11, 2018ALBANY – At 2:45 a.m. 11, 1918, the announcement of the armistice zipped across the telegraph to Capital Region newsrooms. By 3 a.m., church bells were pealing and train and factory whistles blowing to sound the news that World War I was over.Thousands poured into the streets as spontaneous parades broke out that morning in Albany, Saratoga Springs, Schenectady and Troy to celebrate the end of hostilities.“Germany Quits. Democracy Triumphant,” Gordon P. Gleason of Mercer Street, Albany, wrote in his diary entry.“Great noise from whistles and bells and crowds downtown. No one worked but all joined in a Victory celebration and parade, one of the strangest sights I have ever witnessed,” wrote Gleason, who worked as an aide at the office of the state engineer and surveyor.“On the day of the Armistice, November 11, 1918, the bell in the tower of the main home building of the Troy Orphan Asylum was tolled by relays of boys for a half-hour,” according to the history of what is now Vanderheyden Hall.Parades formed in Schenectady and the city's firetrucks rolled in each one.
On the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month is when the armistice or treaty was signed to end war or bring peace. And they used to call it armistice day before a man from emporia had the. Nov 08, 2018 The First World War ended 100 years ago this month on November 11, 1918, at 11 a.m. Nearly 20 million people had perished since the war began on July 28, 1914.
“The whole day the city was celebrating,' said Chris Leonard, Schenectady's city historian.The tumultuous joy of Nov. Crash bandicoot 2 ps1. 11, 1918, and the sacrifices and legacies of World War I aren't recalled as vividly compared to the Civil War and World War II. But its reminders are present every day, from bridges and streets named for those who served to current conflicts in the Middle East caused in part by disputes over boundaries the victors set after the war ended. Armistice Day in Schenectady, Nov. 11, 1918The massive celebrations that are now forgotten stopped every day life. The mail wasn’t delivered. Factories and businesses closed.
It was said only the telephone company and the newspapers printing armistice extra editions were on the job.The armistice signed in Compiegne, France, took effect at “the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month.” A minute before, at 10:59 a.m., Sgt. Henry Gunther, of Baltimore, became the last American soldier killed in action when he died charging a German outpost.The end of the fighting didn't come soon enough for 56 New Yorkers, including seven with ties to the Capital Region, who were among the 320 Americans who died in the hours before the armistice.Two Marines, Pvts. William Stephen Kelly, of Albany, and Gustav A.
Pross, of Gloversville, were killed in action crossing the Meuse River. Boutin, of Albany, and Corp. Bergen, who was born in Catskill, also died in action, according to a review of the World War I casualties list created by the New York State Military Museum in Saratoga Springs. Chamberlain, of Schenectady, and Private Robert R. McNamara, of Albany, died of wounds while Percy T. Keator, a s tudent private at the U.S.
Army Training Section at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, died of the flu and pneumonia. Times Union front page from November 1918There were 4,734,991 Americans in uniform for the war, including more than 500,000 New Yorkers. The nation saw 116,516 soldiers, sailors and Marines die.
Of that number 53,402 died in battle and 63,114 from disease, such as the Spanish flu, and other causes. There were 204,000 wounded.
In the war, 13,956 New Yorkers perished. 1 of25 A view of the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Park on Tuesday, Nov. 6, 2018, in Waterford, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 2 of25 A view of the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Park on Tuesday, Nov.
6, 2018, in Waterford, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 3 of25 A view of some posters from WW I, seen at the New York State Museum on Thursday, Nov. 8, 2018, in Albany, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 4 of25 A view of a page in the diary of Gordon Gleason, seen at the New York State Museum on Thursday, Nov. 8, 2018, in Albany, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 5 of25 Aaron Noble, senior historian for the New York State Museum, talks about posters from WW I, during an interview on Thursday, Nov.
8, 2018, in Albany, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 6 of257 of25 The USS President Lincoln carried the 106th Infantry to France. On May 31, 1918 it was sunk by a U-boat has it carried wounded soldiers back to the U.S.
(New York State Division of Military & Naval Affairs) 8 of25 Quentin Roosevelt. (Museum of the Air Force) 9 of25 Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Albany. For the third year, the Cathedral has celebrated New York State History Month with a historical exhibit commemorating the Cathedral parish’s experience during World War I, featuring the story of Cathedral parishioner and Medal of Honor recipient, PFC Parker F. Dunn, and Bishop Thomas Cusack’s support of American troops.
The exhibit includes items from its historical collection, including a memorial chalice (c. 1919) honoring Parker Dunn. The exhibit is open during the Cathedral’s regular hours, is free and open to the public, and runs until the end of November. 10 of25 New York National Guard’s 107th Infantry Regiment soldiers train with a British tank during training for the assault on the Hindenburg Line. ( NYS MIlitary Museum) 11 of25 Parades honored soldiers of World War I in Schenectady. (Collection of the Schenectady County Historical Society) 12 of25 Parades honored soldiers of World War I in Schenectady.
Record of agarest war zero metacritic. 3D Battle Scenes.
(Collection of the Schenectady County Historical Society) 13 of25 Parades honored soldiers of World War I in Schenectady. (Collection of the Schenectady County Historical Society) 14 of25 Fighting Chaplain, Rev. Kelley of Albany Roman Catholic Diocese.
Served with the 27th Division. Priest at parishes in Cairo, Troy, Fort Edward and Gloversville, Recipient of Distinguished Service Cross. First chaplain of the American Legion. (Courtesy Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany) 15 of25 Fighting Chaplain, Rev. Kelley of Albany Roman Catholic Diocese. Served with the 27th Division. Priest at parishes in Cairo, Troy, Fort Edward and Gloversville, Recipient of Distinguished Service Cross. First chaplain of the American Legion. (Courtesy Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany) 16 of25 Fighting Chaplain, Rev.
Kelley of Albany Roman Catholic Diocese. Served with the 27th Division. Priest at parishes in Cairo, Troy, Fort Edward and Gloversville, Recipient of Distinguished Service Cross.
First chaplain of the American Legion. (Courtesy Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany) 17 of25 Soldiers of the New York National Guard’s 27th Division celebrating the end of World War I following the Armistice on Nov. According to Maj. John O’Ryan, the commander of the division, this photo and others like it were staged in the days following the signing of the document that ended combat in the World War by U.S. Army Signal Corps photographers.
Czarist Russia gave up in December 1917. Tens of thousands of German and Austrian soldiers were freed to redeploy to the Western Front and finish off the exhausted French and British armies.The late-entering United States did not declare war on Germany and Austria-Hungary until April 1917. Six months later, America had still not begun to deploy troops in any great number.Then, suddenly, everything changed. By summer 1918, hordes of American soldiers began arriving in France in unimaginable numbers of up to 10,000 doughboys a day.
Anglo-American convoys began devastating German submarines. The German high command's tactical blunders stalled the German offensives of spring 1918 - the last chance before growing Allied numbers overran German lines. Nonetheless, World War I strangely ended with an armistice - with German troops still well inside France and Belgium. Revolution was brewing in German cities back home.The three major Allied victors squabbled over peace terms.
America's idealist president, Woodrow Wilson, opposed an Allied invasion of German and Austria to occupy both countries and enforce their surrenders.By the time the formal Versailles Peace Conference began in January 1919, millions of soldiers had gone home. German politicians and veterans were already blaming their capitulation on 'stab-in-the-back' traitors and spreading the lie that their armies lost only because they ran out of supplies while on the verge of victory in enemy territory.The Allied victors were in disarray. Wilson was idolized when he arrived in France for peace talks in December 1918 - and was hated for being self-righteous when he left six months later. The Treaty of Versailles proved a disaster, at once too harsh and too soft. Its terms were far less punitive than those the victorious Allies would later dictate to Germany after World War II. Earlier, Germany itself had demanded tougher concessions from a defeated France in 1871 and Russia in 1918.In the end, the Allies proved unforgiving to a defeated Germany in the abstract but not tough enough in the concrete.One ironic result was that the victorious but exhausted Allies announced to the world that they never wished to go to war again.
Meanwhile, the defeated and humiliated Germans seemed all too eager to fight again soon to overturn the verdict of 1918.The consequence was a far bloodier war that followed just two decades later.
11, 2018ALBANY – At 2:45 a.m. 11, 1918, the announcement of the armistice zipped across the telegraph to Capital Region newsrooms. By 3 a.m., church bells were pealing and train and factory whistles blowing to sound the news that World War I was over.Thousands poured into the streets as spontaneous parades broke out that morning in Albany, Saratoga Springs, Schenectady and Troy to celebrate the end of hostilities.“Germany Quits. Democracy Triumphant,” Gordon P. Gleason of Mercer Street, Albany, wrote in his diary entry.“Great noise from whistles and bells and crowds downtown. No one worked but all joined in a Victory celebration and parade, one of the strangest sights I have ever witnessed,” wrote Gleason, who worked as an aide at the office of the state engineer and surveyor.“On the day of the Armistice, November 11, 1918, the bell in the tower of the main home building of the Troy Orphan Asylum was tolled by relays of boys for a half-hour,” according to the history of what is now Vanderheyden Hall.Parades formed in Schenectady and the city's firetrucks rolled in each one.
On the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month is when the armistice or treaty was signed to end war or bring peace. And they used to call it armistice day before a man from emporia had the. Nov 08, 2018 The First World War ended 100 years ago this month on November 11, 1918, at 11 a.m. Nearly 20 million people had perished since the war began on July 28, 1914.
“The whole day the city was celebrating,' said Chris Leonard, Schenectady's city historian.The tumultuous joy of Nov. Crash bandicoot 2 ps1. 11, 1918, and the sacrifices and legacies of World War I aren't recalled as vividly compared to the Civil War and World War II. But its reminders are present every day, from bridges and streets named for those who served to current conflicts in the Middle East caused in part by disputes over boundaries the victors set after the war ended. Armistice Day in Schenectady, Nov. 11, 1918The massive celebrations that are now forgotten stopped every day life. The mail wasn’t delivered. Factories and businesses closed.
It was said only the telephone company and the newspapers printing armistice extra editions were on the job.The armistice signed in Compiegne, France, took effect at “the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month.” A minute before, at 10:59 a.m., Sgt. Henry Gunther, of Baltimore, became the last American soldier killed in action when he died charging a German outpost.The end of the fighting didn't come soon enough for 56 New Yorkers, including seven with ties to the Capital Region, who were among the 320 Americans who died in the hours before the armistice.Two Marines, Pvts. William Stephen Kelly, of Albany, and Gustav A.
Pross, of Gloversville, were killed in action crossing the Meuse River. Boutin, of Albany, and Corp. Bergen, who was born in Catskill, also died in action, according to a review of the World War I casualties list created by the New York State Military Museum in Saratoga Springs. Chamberlain, of Schenectady, and Private Robert R. McNamara, of Albany, died of wounds while Percy T. Keator, a s tudent private at the U.S.
Army Training Section at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, died of the flu and pneumonia. Times Union front page from November 1918There were 4,734,991 Americans in uniform for the war, including more than 500,000 New Yorkers. The nation saw 116,516 soldiers, sailors and Marines die.
Of that number 53,402 died in battle and 63,114 from disease, such as the Spanish flu, and other causes. There were 204,000 wounded.
In the war, 13,956 New Yorkers perished. 1 of25 A view of the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Park on Tuesday, Nov. 6, 2018, in Waterford, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 2 of25 A view of the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Park on Tuesday, Nov.
6, 2018, in Waterford, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 3 of25 A view of some posters from WW I, seen at the New York State Museum on Thursday, Nov. 8, 2018, in Albany, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 4 of25 A view of a page in the diary of Gordon Gleason, seen at the New York State Museum on Thursday, Nov. 8, 2018, in Albany, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 5 of25 Aaron Noble, senior historian for the New York State Museum, talks about posters from WW I, during an interview on Thursday, Nov.
8, 2018, in Albany, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 6 of257 of25 The USS President Lincoln carried the 106th Infantry to France. On May 31, 1918 it was sunk by a U-boat has it carried wounded soldiers back to the U.S.
(New York State Division of Military & Naval Affairs) 8 of25 Quentin Roosevelt. (Museum of the Air Force) 9 of25 Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Albany. For the third year, the Cathedral has celebrated New York State History Month with a historical exhibit commemorating the Cathedral parish’s experience during World War I, featuring the story of Cathedral parishioner and Medal of Honor recipient, PFC Parker F. Dunn, and Bishop Thomas Cusack’s support of American troops.
The exhibit includes items from its historical collection, including a memorial chalice (c. 1919) honoring Parker Dunn. The exhibit is open during the Cathedral’s regular hours, is free and open to the public, and runs until the end of November. 10 of25 New York National Guard’s 107th Infantry Regiment soldiers train with a British tank during training for the assault on the Hindenburg Line. ( NYS MIlitary Museum) 11 of25 Parades honored soldiers of World War I in Schenectady. (Collection of the Schenectady County Historical Society) 12 of25 Parades honored soldiers of World War I in Schenectady.
Record of agarest war zero metacritic. 3D Battle Scenes.
(Collection of the Schenectady County Historical Society) 13 of25 Parades honored soldiers of World War I in Schenectady. (Collection of the Schenectady County Historical Society) 14 of25 Fighting Chaplain, Rev. Kelley of Albany Roman Catholic Diocese.
Served with the 27th Division. Priest at parishes in Cairo, Troy, Fort Edward and Gloversville, Recipient of Distinguished Service Cross. First chaplain of the American Legion. (Courtesy Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany) 15 of25 Fighting Chaplain, Rev. Kelley of Albany Roman Catholic Diocese. Served with the 27th Division. Priest at parishes in Cairo, Troy, Fort Edward and Gloversville, Recipient of Distinguished Service Cross. First chaplain of the American Legion. (Courtesy Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany) 16 of25 Fighting Chaplain, Rev.
Kelley of Albany Roman Catholic Diocese. Served with the 27th Division. Priest at parishes in Cairo, Troy, Fort Edward and Gloversville, Recipient of Distinguished Service Cross.
First chaplain of the American Legion. (Courtesy Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany) 17 of25 Soldiers of the New York National Guard’s 27th Division celebrating the end of World War I following the Armistice on Nov. According to Maj. John O’Ryan, the commander of the division, this photo and others like it were staged in the days following the signing of the document that ended combat in the World War by U.S. Army Signal Corps photographers.
Czarist Russia gave up in December 1917. Tens of thousands of German and Austrian soldiers were freed to redeploy to the Western Front and finish off the exhausted French and British armies.The late-entering United States did not declare war on Germany and Austria-Hungary until April 1917. Six months later, America had still not begun to deploy troops in any great number.Then, suddenly, everything changed. By summer 1918, hordes of American soldiers began arriving in France in unimaginable numbers of up to 10,000 doughboys a day.
Anglo-American convoys began devastating German submarines. The German high command's tactical blunders stalled the German offensives of spring 1918 - the last chance before growing Allied numbers overran German lines. Nonetheless, World War I strangely ended with an armistice - with German troops still well inside France and Belgium. Revolution was brewing in German cities back home.The three major Allied victors squabbled over peace terms.
America's idealist president, Woodrow Wilson, opposed an Allied invasion of German and Austria to occupy both countries and enforce their surrenders.By the time the formal Versailles Peace Conference began in January 1919, millions of soldiers had gone home. German politicians and veterans were already blaming their capitulation on 'stab-in-the-back' traitors and spreading the lie that their armies lost only because they ran out of supplies while on the verge of victory in enemy territory.The Allied victors were in disarray. Wilson was idolized when he arrived in France for peace talks in December 1918 - and was hated for being self-righteous when he left six months later. The Treaty of Versailles proved a disaster, at once too harsh and too soft. Its terms were far less punitive than those the victorious Allies would later dictate to Germany after World War II. Earlier, Germany itself had demanded tougher concessions from a defeated France in 1871 and Russia in 1918.In the end, the Allies proved unforgiving to a defeated Germany in the abstract but not tough enough in the concrete.One ironic result was that the victorious but exhausted Allies announced to the world that they never wished to go to war again.
Meanwhile, the defeated and humiliated Germans seemed all too eager to fight again soon to overturn the verdict of 1918.The consequence was a far bloodier war that followed just two decades later.
...">The 11th Hour Of The 11th Day Of The 11th Month(11.03.2020)11, 2018ALBANY – At 2:45 a.m. 11, 1918, the announcement of the armistice zipped across the telegraph to Capital Region newsrooms. By 3 a.m., church bells were pealing and train and factory whistles blowing to sound the news that World War I was over.Thousands poured into the streets as spontaneous parades broke out that morning in Albany, Saratoga Springs, Schenectady and Troy to celebrate the end of hostilities.“Germany Quits. Democracy Triumphant,” Gordon P. Gleason of Mercer Street, Albany, wrote in his diary entry.“Great noise from whistles and bells and crowds downtown. No one worked but all joined in a Victory celebration and parade, one of the strangest sights I have ever witnessed,” wrote Gleason, who worked as an aide at the office of the state engineer and surveyor.“On the day of the Armistice, November 11, 1918, the bell in the tower of the main home building of the Troy Orphan Asylum was tolled by relays of boys for a half-hour,” according to the history of what is now Vanderheyden Hall.Parades formed in Schenectady and the city's firetrucks rolled in each one.
On the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month is when the armistice or treaty was signed to end war or bring peace. And they used to call it armistice day before a man from emporia had the. Nov 08, 2018 The First World War ended 100 years ago this month on November 11, 1918, at 11 a.m. Nearly 20 million people had perished since the war began on July 28, 1914.
“The whole day the city was celebrating,' said Chris Leonard, Schenectady's city historian.The tumultuous joy of Nov. Crash bandicoot 2 ps1. 11, 1918, and the sacrifices and legacies of World War I aren't recalled as vividly compared to the Civil War and World War II. But its reminders are present every day, from bridges and streets named for those who served to current conflicts in the Middle East caused in part by disputes over boundaries the victors set after the war ended. Armistice Day in Schenectady, Nov. 11, 1918The massive celebrations that are now forgotten stopped every day life. The mail wasn’t delivered. Factories and businesses closed.
It was said only the telephone company and the newspapers printing armistice extra editions were on the job.The armistice signed in Compiegne, France, took effect at “the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month.” A minute before, at 10:59 a.m., Sgt. Henry Gunther, of Baltimore, became the last American soldier killed in action when he died charging a German outpost.The end of the fighting didn't come soon enough for 56 New Yorkers, including seven with ties to the Capital Region, who were among the 320 Americans who died in the hours before the armistice.Two Marines, Pvts. William Stephen Kelly, of Albany, and Gustav A.
Pross, of Gloversville, were killed in action crossing the Meuse River. Boutin, of Albany, and Corp. Bergen, who was born in Catskill, also died in action, according to a review of the World War I casualties list created by the New York State Military Museum in Saratoga Springs. Chamberlain, of Schenectady, and Private Robert R. McNamara, of Albany, died of wounds while Percy T. Keator, a s tudent private at the U.S.
Army Training Section at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, died of the flu and pneumonia. Times Union front page from November 1918There were 4,734,991 Americans in uniform for the war, including more than 500,000 New Yorkers. The nation saw 116,516 soldiers, sailors and Marines die.
Of that number 53,402 died in battle and 63,114 from disease, such as the Spanish flu, and other causes. There were 204,000 wounded.
In the war, 13,956 New Yorkers perished. 1 of25 A view of the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Park on Tuesday, Nov. 6, 2018, in Waterford, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 2 of25 A view of the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Park on Tuesday, Nov.
6, 2018, in Waterford, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 3 of25 A view of some posters from WW I, seen at the New York State Museum on Thursday, Nov. 8, 2018, in Albany, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 4 of25 A view of a page in the diary of Gordon Gleason, seen at the New York State Museum on Thursday, Nov. 8, 2018, in Albany, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 5 of25 Aaron Noble, senior historian for the New York State Museum, talks about posters from WW I, during an interview on Thursday, Nov.
8, 2018, in Albany, N.Y. (Paul Buckowski/Times Union) Paul Buckowski/Albany Times Union 6 of257 of25 The USS President Lincoln carried the 106th Infantry to France. On May 31, 1918 it was sunk by a U-boat has it carried wounded soldiers back to the U.S.
(New York State Division of Military & Naval Affairs) 8 of25 Quentin Roosevelt. (Museum of the Air Force) 9 of25 Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Albany. For the third year, the Cathedral has celebrated New York State History Month with a historical exhibit commemorating the Cathedral parish’s experience during World War I, featuring the story of Cathedral parishioner and Medal of Honor recipient, PFC Parker F. Dunn, and Bishop Thomas Cusack’s support of American troops.
The exhibit includes items from its historical collection, including a memorial chalice (c. 1919) honoring Parker Dunn. The exhibit is open during the Cathedral’s regular hours, is free and open to the public, and runs until the end of November. 10 of25 New York National Guard’s 107th Infantry Regiment soldiers train with a British tank during training for the assault on the Hindenburg Line. ( NYS MIlitary Museum) 11 of25 Parades honored soldiers of World War I in Schenectady. (Collection of the Schenectady County Historical Society) 12 of25 Parades honored soldiers of World War I in Schenectady.
Record of agarest war zero metacritic. 3D Battle Scenes.
(Collection of the Schenectady County Historical Society) 13 of25 Parades honored soldiers of World War I in Schenectady. (Collection of the Schenectady County Historical Society) 14 of25 Fighting Chaplain, Rev. Kelley of Albany Roman Catholic Diocese.
Served with the 27th Division. Priest at parishes in Cairo, Troy, Fort Edward and Gloversville, Recipient of Distinguished Service Cross. First chaplain of the American Legion. (Courtesy Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany) 15 of25 Fighting Chaplain, Rev. Kelley of Albany Roman Catholic Diocese. Served with the 27th Division. Priest at parishes in Cairo, Troy, Fort Edward and Gloversville, Recipient of Distinguished Service Cross. First chaplain of the American Legion. (Courtesy Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany) 16 of25 Fighting Chaplain, Rev.
Kelley of Albany Roman Catholic Diocese. Served with the 27th Division. Priest at parishes in Cairo, Troy, Fort Edward and Gloversville, Recipient of Distinguished Service Cross.
First chaplain of the American Legion. (Courtesy Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany) 17 of25 Soldiers of the New York National Guard’s 27th Division celebrating the end of World War I following the Armistice on Nov. According to Maj. John O’Ryan, the commander of the division, this photo and others like it were staged in the days following the signing of the document that ended combat in the World War by U.S. Army Signal Corps photographers.
Czarist Russia gave up in December 1917. Tens of thousands of German and Austrian soldiers were freed to redeploy to the Western Front and finish off the exhausted French and British armies.The late-entering United States did not declare war on Germany and Austria-Hungary until April 1917. Six months later, America had still not begun to deploy troops in any great number.Then, suddenly, everything changed. By summer 1918, hordes of American soldiers began arriving in France in unimaginable numbers of up to 10,000 doughboys a day.
Anglo-American convoys began devastating German submarines. The German high command's tactical blunders stalled the German offensives of spring 1918 - the last chance before growing Allied numbers overran German lines. Nonetheless, World War I strangely ended with an armistice - with German troops still well inside France and Belgium. Revolution was brewing in German cities back home.The three major Allied victors squabbled over peace terms.
America's idealist president, Woodrow Wilson, opposed an Allied invasion of German and Austria to occupy both countries and enforce their surrenders.By the time the formal Versailles Peace Conference began in January 1919, millions of soldiers had gone home. German politicians and veterans were already blaming their capitulation on 'stab-in-the-back' traitors and spreading the lie that their armies lost only because they ran out of supplies while on the verge of victory in enemy territory.The Allied victors were in disarray. Wilson was idolized when he arrived in France for peace talks in December 1918 - and was hated for being self-righteous when he left six months later. The Treaty of Versailles proved a disaster, at once too harsh and too soft. Its terms were far less punitive than those the victorious Allies would later dictate to Germany after World War II. Earlier, Germany itself had demanded tougher concessions from a defeated France in 1871 and Russia in 1918.In the end, the Allies proved unforgiving to a defeated Germany in the abstract but not tough enough in the concrete.One ironic result was that the victorious but exhausted Allies announced to the world that they never wished to go to war again.
Meanwhile, the defeated and humiliated Germans seemed all too eager to fight again soon to overturn the verdict of 1918.The consequence was a far bloodier war that followed just two decades later.
...">The 11th Hour Of The 11th Day Of The 11th Month(11.03.2020)