World War I - Part #4

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When the war began, Europe's armies had an understanding of warfare that put the use of cavalry in high regard. Soon, however, the deadly terrain that evolved around trench warfare rendered cavalry attacks nearly useless on the Western Front. But the need for constant resupply, movement of new heavy weaponry, and the transport of troops demanded horse power on a massive scale -- automobiles, tractors, and trucks were relatively new inventions and somewhat rare.

British and French forces imported horses from colonies and allies around the world, a near-constant flow of hundreds of thousands of animals across the oceans, headed for war. One estimate places the number of horses killed during the four years of warfare at nearly 8 million. Other animals proved their usefulness as well: Dogs became messengers, sentries, rescuers, and small beasts of burden. Pigeons acted as messenger carriers, and even (experimentally) as aerial reconnaissance platforms. 

Gas attack on the West Front, near St. Quentin 1918—a German messenger dog loosed by his handler. Dogs were used throughout the war as sentries, scouts, rescuers, messengers, and more.

German soldiers pose near a horse mounted with a purpose-built frame, used to accommodate a captured Russian Maxim M1910 machine gun complete with its wheeled mount and ammunition box.

Bandages retrieved from the kit of a British Dog, ca. 1915. 

Members of the Royal Scots Greys cavalry regiment rest their horses by the side of the road, in France. 

At Kemmel, West Flanders, Belgium. The effect of enemy artillery fire upon German ambulances, in May of 1918.

A corporal, probably on the staff of the 2nd Australian general hospital, holds a koala, a pet or mascot in Cairo, in 1915.

Turkish cavalry exercises on the Saloniki front, Turkey, March of 1917. 

A messenger dog with a spool attached to a harness for laying out new electric line in September of 1917. 

An Indian elephant, from the Hamburg Zoo, used by Germans in Valenciennes, France to help move tree trunks in 1915. 

German officers in an automobile on the road with a convoy of wagons; soldiers walk along side the road.

"These homing pigeons are doing much to save the lives of our boys in France. They act as efficient messengers and dispatch bearers not only from division to division and from the trenches to the rear but also are used by our aviators to report back the results of their observation."

Belgian Army pigeons. Homing pigeon stations were set up behind the front lines, the pigeons themselves sent forward, to return later with messages tied to their legs.

Two soldiers with motorbikes, each with a wicker basket strapped to his back. A third man is putting a pigeon in one of the baskets.

A message is attached to a carrier pigeon by British troops on the Western Front, 1917.

A draft horse hitched to a post, its rider just killed by shrapnel, 1916.

Belgian refugees leaving Brussels, their belongings in a wagon pulled by a dog, 1914.

Australian Camel Corps going into action at Sharia near Beersheba, in December of 1917. The Colonel and many of these men were killed an hour or so afterward this photo was taken. 

On the Western Front, a dead German artilleryman and several draft horses, ca. 1918.

A soldier and his horse in gas masks, ca. 1918.

German Red Cross Dogs head to the front. 

Belgian chasseurs pass through the town of Daynze, Belgium, on the way from Ghent to meet the German invasion. 

The breakthrough west of St. Quentin, Aisne, France. Artillery drawn by horses advances through captured British positions on March 26, 1918. 

Western Front, shells carried on horseback, 1916.

Camels line a huge watering station, Asluj, Palestinian campaign, 1916. 

A British Mark V tank passes by a dead horse in Peronne, France in 1918.  

A dog-handler reads a message brought by a messenger dog, who had just swum across a canal in France, during World War I.

French farmers and families on the home front endured great hardship when their best horses were taken for use in the war. 

In Belgium, after the Battle of Haelen, a surviving horse is used in the removal of dead horses killed in the conflict, 1914. 

A dog trained to search for wounded soldiers while under fire, 1915. 

Algerian cavalry attached to the French Army, escorting a group of German prisoners taken in fighting in the west of Belgium. 

A Russian cossack, in firing position, behind his horse, 1915.

Serbian artillery in action on the Salonika front in December of 1917.

A horse strapped and being lowered into position to be operated on for a gunshot wound in Le Valdahon, Doubs, France. 

6th Australian light-horse regiment, marching in Sheikh Jarrah, on the way to Mount Scopus, Jerusalem, in 1918.

French cavalry horses swim across a river in northern France.

Dead horses and a broken cart on Menin Road, troops in the distance, Ypres sector, Belgium, in 1917. 

War animals carrying war animals -- at a carrier pigeon communication school at Namur, Belgium, a dispatch dog fitted with a pigeon basket for transporting carrier pigeons to the front line.