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Heightened by imperialist rivalries, national pride, fanatical nationalism, ambitious statesmen, and the constant talk of war, all was ready for the inevitable slide. Once started by that fatal shot all the frantic efforts to stop the landslide proved futile.
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On Sunday, June 28, 1914, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austrian throne, was shot and killed by a Serbian nationalist during a visit to Sarajevo in Bosnia. Convinced that the Serbian government was involved in the plot, Austria supported by Germany, sent a harsh ultimatum to Serbia. Although Serbia met nearly every demand, Austria, bent on conquest, declared war. The landslide gained momentum.
Russia, the self-proclaimed protector of the Slav nations, mobilized. Germany demanded promises of peace from Russia and
France and, when there was no answer, declared war on Russia on August 1, and on France two days later.
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France looked to Britain for support. Although Britain was not bound by a formal treaty to join France in a war, Sir Edward Grey, the Foreign Secretary, had made an informal agreement with the French. Then on August 4, the German army on its way to France invaded neutral
Belgium Britain sent an ultimatum demanding withdrawal of German troops
and reminding Germany of the Treaty guaranteeing Belgium's neutrality.
Unanswered the Treaty expired at midnight on August 4, 1914.
- Britain was at war. And when
Britain was at war, Canada was at war.
It was with a spirit of light-hearted optimism and exuberant enthusiasm that Britain and her Empire went to war. It would be exciting; it would be good for business; and the boys would be home by Christmas. They did not know that four years of death and destruction lay ahead in a war revolutionized by high explosive shells, rapid-firing machine guns, poison gas, mighty dreadnoughts, stealthy submarines, and airplanes. Nor did they know that it would destroy virtually a whole generation of young men.
Germany, France and Russia already had elaborate war plans and proceeded to put them into effect - all failed. The object of the German "Schlieffen Plan'' was to strike quickly against France, destroy her armies, and then turn against the more slowly mobilizing Russians, on the eastern flank. The plan almost succeeded. Massive German armies struck through Belgium, battered the fortified cities of
Liege and Namur, and wheeled southward into France. At Mons a small British
Expeditionary force made a determined stand, but the task
was impossible, and the "Old Contemptibles" were forced to retreat.
Then, the German advance weakened and the French & British counter-attacked.
In the First Battle of the Marne the
invasion was checked and the Germans were driven back to a line along
the Aisne River. The Schliefflin Plan had failed. The French Plan XVII
also failed as French drives against Germany in Alsace and Lorraine were
bloodily repulsed.
On the eastern front the outcome was familiar. At first the Russians, moving
with unexpected speed, threw back the Austrians and advanced into East Prussia. But Allied hopes
were dashed as the Germans under von Hindenburg disastrously defeated the Russian armies at Tannenberg and the Masurian Lakes. By late autumn a military deadlock had been reached on both the eastern and the western fronts.
In the west, after the ''Miracle of the Marne" there followed a race to the sea as German and Allied armies tried to outflank each other in a desperate bid to gain the Channel ports. As the armies struggled forward men were left behind digging deep,
animal like burrows into the hard baked clay which they fortified with dense barbed wire entanglements, carefully placed machine gun nests, and mortar batteries. These were backed by support lines and heavy artillery. Between these opposing systems was the waste space of "No Man's Land". When the grim race finally ended on the sand dunes of Nieuport an elaborate system of trenches stretched all the way from the Belgian coast to the frontiers of Switzerland. It was on this Western Front that Canada was to be chiefly engaged.
On October 29 the German army made one final effort to reach the Channel ports. In the First Battle of Ypres, in a little corner of Belgium known as Flanders, the British Expeditionary Force held against overwhelming odds and the ports were saved. Unfortunately, in these early campaigns Britain lost the greater part of her precious regular army, and the efforts to protect this Ypres Salient were to be even more costly in the future.
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Canada Enters the War |
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The First Contingent sails for
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That Canada was automatically at war when Britain was at war in 1914 was unquestioned as from coast to coast, in a spirit of almost unbelievable unanimity, Canadians pledged support for the Motherland. Sir
Wilfred Laurier spoke for the majority of Canadians when he proclaimed: "It is our duty to let Great Britain know and to let the friends and toes of Great Britain know that there is in Canada but one mind and one heart and that all Canadians are behind the Mother Country." Prime Minister Robert Borden, calling for a supreme national effort, offered Canadian assistance to Great Britain. The offer was accepted, and immediately orders were given for the mobilization of an expeditionary force.
With a regular army of only 3,110 men and a fledgling navy, Canada was ill-prepared to enter a world conflict. Yet, from Halifax to Vancouver, thousands of young Canadians hastened to the recruiting offices. Within a few weeks more than thirty-two thousand men gathered at Valcartier Camp near Quebec City; and within two months the First Contingent, Canadian Expeditionary Force, was on its way to England in the largest convoy ever to cross the Atlantic. Also sailing in this convoy was a contingent from the still separate British Dominion of Newfoundland.
On reaching England the Canadians endured a long miserable winter training in the mud and drizzle of Salisbury Plain. In the spring of 1915 they were deemed ready for the front line and were razor-keen. Nothing, they believed, could be worse than Salisbury. In the years that lay ahead, they were to find out just how tragically wrong that assessment was.
The first Canadian troops to arrive in France were the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry. The "Princess Pats" landed in France in December 1914 with the British 27th Division and saw action near St. Eloi, and at Polygon Wood.
Early in February 1915 the 1st Canadian Division reached France, and was introduced to trench warfare by veteran British troops. Following this brief training they took over four miles of line in the Armenti6res sector. Faced with the realities of dirt, disease and death their illusions of military glory quickly disappeared.
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