General Facts

  1. The First World War began on the 28th of July 1914 and lasted until the 11th of November 1918.
  2. We call the conflict the First World War or World War I because it was fought over every ocean and on almost every continent on the planet.
  3. At the time, and for a number of years afterwards however, people around the world referred to it as The Great War; at the time it had a bigger impact on the world than any other conflict in history. The word ‘great’ refers to the huge scale of the war, a meaning very far from the positive connotations the word often carries today.
  4. Although political tensions had been simmering for some time, the single event which triggered the start of the war was the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne.
  5. The war was mainly fought between the allies (Britain, France and Russia) and the Central Powers (Germany and Austria-Hungary). Italy, Japan and the US did eventually join the allies, with Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire siding with the central powers.
  6. The world was a very different place after the war. It was the end of the German, Austro-Hungarian, Russian and Ottoman empires; Britain lost its economic edge due to debts owed to America for their role, and the reparations caused huge economic suffering to the people of Germany, paving the way for the rise of the Nazis.
  7. It was referred to as “the war to end all wars” - sadly however, this did not prove to be the case.
  8. The key battleground of the war was the Western Front, a line stretching from the North sea to the Swiss frontier with France.
  9. In addition to this, the Eastern front was fought between Germany (along with Austro Hungary) and Russia; the Italian front between Austro-Hungary and Italy, and both the Balkan Front and battles in the Middle East between the allies and the Ottoman empire.
  10. Well-known people who served in the First World War include JRR Tolkien (who fought at the Battle of the Somme), C S Lewis (who fought at Arras), Ernst Hemingway (who served in the Red Cross Ambulance Corps on the Italian front), and Adolf Hitler who, by all accounts, was a brave soldier who was awarded a number of medals.

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Field Marshal Horatio Herbert Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener