Essential Histories: The First World War (1) : The Eastern Front 1914–1918

This chapter studies an early example of a sermon which focuses more on the toll taken by the First World War on the masses of Jewish civilians living on the contested territories of the Eastern Front rather than on the implications of the war for the general values of culture and civilization. Here the sermon of George (Gedaliah) Silverstone does not underline the patriotism of Jews towards all the countries where they lived, but rather emphasizes the underlying unity of the Jewish people, and the sometimes painful tension between that unity and such patriotism. The preacher introduces it by speaking of the reaction of his listeners to the story they have read ‘in the newspapers’, apparently within the past few days. In addition to narratives drawn from the contemporary newspapers, there are two other major components of the sermon's message, drawn from traditional Jewish literature. The source provides hope for a providential, redemptive dénouement to the bloodshed, in the traditional homiletical style.

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The East’s Eastern Front: The Ottoman–Russian Clash in the Great War and Its Legacies

War in History ◽

10.1177/0968344519827333 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 096834451982733

Author(s):

Michael A. Reynolds

Keyword(s):

Middle East ◽

Ottoman Empire ◽

Russian Empire ◽

First World War ◽

World War ◽

Eastern Front ◽

The First World War ◽

The Russian Empire ◽

The Great War ◽

First World

This article provides an overview of the neglected Caucasian front of the First World War and explores its impact on the overall course of the war and its legacy for the Middle East and Eurasia. By unexpectedly prolonging hostilities and leading the Russian empire to overextend itself, the conflict with the Ottoman empire contributed critically to Russia’s revolutionary crisis and collapse and thereby altered decisively the fate of the Middle East and Eurasia. The article places the Ottoman–Russian conflict in the context of the relentless growth of Western European military and economic might from the eighteenth century onward.

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V. Moltke-Conrad: Relations between the Austro-Hungarian and German General Staffs, 1909–14

The Historical Journal ◽

10.1017/s0018246x00026534 ◽

1966 ◽

Vol 9 (2) ◽

pp. 201-228 ◽

Cited By ~ 5

Author(s):

Norman Stone

Keyword(s):

First World War ◽

The Black Sea ◽

World War ◽

The West ◽

Winston Churchill ◽

Eastern Front ◽

The First World War ◽

The Baltic ◽

The Military ◽

First World

The Eastern Front of the First World War remains, as Winston Churchill called his book on it, ‘The Unknown War’. Whereas in the West, politics were dominated by the military events, the reverse happened in the East: the gigantic struggles which took place from the Baltic to the Black Sea now seem to have been but a prelude to the Revolution in Russia and the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. There has been little interest in the military aspects of the Eastern conflict.

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THE ENVIRONMENTAL HISTORY OF THE FIRST WORLD WAR AT THE EASTERN FRONT: HISTORIOGRAPHIC LANDSCAPE AND RESEARCH PROSPECTS

Вестник Пермского университета История ◽

10.17072/2219-3111-2021-2-5-16 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 5-16

Author(s):

O. S. Nagornaia ◽

◽

Y. A. Golubinov ◽

Keyword(s):

Environmental Changes ◽

First World War ◽

Great War ◽

World War ◽

Ecological History ◽

Eastern Front ◽

The First World War ◽

History Of ◽

The Great War ◽

First World

A lacuna that clearly needs to be filled and remains among various topics of the ecological history of the First World War is the Eastern front theme. The authors of this historiographical essay attempt to analyze various papers and monographs on the ecological history of the First World War, such as works on ecological history and history of technologies, works on socio- and cultural-ecological aspects of the Great War, as well as publications on the experience of military occupation at the Eastern Front and its impact on the ecosystems of different regions. A critical analysis of the achievements and limitations of modern historiography allow the authors to emphasize thematic fields of perspective research. The authors notice that the Eastern front is still obscure and largely ignored by English-speaking scholars. The historiography includes a wide variety of thematic fields. Most of them are related to environmental changes in West European war theatre, as well as in colonial landscapes. Such a view deforms the general picture of the Great War. So, the reconstruction of the military impact on the landscapes of the Eastern front, attempts to economically organize the war space by different armies on the same territories, as well as the transformations of local population's management practice, seem to correct the idea of the universality of the Western front processes and phenomena.

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Neutral Spectators from a Distance? American Jews and the Outbreak of the First World War

Religions ◽

10.3390/rel9070218 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 9 (7) ◽

pp. 218

Author(s):

Sarah Panter

Keyword(s):

First World War ◽

Religious Community ◽

Nation State ◽

American Jews ◽

World War ◽

Cultural Backgrounds ◽

Eastern Front ◽

American Jewry ◽

The First World War ◽

First World

As the First World War broke out in 1914, American Jews seemed far away from the upheaval in Europe. Yet their role as neutral spectators from the distance was questioned right from the outset because of their diverse transcultural entanglements with Europe. Seen from a specific Jewish perspective, the war bore the potential of becoming a fratricidal war. In particular at the Eastern front it was a likely scenario that Jewish soldiers fighting on either side would have to face each other in battle. For Jews, depending on how one defined Jewishness, could be regarded as citizens of a particular nation-state or multi-ethnic empire, as members of a transnational religious community or as members of an ethnic-national diaspora community. Against this background, this article attempts to shed fresh light on the still under-researched topic of American Jewish responses to the outbreak of the First World War. Although American Jewry in 1914 was made up of Jews with different socio-cultural backgrounds, they were often regarded as being pro-German. The war’s impact and the pressures of conformity associated with these contested loyalties for American Jews did therefore not just unfold in and after 1917, but, as this article emphasizes, already in 1914.

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Russian Romances: Emotionalism and Spirituality in the Writings of “Eastern Front” Nurses, 1914–1918

Nursing History Review ◽

10.1891/1062-8061.17.101 ◽

2009 ◽

Vol 17 (1) ◽

pp. 101-128

Author(s):

Christine Hallett

Keyword(s):

First World War ◽

World War ◽

Front Line ◽

Field Hospital ◽

Eastern Front ◽

The First World War ◽

Trench Warfare ◽

First World ◽

Moving Front ◽

Russian Medical

The nursing work of the First World War is usually associated with the trench warfare of the Western Front. Nurses were based within fairly permanent casualty clearing stations and field hospitals, and patients were moved “down the line” to base hospitals, and then to convalescent hospitals “at home.” The nurses and volunteers who worked on the Eastern Front and offered their services to the letuchka or “flying columns” of the Russian medical services had a very different experience. They worked with highly mobile units, following a rapidly moving “front line.” The diaries of three British (one Anglo-Russian) nurses who worked alongside Russian nursing sisterhoods in three different flying columns—Violetta Thurstan (Field Hospital and Flying Column), Florence Farmborough (With the Armies of the Tsar) and Mary Britnieva (One Woman’s Story)—stand as an important corpus of nursing writing. Written in a highly romantic style, they take up similar themes around their work on the Eastern Front as a heroic journey through a dreamlike landscape. Each nurse offers a portrayal of the Russian character as fine and noble. The most important themes deal with the romance of nursing itself, in which nursing work is portrayed as both character-testing and a highly spiritual pursuit.

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Prologue to the “War of Annihilation”?

The Forgotten Front ◽

10.5810/kentucky/9780813175416.003.0021 ◽

2018 ◽

pp. 345-362

Author(s):

Rüdiger Bergien

Keyword(s):

Learning Experience ◽

First World War ◽

Scholarly Work ◽

World War ◽

Direct Experience ◽

Eastern Front ◽

The First World War ◽

First World

Rüdiger Bergien’s concluding chapter draws on the research compiled in this volume to address the question of whether there are clear lines of continuity between the German conduct of war on the eastern front in the First World War and the Second. The chapter applies additional scholarly work on the concepts of Erlebnis (direct experience) and Erfahrung (learning experience) in its consideration of the topic.

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From Ober Ost to Ostland?

The Forgotten Front ◽

10.5810/kentucky/9780813175416.003.0015 ◽

2018 ◽

pp. 245-262

Author(s):

Vejas Gabriel Liulevicius

Keyword(s):

Civil War ◽

Cultural Memory ◽

First World War ◽

World War ◽

Western Front ◽

Eastern Front ◽

The First World War ◽

The World ◽

First World ◽

Vast Area

Igor Narskij examines the experience of Russian soldiers on the eastern front, an experience significantly different from that undergone by soldiers on the western front because of the vast area of the eastern theater of war and the fact that it was largely fought as a mobile war, not a static one. Maintaining that prevalent arguments put forward by historians to explain Russia’s failure in the war―including the alleged backwardness of the country’s peasant soldiers and the lack of adequate supplies―have been overstated, the chapter posits that the war actually had a significant civilizing and disciplining effect. The chapter also argues that because for Russia the First World War segued into internal dissension in the Revolution of 1917 and the Civil War of 1918–1920, Russians never completely integrated the experience of the world war into its cultural memory.

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The Bear in the Room: Gallipoli, Russia, and the First World War

War in History ◽

10.1177/0968344520953455 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 096834452095345

Author(s):

David Trudinger

Keyword(s):

First World War ◽

World War ◽

Eastern Front ◽

The First World War ◽

First World

Russia was much more entwined in the narrative of Gallipoli than the Australian (and the international) historiography of that epic encounter suggests. The principal knot that tied Gallipoli and Russia together was the Constantinople Agreement of April 1915. Russia utilized British fears that she would abandon the Eastern front to impose on its Allies the secret Constantinople Agreement, which promised possession of the Straits and Constantinople to Russia after a successful war. Gallipoli was, in effect, both the main catalyst and guarantor of the Agreement, which then played a role in keeping Russia in the war, crucially denying Germany a one-front war.

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