Timeline

This timeline is for the Western Front of the Great War between 1914 and 1918. It is drawn primarily from John Keegan’s The First World War (Pimlico, 1999) and Hew Strachan’s The First World War (Simon & Schuster, 2003). For details of the Eastern Front, see Norman Stone’s The Eastern Front: 1914–1917 (Penguin, 1998), and for the Italian Front see Mark Thompson’s The White War: Life and Death on the Italian Front 1915–1919 (Faber and Faber, 2008)

In 1914, Europe divided into two coalitions. The Triple Entente comprised Russia, France and Great Britain. Germany was allied with the Habsburg Austro-Hungarian Empire. The main parties in the coalitions also had treaties with smaller European countries whose safety they guaranteed.

1914

28 June	Assassination in Serbia of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, nephew to the Emperor of Austria.
26–27 July	Serbia mobilises its army in response to Austrian diplomatic activity.
27 July	Russia mobilises in defence of Serbia.
28 July	Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia.
1 August	Germany mobilises against Russia.
2 August	France mobilises against Germany.
4 August	Germany invades Belgium. Britain declares war on Germany in support of Belgium at midnight, after German failure to withdraw.
14 August	The Battle of the Frontiers begins: Britain, France and Germany engage each other along the French border.
21 August	Belgian army retreats to the entrenched camp at Antwerp.
23 August	Battle of Mons: British and French troops defeated.
24 August	French and British armies begin retreating along the entire length of the front. The end of the Battle of the Frontiers.
6 September	Retreat halted. Battle of the Marne begins. British and French troops hold the line and stop the German advance towards Paris.
9 September	German armies retreat back to a line along the River Aisne and begin to entrench. They hold most of Belgium and part of north-west France. This becomes known as the Flanders Position, where most of the fighting will take place over the next four years.
12 September	The ‘Race for the Sea’ begins as both sides turn north towards the Channel to secure a route to the coast. Entrenchment begins along the line.
22 September	No. 1 Belgian Field Hospital opens in Antwerp.
9 October	No. 1 Belgian Field Hospital evacuated from Antwerp.
10 October	Belgium surrenders, except for a small corner of territory behind a loop in the River Yser.
12 October	First battle of Ypres. Entrenched positions lengthen towards the coast. British and French forces plug the gap in the front, and German offensive fails.
21 October	No. 1 Belgian Field Hospital re-established at Furnes. Henry Souttar and Sarah MacNaughtan are on the staff.
10 November	Jentie Patterson writes her first letter to her sister, describing how No. 5 Casualty Clearing Station has become a front-line field hospital.
22 November	End of the battle of Ypres. High casualties on all sides and dreadful winter weather stop any significant offensive plans. Defensive positions ordered by both sides and trenches are dug in deep. The Western Front, as we now know it, is created.
29 November	Turkey attacks Russian Black Sea ports, joining the war on the side of Germany and Austria-Hungary.
8 December	Sarah MacNaughtan receives her specially made trolley from Harrods for her work at Furnes station.
14–24 December	First battle of Artois – inconclusive.
20 December	Smaller winter offensives are begun in Champagne by the French – inconclusive.

1915

Publication of the Oxford War Manuals begins.

3 January	Gas used by Germans at Bulimov on the Eastern Front.
10 March	Battle of Neuve Chapelle, first of the spring offensives.
12 March	Mickey Chater injured on last day of Neuve Chapelle. Battle ends inconclusively, but sets the pattern for future British and French offensives.
22 April	Germans use gas for the first time on the Western Front during the second battle of Ypres.
9 May	William Kelsey Fry wins Military Cross for bravery under fire retrieving casualties at Festubert.
23 May	Italy joins the war on the side of Britain, France and Russia.
25 May	End of second battle of Ypres.
May–June	Renewed offensives in Artois and Champagne.
1 June	Sarah MacNaughtan leaves Furnes and returns to England.
July	British troops reinforced.
25–28 September	Battle of Loos, part of the second offensive in Champagne. Frank Pierce, one of William Kelsey Fry’s bearers, wins the Distinguished Combat Medal. Father John Lane Fox buries men killed at the battle during the night. First British use of gas weapons.
13 October	Padre Charles Doudney killed by a shell.
6 November	End of British and French offensives on the Western Front.
6–8 December	Entente military commanders meet at Chantilly to plan the great offensive for the forthcoming year, known as the Big Push.

1916

7 January	William Kelsey Fry refuses to leave his front-line RMO post for a casualty clearing station.
2 February	Charles McKerrow asks his wife to send him twenty pairs of medical scissors for his stretcher bearers.
21 February	German army begins new offensive at Verdun. It will grind on until December.
20 June	RMO Alfred Hardwick of 59th Field Ambulance charged extra for beer at the mess and told about the forthcoming Big Push by a local worker.
30 June	Padre Ernest Crosse builds medical posts with his RMO in preparation for the British and French offensive at the Somme.
1 July	Battle of the Somme begins. Bert Payne, the scout, injured at Montauban. The Royal Northumberland Fusiliers, with Charles McKerrow as RMO, are involved in the first day of the attack at La Boiselle: 2,440 men of the Northumberlands are killed, seventy from one small mining village alone.
7 July	RMO Alfred Hardwick notes ‘Dead men + +’ in his diary.
21 July	Padre Ernest Crosse leaves the Somme front line. Completes his grave map.
22 July	Charles McKerrow reports to his wife that three of his stretcher bearers have been given the Military Medal for their service during the Somme.
24 July	Sarah MacNaughtan dies in London.
29 August	William Kelsey Fry injured when his medical post is hit by a shell. Pearce and Sheasby from his bearer team are both killed.
19 November	End of the battle of the Somme. The two sides together have lost over a million men.
18 December	End of the battle of Verdun. German offensive pushed back.
20 December	RMO Charles McKerrow killed by a shell.

1917

6 April	America declares war on Germany.
9–15 April	Battle of Arras – inconclusive.
16 April–19 May	French offensives on the Aisne. All are inconclusive.
17 April	59th Field Ambulance hit by a shell. RMO Alfred Hardwick survives along with five bearers, but three others are killed. Padre John Murray takes up his front-line posting.
18 May	America enacts selective conscription for her armies.
7 June	British attack on Messines. German armies driven back and British armies gain a foothold.
4 July	First American units to arrive in France parade in Paris.
7 July	Air raid on No. 11 Casualty Clearing Station near Bailleul. Four doctors and twenty-three patients are killed; five doctors, sixty-three patients and the chaplain injured.
31 July	Third battle of Ypres begins (often called Passchendaele) to consolidate British gains.
21 August	John Glubb injured on the Hénin–Saint-Martin-sur-Cojeul road.
26 October	Russia, under her new communist leadership, leaves the war. German troops free to reinforce other fronts.
10 November	Dreadful weather and inconclusive results force the end of the battle of Passchendaele.
20–30 November	Battle of Cambrai. First significant use of tanks does not bring about a breakthrough.
23 December	Ambulance-train Nurse Morgan visits a battlefield and climbs a tank whilst her train spends Christmas in sidings in the middle of the trenches.

1918

21 March	First German offensive using reinforced Western Front army. Operation Michael attacks British army units on the old Somme battlefield.
1 April	Britain establishes the world’s first independent air force, the RAF.
5 April	End of Michael offensive.
9 April	Germans launch Georgette offensive. Collapses after twelve-mile gain.
27 May	German Blücher offensive on the Aisne towards Paris begins.
6 June	Blücher offensive halted.
9 June	German Gneisenau offensive along River Matz.
14 June	Gneisenau offensive halted. American troops fight alongside French at Château-Thierry and Belleau Wood.
15 July	Last German offensive along Champagne–Marne line.
18 July	French and American troops halt the offensive in the second battle of the Marne.
19 July	German army begins retreat.
8 August	Battle of Amiens – significant victory for the Entente. German troops begin to surrender in large numbers.
30 August	First American Army fights near Verdun.
12 September	First all-American offensive of the war. German army falls back to 1914 positions.
26 September	Huge Entente offensive along the entire Western Front. German army retreats continually back into Germany.
30 October	Turkish Government asks for ceasefire.
3 November	Austrian Empire asks for ceasefire. Germany is the only power left fighting.
11 November	Armistice signed by Germany and Entente powers. The war is over.
12 November	Private Joseph Simpson dies in Nurse Elizabeth Boon’s ward.