Author: brhg

Opposition to WW1 in Bristol in August 1914

War enthusiasm?

There is a perception in Britain that popular patriotic pressure drove politicians to declare war on Germany on August 4th 1914 and that the population somehow desired war. This so-called ‘war enthusiasm’ has been characterised in the popular memory as: “cheering crowds outside Buckingham Palace, long lines outside recruiting offices and of soldiers marching away singing ‘Tipperary'”^[1] . These images have been recently promoted by TV programmes and films such as Blackadder Goes Forth, War Horse and Downton Abbey.

But how true is this perception? Was the desire for war widespread? What actually happened in August 1914?

Over the first weekend of August 1914 there were numerous anti-war marches, protests and demonstrations across Britain. Similar protests involving hundreds of thousands had occurred a few days before in Germany and other European countries. In almost every city and major town in the country thousands of people met to voice their opposition to the impending conflict and to Britain’s potential entry into what became a disastrous world war.

In the preceding week, the dispute between Austria and Serbia which had begun at the end of June had begun to escalate towards a major conflict between the Imperial powers; Britain, France, Russia, Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire. Germany and Austria had declared war on Russia and the following day, Sunday 2nd August, Britain was being pressurised by its allies to declare war on Germany.

Fifteen thousand people attended a demonstration in Trafalgar square where a resolution calling for Britain to stay neutral and to prevent the spread of the conflict was unanimously passed. Similar resolutions were passed across the country by tens of thousands. Provincial media opinion, whether Liberal or Tory, “expressed a firm preference for neutrality” ^[2]. Non-conformist churches, along with most socialists and Trade Unionists were united in their opposition to war. The evidence suggests that the public, although sympathetic to the plight of ‘small nations’ such as Belgium, was certainly not convinced of the case for war.

Anti-war politician Kier Hardie addresses a protest in Trafalgar Sq. (Sun Aug 2nd  1914)

As for pro-war demonstrations; these were, despite the perception of “cheering crowds outside Buckingham Palace”, few and far between. One historian stated that “close examination of the ‘pro-war’ crowds in the metropolis during the war crisis causes them to dwindle almost to the point of disappearance”. He estimated that the traditional Bank Holiday crowd at Buckingham Palace on 3rd August 1914 to be in the region of 8,000, “little over one in a thousand of the metropolitan population”^[3] .

And in Bristol?

What was happening on the streets of Bristol in those critical August days?

On Sunday 2nd August an anti-war protest on Durdham Down was addressed by the Trade Union leader Ernest Bevin. Somerset born Bevin, originally a farm labourer was by 1914 a committed socialist and national organiser of the Dock, Wharf, Riverside and General Workers’ Union. Trade Unionists such as Bevin had worked hard for years to build an international movement whose primary aim was to stop any conflict breaking out between the Imperial powers. Now they were faced with the predicted but unthinkable…a world war. Would their nerve hold?

On the Downs, a young Bevin, steadfastly called for action by workers in all countries to prevent war ^[4]. In the preceding months Bevin had supported a resolution at the International Federation of Trade Unions to call an international general strike if a conflict looked likely to break out. However the speed with which the Austrian-Serbian crisis had escalated in July had caught Trade Unionists and Socialists on the hop. The possibility of international action by workers against the war seemed to be receding in the first few days of August, despite protests across Europe.

Earlier that day Bevin had been speaking at a well-attended a mass meeting of Dockers on the Grove in the city centre to discuss the worrying situation on the Continent. Bevin, addressing the Dockers, pointed out prophetically that “‘the South African war would be a mere fleabite compared with a great war in Europe” and added: “English Trade Unionists are on the most friendly terms with Trade Unionists across the Continent. It would be insane to fight them simply because there is a dispute between Austria and Serbia”^[5] . He railed against the machinations of the British Government with its secret alliances and diplomatic manoeuvres, all of which he argued were undemocratic and hidden from the population.

Bevin proposed a resolution which called upon the:

Government to immediately declare its neutrality in connection with the European war and…upon the Parliamentary Committee of the Trades Union Congress, the General Federation of Labour and the Labour Party to call a national conference to discuss way and means of preventing this country from being involved in ‘hostilities’ ^[6].

This resolution was carried unanimously by the assembled Dockers. The following day, in emergency meetings, the Bristol No.1 branch of the National Union of Railwaymen (representing 1,400 workers) and their sister organisation the NUR Women’s Guild both voted against British intervention in the conflict and for neutrality^[7]. That first weekend of August churches prayed for peace and in most quarters there was widespread gloom, dread and uncertainty rather than enthusiasm.

War is declared…

The British government declared war on Germany at 11pm on Tuesday August 4th 1914. During the evening crowds gathered in Bristol city centre to be near the newspaper offices where the news would break. When it did there were mixed reactions in the crowd; some were stunned whilst others took part in impromptu marches through the streets singing the national anthem^[10]. The debate as to the righteousness of the decision continued; but now the die was cast and the full force of patriotic propaganda was unleashed on the populace.

An important aspect of supposed ‘war enthusiasm’ is the idea that the moment war was declared there was an immediate rush of patriotic volunteers to enlist in the armed forces. In fact, although there was significant recruitment in the first weeks of August, the majority of enlistees joined much later, between 25th August and 15th September 1914. Why was this?

On 25th August 1914 two important events occurred which caused an unprecedented burst of recruitment. First the Government published exaggerated details of shocking atrocities by German troops in Belgium. The same day The Times published the ‘Mons dispatch’ which gave distressing reports of the defeat and retreat of the British Expeditionary Force in Belgium and appealed directly for men to join up. Despite our perception of widespread naiveté amongst patriotic recruits, who supposedly thought it would be ‘over by Christmas’, one historian noted that: “Men did not join the British Army expecting a picnic stroll to Berlin but in the expectation of a desperate fight for national defence”^[11].

The myth of ‘war enthusiasm’ in the days prior to the declaration of war and supposed immediate, massive and naïve voluntary enlistment in the days after, abound in films and TV programmes. The historical evidence suggests these perceptions are dubious to say the least. On this centenary of the start of World War 1 the time has come to dismiss these tired clichés about widespread popular jingoism.

Dockers Debate Recreated

On Saturday 26th July the Dockers Debate of August 1914 was recreated on Narrow Quay on the water front in the city centre. The historical drama featured Somerset and Bristol-born Trade Union leaders Ernest Bevin and Ben Tillett, both of whom made passionate speeches arguing for Britain to stay neutral in August 1914.

 Ben Tillett of the National Transport Workers Union makes the opening address

 A lively crowd of a hundred or more included many in period dress with anti-war Independent Labour Party members, a contingent of Irish Dockers and some lively ‘patriots’ all having their say. The resolution for Britain to stay neutral was passed unanimously by the crowd, as it was in 1914. The drama concluded with the Red Notes choir leading the crowd with the ‘Internationale’ and a women’s choir singing the popular anti-war song “I didn’t raise my boy to be a soldier”.

A lively crowd of Dockers, Anti-war protestors and patriots gathers on Narrow Quay

Ernest Bevin (Dockers Union Organiser) and Ben Tillett interviewed by the press

Author and actors in the play, Roger Ball (Ernest Bevin) and John Bassett (Ben Tillett) both commented on the importance of highlighting the dissent against what became World War 1. Roger said ‘It is great to see the number of people who turned up today in period dress to participate in this drama. This was a key historical event in Bristol’s vibrant history of anti-war protest which has been obscured for too long’.

Anti-war Women’s choir singing ‘I Didn’t Raise My Son to Be a Soldier’

The Remembering the Real World War 1 Group who organised the event aims to highlight hidden histories of the ‘Great War’ and to dispel some of its myths.

They meet regularly and can be contacted at: Website: https://network23.org/realww1/ E-mail: rememberingrealww1@gmail.com

The Script

Ernie Bevin – Ben Tillett Debate: The Grove, Sunday 2^nd August 1914

(Outside Arnolfini, Narrow Quay, 2.00pm Saturday 26^th July 2014)

Cast

Ernest Bevin (National Organiser of the Dock, Wharf, Riverside and General Workers’ Union) [Roger]

Ben Tillett (Secretary of the National Transport Workers’ Federation) [John]

Chairman (Bristol Branch: Dock, Wharf, Riverside and General Workers’ Union) [Johnny]

Mr. G. Clark [?]

An Irish Docker [Ruari]

Independent Labour Party members [Woodsy, Di, Mel, Zoey, Helen]

Some ‘patriots’ in boaters [Rich, Mike, other troublemakers]

A large crowd of dockers (members of the Dock, Wharf, Riverside and General Workers’ Union)

Action

[A restless crowd of Bristol Dockers and bystanders surround a simple podium, a small group of ILP supporters hold anti-war placards, others in boaters are waving Union Jacks]

Chairman: [stands on podium] Brothers, Brothers…..Order, Order….Can we have some quiet…[crowd quietens]

Brothers, this emergency meeting of the Bristol branch of the Dock, Wharf, Riverside and General Workers’ Union has been called in response to the distressing news from the Continent.

The dispute between Austria and Serbia which began at the end of June threatens to become a major conflict between the imperial powers, including Britain. Last Tuesday the Austro-Hungarian Empire declared war on Serbia. On Thursday Austrian Ironclads on the Danube began bombarding Belgrade in Serbia. Russian and German armies began mobilising during the week and then yesterday, as you know, we received the dreadful news that Germany had declared war on Russia.

Brothers, this is an extremely dangeous situation as Britain is currently in an alliance with Russia and France. Pressure will be applied to the British Government by our allies, who are now at war with Germany, to join the conflict. Brothers, I am sad to say, we maybe days from an all-out war in Europe.

Crowd: [heckles and groans] Bring it on….the Hun won’t stop us… down with bosses wars…no war but the class war etc.

Chairman: Brothers, Brothers…..Order, Order….this meeting is a chance for us to discuss this disturbing situation and to make some resolutions.

We are lucky to have a two west-country Union men here today, who don’t need an introduction…

…a Bristolian [points to Tillett], Ben Tillett, founder and secretary of the National Transport Workers’ Federation to whom we are now affiliated [crowd cheers]…

…and a sturdy Somerset lad [points to Bevin, laughter in crowd], Ernie Bevin, national organiser for our Union [crowd cheers].

Both would like to speak on this worrying news, I give you Ben Tillett….

Tillett: [stands on podium to applause] Fellow workers, it is a pleasure to be back in Bristol, the city of my birth and always close to my heart. I see some comrades from Easton…. [waves]

However, it is a shame that I have to speak to you in these difficult times. I am here to bring a warning to you all. We stand on the brink of war, a war created by the intrigues and manoeuvres of Kaiser Wilhelm, Emperor Franz and their allies. At this very moment German armies are marshalling on the borders of Russia and France, their Dreadnoughts are getting up steam ready to foray into the North Sea and the German people are charged up with propaganda.

Brothers, I have only recently returned from Germany and I assure you that all that can be done is being done to prevent a war amongst the European nations.

As you know since the Agadir crisis three years ago and the conflict in the Balkans the year before last, we have been facing the danger of an all out war between the major powers. It was on that basis that the Manifesto of the International Socialist Congress at Basel was passed two years ago. This manifesto states that:

If a war threatens to break out, it is the duty of the working classes and their parliamentary representatives in the countries involved to exert every effort in order to prevent the outbreak of war by the means they consider most effective

It is my belief that Basel Resolution calls for a European-wide strike of organised labour, which, if adhered to, will make this militarist adventure impossible.

However, while I in no way make any compromises, that fact is that events are moving very rapidly. In Germany I put the Basel Manifesto to our comrades. Any action they take in support of that resolution we will reciprocate with our own action.

ILP heckler: Why do we need to wait for the Germans?

Tillett: I am sad to say, without the Germans, comrade, there is no international strike…

ILP heckler: But hundreds of thousands of workers marched in Germany against war on Wednesday and Thursday last week….

Tillett: They may have marched, my love…. but Germany declared war on Friday in case you didn’t know… [a few laughs in the crowd]

Patriotic Hecklers: [Start singing God Save the King]

Tillett: [shuts them up] We don’t want to sing ‘Rule Britannia’ nor ‘God Save the King’, what we want is to sing ‘God Save the People’….

[Addressing hecklers] England is the freest country in the world and I hope I have been one of its biggest rebels. This is because I always wanted it to be better than the best. I have fought in more strikes than any man living; I may have advised against a strike, but when it had been agreed on I have never let down my class. As I stand by my class in a strike; so I stand by my country.

Crowd: [Some cheers and applause, some heckling] Hear hear…. etc.

Irish docker: You didn’t stand by the Irish working class, you didn’t stand by the Dublin strikers last year, you sold Jim Larkin out ….

Tillett: We sent them money, I fought for Larkin and Connolly when they were imprisoned, I shared a platform with Larkin…

Irish docker: Fine speeches are one thing, action another. You stabbed Larkin in the back, and the TUC and the Labour Party sold them all out….

Tillett: That strike was doomed by Larkin’s mouth not mine….

Irish docker: Charlatan, sell out… [scuffles as the Irishman is restrained by his fellows]

[Tillett retires from the platform]

Chairman: Ernie, would you like to take the platform…

Bevin: Brothers, I come before you with a heavy heart after reading the stop press in the newspapers.

Yesterday, the first steps to a major conflict in Europe were taken when Germany declared war on Russia. This is a critical moment in history when we need clear heads, without emotion, without propaganda and without fear.

In these moments we should turn to what we know best and what is best for our class; that is the working class of Bristol, Britain, Europe and the World.

The imperial powers of Europe and the near East have been rattling their sabres and trading insults for months; they may have prepared for war, they may now be heading for war, but without the international working-classes behind them they are incapable of war.

This afternoon, all across Britain, in every city and major town, tens of thousands of working people are meeting like this. Together we oppose the head-long rush to bloody conflict that our rulers seem incapable or unwilling to halt.

Patriots: Pacifist traitors! German lovers! Cowards!

My public school friends may be a little confused, despite their education….I don’t see many pacifists here….No disrespect my love [points towards ILP women]. What I do see are fighters for the working-class, who have been proved in many battles [Cheers from the crowd].

We have not come here today to discuss Christian morals; we are deciding whether Britain should enter a conflict that could escalate across the world; a world war which could end in the slaughter of the working-class; English, French, Russian or German and Austrian alike. It is we the workers who will suffer, not the ruling classes.

We all know the suffering of the recent South African war will be a mere fleabite compared with total war between the imperial powers. Fighting a few Dutch Boers…and I see some veterans here… with all the death and misery that entailed, will be nothing compared to the havoc and destruction that Dreadnaughts, Airships and Armies will wreak on the cities of Europe if they are unleashed.

Some may think there is no choice but to join this impending conflict, but there is always a choice for the working-class. Do we support our moneyed-rulers or do we support the international working-class? That is the question.

Struggling for peace, comrades, does not make you a moral pacifist. However, arguing for conflict makes you war-mongers [looks accusingly at patriots].

Only the other day, in the lobby to the House of Commons… somewhere I cannot say I am accustomed to [laughter in crowd]…. I heard of an agreement to send 70,000 British soldiers to the Continent in case of war. 70,000 British workers! Have you been consulted about this? Has this been debated by our so-called democracy? If it was, comrades, then I think it would not be agreed to. It is this urgency to fight by our rulers that endangers us.

As my comrade Ben Tillett knows full well….English Trade Unionists are on the most friendly terms with Trade Unionists across the Continent. It would be insane to fight them simply because there is a local dispute between Austria and Serbia.

This is not our war. This is not a war for the workers. This is a war for profit, land and booty.

[Bevin retires from the platform, Tillett retakes it]

Crowd: [Some cheers and applause] Hear hear…. etc.

Patriots: Pacifist traitors! German lovers! Cowards!

Tillett: Our pro-war friends over here accuse us of being pacifists, as if we would stand around doing nothing whilst thousands of British workers died for an unjust cause. No, we are far from being canting humbugs… Afraid? Are we afraid? Are we cowards? No, comrades we are not.

However, neither are we lovers of war.

I have in my hand a piece of paper [fumbles for a piece of paper]…a manifesto which I have brought from London, signed today by Keir Hardie and Arthur Henderson, as you know both recent leaders of the Labour Party.

This manifesto urges our movement to:

• Hold mass demonstrations against war in every industrial centre.
• Compel the governing class and their Press…who are eager to commit you to co-operate with Russia….to keep silence and respect the decision of the overwhelming majority of the people, who will have neither part nor lot in such infamy.
• Workers stand together for peace!
• Combine and conquer the militarist enemy and the self-seeking Imperialists today, once and for all.
• Proclaim that for you the days of plunder and butchery have gone by.
• Send messages of peace and fraternity to your fellows who have less liberty than you.
• Down with class rule. Down with the rule of brute force. Down with the war.
• Up with the peaceful rule of the people.

Tomorrow there is an emergency session of the Dockers’ Union executive in London. At this meeting we will consider what action can be taken. Your decisions today, Brothers, will have a bearing on this.

Our resolutions will be sent to the presidents of the Miners, Transport Workers and Railwaymen…our triple alliance…. I hope the purpose and power of this alliance can be made felt and the grave necessity of the occasion and our sacred responsibilities in preventing war and demanding the neutrality of England be realised.

The Kings, Czars and Emperors of Europe may have their alliances, their so-called triple ententes….. but if there is to be an alliance between countries, let that alliance be confined to the workers of each country who have no quarrel with each other.

[Tillett retires from the platform, Bevin retakes it]

Bevin: Comrade Tillett is right to speak of alliances. We are being asked to support an unholy alliance to which the British people have never agreed. We are being asked to give our lives in fighting against German dictatorship. It seems our rulers and their media lackeys have lost their memories which is no surprise in these fevered times…..

As for German militarists, have they forgotten about Russia our supposed ally? Are we meant to leap to the defence of the Czar and his band of corrupt aristocrats? Everyone knows that Russia is a cruel autocracy, a place where peasants and workers are treated like cattle, where to even organise a strike is a crime. Why should British workers die for corrupt dictators who would lock us up if they had half a chance? [cheers in the crowd]

We as workers have no say in the secret deals between the rulers of Britain, France and Russia. We have no idea what they are getting up to in their hallowed halls with their sherry and cigars, with their maps, carving up the world between them.

But what I do know, and this is a fact; without us, Brothers and Sisters, workers of the world, they cannot have their wars and they couldn’t carve anything except a Sunday joint… [cheers] and we probably wouldn’t trust them with that… [Laughter]

[Bevin retires from the platform, Tillett retakes it]

Chairman: Brothers, we need to move to a resolution. Ernie would you like to propose?

Bevin: I move the following resolution….that this meeting of the Bristol branch of the Dock, Wharf, Riverside and General Workers’ Union calls upon the Government to immediately declare its neutrality in connection with the European war……..and further calls upon the Parliamentary Committee of the Trades Union Congress, the General Federation of Labour and the Labour Party to call a national conference to discuss way and means of preventing this country from being involved in ‘hostilities’.

Chairman: Does anyone second this?

Mr. G. Clark: I second you Ernie….

Chairman: Then we’ll take it to a vote….

All those in favour of Ernies resolution, we call on the Government to declare Britain’s neutrality and for a national conference to debate ways for preventing this country joining the conflict. All those in favour raise your hands and say Aye….

Crowd: [most raise their hands] Aye, Aye …

Chairman: All those against, raise your hands…

Crowd: [A few hands are raised, the patriots cheer them] Nay, Nay

Chairman: The resolution is carried, unanimously…. [cheers from the crowd]

Before we conclude this meeting Comrades, I would like to bring your attention to very sad piece of news. On Friday, as some of you may know, the French Socialist Party leader, Jean Jaurès was assassinated in Paris. Jean was shot down in a café in a cold-blooded and cowardly murder. His assassin, it seems, was a French Nationalist, a lover of war and one who could not bear Jean’s principled internationalism and anti-militarist stance. I would like to read a few words from a friend of Jaurès who was present at his horrific demise in Paris.

I have known M. Jaures well, and a more simple-hearted man I never met in my life. He was absolutely free from personal vanity and personal ambition, and gave up the whole of his life to the cause of Socialism and peace. His death is a terrible loss to the Socialist party in France which cannot replace him without the very greatest difficulty.

Comrades, in memory of our comrade and brother Jean Jaurès I would like you to respect a minutes silence…

[A minutes silence]

Unless there is any other business or any objections we will conclude this afternoons meeting with a song… Comrades in memory of Jean Jaurès, I give you the Bristol Socialist Society Choir. Let’s give ‘em a big hand comrades….

[The Internationale]

Ends

Sources

Books and Journals

Ball, Roger The Origins and an Account of Black Friday 23rd December1892 (Bristol Radical History Group, 2013)

Belsey, James The Forgotten Front: Bristol at War 1914-1918 (Redcliffe, 1986)

Bullock, Alan The Life and Times of Ernest Bevin; Vol. 1 Trade Union Leader 1881-1940 (Heinemann, 1960)

Gregory, Adrian ‘British War Enthusiasm in 1914: a Reassessment’ in Evidence, History and the Great War: Historians and the Impact of 1914-18 Braybon, Gail (ed.) (Berghahn, 2003)

Hochschild, Adam To End All Wars: A story of protest and patriotism in the First World War (Pan, 2012)

Lorwin, Lewis Labor and Internationalism (Macmillan, 1929)

McNeill, Jim Ben Tillett (Bristol Radical History Group, 2012)

Millman, Brock Managing Domestic Dissent in First World War Britain (Frank Cass, 2000)

Morgan, Kevin Bolshevism, syndicalism and the general strike: The lost internationalist world of A. A. Purcell (Lawrence and Wishart, 2013)

Moses, John Trade Unionism in Germany from Bismarck to Hitler 1869-1918 (George Prior, 1982)

Pearce, Robert ‘Ernest Bevin’ in Labour Forces: From Ernie Bevin to Gordon Brown Kevin Jefferys (ed.) (I.B. Tauris, 2002)

Richardson, Michael Bristol and the Labour Unrest 1910-14 (Bristol Radical History Group, 2013)

Schneer, Jonathan Ben Tillett (Croom Helm, 1982)

Tillett, Ben Who was responsible for the war–and why? (Whitwell Press, 1917)

Newspapers

Bristol and the War December 1915

Western Daily Press 3 August 1914

Bristol Evening News 4 August 1914

Daily Herald 3 & 5 August 1914

Websites

Spartacus Educational http://spartacus-educational.com/FWWjaures.htm

Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Jaur%C3%A8s

1. Notes
2. ^[1]A. Gregory “British War Enthusiasm in 1914: a Reassessment” in Evidence, History and the Great War: Historians and the Impact of 1914-18 G. Braybon (ed.) (Berghahn, 2003) p. 67.↩
3. ^[2]A. Gregory “British War Enthusiasm in 1914: a Reassessment” in Evidence, History and the Great War: Historians and the Impact of 1914-18 G. Braybon (ed.) (Berghahn, 2003) p. 77.↩
4. ^[3]A. Gregory “British War Enthusiasm in 1914: a Reassessment” in Evidence, History and the Great War: Historians and the Impact of 1914-18 G. Braybon (ed.) (Berghahn, 2003) p. 71-2.↩
5. ^[4]Bullock, Alan The Life and Times of Ernest Bevin; Vol. 1 Trade Union Leader 1881-1940 (Heinemann, 1960) p. 45.↩
6. ^[5]Western Daily Press 3 August 1914.↩
7. ^[6]Western Daily Press 3 August 1914.↩
8. ^[8] ↩
9. ^[9] ↩
10. ^[7]Western Daily Press 4 August 1914.^[8].These expressions of mass popular dissent against the war in Bristol were matched by the reactions of local newspapers such as the Western Daily Press were initially reticent to support Britain entering the conflict warning its readers of: “the grim shadow of war over the Near East” and harangued the foreign politicians for “the sheer madness of it” ^[9]

    Western Dailiy Press 27 July 1914; J. Belsey The Forgotten Front: Bristol at War 1914-1918 (Redcliffe, 1986) p. 12.

    ↩

11. ^[10]J. Belsey The Forgotten Front: Bristol at War 1914-1918 (Redcliffe, 1986) p. 12.↩
12. ^[11]C. Pennell WWI New Perspectives: Rethinking British Volunteerism in 1914 – Youtube

    ↩

This article was originally posted on Bristol Radical History Group’s website in December 2012.

Balls to War: extract

The above  film ‘Balls to War: a Sports Report from 1170 A.D. to the Present’ was submitted to BRHG by the poet and activist Heathcote Williams whose poetry has featured in several of our events over the last couple of years. This is definitely worth a watch especially for the amazing photographs concerning the fraternisation between British and German front-line troops on Christmas Day 1914. Now we all know about this story, well, I was certainly ‘educated’ about it at school. How German troops sang ‘Silent Night’ and the Tommies responded, then the crossing of the lines into ‘No Man’s Land’ and a game of football. It is now an iconic part of the popular history of WWI.

One thing that always confused me as I got older was why this potentially subversive act was even known about, let alone had become iconic. One completely taboo area in most nation-states history is mutiny in its armed forces (unless it led to a ‘succesful’ revolution of course where the history becomes available, e.g. Russia in 1917). BRHG have covered several of these hidden histories (for example the massive wave of mutiny, desertion and refusal in the U.S. armed forces during the Vietnam war, which certainly helped bring it to an end…see Sir! No Sir!) precisely because they aren’t known. And of course BRHG ask the more fundamental question; ‘Why don’t we know about them?’. However, the fraternisation in December 1914 bucks the trend, as it is widely known and taught in our schools. So why is this the case?

The first point to make is that we don’t actually know the full story and it is far more subversive than we imagine. Firstly, the initial fraternisation involved about 100,000 troops on both sides, not just a couple of football teams! It spread spontaneously like wildfire along whole sections of the western front and despite protestations from commanders it could not be stopped. It did not last one ‘holy’ day as is presented in the story, but in some areas of the front well into February 1915. The events were also successfully repeated in 1915 at Easter, in November and again despite explicit attempts to stop them at Christmas. British, French and German troops were involved in all these incidents.

For about a week, after the Christmas Day truce of 1914, the British Military and Government desperately tried to suppress news of the event. However, by the literal ‘weight’ of word of mouth and letters home from soldiers, the news leaked out. The authorities could not smother such an amazing story and it effectively went ‘viral’ amongst first the troops and then the public. It appeared in the press in the U.S. first and then it was widely publicised in the British media, with the first photographs appearing on 8th January 1915.

So this is why we know about the ‘Christmas Truce’, people talked en masse and the authorities eventually had no choice but to acknowledge it. However, in the great British tradition of propaganda, from Afghanistan to Dunkirk (and Hillsborough), if a story is ‘unfortunately’ out because it has been witnessed by tens of thousands, then it has to be sanitised, distorted or downgraded to remove its unpaplatable message. In the case of the ‘Christmas Truce’ of 1914 it is minimalised, shortened and turned into a particular ‘miracle’ related to Christian morality. It was an extraordinary aberration, a moment of ‘happy madness’ which restores our ‘faith’ in humanity or some other religious bollocks. So we end up with a peculiar but interesting incident which gives us a sniff of subversion but no more, amongst the bloody slaughter of WWI.

Of course, refusals to fight, desertion and massive armed mutinies led to the Russian Revolution, the collapse of the French, German and to some extent British Forces in 1917-18. I would argue that the degree to which the actions of the mutinous and revolutionary working class in Europe in this period stopped WWI, saving millions of lives, is massively underestimated and under-researched by historians. But this is no surprise; no nation-state is going to propagate the idea that ‘revolutionary defeatism’, mutiny and ‘turning your guns on your own officers’ is either the best way to stop war-machines or a good Christmas message! This is our and your job.

If you want to read more about the hidden histories of mutiny in WWI then check these excellent sources out:

• Solidarity’s excellent pamphlet on mutinies in the British armed forces towards the end of World War I
• The Wilhelmshaven Revolt – A Chapter of the Revolutionary Movement in the German Navy, 1918-1919
• The French Black Sea Fleet
• And Bulgaria

RB 29th Dec 2012

Tommy Atkins’ hidden tactics to avoid combat on the Western Front in WW1 or why ‘Blackadder Goes Forth’ could have been a lot funnier (and more subversive)…

A young Army, but the finest we have ever marshalled; improvised at the sound of the cannonade, every man a volunteer, inspired not only by love of country but by a widespread conviction that human freedom was challenged by military and Imperial tyranny, they grudged no sacrifice however unfruitful and shrank from no ordeal however destructive… If two lives or ten lives were required by their commanders to kill one German, no word of complaint ever rose from the fighting troops. No attack, however forlorn, however fatal, found them without ardour. No slaughter however desolating prevented them from returning to the charge. No physical conditions however severe deprived their commanders of their obedience and loyalty. Martyrs not less than soldiers, they fulfilled the high purpose of duty with which they were imbued. The battlefields of the Somme were the graveyards of Kitchener’s Army^[1]

Winston Churchill speaking of British soldiers slaughtered during the Battle of the Somme (1916)

From now on the veterans, myself included, decided to do no more than was really necessary, following orders but if possible keeping out of harms way^[2]

A Tommy speaks in the aftermath of the Somme (1916)

Hatred of the enemy, so strenuously fostered in training days, largely faded away in the line. We somehow realized that individually they were very like ourselves, just as fed-up and anxious to be done with it all^[3]

The view from the front-line late in the war, a Tommy reminisces…

About four weeks ago about 10,000 men had a big racket at Etaples and cleared the place from one end to the other, and when the General asked what was wrong, they said they wanted the war stopped.^[4]

Letter from a Tommy (1917)

Introduction

Much of the media discussion concerning WW1 over the last few years has been centred on the Courts-Martial and executions of so-called ‘cowards’ from the British Infantry between 1914-1918. This debate has been focussed on getting pardons for those who were shot (often in front of their comrades) on the basis they were ‘shell-shocked’ or suffering from ‘post-traumatic stress disorder’ rather than being ‘cowards’^[5]. This victim-orientated narrative (there were 300 posthumous pardons issued by the state in 2006) implies that on the whole the issue of desertion and disobedience was limited to relatively isolated incidents^[6]. Arguing about those who ‘refused’ the slaughter of WW1 on the basis of ‘cowardice’ or ‘mental illness’ provides both an exception to the rule (of supposed generally good discipline) and takes away the agency of soldiers, instead presenting the few miscreants as either embarrassing ‘gibbering weak-willed wrecks’ or deserving our sympathy as ‘damaged lunatics’. In contrast, very little attention has been paid to the mass of mutineers, strikers, agitators, shirkers and skulkers who were consciously and actively refusing and/or avoiding front-line combat and the war in general.

Mass refusals, disobedience, mutinies, strikes and out-right rebellion were all part of the British armed forces experience in WW1^[7]These were all fairly explicit events and to a certain extent these hidden narratives are becoming part of the historical record despite the attempts of contemporary military censors and government ‘D’ notices on the press as well as the 100 year rule in suppressing military documents. Subsequent post-war collective memory loss related to dominant patriotic ideologies served to smother these events even further, but in the 1960s/70s a critical historical reappraisal of WW1 began, marked in the cultural sphere by the biting satire of the musical ‘Oh What a Lovely War’^[8]. This reassessment of WW1 led to a series of historical and sociological examinations of the ‘life in the trenches’ in the succeeding decade. Some of these works provide a new and interesting angle on the subterranean (but at the same time mass) collective tactics British (and German) soldiers used for avoiding combat.

It is no surprise that in historical studies that examine tactics for refusing or avoiding warfare, the classical ‘lefty’ researcher will be drawn towards explicit (and often momentary) events, such as the mutiny or strike. Despite the taboo nature of such events for any nation-state it is hard for the authorities to completely supress or ‘air-brush’ such important histories from the record. However, these explicit ‘waves’ of incidents (such as in 1917-19) often mask a much greater ‘sea’ of more discrete discontent, disobedience and refusal which contextualise the subsequent mutinies. By way of example, it is as if criminal activity was only marked in the media by spectacular bank robberies, whilst many more instances of banal, clandestine and consequently unknown illegality such as fraud were successful and rife in the population. Searching for repertoires of tactics based on non-explicit fraudulent type activities, that achieve their success by their ‘hidden’ and ‘unwritten’ nature (else they would have been discovered and probably failed), is obviously problematic for the researcher. The widespread and successful use of such tactics necessarily implies an unrecorded subterranean form.

However, a pioneering sociologist and two historians touched on these tactics of refusal and avoidance in WW1 in a couple of excellent papers separated by ten years; the 1968 ‘The Sociology of Trench Warfare’ and in 1978 ‘Jack, Tommy, and Henry Dubb: the Armed Forces and the Working Class’^[9]. These two papers provide the basis of this article.

The unwritten ‘agreement’

The first of the two studies, based upon participant accounts, battalion histories and military records, considers some interesting evidence for informal and collective collusion between British, French and German front-line troops on a mass scale. The form of this activity was effectively a ‘live and let live’ doctrine in complete opposition to army protocols and direct orders^[10]on both sides of ‘No Man’s Land’.  The author describes this strategy as:

‘The Live and Let Live principle was an informal and collective agreement between front-line soldiers of opposing armies to inhibit offensive activity to a level mutually defined as tolerable.

Some primary source examples given in the paper of the tactics involved in this doctrine of refusal are presented below:

Refusal to engage on a daily basis

The first item has interest on two accounts. It suggests an extreme case in which all offensive activity is absent from the front. Secondly, the author is a staff captain, a member of the military elite, and his recorded reactions indicate the elite attitude to this phenomenon.

‘We were astonished to observe German soldiers walking about within rifle range behind their lines. Our men appeared to take no notice. I privately made up my mind to do away with that sort of thing when we took over; such things could not be allowed. These people evidently did not know there was a war on. Both sides apparently believed in the policy of Live and Let Live.’^[11]

‘Search and ignore’ patrols^[12]

‘All patrols-English and German-are much averse to the death and glory principle, so on running up against one another . . . both pretend that they are Levites and the other is a good Samaritan, and pass by on the other side, no word spoken. For either side to bomb the other would be a useless violation of the unwritten laws that govern the relations of combatants permanently within a hundred yards’ distance of each other ….’^[13]

Suspension of ‘sniping’

Sniping, however, like other offensive activity was on occasion regulated by the Live and Let Live principle. In the example below an artilleryman is in the trenches with an infantry-man as guide. His mission is to take him within 20 yards of the German line. He is cautious upon hearing this until his guide assures him ‘that they [the battalion holding the line] had a complete under-standing with the Hun infantry and that we should not be sniped’^[14]

Refusal to rudely interrupt the ‘enemies’ daily life

In addition the norm regulated activities of a non-offensive nature; thus by mutual agreement working parties between the lines were often un-molested-these might include soldiers who emerged in daylight to cut grass in front of their trenches. Similarly each side would often allow the other to deliver the front-line rations without interference. One infantryman observes that ‘it is only common courtesy not to interrupt each other’s meals with intermittent missiles of hate’, while on occasion game was shot in no-man’s-land and retrieved with complete confidence in daylight’^[15]

Ritualization of offensive activity

Firstly, sniping: ‘The only activity with which the battalion had to contend was sniping … not all of this was in deadly earnest. On the left the Germans amused themselves by aiming at spots on the walls of cottages and firing until they had cut out a hole ….’

Secondly, in relation to machine-gun operations, an infantryman observes, ‘all was quiet save for the stammer of a Lewis gun firing at the enemy’s rear line to conceal our lack of activity’

Finally, an unusual example in which ritualization occurs by explicit verbal contact. ‘Some of our saps are less than ten yards apart. At first we threw bombs at each other, but then we agreed not to throw any more … if a Frenchman had orders to throw bombs several times during the night he agreed with his “German comrade” to throw them to the left and right of the trench.’^[16]

Routinization of offensive activity

Offensive activity would often follow a regular and unvarying pattern in terms of time and volume. A certain amount of ritualized and predictable activity was mutually accepted without the application of negative sanctions. Such episodes were referred to as the ‘morning hate’ or the ‘evening strafe’. A typical description of a routinized front is as follows: ‘in the middle of the morning a dozen or so 5.9 shells come over at regular half-minute intervals, and then the front nearly always remains quiet until stand-to at sunset, when there is usually some rifle-firing and a machine gun in Gommecourt shows us what it can do’^[17]

These examples of a collective and cooperative ‘doctrine of refusal’ could be dismissed as merely exceptions to the rule, but the author follows this up with evidence from a study of two battalions of the British Army from 1915-18^[18]. Often whole sections of the combat zone were considered ‘quiet fronts’, where tactics such as those outlined above were in operation. Ashworth notes that this study demonstrated that, outside of major offensives, somewhere between 35-50% of front-line sectors were considered ‘quiet’ whilst only 20-25% were considered ‘active’, with the remainder ‘inconclusive’. So the clandestine philosophy of ‘live and let live’, in all its diverse forms, may have been replicated by troops on both sides for large sections of the front-line and for considerable periods of time^[19].

Non-verbal communication between the ‘lines’

So how was it possible that the British soldier was able to enact and organise the ‘live and let live’ philosophy with the ‘enemy’? Ashworth explains that this did not necessarily involve direct verbal communication between the opposing forces:

This understanding was tacit and covert; it was expressed in activity or non-activity rather than in verbal terms. The norm was supported by a system of sanctions. In the positive sense it constituted a system of mutual service, each side rewarded the other by refraining from offensive activity on the condition, of course, that this non-activity was reciprocated.

So an ‘understanding’ was reached, by careful study of action and reaction by the troops on both sides, about acceptable levels of violence. This was enforced by a negative sanction if the unwritten and non-verbalised ‘agreement’ was infringed as one British soldier recounted:

…the incident related occurred during an un-certain period during which the Germans appeared to be exceeding the existing level of offensiveness. ‘The Germans about this time also fired minenwerfers^[20][see Fig. 1] into our poor draggled front line; this in-humanity could not be allowed and the rifle grenades that went over no-man’s-land in reply, for once almost carried out the staffs’ vicarious motto: give them three for every one. One glared hideously at the broken wood and clay flung up from our grenades and trench-mortar shells in the German trenches, finding for once that a little hate was possible.’ The arrival of the minenwerfer made clear the violation of the norm. The term ‘inhumanity’ is either a reference to the in-formal norm or else it is meaningless. The sanction was immediate: the maximum and officially prescribed offensiveness. The author, however, makes clear that such retaliation was not the rule.^[21]

The disapproval (and reply) of the British troops to this unusual transgression was an attempt to re-establish the ‘quiet front’, rather than deal death to the ‘enemy’ as the Generals wanted on a day to day basis.  Interestingly this negative sanction also reciprocally applied to their own actions and those of their officers as was explained by another ‘Tommy’:

‘The most unpopular man in the trenches is undoubtedly the trench mortar officer, he discharges the mortar over the parapet into the German trenches . . . for obvious reasons it is not advisable to fire a trench mortar too often, at any rate from the same place. But the whole weight of public opinion in our trench is directed against it being fired from anywhere at all’^[22]

In this case the decisions of the trench mortar officer could seriously damage the unwritten ‘agreement’ by unleashing the negative sanction, this time from the German-side, and in so doing endanger British lives.

Fig. 1: German soldiers loading a 25 cm Minenwerfer, World War I

Such tacit ‘agreements’ as ‘live and let live’ combined with the ritualization and routinization of offensive activity had to remain partially or wholly ‘hidden’ from the upper echelons of military command on both sides, else the ‘agreements’ would be forcibly broken by these powers. It had to ‘look’ and ‘sound’ like something was happening for the benefit of  the ‘brass’, even if the troops themselves were in little danger. Ashworth notes:

We have here a curious and paradoxical situation in which a ritualized and routinized structure of offensive activity functioned within the informal structure as a means of indirect communication between antagonists. The intention to Live and Let Live was often communicated by subtle yet meaningful manipulation of the intensity and rhythm of offensiveness. The tacitly arranged schedule which evolved established a mutually acceptable level of activity. To the uninitiated observer such a front line would appear to show a degree of offensive activity compatible with officially prescribed levels; for the participants, however, such bombs and bullets were not indicators of animosity but rather its contrary.^[23]

So it was necessary that the collective ‘fraud’ was tacitly accepted by all (including front-line officers) and kept secret from the ‘brass’, as this was in the interests of both the British and German combatants.

Ashworth concludes his paper by noting that such forms of cooperation by supposed front-line adversaries began to undermine the nationalist propaganda which was intended to divide them from ‘the enemy’ and motivate them to kill each other. He argues:

The experience of tacit co-operation came as a reality shock to combatants. It demonstrated to each side that the other was not the implacably hostile and violent creature of the official image. The latter eroded and was replaced, as we have seen, by an indigenous definition based on common experience and situation. This deviant image stressed similarities rather than differences between combatants. The institutionally prescribed and dichotomous WE and THEY dissolved. The WE now included the enemy as the fellow sufferer. The THEY became the staff.^[24]

This change in relationship may provide significant background context for the mutinies and strikes which ripped through the Russian, French, German and British armies to varying degree from 1917-19.

Skulkers, shirkers and deserters

Another ‘hidden’ aspect of the ‘Tommie’s’ war resistance is examined in the second of the two papers by David Englander and James Osborne. Desertion is generally understood to mean ‘running away’ from the front and it is certainly true that the official desertion rate in WW1 was significantly higher^[25] than WW2 despite the serious nature of the offence during the former conflict. However, in which direction you ‘run’ is also an interesting point. According to the British Army Council:

‘desertion to the enemy….was a serious and growing problem particularly after Passchendaele’ [June-Nov 1917]

And they added in March 1918 that:

‘During the present war a large number of surrenders have taken place, which if evidence could be produced, would be found to have been without any justification’

A contemporary right-wing military historian, a Colonel, stated that he had:

‘direct evidence’ that British troops deserted to the enemy ‘in considerable numbers’ during the battle of the Ancre in August 1916, as they were again to do the following October.^[26]

What was the attraction of ‘deserting to the enemy’ to become a POW? On the face of it, not much. So were these miscreants ‘cowards’ and/or ‘traitors’, or was something else going on, another collective ‘fraud’ perhaps? A clue to the wiles of the ‘Tommy’ war resister were noted in this statement by a War Office Committee:

‘The recent exchange of prisoners while the war is in progress and the campaign largely undertaken in the Press of this country, in order to influence the nation to look upon prisoners of war indiscriminately as objects of sympathy, and indeed, almost as heroes, will in the opinion of the Army Council go far towards undermining the fighting discipline of the Army.’^[27]

So it appears many late-war battle-weary British combat troops chose the option of ‘deserting to the enemy’ and becoming a POW for self-preservation. Knowing that their stay in an enemy prison camp (surely better and safer than the trenches?) would be fairly short as the war was coming to an end and the great British press was campaigning for their ‘exchange’; consequently the option of ‘running in the wrong direction’ became very attractive. In fact an added bonus was, with a prisoner exchange, they could return to ‘Blighty’ as a ‘war-hero’ and of course very much alive. This area of military research is notoriously difficult to ascertain as it is of course a taboo subject, but the comments of the Army Council alone suggest something significant and collective was going on at the front which could seriously undermine the morale and effectiveness of the British Army.

Self-incarceration as a ‘hidden’ collective survival strategy also had an interesting parallel behind friendly lines. Consider this statement from General Childs who spotted the following in 1915 when on a visit to G.H.Q. St Omer:

‘I met about 120 soldiers being marched under escort through the streets. They were singing and whistling and in very good humour. I ascertained that they were all on their way to the base to undergo punishment in the military prisons there. It was pretty obvious, at once, that such a state of affairs could not be allowed to continue, as it was evident that certain types of men would commit crimes solely to avoid duty at the front’^[28]

This may have been a ‘hidden’ strategy to avoid front-line combat but it was not a new problem for the British Army, as Englander and Osborne note:

During the Boer War, for example, front-line troops deliberately flouted the law, confident that misbehaviour would entail their withdrawal to the base for punishment^[29]

In fact the ‘problem’ of self-incarceration as a means to avoid combat created significant difficulties, particularly for stretched armies undergoing intensive fighting. If troops committed misdemeanours then they should be Court Martialled and typically sent to Military Prison. However, this removed them from the front-line and depleted numbers, especially if a collective strategy of refusal was in operation. Consequently, a series of changes to Army policy were introduced both before and during WW1.

‘Field punishments’ were introduced into the British Army in the 1880s to combat such strategies by keeping the ‘criminals’ in the front-line. Rather than the costly and depleting Courts Martial-Military prison route, ‘Field Punishments’ were typically aimed at public suffering and humiliation for soldiers who had committed fairly minor offences. Wikipedia states:

Field Punishment Number One [see Fig. 2]…consisted of the convicted man being placed in fetters and handcuffs or similar restraints and attached to a fixed object, such as a gun wheel, for up to two hours per day. During the early part of World War I, the punishment was often applied with the arms stretched out and the legs tied together, giving rise to the nickname “crucifixion”^[30]

Unsurprisingly such sanctions were very unpopular amongst the troops and although they may have stemmed the tide of self-incarceration it was a ‘double-edged’ sword for the Military as it bred further resentment. In addition to the Field Punishment system, General Childs (who had spotted the happy prisoners in St Omer), drafted up a new protocol, the Army Suspension of Sentences Act. Englander and Osborne note that the Act:

‘fulfilled the basic tenet of military law in that the penalty did nothing to precipitate a man-power shortage. In consequence, an offender might remain on active service despite conviction, the army reserving the right to acquit or impose sentence at will’^[31]

The interest of the historian in these revised punishment measures should not be primarily concerned with their effect, rather, why they were being introduced and enforced during WW1. They are a sign that something ‘hidden’ was underway; in fact it appears the reformed punishments were probably a counter-response by the Army Council to a collective strategy for avoiding combat.

Fig. 2: Illustration of Field Punishment No.1

For many British soldiers (perhaps the less desperate) the object was to avoid the misery of either the trench or incarceration in Military prison as a result of a court martial or as a POW. These ‘shirkers’ and ‘skulkers’, as they were labelled by the army leadership, practised covert, subtle tactics which trod the line between both of these unpalatable options. The ‘base camps’ (such as Etaples, see Fig. 3), effectively staging points through which tens of thousands of troops heading to combat on the front-line passed, became crowded, chaotic and unruly as the war progressed. These massive, sprawling logistic centres were perfect for ‘professional malingerers and shirkers’ who ‘refined the practice of [avoiding front-line combat] to an art’.^[32] It is difficult to gauge the extent of such practices for obvious evidential reasons but Englander and Osborne use an indirect approach to gain some evidence for the existence of a chronic ‘problem’. The authors note that the numbers of military police per serviceman grew at almost an exponential rate during the four years of war. In 1914 there was approximately one MP for every 3,000 soldiers; by 1918 this had grown to one MP for every 300 servicemen; an increase by a factor of ten^[33]. So something was happening; and it appears like a serious increase in ‘criminality’, ‘disorder’ and a significant breakdown in discipline were occurring. Perhaps a large part of the repressive effort was aimed at ‘ferreting out’ the growing numbers of invisible ‘skulkers’, ‘shirkers’ and ‘deserters’?

Fig. 3: The British Army Base Camp at Etaples, France showing a hospital section

If our ‘Tommy’ could now not avoid combat by being sent to Military prison or the opportunities for day-to-day ‘shirking’ and ‘skulking’ were reduced by increased repression by the Military Police, then there were, other, more pleasurable ways to get out of the ‘front-line’. Most of us are aware of self-mutilation as a strategy for avoiding war, through the proverbial expression ‘shooting oneself in the foot’. However, according to British Army sources, less than 1% of courts-martial offences accounted for such acts of self-mutilation.^[34] A much more favourable strategy for ‘Tommy’ was self-inflicted Venereal Disease. The equivalent of approximately two divisions of the British Army in WW1 (about 20-30,000 troops) were ‘out-of-action’ at any one time with this affliction^[35]. Once again the consciousness of this act is hard to prove, but it is not unreasonable to assume that lots of unprotected sex and subsequent disease was a more attractive way out of the misery of the front-line than a ‘heroic’ death or serious injury.

Conclusion: Tommies, ‘apathetic victims’ or ‘cunning foxes’?

It is no surprise that the ‘combat avoidance’ tactics outlined by the two papers, ranging from tacit co-operation on the front-line between opposing forces, through self-incarceration or desertion to the enemy to shirking, skulking and self-imposed VD, remained the concealed ‘unwritten rules’ for survival in the military environment. But why were they not exposed in the social sphere during the relative security of post-war civilian Britain? There is probably is a simple reason for this. The supposed ‘victory’ of Allied Forces in WW1 and attempts to rally the British population around this nationalist rejoicing (which was vital during the industrial and political upheavals of 1919) effectively smothered these ‘hidden’ tactics. The post-war ‘hero’ culture was not an environment where you would be likely to admit to ‘avoiding combat’ as a veteran of the trenches. It was much easier to keep ‘mum’ and remain a silent  ‘hero’, than to admit to the unpatriotic reality. So Tommy’s hidden ‘knowledge’, the repertoire of tactics that enacted this ‘doctrine of refusal’ during WW1, declined in the same way as a ‘dying language’ or a ‘thieves kant’, with fewer and fewer demobilised adherents admitting to speaking its tongue.

The perceptions of the WW1 British soldier by establishment historians and military commentators range from the optimistic (and fantastical) of Winston Churchill (see Page 1), as loyal, brave and steadfast  through to the negative and derogatory which argued that the Tommy was driven by the war to ‘self-regarding and indolent apathy’ or ‘reduced to a perpetual state of morbid introspection and incipient breakdown’^[36]. In each case ‘Tommy Atkins’ is individualised, lacks agency and is unable or unwilling to act against his miserable condition. Ashworth and Englander and Osborne’s excellent papers provide some counter-evidence for these views. The authors’ demonstrate that British resistance to WW1 on the Western Front was not just the province of the spectacular (and momentary) mutiny, strike or rebellion, but in fact also took an every-day subterranean form which evaded both the military authorities and the historian. Rather than seeing Tommy Atkins and his comrades as ‘apathetic victims’ perhaps they should be viewed as a collective of ‘wily foxes’ avoiding both their misery and potential demise with a ‘cunning plan from the University of Cunning’.