Getty Images. The first black African elected to the French Chamber of Deputies, Blaise Diagne transformed Senegalese and French colonial politics and helped prepare the way for development of democracy in Senegal. The Four Communes of Senegal had a unique status in which they were given the right to have a deputy to the French Parliament. (Senegal was the only colony north of South Africa where ordinary Africans had the right to vote).

Those elected were usually from the mulatto elite, called the metis, but in the first years of the twentieth century, educated Africans, organized in a group called the Young Senegalese, wanted a more important role in government. Blaise Diagne, son of a cook, was adopted by a leading metis family. In 1914, he won the election and served in the Parliament. In 1915, as a leading recruiter for the French army during World War I, when thousands of black West Africans fought on the Western Front, he was able to put forward a law that allowed originaires, the resident of the Senegal to serve in the better-paid regular army rather than with the colonial troops. The next year, he persuaded the Chamber of Deputies to pass a law recognizing originaires as French citizens. After the war, his influence waned–with swing to the right in French elections. In 1923 Diagne forged an alliance with his former enemies, the commercial houses based in Bordeaux. He remained a deputy until his death in 1934. Rate this:

Question: The 1st World War Armistice was signed in 'Compagnie Internationale des Wagons Lits 2419', a?
Answer: Railway carriage