Bertrand Russell - Edward Grey - Peaky Blinders TV - George Orwell - James Fox TV - Paul Nash - Evelyn Princess Blucher - Beyond the Fringe TV - Saul David: Bullets Boots & Bandages TV - Recruiting Posters - Gertrude Stein - Anon - Herbert Asquith - William Shakespeare - T E Lawrence - Royal Cousins at War TV - 37 Days TV - Lord Kitchener - Lloyd George - Chariots of Fire 1981 - D H Lawrence - Adolf Hitler - A J P Taylor - Ernest Hemingway - Winston Churchill - Churchill TV - G Edward Griffin - Maud Gonne MacBride - Philippe Petain - The Wipers Times - The Wipers Times TV - Rudyard Kipling - Secret Serbian Manifesto 1911 - Robert Saunders - Paul Alfred Rubens - Lena Guilbert Ford - Infamous Assassinations TV - Thomas Hardy - War Correspondent - Wilfred Owen - Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life 1983 - Queen Victoria and the Crippled Kaiser TV - Andrew Marr TV - Laurence Binyon - Siegfried Sassoon - Ford Madox Ford - Who on Earth was Ford Madox Ford? TV - The Poet Who Loved the War: Ivor Gurney TV - Ivor Gurney - Winifred Mary Letts - Charles Hamilton Sorley - Charles Shaw - Patrick Shaw-Stewart - R P Weston & Bert Lee - Anon letter - Days that Shook the World TV - The Secret Plan of the New World Order - The New American Century - The First World War series TV - World War I in Colour TV - Britain’s Great War TV - Niall Ferguson TV - Max Hastings TV - Churchill’s First World War TV - Attack of the Zeppelins TV - 1914-1918: The Noise and the Fury TV - Unsolved History TV - Declassified: Secrets of World War I TV - Dan Snow TV - Peter & Dan Snow TV - Giuseppe Giurati - Anon memoir - Sergeant Paul Dubrulle - Harold Macmillan - Eduard Engel - The New York Times 1915 - Major Walter Nicolai - General Karl von Einem - Marshal Ferdinand Foch - Earl Douglas Haig - British Military Order 1137 - William Francis - Herbert Thompson - Paul Tuffrau - Woodrow Wilson - Erich Maria Remarque - German soldier - Lieutenant-General John Manash - Major Charles E Heller - Ceasefire Order 1918 - Timewatch TV - The Evening News 1918 - English soldier - Richard Dixon - Eric Geddes - Lieutenant Frank Stansfield - Harold Hill - John Maynard Keynes - Gary Sheffield - Blackadder Goes Forth TV - Aces High 1977 - Third Reich: The Rise TV - Michael Collins - Great War Diaries TV - Tony Robinson TV - David Olusoga The World’s War: Forgotten Soldiers of Empire TV - Our World War TV -
The First World War made me think it just won’t do to live in an ivory tower. This world is too bad – you must notice it. Bertrand Russell
The lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime. Edward Grey, Foreign Secretary
We are not parties to the Franco-Russian alliance. We do not know the terms of the alliance. Edward Grey
Not a single man came back the same. Peaky Blinders s1e6, Polly, BBC 2013
The War had been conducted mainly by old men and had been conducted with supreme incompetence. George Orwell, The Road to Wigan Pier
It was 1914: the First World War had just begun ... One young man was enjoying the attractions of his local fairground. His name was Mark Gertler ... The painting he made was much more than a vision of the Great War, it was a prophecy of the entire twentieth century: the ride we couldn’t get off. Dr James Fox, British Masters, BBC 2011
Sunset and sunrise are blasphemous. They are mockeries to man. It is unspeakable, godless, hopeless. I am no longer an artist interested and curious; I am a messenger. Paul Nash, letter to wife
I am no longer an artist interested and curious, I am a messenger who will bring back word from the men who are fighting to those who want the war to go on for ever. Feeble, inarticulate, will be my message, but it will have a bitter truth, and may it burn their lousy souls. Paul Nash, letter to wife
The shells never cease. They plunge into the grave which is this land. One huge grave had cast upon it the poor dead. It is unspeakable. Godless. Hopeless. Paul Nash, letter to wife
Parvenus who have grown rich through the war are especially detested. Evelyn, Princess Blucher, ‘An English Wife in Berlin’
There are increasing signs of a scarcity of metal. In a small town near here a sad ceremony took place: the ancient church bell which had rung people from cradle to grave for three hundred years was requisitioned. The inhabitants performed a funeral service for it. The bell was covered with wreaths and flowers, and handed over to the authorities under tears and protestations. Evelyn, Princess Blucher
Perkins, I want you to lay down your life. We need a futile gesture at this stage. It will raise the whole tone of the war. Beyond the Fringe, BBC 1964
World War I generals were no longer swashbuckling leaders on the charge but managers calling the shots from a boardroom of war. Saul David, Bullets, Boots and Bandages: How to Really Win at War I: Staying Alive, BBC 2012
World War I was the first industrial war. ibid.
Civilian innovations in kit and supply transformed war just as much as the guns. ibid.
Death on a scale that had never been seen before. Over the course of World War I three million British soldiers were killed or injured. ibid.
World War I changed everything: modern total industrial war. Saul David, Bullets, Boots and Bandages: How to Really Win at War III: Raising Arms
Automatically feeding ammunition – the Vickers machine-gun used up bullets at the same rate as eighty conventional rifles. ibid.
Daddy, what did you do in the Great War? First World War recruiting poster
No price can be too high when honour and freedom are at stake. First World War recruiting poster
You are all a lost generation. Gertrude Stein
Do you take an interest in the war, Mr Asquith? Guest to prime minister, attributed
It is quite against British interests that France should be wiped out. Herbert Asquith
We shall never sheathe the sword which we have not lightly drawn until Belgium recovers in full measure all and more than all that she has sacrificed, until France is adequately secured against the menace of aggression, until the rights of the smaller nationalities of Europe are placed upon an unassailable foundation, and until the military domination of Prussia is wholly and finally destroyed. Herbert Asquith
He is a very valiant trencher-man. William Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing I i 52
The Arabs saw in me a free agent of the British government and demanded from me an endorsement of its written promises. So I had to join the conspiracy. And assured the men of their reward. T E Lawrence
On August 4th 1914 Britain went to war against an old friend and traditional ally ... How it is that Britain came to fight alongside Russia against Germany is one of the great puzzles of the twentieth century. The explanation lies in part in the eccentricities and foibles of a single family. Royal Cousins at War I, BBC 2014
European diplomacy was also a domestic drama. ibid.
It was nothing less than a battle for the soul of the future Germany – a heavy burden to place on the shoulders of a seventeen-year-old girl [Vicky]. ibid.
Berlin: The wedding of the German Kaiser’s only daughter Victoria Louisa. Kaiser Wilhelm was filmed with his cousin King George V of Britain. Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, another cousin, was also a guest. Royal Cousins at War II
The modern age hovered like a spectre at the feast. ibid.
Europe’s three royal cousins would never meet again. ibid.
It was the Germans who now felt isolated. ibid.
The two monarchs signed a military alliance between German and Russia. ibid.
Very ordinary men steamrollered by history. ibid.
Never again would the peace of Europe hinge on the eccentricities of individuals selected by the lottery of birth. ibid.
On 28th June 1914 Europe was enjoying a prosperous peace. 37 days later the nations were at war. In that time only a handful of people knew what was happening. 37 Days, BBC 2014