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Animals in the Great War
Maria Grazia Suriano
Animals in the Great War
Maria Grazia Suriano
Associazione culturale Se
Animals in the Great War
Maria Grazia Suriano
Published by Associazione culturale Se, case studies|Se, December, 15th 2017
ISBN: 978-88-943141-1-3
© Associazione culturale Se. All Rights Reserved
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To Novembre
Table of Contents
0. Title Page............................................................................................................ 0
0. Dedication.......................................................................................................... 0
INTRODUCTION............................................................................................... 11
3. The project...................................................................................................... 13
4. The instruments.............................................................................................. 15
0. Thanks................................................................................................................ 0
I. ANIMALS IN THE GREAT WAR. WORKING WITH THE SOURCES.19
6. Describing the animal experience to obtain an inclusive history............ 21
7. Inferior who? Going beyond the construction of animal inferiority....... 27
8. Recounting war animals in the class room ................................................ 34
9. Empathy, a didactic approach...................................................................... 40
II. THE PROTAGONISTS.................................................................................. 43
10. Dogs................................................................................................................ 45
11. Bally Shannon, Satan and Stubby............................................................... 50
12. Instruments for in-depth study.................................................................. 55
13. Pigeons........................................................................................................... 57
14. Cher Ami, Mocker and Valiant................................................................... 62
15. Instruments for in-depth study.................................................................. 66
16. Horses............................................................................................................. 68
17. Warrior........................................................................................................... 73
18. Instruments for in-depth study.................................................................. 76
19. A Multimedia Guide.................................................................................... 79
20. Bibliography.................................................................................................. 87
0. Copyright........................................................................................................... 0
Table of Figures
Figure 6.1 British soldier feeding a snow-covered cat at Neulette, 17
December 1917 © IWM (Q 6399)...................................................................... 24
Figure 7.1 Soldier with "Sammy", the fourth battalion mascot, Royal
Northumberland Fusiliers © IWM (Q 1451)................................................... 28
Figure 7.2 RAVC Soldier with a Blindfolded Horse at Veterinary Hospital n.
5, Abbeville, April 22, 1918 © IWM (Q 8726).................................................. 31
Figure 8.1 Australian members of the Imperial Camel Corps near Jaffa,
Palestine, 1918 © IWM (HU 75737).................................................................. 35
Figure 8.2 Refractory horses © IWM (Q 33569).............................................. 36
Figure 8.3 War chariot for electric lamps pulled by dogs, Dorimbergo, Front
of the Isonzo, ca 1916 © ÖNB, Europeana Collections 1914-1918............... 37
Figure 8.4 Pigeons returning to their own dovecote, Pernes, 1918 © IWM (Q
9000)...................................................................................................................... 38
Figure 10.1 A messenger dog with a cylinder, in which the message was
transported, Etaples, 28 August 1918 © IWM (Q 9277)................................ 45
Figure 10.2 Officers relax around a gramophone with their dogs, on the field
at Poperinghe, September 26, 1917 © IWM (Q 2897)..................................... 48
Figure 11.1 Front page of Le Miroir, 17 June 1917......................................... 51
Figure 11.2 Stubby, the hero of Georgetown.................................................. 53
Figure 13.1 British pilot releasing a pigeon © IWM (Q 13613)..................... 57
Figure 13.2 A miniature photographic camera placed under the belly of the
traveling pigeons, © Bnf, Europeana Collections 1914-1918........................ 59
Figure 13.3 Anti-gas box for 15 carrier pigeons, Trento, © ÖNB, Europeana
Collections 1914-1918......................................................................................... 60
Figure 14.1 Postcard of Commander Raynal, 1916........................................ 64
Figure 16.1 Men and horses of the Army Service Corps (ASC) undergoing an
anti-gas drill, somewhere in the UK, probably Aldershot © IWM (Q
34105).................................................................................................................... 68
Figure 16.2 Captured Italians bury horses lying on the street, 1917 © ÖNB,
Europeana Collection 1914-1918....................................................................... 69
Figure 17.1 Troops of Royal Engineers taking their horses away after
disembarkation in France,© IWM (Q 33311)................................................. 74
9
Animals in the Great War
Maria Grazia Suriano
case studies |Se
10
To Novembre
Introduction
13
3. The project
The e-book Animals in the Great War is one of the didactic proposals that was
developed by the cultural association Se. It is in response to the latter’s
pledge to promote the history of the twentieth century, disseminating an in
clusive knowledge that develops further secondary subjects that have been
excluded from institutional accounts with the aim of expanding the defini
tion of a discipline, in this case history, so that it is no longer the “science of
man throughout time” but the “science of the living throughout time.”
In this sense, animals can be considered unique subjects. Just like humans,
they are subjects of life: they ‘feel’, in other words they experience emotions,
but unlike man, who often needs lengthy psychoanalytical sessions to ex
press them, they access their emotions with astounding ease. They have
complex social lives, they develop passionate relationships with each other,
and love their offspring desperately. Man’s prolonged conviction that any
thing that does not resemble him physically is unworthy of respect led to an
overall impoverishment of social relations and with the natural environment
and has influenced his manner of thinking and ability to produce critical re
flections. It was only recently that the possibility has been acknowledged
that animals can actually be the subject of future biographies, at least for
studies, as autobiographies are out of the question .
The numerous initiatives that have been promoted throughout Europe to
mark the centennial of the Great War have therefore been a source of inspi
ration to reflect on all those subjects that are not wholly extraneous to histo
riography, but have been excluded from textbooks. The result was the devel
opment of a didactic project aimed at secondary school pupils and teachers,
with the objective of offering a different perspective in their studies on the
First World War and further instruments that could be used to modernise
the classic methods of teaching history.
Edited by the cultural association Se, the first number of the series “Case
Studies” is Animals in the Great War and offers a response to the need to have
more updated references to develop line of study in the classroom whilst al
1
14
so offering a methodological support for individual or group work at home.
Just like the didactic offers (training courses and seminars) offered by the
Association, the e-books in this series all favour the use of comparative
methodology, interdisciplinary studies and multimedia, whilst also identify
ing useful instruments for education that can be used both on the web and
freely accessed so that they may be used again if necessary.
In recognition of the fact that free, inclusive knowledge should be free of
charge, the cultural Association Se decided that this first e-book in the ‘Case
Studies’ series should be available free of charge on their website. This was
made possible by participating in the first international competition “Euro
peana Strike a match for Education” promoted by the Europeana cultural
network in collaboration with the Goteo civic crowdfunding platform and
the proceeds from the funds raised, in which Animals in the Great War
participated and was one of the three winning projects.
1. J. M. Masson, S. McCarthy,When Elephants Weep. The Emotional Lives of Animals, Cape,
London 1994 and M. Bekoff,The Emotional Lives of Animals, New World Library, Novato 2008.
See, also A. Horowitz,Inside of a Dog. What Dogs See, Smell, and Know, Simon & Schuster, New
York 2009, J.-L. Guichet (ed.),Douleur animale, douleur humaine, Quae, Versailles 2010, C.
Darwin,The Expression of Emotions in Man and Animals, Murray, London 1872, and A. R.
Damasio,Descartes’ Error. Emotion, Reason, and Human Brain, Putnam’s, New York 1994.
15
4. The instruments
The web is a source of information that is in continuous and constant
growth; the use of this information for educational purposes must be able to
count on a guarantee of authenticity and quality. As far as studies on the
Great War are concerned, it is now possible to access a variety of digital col
lections that have been compiled by museums and libraries; these have the
advantage of being accurate from an archivistic perspective and of guaran
teeing their authenticity and quality of the sources made available to the
users. There is a multitude of materials available and they are all extremely
valid; they include period footage, films, novels as well as articles, docu
ments, documentaries and photographs (Ch. III, A Multimedia Guide), all con
tribute to the development of more comprehensive educational activities
than those found in scholastic textbooks, with the aim of offering a coherent
account of the history of the Great War, from the perspective of the animals
that took part. The decision in this e-book to place the iconographic sources
in the foreground was dictated by the fact that it offers the most direct form
of the animals’ experience on the front, and from a didactical point of view,
has the ability to attract attention more immediately.
Today most of this European cultural heritage can be accessed online thanks
to an initiative promoted by the portal Europeana, which is the result of the
work carried out by the same-named foundation to represent and enhance
cultural heritage through extensive initiatives of digitalization and conserva
tion; this has made more than 23 million elements accessible, in the form of
texts, images, film and audio clips, all regarding the historical periods and
cultural movements of Europe, from north to south, and from east to west.
Also available here is the collection dedicated to the Great War Europeana
1914-1918.
Promoted by the initiative of digitalising the patrimony of ten important na
tional foundations, Europeana 1914-1918 was one of the numerous initiatives
to commemorate the one hundredth anniversary of the First World War; its
objective was to document those diverse aspects of the conflict that were
16
particularly pertinent to the everyday life of the common people and sol
diers. As a result, a patrimony comprising books, newspapers, trench jour
nals, geographical maps, sheet music, children’s tales, photographs, posters,
pamphlets, propaganda flyers, art works, religious texts, medals and coins.
The institutions that took part in the creation of the Europeana 1914-1918
database are the Berlin Staatsbibliothek, which acted as coordinator, and the
Clio-Online portal that had the task of inventories and analysis of the requi
sites. Other partners and content suppliers included Bibliothèque Nationale
de France and Bibliothèque Nationale et Universitaire de Strasbourg
(France); Biblioteca Nazionale Centrale di Roma “Vittorio Emanuele II”, Bib
lioteca Nazionale Centrale di Firenze and the Istituto Centrale per il Catalo
go Unico delle Biblioteche Italiane e per le Informazioni Bibliografiche
(Italy); Bibliothèque Royale de Belgique (Belgium); British Library (Great
Britain); Kongelige Bibliotek (Denmark); Österreichische Nationalbibliothek
(Austria) and Narodna Biblioteka Srbije (Serbia).
Furthermore, there are also other digital collections that are equally impor
tant and of inestimable value.In some cases they are long-term experiences,
with a vast tradition of looking after and conserving heritage behind them;
this is the case with theImperial War Museums and, in particular with the
digital collection dedicated to the Great War. Navigating in this collection
one can consult one of the richest iconographic collections on war animals;
this is one of the most beautiful and comprehensive ones in the world, con
firmation of the lengthy British tradition and sensitivity in the valorisation of
military history and the animal world.
Italian contents have also found their rightful place for this centennial. The
posters, prints, periodicals and photographs preserved in Biblioteca Univer
sitaria Alessandrina, Biblioteca di Storia Moderna e Contemporanea and in
the Istituto per la Storia del Risorgimento Italiano have been digitalised for
the occasion and they can now be consulted on the website 14-18. Documen
ti e immagini della Grande Guerra.
The e-book is divided into three chapters, The first chapter offers a histori
cal-critical presentation of the role of animals in the First World War, includ
ing, through further studies and the analytical approaches adopted in them,
to what extent the animal perspective lends itself for an institutional account
17
of the Great War and for a multidisciplinary study of the aforementioned.
The second chapter offers three case studies and the relative instruments for
further study that can be used by the teacher to prepare lessons as well as by
the student in individual or group projects. Each of the three paragraphs in
the chapter includes an introduction to the specific case in question, regard
ing the dog, pigeon, and horse, followed by a section on the experiences of
the individual protagonists; the last section is devoted to the study tools
needed to develop a didactic activity. The third chapter is dedicated to the
sources and offers a multimedia guide of the selected resources. At the end
of the book is an updated general bibliography to illustrate the guidelines
for reflection on the presence of animals in the war.
18
Thanks
Many people made this project possible. Heartfelt thanks go to friends, colleagues,
known and unknown supporters whose financial support made Animals in the
Great War possible.
The match funding campaign promoted by the Goteo and Europeana foundations
was the instrument that enabled this unique synergy. In particular, I would like to
thank Alexandra Baez, who coordinated the first phase of the project for Goteo, fol
lowing it step by step during the intense weeks of crowdfunding. Grateful thanks al
so go to the staff at Europeana who facilitated the bureaucratic formalities from The
Hague.
Special thanks also go to Emanuela Guzzinati, head of the inter-library loan at the
‘Walter Bigiavi’ Library at Bologna University who followed my numerous requests
with such professionalism and kindness, obtaining texts that would have otherwise
been impossible to find.
I. Animals in the Great War. Working with the sources
21
6. Describing the animal experience to obtain an inclusive
history
“A week since, I was lying out in no-man’s-land, a little German dog trotted up and
licked my British face. I pulled his German ears and stroked his German back. He
wagged his German tail. My little friend abolished no-man’s-land, and so in time
can we (Lt Melville Hastings, killed in action, 3 October 1918)”
From a technological perspective, the Great War can be regarded as the first
modern war that was ever fought. Scientific progress and its technical appli
cation in the war industry, which grew significantly during the second half
of the nineteenth century, meant that for the first time in 1914 every army,
without any distinction whatsoever, could count on mobile columns of light
and heavy artillery and automatic and semi-automatic artillery; on aero
planes, used to carry out bombing and recognition and fighter flights; on
submarines, which were used in naval battles in the Channel and Mediter
ranean. In addition, the extensive use of new means of communication such
as the radio, telephone, telegraph and cablegram should not be forgotten .
Although neglected for a long time by historical reconstructions and totally
absent in text books, the most striking fact is that the First World War was a
modern war, but one that soon lost its character as an adventure and instead
became a long, desperate undertaking that was actually primordial in na
ture, that is, with the mass recruitment of millions of animals that made it
possible to begin and succeed over such a long period. Today the figure is
still imprecise since it is not precisely known if it refers to the overall num
ber of animals present on the fronts at the beginning of the conflict or at the
end; the fact remains, however, that it is somewhere around the sum of 12
million animals, of which 11 million were equine, 100,000 dogs and between
200,000 and 250,000 pigeons. Most of the animals were requisitioned by the
authorities and actually recruited, that is, given military service documents
because they were considered useful from a tactical point of view. They in
cluded dogs, mules, donkeys, horses, pigeons and camels; in addition there
were mice and lice, the main inhabitants alongside the soldiers in the trench
1
2
22
es, as well as the fireflies that were captured and used at night to read maps
or letters from the family; unless plundered beforehand, farmyard animals
escaped from houses, stalls, and farmyards when the fronts fell; in addition
were the animals to be slaughtered, mainly bovine and pigs, which were
destined for the soldiers’ meals .
The numbers were considerable and certainly well-known as can be seen in
the correspondence and letters of both common soldiers and officers, as well
as in the information regarding the strategic-logistical organisation of the
fronts, where specific structures were created such as staging posts where
the transport animals (mules, donkeys, dogs) could rest, storerooms for feed
and veterinary hospitals. In close proximity to the front there were also sta
bles to house the animals for short periods that were to be slaughtered for
food as well as digester facilities where the carcasses were disposed of .
With the exception of the rare publications of official memoirs that appeared
in the Twenties and Thirties, in which evocations of the relationship with an
imals on the front are often to be found, it was not until the early Eighties
that the story of Warrior caught the attention of the children’s writer
Michael Morpurgo. This was the name of the horse that belonged to the
British general Jack Seely, who was with his regiment in France. Warrior
was the source of inspiration for the protagonist of the novel War Horse,
which was published in 1982 and in which the narrator is the war horse
Joey, and was made into a film in 2011 by Steven Spielberg.
In the same years the Imperial War Museum commissioned a renowned
British writer, Jilly Cooper, with a book to accompany the exhibition dedi
cated to animals in the war, planned for 1984. The publication of Animals in
War inspired the creation of the Animals in War Memorial Fund, which,
over a twenty-year period, raised the two million pounds needed for the
construction of the impressive memorial with the same name, dedicated as
can be read in the inscription “to all the animals that served and died along
side the British and allied troops in the wars and military campaigns
throughout the ages”, inaugurated in Park Lane (London) in November 2004
on the occasion of the 90 anniversary of the end of the Great War.
3
4
th
23
From this date on, and for the following ten years, numerous exhibitions
dedicated to the animals in war or the Great War were staged in nearly all
the countries of the Western front (London 2005, Péronne 2007, Campbell
2008, Osnabruck and Brussels 2010, Gorizia 2014), the organisation of which
required a significant amount of seeking documents in archives, making it
possible to bring to light and reorganise a large amount of material, especial
ly that of an iconographic nature. Today this material has been studied by
those who love the history of war, resulting in the creation of numerous
websites and the publication of diverse studies that, in view of the accuracy
of their reconstructions and the value of the sources used, cannot be de
scribed as amateurish. Nevertheless, all of these works basically concentrate
on the practical use of animals in war. In the accounts the animal is never
placed in the foreground as the subject and protagonist of an activity or ac
tion, instead they focus on the human aspect, and it is from this perspective
that their history is offered to the reader .
Despite looking more closely at the condition of the animals during the con
flict, even several worthy Italian studies such as those by Bucciol and Fabi
do the same, and do not place their experience at the centre of their analyses;
Fabi does, however, observe that, as they are mainly being used as elements
of the armed corps, “they are also and above all living beings that accompa
ny the soldiers on a difficult, demanding situation that is at times desperate
and impossible, but also carefree and amusing, at times extremely danger
ous whilst at others inevitably boring” . The animal remains an asset to be
used, whether as food, logistical support or a pet therapy instrument. It is
worthwhile remembering that the presence of animals was also used to alle
viate the horror of the trenches. Taking care of defenceless beings that were
completely dependent on man enabled the soldiers to recover their own hu
manity, which had been offended by the experience of war , albeit only for a
short period of time.
5
6
7
24
Fig. 6.1:
British soldier feeding a snow-covered cat at Neulette, 17 December 1917 ©
IWM (Q 6399)
The few professional historians who studied the subject of the presence of
animals in the wars until the beginning of 2000 did the same, limiting their
approach to the human aspect out of conviction or habit of the fact that his
tory as a discipline is exclusively a science that studies man throughout the
ages. There was interest in the use of horses and homing pigeons, in cultural
portrayals and the affective projections of the soldiers on the animals in their
trust, in the organisation of veterinary services and the unheard of chal
lenges resulting from having to face the illnesses and traumas of war, in
which the animals were the victims; however, even in these cases the ani
mals are only perceived in comparison to the efforts made by the veterinary
staff, for example. The veterinary records, however, could have been an ex
cellent source to evoke their experiences, especially in the light of the infor
mation that is now available as regards their emotional world, ability to feel
pain and to react to suffering .
8
25
On the contrary, there was no desire to shift the perspective and link the
analysis with knowledge from other disciplines, for example the natural sci
ences, psychology, ethology and, above all, from feminist and animalist re
flection; this was owing to the still unwavering prejudice according to which
animals are inferior to humans and as such, object of their projections, atten
tion, whether being cared for or violence, with the aim of satisfying and con
firming the role on a hierarchic scale, in line with the dualism of the Western
cultural and philosophical tradition that continues to perpetualise the logic
and practices of patriarchal rule, which was exercised over the centuries
over anyone who appeared to be at a disadvantage, (coloured people, work
ers, for example), and still exercised with constant and violent stubbornness
over women, animals and nature. Three examples of beings, which do not
correspond to the hierarchic model men created for themselves, are able to
‘break the mirror’ in which dominance seeks its own reflection at all costs .
1. R. van Emden, Tommy’s Ark: Soldiers and Their Animals in the Great War, Bloomsbury, Lon
don 2011, p. 12.
2. The role of science in the production of weapons M. G. Suriano, “Will this terrible possibility
become a fact?”. Il progresso scientifico applicato alla guerra nella riflessione di Gertrude Woker e
Kathleen Lonsdale, in “Dep. Deportate, esuli, profughe”, n. 35, 2017, pp. 26-41, http://
www.unive.it/media/allegato/dep/n35/02_Suriano_modello.pdf
3. É. Baratay, Bêtes des tranchées. Des vécus oubliés, CNRS Éditions, Paris 2013, pp. 8-9, D. Baldin
(ed.), La guerre des animaux, 1914
‐
1918, Artlys, Versailles 2007. See, also E. Bucciol, Animali
al fronte. Protagonisti oscuri della Grande guerra, Nuovadimensione/Ediciclo, Portogruaro 2003
and L. Fabi, Guerra bestiale: uomini e animali nella Grande Guerra, Persico, Cremona 2004.
4. L. Fabi, Guerra bestiale, pp. 8-13.
5. On the topic animals in war, see S. Bulanda,Soldiers in Fur and Feathers. The Animals that
Served in World War I - Allied Forces, Alpine Publications, Crawford 2013, J.-M. Derex,Héros
oubliés: les animaux dans la Grande Guerre, Pierre de Taillac Editions, Villers-sur-Mer 2014, L.
Fabi, Il bravo soldato mulo. Storie di uomini e animali nella Grande guerra, Mursia, Milano 2012,
J. Gardiner, The Animals War: Animals in Wartime from the First World War to the Present Day,
Portrait, London 2006, I. George, R. L. Jones, Animals at War, Usborne Publishing, London
2006, E. Le Chene, Silent Heroes: The Bravery & Devotion of Animals in War: An Animals’ Roll of
Honour, Souvenir Press Ltd, London 1997, D. Leoni, La guerra verticale. Uomini, animali e mac
chine sul fronte di montagna, Einaudi, Torino 2015 and F. Quilici,Umili eroi: storia degli animali
nella Grande Guerra, Mondadori, Milano 2016. See also articles and essay in this e-Book Ch.
III, A multimedia guide.
6. L. Fabi,Guerra bestiale, p. 16.
7. G. Ungaretti, Lettere a Giovanni Papini 1915-1948, a cura di M. A. Terzoli, Mondadori, Milano
1988 and R. van Emden, Tommy’s Ark.
9
26
8. D. Baldin (ed.),La guerre des animaux, 1914
‐
1918. Baldin also authored De la continuité anthro
pologique entre le combattant et le cheval: le cheval et son image dans l’armée française durant la Pre
mière guerre mondiale, in “Revue historique des armées”, n. 249, 2007, pp. 75-87 andLe chien,
animal exemplaire d’une anthropologie historique des relations hommes-animaux en temps de guerre
(1914-1918), in “Ethnozootechnie”, n. 78, 2006, pp. 159-162. See, also R. Bruneau,Les équidés
dans la Grande Guerre, in “Bulletin de la Société Française d’Histoire de la Médecine et des
Sciences Vétérinaires”, IV, n. 1, 2005, pp. 20-33, J. Kramer,Animal Heroes. Military Mascots
and Pets, Secker & Warburg, London 1982, J. Wajerowski,La Grande Guerre des pigeons
voyageurs, in D. Baldin (ed.),La guerre des animaux, pp. 59-67; the essays in R. Pöppinghege
(ed.),Tiere im Krieg. Von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart, Schöningh, Paderborn 2009, and D.
Roche (ed.),Le cheval et la guerre, Académie d’Art Équestre, Versailles 2002.
9. P. Singer, Animal Liberation, Random House, New York 1975 and P.Jouventin, D. Chauvet,
E. Utria (ed.), La raison des plus forts: la conscience déniée aux animaux, Imho, Paris 2010, and
by D. Haraway, see “A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in
the Late Twentieth Century”, inSimians, Cyborgs and Women: The Reinvention of Nature, Rout
ledge, New York 1991 [1st ed. 1985], pp.149-181 andPrimate Vision: Gender, Race and Nature
in the World of Modern Science, Routledge, New York 1989.
27
7. Inferior who? Going beyond the construction of animal
inferiority
The first step in emancipating the animal from the inferiority it was destined
to is deconstructing the habit of regarding animals as passive beings and
seeing them as mere objects, to the extent of labelling human attitudes and
feelings towards them as purely anthropomorphic projections, and the rela
tionship with them as a simple relationship and unique pole (man) in one di
rection (man’s towards his animal), in which the former exercises his
projects, knowledge and practices without any consequences on a transpar
ent object that has been transformed into a simple pretext; this would then
make it possible to begin developing a reflection that is able to show how
the relationships of animals with men are much more complex; they are two-
pole, and in two directions because animals are actors that act, react and cre
ate interaction with men where there is room for misunderstandings, adjust
ment, violence, resistance, exchange and empathy .
Living together for a long time in situations of extreme danger can therefore
be an excellent expedient to study a variety of animal biographies. The war
not only reinforced a familiarity, which partially evoked the memory of rur
al tradition, in which whilst on the one hand the attitude towards animals
was hard, on the other it was also compassionate and responded partially to
a more modern bourgeois culture that was open to living and interacting
with animals with affection, whilst also highlighting the possibility of a pro
found, reciprocal affective relationship. The war chronicled the love of a
German horse that, right in the middle of a cavalry charge turned back to
comfort its dying rider until a grenade killed them both; a little mongrel that
ran from one soldier to another in the trenches desperately looking for its
owner until it lost strength; and also that of the mule track Indians, who
were paid just £1.20 a month to look after the mules, and who refused to
abandon their job because they did not want to leave them to their fate .
1
2
28
Fig. 7.1: Soldier with "Sammy", the fourth battalion mascot, Royal Northumberland
Fusiliers © IWM (Q 1451)
Drawing attention to particular aspects of the relationships that the animals
established with soldiers and civilians, with whom they interacted, means
adopting the perspective of their experiences and placing it at the centre of
the study; in other words, it means abandoning a restrictive anthropocentric
perspective, inverting approaches, analyses and therefore the actual struc
ture of the tale. It is in this direction that recent studies put forward by Éric
Baratay and Jean-Christophe Bailly go; in them one learns that to better get
to know and understand these living beings, the abilities of whom are often
important and much more superior to the ones we usually attribute them
with and often with pronounced individuality , the historian has no choice
but to accept openings in other disciplines.
The roots of this inclusive approach are to be found in the Animal Studies
that appeared in the mid Eighties in Europe and the United States, as a new
discipline project focussing on the study of man-animal interaction. Such
studies are characterised by their multi-disciplinary method, ranging from
the philosophical field, in particular in reference to the ethical problems of
3
4
29
the relationship with the other species, to aspects that lead back to the hu
man and natural sciences. The prerequisite condition if the other species are
to be taken into consideration and result in an expansion of the notion of his
tory that, from this perspective can not be exclusively regarded as the sci
ence that studies men over time, but also has to have the objective of study
ing living beings over time, is to overcome the distinction between man and
animal, a distinction whose origins lead back to Western religion and philos
ophy and that, when it comes down to it, are futile, puerile and false. To go
back to Baratay’s thoughts on the subject, it is:
"Futile because the animal does not exist, it is nothing other than a concept
that wants to hide the reality of the multiplicity of the species. Puerile be
cause the question of the difference between an actual species, man, is an il
lusion (the concept of animal) was never necessary to distinguish the diverse
animals, but rather was one that allowed humans to prevail, when what was
actually necessary was to think about the multiplicity of the living beings, al
so that of humans, not in terms of superiority and hierarchy, but in terms of
difference, specificity, and the wealth of each. False, because we still know
very little about animals (we also are not particularly interested in doing so
and often prefer convenient stereotypes about animals instead) and nearly
always establish the differences about beliefs, confounding the study with a
discussion about domination" .
For a historian, a discussion of the presence of animals in the Great War
therefore entails a two-fold challenge. The first is of a theoretical nature and
concerns the overcoming of the man-animal distinction and the acceptance
of animal alterity as a subject of history with a narratable biography. The
second is of a methodological nature and consists in finding the point at
which the two historiographies meet; in this case, the one that begins con
structing the animal history and the already consolidated one of the war,
with the aim of writing the history of all the protagonists, soldiers and civil
ians, men, women and children, westerners and non, and also the animals.
The greatest difficulty in presenting the account from the animals’ point of
view concerns the documents that can be used. Available sources regard
physiological reactions and immediate reactions, which can only be found if
they were observed and described by man .
5
6
30
Military archives, which are a primary source for studies of war experiences,
are often disappointing as regards animal experience: they conserve, for ex
ample, documents recalling the activities of dog handlers but do not record
any information regarding the animals’ origins, their functions and what
happens to them once they have completed their service. Combatants’ testi
monies such as letters, novels and diaries could help fill the gaps in so far as
memoirs pose the stringent question for the historian of source reliability.
The value of memoirs should be measured on the basis of numerous vari
ables: the period in which the testimony was produced (during or after the
war), the author’s social and cultural context, the nature of the texts (letters,
private papers, texts destined for the public and therefore edited for publica
tion); the state of the text (direct or indirect narrative). If one is to achieve a
coherent, truthful reconstruction of an episode that is inherent to human ex
perience, these are important questions to be resolved although they are not
necessarily pertinent to the reconstruction of an animal experience. In most
cases, memoirs say nothing specific about animals; instead, they just give
clues: it is easy to find a comment like “the cannon … arrived at a galop”; on
the other hand, there is little trace of the horse carnage caused by artillery,
although comments expressing regret for such a fate do appear. What does
emerge from these texts as a sociological fact is that whilst the nationalist-in
spired writers also care about the animals and their presence on the front
when evoking the body-to-body, need for sacrifice and hatred for the enemy,
their pacifist-inspired counterparts say nothing about the animals and their
fate, despite denouncing the violence and suffering .
Another source that is of extreme value for the historian is that of the finan
cial statements and reports written by military veterinary surgeons. These
are official documents that were written for governments and professional
in-depth studies that, despite focusing almost exclusively on horses, proved
indispensable as a source of knowledge regarding the animals’ everyday life
on the front, ranging from the type of food they were given, the traumas
they suffered, their capacity for endurance and the relationships they creat
ed with their human companions-in arms .
7
8
9
31
Fig. 7.1: RAVC Soldier with a Blindfolded Horse at Veterinary Hospital n.5, Abbeville,
April 22, 1918 © IWM (Q 8726)
Finally, sources also include the testimonies of civilians who were encour
aged to hand over dogs for military use and the photographs that were pub
lished in newspapers and magazines at that time. Controlled, stereotypical
photographs that often show dogs being used in the military health system ,
but not messengers and guard dogs, which were used as sentries in the War
prisons , and not even companion dogs and mascots . These can be seen in
the photographs taken by press agencies or in photographs by soldiers, par
ticularly by officers. This material has been used extensively by amateur his
torians, thus making it possible to ascertain once and for all a presence that
has not been evoked by texts, making animals whose traces had been lost
appear out of the blue and therefore making it possible to reconstruct their
presence and look at their attitudes. Furthermore, images of animals at the
front also make it possible to describe the different war fronts from a per
spective that is not that of opposite fronts , as has emerged from the count
less similarities that can be seen in images from the Italian, French and Russ
ian fronts, going from the one in the Balkans to those in the Ottoman Em
10
11 12
13
32
pire, in Palestine or today’s Iraq, not to mention in the German and Austri
an-Hungarian hinterland, preserved in the Archive of the Austrian war, and
now integrated in the Europeana 1914-1918 database.
The information used in historical studies is all to be used with circumspec
tion; as a result, studying the conditions in which the testimonies were pro
duced and their cultural characteristics is indispensable but it must not be an
insurmountable objective. Cross-checking the documents is the best possible
way to overcome any flaws. The combatants’ descriptions should be cross-
checked with the information the current researchers have and it should be
interpreted from the animals’ point of view; this means inverting the infor
mation, tracing the information that is in the background, reading between
the lines, guessing or making assumptions based on the previous ones, in
the same manner that historians learned to do in order to study the losers,
the submissive and the anonymous in history. To do so, it was necessary to
resort to other knowledge. Ethology is necessary to study animal behaviour
and social interaction, in particular applied ethology, which deals with do
mestic species when with humans; cognitive ethology, which focuses on
mental states and descriptions at the origin of such behaviour, as well as
psychology and neurobiology to understand the emotions, pain and suffer
ing experienced by the species involved in the conflict. One must withstand
the arrogant temptation of denying or diminishing the animals’ faculties and
instead adopt supplementary, plural definitions of their abilities as they vary
depending on the species, groups and periods, equal to the intelligence that
is not defined univocally by ethologists for all species; instead they speak of
multiple intelligence, without falling into the anthropomorphic temptation
of projecting human abilities onto the animals .
14
33
The question of animals in the Great War must be regarded as an itinerary
under construction from the perspective of historical studies. It consists in
the study of the animals’ behaviour and sociality in a precise period and sit
uation, working with scarce, accurate information, whether detailed or par
tial, from multiple sources. What is important is that the animals’ experi
ences are taken into account, starting with the variables that determine the
experience, whether environmental or emotional, where documents and
knowledge allow. However, above all one must feel empathy: this is an in
tention, an attitude, a method of tending towards the animal.
1. É. Baratay,Bêtes des tranchées, p. 11.
2. J. Cooper,Animals in War, Corgi, London 1983.
3. J.-C. Bailly,Le versant animal, Bayard, Paris 2007. See É. Baratay,Bêtes des tranchées, and by
the same authorLe point de vue animal, une autre version de l’histoire, Seuil, Paris 2012, and Bi
ographies animales, Seuil, Paris 2017
4. M. Bekoff,The Emotional Lives of Animals, F. Burgat (ed.),Penser le comportement animal, Mai
son des Sciences de l’Homme, Paris 2010, and A. Horowitz,Inside of a Dog. What Dogs See,
Smell, and Know. See also Roberto Marchesini,Post-human: verso nuovi modelli di esistenza, Bol
lati Boringhieri, Torino 2002.
5. É. Baratay,Bêtes des tranchées, p. 15.
6. É. Baratay,Le point de vue animal, une autre version de l’histoire.
7. C. E. Gadda, Giornale di guerra e prigionia, Einaudi, Torino 1965, e successive ristampe), R.
van Emden, Tommy’s Ark, and B. Amez,Dans les tranchées, les écrits non-publiés des combat
tants belges de la premiére Guerre mondiale, Publibbok, Paris 2009.
8. É. Baratay,Bêtes des tranchées, p. 12.
9. D. Baldin,De la continuité anthropologique entre le combattant et le cheval, and also L.
Fabi,Guerra bestiale.
10. On sanitary dogs, see Ch. III, A multimedia guide, for footage available on British pathè.
11. S. Audoin-Rouzeau, A. Bécker, C. Ingrao,La violence de guerre, 1914-1945, Complexe, Brux
elles 2002, H. Jones,Violence Against Prisoners of War in the First World War, Cambridge Uni
versity Press, Cambridge 2011, R. E. Lubow,The War Animals. The Training and Use of Ani
mals as Weapons of War, Doubleday, New York 1977, and M. Puricelli,Prefazione, in S. Ferrari,
S.E.L. Probst,1914/18: la guerra e gli animali. Truppe silenziose al servizio degli eserciti, Ideago,
Gorizia 2015.
12. J. Kramer,Animal Heroes. Military Mascots and Pets.
13. E. Bucciol,Animali al fronte.
14. É. Baratay,Bêtes des tranchées, p. 15.
34
8. Recounting war animals in the classroom
Despite all its technical modernity , millions of animals were involved in the
First World War. Without mules and donkeys, the soldiers would have had
difficulty in reaching the fronts they were being sent to. It was thanks to
them that artillery and the materials needed to fortify the trenches were
transported, together with water, foodstuffs and obviously also the dead
and injured. Unjustly believed to be irascible and stubborn, mules displayed
their stoicism in the most extreme situations, under fire at the Battle of Gal
lipoli and in the freezing cold of the Balkan nights, not to mention the fact
they were more resistant than the other equines to disease owing to their hy
brid nature . Donkeys, on the other hand, were used extensively on the
Western front by French and Italian troops for transport, and they were also
used by the allies in the campaign in eastern Africa in 1916-1917, where
thousands died in Palestine because of the tze-tze flies: of the 34,000 head
enrolled, only 1,042 had survived by the end of the operations .
On the middle-eastern front the camels of the Imperial Camel Corps were al
so used in northern Africa, the Sinai desert and in the Middle East, where
the normal infantry units could not be used because it would have been too
difficult for the horses to adapt to the climate. Nevertheless, the western sol
diers discovered they were ill-prepared to look after such exotic animals,
which were delicate despite their impressive appearance, anything but fast,
hypersensitive to the cold, and terrified of water, as well as a danger to the
soldiers’ safety; there were cases of males that became so uncontrollable that
they attacked their riders during the mating season. When General Allenby
decided to march towards Jerusalem and Amman in 1917-18, going across
the Judaean hills, there were numerous losses owing to the cold tempera
tures at night .
1
2
3
4
5
35
Fig. 8.1: Australian members of the Imperial Camel Corps near Jaffa, Palestine, 1918 ©
IWM (HU 75737)
Horses played a primary military role and the price they paid was enor
mous. Sensitive, shy and delicate, their presence in human wars goes back to
2000-1000 BC, when it is believed cavalry was born. Ever since, and at least
until the First World War, these noble equines have always been present in
armies and have been adapted to the technological tools that have gradually
been developed by the science of war, whether attaching small barrows to
the horses to move pieces of artillery, or teaching them to maintain their po
sition under fire and amidst the sound of explosives. The Great War became
an appalling slaughter. They died in the hundreds on the battlefields during
infantry charges and as a result of the hazards of war in the trenches, where
they were exposed to enemy machine-guns, asphyxiating gases and metal
entanglements. However, before they even got that far countless animals
died crossing the ocean, when they were packed on to vessels coming from
the United States, Canada and Australia, sent to Europe to replace those that
had fallen in the allied infantry divisions on the Western Front .
6
36
Fig. 8.2: Refractory horses © IWM (Q 33569)
Dogs were also involved in this regard although their role was more strate
gic. In fact, in the early months of the war a sort of canine conscription was
established in diverse European countries on a “voluntary” basis: the own
ers were asked to present their dogs for military examinations and if they
were found suitable, they were requisitioned and the owners were issued a
document of enrolment. The most popular breeds for military tasks were the
classical retriever dogs, especially the Rottweiler, German shepherd, terrier
and robust cross-breeds of medium size. Numerous Maremma sheep dogs
were used in the Italian army. After receiving specific training, they were
used in recognition operations to verify whether anything had been sabo
taged along the telephone lines, as well as in retrieving the injured and fallen
in “no man’s land.” They were often sent with parachutes behind enemy
lines to retrieve information. In the particularly inaccessible areas such as the
Alps, they were used to transport weapons and drag the stretchers with the
injured .
7
37
Fig. 8.3: War chariot for electric lamps pulled by dogs, Dorimbergo, Front of the Isonzo, ca
1916 © ÖNB, Europeana Collections 1914-1918
The function of pigeons was equally strategic. Although communications
systems such as the cablegram, telegraph and telephone were used, they
were used to send messages and carry out espionage operations. The
pigeons were fast, resilient and in their own way really intrepid. They flew
at a speed of 40 km/h and were able to cover distances of up to 100 km
without a break. They bore messages of vital importance and, as they
showed during the battle of La Marne in 1914, always returned to their
dovecots, even if the latter had been moved in the meanwhile. They were
believed to be so strategic that it was forbidden to capture them for food,
and any injured birds were rescued, and if possible treated .
8
38
Fig. 8.4: Pigeons returning to their own dovecote, Pernes, 1918 © IWM (Q 9000)
Rescue measures and treatment were foreseen for the animals at the front
and, if there was no veterinary hospital (on the field), the medical officers in
charge of treating men would intervene. On all the fronts, but on the West
ern Front in particular and to a certain extent in Palestine, the commitment
of the British veterinary corps was impressive; supported by the Royal Soci
ety for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA), it was extremely ac
tive in raising funds, estimated at around 250,000 pounds, for the equipment
of veterinary hospitals on the field, the purchase of ambulances, medicine
and feed; it also guaranteed the convalescence of injured animals, most of
which were horses and mules, but not only .
9
39
As shall be seen, only a few of these creatures were to be recognised official
ly and be given medals of valour for their actions on the field alongside their
brothers-in arms; in fact, most of them did not even have right to be remem
bered.
1. Diego Leoni,La guerra verticale. Uomini, animali e macchine sul fronte di montagna, Einaudi,
Torino 2015.
2. M. Greenwood, F. Lessac,The Donkey of Gallipoli: A True Story of Courage in World War I,
Candlewick Press, Cambridge (MA) 2008.
3. J. Cooper,Animals in War, pp. 96-109, E. Bucciol,Animali al fronte, and L. Fabi,Il bravo solda
to mulo.
4. J. Cooper,Animals in War, pp. 154-163.
5. J. Cooper,Animals in War, pp. 85-95.
6. R. Bruneau,Les équidés dans la Grande Guerre, S. Butler,The War Horses: The Tragic Fate of a
Million Horses Sacrificed in the First World War, Halsgrove, Wellington (UK) 2011, D.
Kenyon,Horsemen in No Man’s Land: British Cavalry and Trench Warfare 1914-1918, Pen &
Sword, Barnsley 2011, G. Tempest,All the Muddy Horses: Giving a Voice to the “Dumb Crea
tures” of the Western Front (1914-1918), in R. Pöppinghege (ed.),Tiere und Krieg, pp. 217-234,
and G. Winton,‘Theirs Not To Reason Why’. Horsing the British Army 1875-1925, Helion and
Company, Solihull 2013.
7. J. Cooper,Animals in War, pp. 54-71 and L. Fabi,Guerra bestiale. See, also N. Allsopp,Cry
Havoc: The History of War Dogs, New Holland Publishers, Chatswood, 2009, D.
Castellani,Cani in guerra, storie di soldati a quattro zampe, Nordpress, Chiari 2000, I.
George,Dog Soldiers. Love, Loyalty and Sacrifice on the Front Line, Harper Collins, London
2016, M. G. Lemish,War dogs: A History of Loyalty and Heroism, Potomac, Washington, D.C
2008, D. Lewis,War Dog: The no-man’s-land puppy who took to the skies, Sphere, London 2014,
K.-G. Petzl,Hundee in Krieg und Frieden, Petzi, Wien 2005, L. Rogak,The Dogs of War: The
Courage, Love and Loyalty of Military Working, Saint-Martin’s Press, New York 2011 and R.
Todero,Cani e soldati nella Prima Guerra Mondiale, Gaspari Editore, Treviso 2011.
8. F. Calvet, J.-P. Demonchaux, R. Lamand, G. Bornert,Une brève histoire de la colombophilie, in
“Revue Historique des Armées”, n. 248, 2007, pp. 93-105,https://rha.revues.org/1403 -
tocto2n3, M. Marchisio, G. Morei,L’impiego dei piccioni viaggiatori durante la Prima guerra
mondiale, in “Veterinaria Militare”, n. 12, 2007, pp. 541-542,http://
www.ordiniveterinaripiemonte.it/rivista/07n12/pdf/09.pdf, A. Salles,La colombophilie mili
taire. I. 1870-1918 Un drôle d’oiseau, in “Histoire de Guerre, Blindés et Matériels”, n. 93, 2010,
p. 44-53, and J. Wajerowski,La Grande Guerre des pigeons voyageurs, in D. Baldin (ed.),La
guerre des animaux, pp. 59-67.
9. J. Cooper,Animals in War.
40
9. Empathy, a didactic approach
The presence of animals in wars is a subject that is of the utmost topicality.
In fact, military corps have never stopped using animals for war-related pur
poses; on the contrary, it is still continuing and with increasingly sophisticat
ed forms. While the presence of some of the animals that died during the
First World War (for example, mules, donkeys, horses and homing pigeons)
has been reduced if present at all, other examples, first and foremost dogs,
followed by mice, hamsters, cats, marine mammals, in particular dolphins,
and bees, are still present and their military application continues to be ex
tensive, strategic and cruel. Used mainly for mine-removing operations and
in some cases for targeted attacks with explosives against enemy means,
they are also used in ‘times of peace’ to test the effect of chemical and bacte
riological weapons .
Taking a topical subject as the starting point and leading it back to a study of
the Great War can not only be interesting, but also effective from a didactic
perspective. In the case in point, compared to textbook reconstructions, it is
completely or almost completely unheard of and it is this novel character
that makes it a catalyst of attention, stimulating the pupils attention when
they are asked to trace the animal’s experience between the lines, cross-
checking documents, bringing to the fore what has remained in the back
ground, as described above. In a classroom, stimulating the creative effort
needed to change one’s perspective to something that is usually excluded
from accounts because it is considered secondary, will generate the empathy
needed to start further in-depth studies. Apparently banal questions – what
was it like for the horses from the American grasslands to live so far away
from their own habitat when they were shipped to the Western Front? What
conditions were they subjected to during the journey and what implications
did this have on their health? How did they react to the sound and firing of
the weapons? – will suffice not only to make them consider the animals in
war, but also to assume their point of view so that it becomes the centre of
the account: they are no longer just a resource to be used, simple instru
1
41
ments in the soldiers’ hands, but the subjects of history, the protagonists in a
narratable biography .
Furthermore, studying the Great War with the animals that participated in it
as the starting point also has various advantages. Precisely because it means
an inversion of approach and analysis as regards that of the dominant sub
ject, adopting the point of view of a subordinate subject necessarily results in
a broader horizon, leading one to reflect on the particular aspects of an indi
vidual historical event that we would otherwise have never taken into con
sideration, and thus inevitably reflecting on how we regard the present. This
dilated vision from the bottom to the top that is inherent to that of the ani
mal, makes it possible to develop a new narrative of the war, emancipating
it from the text book narrative that is often exclusively focused on European
fronts, losses, defeats and the victories of the individual countries and hard
ly ever on the day-to-day aspects of those who fought and experienced the
war.
Chapter III, A Multimedia Guide, includes an extensive catalogue of instru
ments, films, novels as well as articles, documents, documentaries and pho
tographs available on-line and, in most cases with free access, so that they
can be drawn on to integrate text book education, transforming it into one
that entails active and empathetic. It was conceived to make it easier to
overcome geographic, linguistic, and teaching subject borders so that the
teachers of different disciplines can develop truly multidisciplinary itiner
aries in the classroom, either concerted or parallel, starting with a single case
study.
If properly reconstructed, the experience of animals in the war facilitates an
international analysis of the Great War because the animals are figures that
are extraneous to European nationalisms. They make it easier to cross the
apparently impregnable borders of men, the history of which seems to have
been fashioned by opposing nationalism, highlighting the elements that are
constant and common in the experiences of each of them, even the ‘enemies’ .
1. J. Cooper,Animals in War, pp. 54-71.
2. K.-G. Petzl,Hundee in Krieg und Frieden, L. Fabi,Guerra Bestiale.
3. É. Baratay,Bêtes des tranchées, E. Bucciol,Animali al fronte.
2
3
II. The protagonists
45
10. Dogs
Fig. 10.1:
A messenger dog with a cylinder, in which the message was transported, Eta
ples, 28 August 1918 © IWM (Q 9277)
In the First World War around 100,000 dogs were recruited, but it is likely
that the figure of their mobilisation was higher, in view of the fact that, as
shown in the first chapter, studies have not yet been able to establish the
true number of animals on the front. The figure is, however, undoubtedly
substantial, although not completely unheard of. In actual fact, dogs are
known to have taken part in earlier wars, when they were given an auxiliary
role with the purpose of the light transport of ammunition, medicine, food
supplies, water, post and delivering orders. What was new in the early years
46
of the war was the new strategic role, one that was indispensable to military
operations, that these animals were given, despite the significant technical-
scientific investments that had been made by all the forces.
The Germans were the first to train military dogs, beginning in 1870, and
over the years, thanks to breeding and the purchase of numerous specimens,
they managed to put together real divisions; they were so successful that
when the world war broke out, they were able to count on a contingent of
6,000 dogs; to give an idea of the disproportionate differences, the English
on the other hand, only had one, which fell in action during the battle of
Aisne, on the Western front, in September 1914 . The most popular breeds
for these military tasks were the classical retriever dogs, especially the Rot
tweiler, German shepherd, terrier and robust cross-breeds of medium size,
and in the case of Italy, Maremma sheep dogs .
The importance and use of dogs on the front was already clear in the early
months of the war, so much so that all the countries involved and above all,
those of the Entente, rushed to enlist as many dogs as possible to compen
sate the deficit they had accumulated compared to their German adver
saries. In countries that were more sensitive to animals, dogs in particular,
such as Great Britain, they began to seek suitable specimens amongst the
strays and abandoned dogs, in the fear that dog owners would be unwilling
to collaborate. In fact, in the diverse European countries a sort of canine con
scription was established; it was called ‘voluntary’ but actually obliged the
owners to present their dogs at military examinations. The recollections of
the officers in charge of this selection process include heart breaking scenes
of the owners who went to great lengths to remind the soldiers the names of
their dogs, telling them about their dietary habits and begging them to treat
them kindly and bring them back once the war was over; there is also a rec
ollection of children writing to the authorities, asking to be allowed to keep
their dogs because they were old, stating that they had already given them
the younger ones. Once the military examination was over, the animals
deemed suitable were recruited and given a conscription certificate, attesting
the authorities’ commitment to give them back at the end of the war; they
were then sent off for training .
1
2
3
47
The training courses, in the case in point courses for war dog handlers, last
ed 6 months and, in addition to the objective of teaching the dog how to car
ry out certain specific tasks, they also had the aim of creating a close rela
tionship between the dog and its handler. Training was arduous and could
last for several hours each day as it was indispensible that the hoped for re
sults would be achieved so that the dogs could be sent to the front. The dogs
were taught how to carry out their tasks despite the deafening noise of the
weapons and confusion, and to penetrate inaccessible zones. To ensure they
would carry out their task successfully, they had to go without food while
they were waiting to be sent on their mission, and were fed as a reward
when they returned . Once they were at the front their tasks included deliv
ering dispatches, reconnaissance of telephone line sabotage, helping the
health units retrieving the injured and fallen in “no man’s land” and trans
porting medicine, as well as eliminating rats from the trenches. Using dogs
to deliver messages, for example, had objective advantages as they were
three times faster than a man, could dodge the enemy’s sight with greater
agility, were light enough to be able to walk over a mine without it explod
ing and, unlike pigeons, could also be sent on a mission in adverse weather
conditions. In particularly impenetrable areas such as the Alps, they were
used to transport weapons, food and to haul the stretchers with the wound
ed; in fact, specific carts that could be pulled by two dogs were put into pro
duction. On the Italian Adamello front in particular, dogs would pull the
sledges through tunnels that had been dug in the ice. In addition to messen
ger and transporter dogs there were also those that were trained to keep
guard and, unfortunately, to terrify prisoners. Finally, although they do not
belong to the dogs that were enlisted, one must also take into account the
companion dogs and mascots at the front. Taken in by the soldiers and often
adopted by the officers, these were animals that had been abandoned during
evacuations and sought food and shelter in the trenches; in exchange they
got rid of the rats, sounded the alarm because they could sense grenades ar
riving before humans did, and gave the men a sort of normality just by wag
ging their tails .
4
5
48
Fig. 10.1: Officers relax around a gramophone with their dogs, on the field at
Poperinghe, September 26, 1917 © IWM (Q 2897)
The presence of dogs at the front was believed to be so indispensable that
the commanding officers gave orders to ensure the soldiers paid the greatest
attention to their general well-being, introducing precautions to guarantee
they could rest after each mission, suitable and sufficient food, as well as
treatment if they fell ill or were injured during their mission, for example by
automatic weapons or gas explosions. Most cases were treated by the med
ical officers because although veterinary staff was foreseen in the operation
zones, it was not in permanent service at the front. Sanitary care, which was
to have a positive effect on the progress veterinary science made after the
war, did not adhere to a principle of compassion and greater sensitivity to
wards the suffering of the four-legged comrade-in-arms but rather a funda
mental utilitarian one that had the aim of not wasting the investment that
had been made with the training and the animal’s upkeep. Although there
was no denying the bond that was created between the animal and soldier,
as can be seen in sources, it was the soldiers themselves who abandoned the
countless civilian dogs to their own fate, having shared the endless months
in the trenches with them, and the dogs that had been enlisted regularly did
49
not have a better fate. In actual fact, once the war had ended the dogs that
had survived on the battlefield were put to sleep if they were injured or ill
whilst the others were abandoned in the operation areas. The most tragic ex
perience was probably that of the Italian dogs at Adamello that were aban
doned in the mountains in 1918: only the most robust were able to free them
selves and disappear in the mountains, while the others died of hardship .
Unlike the extraordinary undertakings in which they were the protagonists,
only very few became heroes. Others lived on in the soldiers’ recollections,
for example Isonzo, the dog of the Italian poet Vittorio Locchi ; the dogs of
the legendary Captain Carlo Mozzoli, on the Italian front ; and Pataud, the
dog of the French artilleryman Luis Bedu . The biographies for many others,
especially those on the Eastern front are still to be studied.
1. J. Cooper,Animals in War, pp. 54-71.
2. K.-G. Petzl,Hundee in Krieg und Frieden, L. Fabi,Guerra Bestiale
3. J. Cooper,Animals in War, pp. 54-71.
4. Edwin H. Richardson,British War Dogs. Their Training and Their Psychology, Skeffington, Lon
don 1920.
5. L. Fabi,Guerra Bestiale.
6. L. Fabi,Guerra Bestiale. See, also T. Auffret van der Kamp, J. C. Nouët (ed.),Homme et animal:
de la douleur à la cruauté, L’Harmattan, Paris 2008.
7. S. Ferrari, S.E.L. Probst,
1914/18: la guerra e gli animali.
8. L. Fabi,Guerra Bestiale.
9. D. Arnold,Le chien et l’artilleur, Pataud et Louis Bedu, Archives départementales et patrimoine
du Cher,http://www.archives18.fr/article.php?laref=825&titre=le-chien-et-l-artilleur-
pataud-et-louis-bedu
6
7
8
9
50
11. Bally Shannon, Satan and Stubby
Although there were not many dog heroes in the Great War, there are some
that have not been forgotten. One such case is Bally Shannon, the British sani
tary-dog, who retrieved numerous injured soldiers from the “no man’s
land” on the French front; Satan, the French messenger dog, who changed
the outcome of the siege of Verdun; and Stubby, the multiple decorated
sergeant in the American army. The story of this dog is quite unique because
it was not a military dog that had been enlisted and trained like the first two
but instead was a companion dog that followed its owner when he set out
for Europe in 1917.
51
Fig. 11.1: Front page of Le Miroir, 17 June 1917
Bally Shannon was an Irish greyhound. It was in action in France in the ranks
of the British sanitary contingent and was mainly used to retrieve the allied
injured and dead from “no man’s land”. From the documentation we have,
it appears that it distinguished itself on the field by having retrieved 10 casu
alties, defying German gunfire, until it was seriously injured together with
its handler when a grenade exploded. Both were taken aboard on a ship-hos
pital to return home but were attacked by a German submarine whilst cross
ing the Channel. After being struck by a torpedo, the ship sunk with the en
tire crew and only three men survived, one of which was Shannon’s handler,
and the dog itself. In the bitterly cold and choppy waters of the Channel, the
three soldiers managed to hold on to a plank, and drifted whilst waiting to
be saved, which happened the following day. When Shannon approached the
52
group, its handler apparently told him not to get close to them because its
weight would have made their makeshift raft sink. The dog then swam the
whole night alongside its comrades-in arms, only resting its chin on the
plank when it was completely exhausted.
Unlike its handler, Bally Shannon survived the crossing and once the war had
ended it was taken to New York where it remained for the rest of its life .
The only certain description of this four-legged hero is the one by the war
correspondent and American writer Albert Payson Terhune, who describes
Satan as a ‘hairy mongrel’ that saved Verdun . What we know as the Battle
of Verdun was a lengthy siege that lasted ten months, from February to De
cember 1916, when the French troops found themselves besieged in the city
under German fire. After the Battle of La Marne (1914), this was the most im
portant offensive by the Germans on the Western Front and, also thanks to
Satan, it was at the origin of the start of the operations by the British troops,
shattering any hope of Germany winning the war. In autumn 1916 the Ger
mans were present in a position of strength that allowed them to surround
the city and they were ready for the final offensive. The French troops con
tinued to resist without much hope, having lost all their messenger dogs and
homing pigeons; in addition, a dozen men had been killed in the attempt to
deliver requests for help to the headquarters. According to the soldiers, at
the most critical moment of the battle Satan, the dog-messenger sent from
the headquarters appeared, knowing that its handler, the soldier Duvalle
was at Verdun . Accounts from the trenches describe a dog, that looked as if
it was flying as it ran zig-zag towards the French line and its handler, and
some soldiers even swear they saw wings sprout on its shoulders. Moving
with the greatest agility through “no man’s land”, the dog was intercepted
by German fire and hit repeatedly; it collapsed just a few metres away from
its comrades-in arms when a bullet practically shot off a leg. At that point, in
a suicidal gesture, its handler stood up on the edge of the trench and called
it. Hearing Duvalle’s voice, Satan got up and dragged itself as far as the
trench; its handler was dead, but he had managed to bring them the mes
sage. Under its gas mask the soldiers found the dispatch from the headquar
ters, telling them to resist until the following day when reinforcements were
coming, and to send them the coordinates via the two homing pigeons that
Satan was carrying on its back. The homing pigeons were sent back with the
1
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3
53
coordinates. One was shot down immediately while the other one managed
to reach the headquarters, with the result that the following day, the attack
that was launched on the Germans opened the passageway that was to re
unite the British and French troops, thus changing the outcome of the war.
As far as Satan is concerned, there is no precise information about his fate; it
might have received the necessary treatment and been saved or might have
died after having carried out its mission.
Fig. 11.1: Stubby, the hero of Georgetown
Unlike Bally Shannon and Satan, Stubby was not a military dog but a mascot,
a small-sized dog that was discharged as sergeant. It embarked in the spring
of 1917 with its owner, a Harvard student, Corporal Robert Conroy, who set
out from Connecticut for the French trenches with the 102 infantry regi
ment of the American army. Following his human companion, Stubby soon
found himself working in France for 18 months, during which it became im
mensely popular owing to the courage it showed in action. Thanks to its
small size, it was used to infiltrate the enemy lines and transport the cables
needed to repair the sabotaged telephone lines. Injured on numerous occa
sions, it unfailingly returned to the front after a convalescence period, and
was awarded decorations and praise, until it was made sergeant as a result
of its contribution to the capture of a German spy. It was so famous that,
nd
54
when the Americans entered Château-Thierry, the local women made it a
jacket so they could hang the numerous medals it had won on it .
Once they had returned to the United States Stubby participated with Con
roy in public debates dedicated to the Great War and became a national
hero. When it died of old age in 1926, its body was embalmed and put on
display in the National Museum of American History in Washington, DC,
where it can still be seen today.
1. W. A. Dyer,Bally Shannon – Dog of War, in “Country Life”, November 1918,http://
www.irishwolfhounds.org/ballyshannon.htm
2. Kate Kelly,World War I and a Remarkable Messenger Dog,https://americacomesalive.com/
2013/07/31/national-mutts-day-july-31-a-brave-and-remarkable-messenger-dog/
3. Alexander Robertson,Revealed:How a messenger dog called Satan dodged German fire in a gas
mask to help Allied forces turn the tide in one of the Great War’s bloodiest battles,http://
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3456252/How-messenger-dog-called-Satan-dodged-
German-fire-gas-mask-help-Allied-forces-turn-tide-one-Great-War-s-bloodiest-battles.html
4. Ben Thompson,Sergent Stubby,http://www.badassoftheweek.com/sgtstubby.html
4
55
12. Instruments for in-depth study
Digital collections and databases
Europeana 1914-1918
By typing the key-words dogs, cani, army veterinary corps, one can access
all the images of sleigh-dogs and retrievers, used to transport war materials
such as electric cables, but also materials for everyday use such as wood,
and companion dogs, or rather, mascots (see ch. III, A Multimedia Guide).
1418 documenti e immagini della grande guerra
The search path is not intuitive; nevertheless, clicking on the page fotografie,
the page album fotografici opens up and then, adding the word animali in the
space parola da cercare one can see some images of the Adamello dogs.
BBC Schools World War One
It is a thematic site by the BBC that is dedicated to the First World War. On
the pageAnimals during the warthere is a specific section dedicated to
dogs.
British pathé
It is a cross-media site that allows access to numerous period videos. A
search for animals in war results in the vision of some interesting footage re
garding the training of French military dogs (see Ch. III, A Multimedia
Guide).
Articles online
56
Didier Arnold, Le chien et l’artilleur, Pataud et Louis Bedu, Archives départe
mentales et patrimoine du Cher, http://www.archives18.fr/article.php?
laref=825&titre=le-chien-et-l-artilleur-pataud-et-louis-bedu
Walter A. Dyer, Bally Shannon – Dog of War, in “Country Life”, November
1918, http://www.irishwolfhounds.org/ballyshannon.htm
Rebecca Frankel, Dogs at War: Three-Legged Dog Delivers Crucial Message in
WWI, http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/05/140516-dogs-
war-canines-soldiers-troops-army-military/
Kate Kelly, World War I and a Remarkable Messenger Dog,https://
americacomesalive.com/2013/07/31/national-mutts-day-july-31-a-brave-
and-remarkable-messenger-dog/
Warren Manger, Satan the messenger dog who helped Allies turn tide of Great
War remembered 100 years on,http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/
satan-messenger-dog-who-helped-7404457
Alexander Robertson, Revealed: How a messenger dog called Satan dodged Ger
man fire in a gas to help Allied forces turn the tide in one of the Great War's bloodi
est battles,http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3456252/How-mes
senger-dog-called-Satan-dodged-German-fire-gas-mask-help-Allied-forces-
turn-tide-one-Great-War-s-bloodiest-battles.html
Joe Shute, "Dogs of war: the unsung heroes of the trenches", The Telegraph, 29
oct. 2014,http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/world-war-one/11195378/
Dogs-of-war-the-unsung-heroes-of-the-trenches.html
Ben Thompson, Sergent Stubby, http://www.badassoftheweek.com/
sgtstubby.html
C. N. Trueman, Dogs In World War One, The History Learning Site, 16 Apr.
2015, http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/world-war-one/the-western-
front-in-world-war-one/animals-in-world-war-one/dogs-in-world-war-
one/
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13. Pigeons
Fig. 13.1: British pilot releasing a pigeon © IWM (Q 13613)
In the early years of the war, although all the armies had special divisions
with specialised staff who looked after and trained the homing pigeons, the
main means of communication were the new forms (telephone, telegraph,
cablegram, radio) as it was believed that homing pigeons should only be
used in the case of a siege. Very quickly, however, they realised that they
were not only useful, but even more reliable for communications between
the lines and the headquarters. This was because the telecommunications
and radio were often subjected to sabotage and interceptions and, as a result,
often useless while homing pigeons would not stop until they reached their
destination, and had handed over the message to be given, unless they were
seriously injured or shot down .
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Every division had four dovecotes that were divided into car-dovecotes on
four-wheeled vehicles, and in tow-dovecotes on two-wheeled vehicles
towed by light motor vehicles. A total of 90 – 120 pigeons could be housed in
these structures and they were moved along the front in accordance with lo
gistical needs. The immobile dovecotes, on the other hand, were placed in
barns and lofts in places that were far away from the operations, and were
used to supply the mobile dovecotes with young, newly trained pigeons.
Their logistical support was mainly aimed at the ground forces, but they
were also present on ships, airplanes and submarines. In the case of attack,
they were sent to warn the headquarters of what had happened, carrying
messages with the coordinates and requests for back up and help. In many
cases they represented the soldiers’ last possibility of salvation. The pigeons
were very fast, resilient and, in their own way, fearless. They flew at a speed
of 40 km an hour and were able to travel up to 100 km without stopping,
bearing messages that were of vital importance and, thanks to their marvel
lous sense of direction, as they had shown during the Battle of La Marne in
1914, always returned to their dovecotes, even if they had been moved in the
meantime. In addition to delivering messages, they could also be used for
espionage when small cameras were attached to their breasts that had a self-
timer and could take pictures during their flight .
2
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Fig. 13.1: A miniature photographic camera placed under the belly of the traveling pigeons, ©
Bnf, Europeana Collections 1914-1918
Just like dogs, pigeons had a strategic military function so that precautionary
measures were introduced to protect them; these included being looked af
ter, a suitable diet, a total ban on their capture for food and anti-gas protec
tion measures. Any pigeons that were injured were treated and, of possible,
looked after by sanitary or veterinary staff when present.
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61
Fig. 13.2: Anti-gas box for 15 carrier pigeons, Trento, © ÖNB, Europeana Collections
1914-1918
Around 200,000 pigeons were enlisted in the Great War, most of which died
on the field. They were considered to be a secret weapon and as such, were
fought against with equally lethal weapons – in this case snipers who were
trained specifically to shoot them down in flight. There is no trace of their
presence in history books although they too belong to the list of heroes.
1. M. Shaw,Animals and War, British Library,http://www.bl.uk/world-war-one/articles/ani
mals-and-war, C. N. Trueman,Pigeons And World War One, The History Learning Site, 16
Apr. 2015,http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/world-war-one/the-western-front-in-
world-war-one/animals-in-world-war-one/pigeons-and-world-war-one/,Pigeons militaires
et premiere guerre mondiale, Musée du pigeon voyager,http://www.museedupigeon.com/
pages/pigeons-militaires-et-premiere-guerre-mondiale.html.
2. M. Marchisio,G. Morei,L’impiego dei piccioni viaggiatori durante la Prima guerra mondiale, in
“Veterinaria Militare”, n. 12, 2007, pp. 541-542,http://www.ordiniveterinaripiemonte.it/
rivista/07n12/pdf/09.pdf.
62
14. Cher Ami, Mocker and Valiant
The most renowned hero was Cher Ami, who carried out twelve journeys
from Verdun to Rampont during the Meuse-Argonne offensive (September –
Novembe 1918), and managed to deliver all its messages successively.
Equally brave was Mocker who, despite having lost an eye and part of its
skull, managed to deliver the message that allowed the American army to
thwart the German attack (September 1918). The last one was Vaillant, the
courageous pigeon from Fort Vauz who, in June 1916, during the lengthy
siege of Verdun, kept communications open between the troops and head
quarters.
The use of pigeons in war was widespread and had a long tradition behind
it in Europe , so much so, that every army had its own contingents of hom
ing pigeons and staff to look after and train them but it was almost un
known in the United States. The use of pigeons by the British and French
troops made such an impression on General Pershing, the head of the Amer
ican forces that were sent to Europe to support the armies of the Triple En
tente in the spring of 1917, that he asked for a similar service to be intro
duced in the American army as well. It was no easy undertaking, also be
cause the acquisition of the birds needed for the divisions was very complex;
nevertheless, in February 1918 the service was organised and an American
contingent that was specialised in communication consisting of three offices,
118 soldiers and a couple of hundred pigeons was transferred to France. In
the Battle of Saint Mihiel (12-19 September 1918) 572 American pigeons were
needed, and one of them was Mocker; Cher Ami, on the other hand, belonged
to the contingent with 442 birds that was engaged in the Meuse-Argonne of
fensive .
Cher Ami is the most famous pigeon of the First World War and it was not
until it was embalmed that it was discovered it was a female. It was given to
the 77 infantry division of the American army by the English and, during
the period it was in action, it managed to deliver twelve messages of vital
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importance with success between the Verdun front and the headquarters in
Rampont; it thus cemented the soldiers’ friendship who called it by name
and relied on its service, having seen how reliable it was up to the last mis
sion, when it saved the “Lost Battalion” of its division. In October 1918, a
battalion belonging to the 77 division was surrounded by the Germans. Af
ter several days’ fighting, half of the battalion had been killed and food and
water rations sufficed for barely a day. In such conditions, resistance was
impossible, as was the idea of accepting the German’s request for surrender,
as the order had been to resist to the bitter end. The commanding officer’s
last hope was therefore Cher Ami. Struck repeatedly by enemy fire, despite
its injuries it managed to cover the distance of 40 kilometres that separated
the battalion from the headquarters in just 25 minutes, delivering the mes
sage that saved them. One bullet had hit Cher Ami in the breast while anoth
er had shot off a foot. It was General Pershing himself who organised its re
turn to the United States where it was treated, looked after and finally died
in June 1919 in Fort Monmouth (New Jersey). It was awarded the Distin
guished Service Cross by the American army and the French Croix de
Guerre for its bravery. Just like Stubby, Cher Ami’s body was also embalmed
and can still be seen today at the National Museum of American History in
Washington DC . The events in which it was protagonist were reconstructed
in 2001 in a made-for-television The Lost Battalion, directed by Russel Mulc
ahy and distributed around the world by 20 Century Fox Television.
Mocker, the embalmed body of whom is preserved in the U.S. Army Com
munications Electronics Museum in Fort Monmouth, was one of the long-
lived heroes of the First World War and did not die until 1937. While in ser
vice in France, it carried out no less than 52 missions, the last of which went
back to 12 September 1918, when the American push in the French sector of
Alsace-Lorrain was blocked by a heavy German attack. Mocker set out from
near Beaumont for the headquarters and, despite losing an eye and part of
its skull, managed to deliver the message with the coordinates, enabling the
American army to counter the enemy artillery and open a passageway to en
ter the German sector of the region. Awarded the Distinguished Service
Cross and the Croix de Guerre, Mocker was sent back to the United States
where he was treated and lived for another 19 years .
th
3
th
4
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Fig. 14.1: Postcard of Commander Raynal, 1916
Recruited in the French army, Vaillant was the last courageous pigeon that
Commanding Officer Raynal had to deliver the message that was to save
Fort Vaux from the siege of 4 June 1916. Fort Vaux was situated along the
right banks of the Meuse and had suffered a heavy German attack with gas;
most of the men had been seriously intoxicated if not killed, and the intense
smoke made visual communication with the fort in Souville behind the lines
65
impossible. The message, which Raynal attached to a ring on Vaillant’s leg
was desperate. This was also a testimony of the great difficulty in dealing
with toxic gas attacks, which occurred frequently on the Western Front: in
fact, one did not know how long they would have been able to resist, and
had no other means of communication. Despite the difficulties owing to the
smoke and exposure to the gas, Vaillant managed to reach its own dovecote,
albeit almost dead, and deliver the message that was to save Fort Vaux. It
survived and died at the age of 24 in 1939, in the same week that Command
ing Officer Raynal died. Vaillant received two awards for its bravery, the
Bague d’honneur and the Citation à l’ordre de la Nation, as well as the Croix de
Guerre. Its story was the inspiration for a famous French cartoon set in the
Second World War, called Vaillant, pigeon de combat .
1. Cfr. A. Salles,La colombophilie militaire. I. 1870-1918 Un drôle d’oiseau, and F. Calvet, J.-
P.Demonchaux, R. Lamand, G. Bornert,Une brève histoire de la colombophilie.
2. Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations and Plans - U.S. Army CECOM Life Cycle
Management Command,A history of Army communications and electronics at Fort Monmouth,
New Jersey, 1917-2007,https://openlibrary.org/books/OL22977787M/
A_history_of_Army_communications_and_electronics_at_Fort_Monmouth_New_Jersey_1917-2007.
3. A history of Army communications and electronics at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, 1917-2007,
andCher Ami,http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/nmah_425415.
4. A history of Army communications and electronics at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, 1917-2007, and
CECOM Historical Office - U.S. Army Live Blog,Mocker - Distiguished Pigeon,http://
cecomhistorian.armylive.dodlive.mil/2013/04/25/mocker-distinguished-pigeon/.
5. Pigeons militaires et premiere guerre mondiale, Musée du pigeon voyager,http://
www.museedupigeon.com/pages/pigeons-militaires-et-premiere-guerre-mondiale.html,
and F. Plancard, Vaillant, pigeon de combat,http://verdun-meuse.fr/images/files/
VaillantpigeondecombatER30072014.pdf.
5
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15. Instruments for in-depth study
Digital collections and databases
Europeana 1914-1918
Using the key word pigeons one accesses an iconographic collection that al
lows one to visualise both the systems that were developed to look after and
protect the pigeons, and to verify the strategic function and self-sacrifice
they showed whilst carrying out their tasks (see Ch. III, A Multimedia Guide).
1418 documenti e immagini della grande guerra
Starting with the sheet fotografie one accesses the page album fotografici
where, typing piccioni viaggiatori [homing pigeons] in the string parola da
cercare, one can see diverse images of military dovecotes.
BBC Schools World War One
On the page animals during the warthere is an entire section that is dedicat
ed to pigeons, including interesting didactic ideas.
British pathé
By doing a search for animals in war, one accesses period footage on mili
tary homing pigeons (see Ch. III. A Multimedia Guide).
Articles online
Florance Calvet, Jean-Paul Demonchaux, Régis Lamand, Gilles Bornert,
Une brève histoire de la colombophilie, in “Revue Historique des Armées”, n.
248, 2007, pp. 93-105, https://rha.revues.org/1403#tocto2n3
67
CECOM Historical Office - U.S. Army Live Blog, Mocker - Distiguished Pigeon,
http://cecomhistorian.armylive.dodlive.mil/2013/04/25/mocker-distin
guished-pigeon/
Cher Ami, http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/
nmah_425415
Mario Marchisio, Giovanni Morei, L’impiego dei piccioni viaggiatori durante
la Prima guerra mondiale, in “Veterinaria Militare”, n. 12, 2007, pp. 541-542,
http://www.ordiniveterinaripiemonte.it/rivista/07n12/pdf/09.pdf
Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations and Plans - U.S. Army CE
COM Life Cycle Management Command, A history of Army communications
and electronics at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey, 1917-2007,https://
openlibrary.org/books/OL22977787M/
A_history_of_Army_communications_and_electronics_at_Fort_Monmouth_New_Jersey_1917-2007
Pigeons militaires et premiere guerre mondiale, Musée du pigeon voyager,
http://www.museedupigeon.com/pages/pigeons-militaires-et-premiere-
guerre-mondiale.html
Frédéric Plancard, Vaillant, pigeon de combat, http://verdun-meuse.fr/im
ages/files/VaillantpigeondecombatER30072014.pdf
Matteo Rubboli, Cher Ami: il piccione che salvò 194 soldati volando senza una
gamba e un occhio nella battaglia delle Argonne, http://
www.vanillamagazine.it/cher-ami-il-piccione-che-salvo-194-uomini-volan
do-senza-una-gamba-e-un-occhio-nella-battaglia-delle-argonne/
Matthew Shaw, Animals and War, British Library, http://www.bl.uk/
world-war-one/articles/animals-and-war
C. N. Trueman, Pigeons And World War One, The History Learning Site, 16
Apr. 2015, http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/world-war-one/the-west
ern-front-in-world-war-one/animals-in-world-war-one/pigeons-and-world-
war-one/
68
16. Horses
Fig. 16.1: Men and horses of the Army Service Corps (ASC) undergoing an anti-gas
drill, somewhere in the UK, probably Aldershot © IWM (Q 34105)
Horses are probably the most well known animals in the collective imagina
tion, owing to their sensitivity and shyness, as well as their delicate nature
despite their impressive physique. Nevertheless, they have been a constant
presence in armies every since 2000 – 1000 BC, when the cavalry presumably
originated. Over the centuries, and in the nineteenth and beginning of the
twentieth century in particular, on the one hand technical-scientific progress
had strengthened armies, giving them increasingly sophisticated weapons,
whilst on the other, it contributed to the slaughter of these animals. It was no
coincidence that today the confiscation of horses by military authorities is re
garded as a real act of war against these animals, and after the Great War
they were no longer recruited.
69
The Crimean War and the Franco-Prussian War had already shown just how
dire the consequences of technological war was on horses and it was precise
ly these experiences that led to the beginning of activities such as the cre
ation of the British Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
(RSPCA), with an official letter to the contenders in the field, asking them to
show greater compassion, introducing a corps of officers-butchers in their
armies with the task of putting to an end the suffering of injured animals,
and removing their bodies from the battle field. At the end of the twentieth
century, growing sensitivity towards animal suffering began to make itself
felt in public opinion. All the European countries reacted differently but a
powerful movement emerged in Great Britain where, in 1902 for example,
public opinion was so reviled after having learnt that the most common
memory of Anglo-Boer veterans was the terrible groans of injured horses
and the pain they felt at having to abandon them, that a parliamentary in
quest became necessary; the following year this then led to the establishment
of the Army Veterinary Corps .
Fig. 16.1:
Captured Italians bury horses lying on the street, 1917 © ÖNB, Europeana Collection
1914-1918
1
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In the First World War over 10,000,000 horses died. Enlisted in equal num
bers to the soldiers, the central empires had to rely almost exclusively on
horses that had been bred in Central Europe, in particular Hungary and
Czechoslovakia; and after the first battles, when the horse divisions had
been decimated, the only animals they were able to replace them with were
requisitioned in Belgium, French territories and to the est in Ukraine. The
Entente allies, however, were able to count on a supply of horses from Cana
da, the United States and Australia.
Life expectancy at the front was ten days at the most. In addition to the deci
mation suffered in battle, for example those on the Western Front and, dur
ing the early stages of the war, with the operations of the Russian cavalry to
conquer German territory, the horses also fell victim to the perils of trench
warfare and their own sensitivity. The extreme weather conditions and ex
plosions caused them to react in ways that were difficult to control, so that
they often had to be killed to avoid endangering the safety of the soldiers
around them; in addition, exposure to enemy machine-gun fire, asphyxiat
ing gas and barbed wire resulted in injuries that left them without hope. As
the war and immobility on the fronts continued, their military function was
limited to behind the lines, to transferring soldiers and pieces of artillery as
well as provisions. This reduction of operativeness resulted in terrible living
conditions, including scarce amounts of food that was often rotten, and of
water, which was often polluted.
This does not mean that no measures were taken to guarantee any treatment
they might need. On all the fronts, but on the Western Front in particular
and, to a certain extent in Palestine, the British veterinary corps showed out
standing commitment and the RSPCA was extremely active in raising the
funds needed to equip veterinary hospitals on the field, to purchase ambu
lances, medicine, fodder, as well as guaranteeing the convalescence of in
jured animals.
Organisations such as the Blue Cross also benefitted from these resources,
fitting out veterinary hospitals in French territory for the treatment and re
habilitation of the horses, although the possibility of life and recovery for
these animals was minimal.
71
Nevertheless, the protective measures did not suffice to save the horses from
the violence of their own comrades-in-arms. In some cases, the violence was
unconscious, dictated by foolhardiness or naivety of actions; one example is
that regarding the protective measures and treatment for gas exposure. The
first measures that were applied to protect the horses from gas fumes were
rather rudimental and extremely painful. It consisted in tampons that were
inserted in the horse’s nostrils and kept in place by sticking pins into their
nostrils. Later, when they realised that such a practise was not only fero
cious, but also futile as it had to be applied for a long time, the decision was
taken to use bags like the ones used for food, with equally disappointing re
sults: the horses would become restless because they were looking for food,
and when they did not find any, they would remove the protection bag. If
possible, the treatment for gas exposure was even worse. The horses that
had been exposed were treated to a daily dosage of arsenic, administered in
small quantities over an extended period of time. For logistical reasons, the
tablet containing the poison was added to the bag containing its food; as a
result, it often remained at the bottom, leading to the concrete risk that the
animal would be killed later, when the food had been finished and it ended
up swallowing a fatal quantity of arsenic .
In other cases it was a matter of premeditated violence that was often dictat
ed by events, and certainly unwarranted. There is no lack of testimonies of
soldiers killing the weaker animals so they had something to eat; likewise,
there are accounts of decisions taken at the top at the end of the war, to sell
the few surviving animals to the slaughterhouses near the demobilisation ar
eas . Nevertheless, the cruelty of war did not stop a very strong, reciprocal
bond developing between the soldier and horse. Very often one would see
the soldiers brave danger so that they could stay with their dying animals,
or horses that had gone mad with despair because they had lost their rider .
2
3
4
72
The experience of horses at the front has generally been neglected in histori
cal accounts that, by assimilating it with that of the military corps they be
longed to actually covered it up. However, their presence is mentioned in
the soldiers’ letters and diaries as well as in literature. The most vivid con
demnation of the atrocious and futile slaughter of millions of horses is to be
found on some of the pages of the heartbreaking novel All Quiet on the West
ern Front by the writer-soldier Erich M. Remarque.
1. M. Shaw,Animals and War, British Library,http://www.bl.uk/world-war-one/articles/ani
mals-and-war, C. N. Trueman,Horses In World War One, The History Learning Site, 16 Apr
2015, http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/world-war-one/the-western-front-in-world-
war-one/animals-in-world-war-one/horses-in-world-war-one/, and J. Cooper,Animals in
War, pp. 23-27.
2. J. Cooper,Animals in War, pp. 34-49.
3. L. Fabi,Guerra bestialeandIl bravo soldato mulo.
4. J. Cooper,Animals in War, pp. 34-36.
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17. Warrior
Very few horses survived the Great War, and of these even fewer had the
good fortune of growing old and dying serenely many years after the war
had ended. One such horse was Warrior, the horse that belonged to the
British general Jack Seely.
Many years after the war had ended, its story was to attract the attention of
the writer Michael Morpurgo and it was this that inspired the creation of the
protagonist of the novel for children, War Horse, published in 1982, in which
the narrator is the war horse, Joey, who describes his adventures at the front.
In turn, this novel inspired the same-named film by Steven Spielberg that
was released in 2011. However, the real story of Warrior was already well-
known immediately after the war thanks to the Canadian soldiers who de
scribed its legendary undertakings, thus contributing to its growing renown
with the English-speaking audience; it became so famous that in 1934 its
owner and handler, General Seely decided to write the biography My Horse
Warrior,
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Fig. 17.1: Troops of Royal Engineers taking their horses away after disembarkation in
France,© IWM (Q 33311)
75
Warrior arrived in France in August 1914 with General Seely, the comman
der of the British expedition corps. After an initial period, in February 1915 it
returned to Great Britain for a training period with the Canadian Corps Cav
alry, of which Seely had become the commander. After returning to France
two months later, it remained on the Western Front until Christmas 1918,
when it returned to the family house on the Isle of Wight, where it died at
the age of 33, in 1941. Warrior participated in some of the most important
battles that were fought on the Western Front, including the Battle of the
Somme in 1916 and that of Cambrai in 1918 and despite having sustained in
juries, it always returned to the front line, even when Seely had to stop and
receive treatment after having fallen victim to a gas attack. It stood out for its
intrepidity on the field, always remaining at its handler’s side and the Cana
dian comrades-in arms helped increase its fame by giving it the nickname
“the horse that the Germans were unable to kill”. Although its experience
was renowned, it was not until 2014 that Warrior was awarded the People’s
Dispensary for Sick Animals (PDSA) Dickin Medal in its memory, for having
distinguished itself 100 years after the events in which it had been a protago
nist .
1. K. Perry,Heroic First World War Horse Warrior Receives ‘Animal Victoria Cross’, The Telegraph,
2 Sept 2014,http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/world-war-one/11069681/Heroic-First-
World-War-horse-Warrior-receives-animal-Victoria-Cross.html
1
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18. Instruments for in-depth study
Digital collections and databases
Europeana 1914-1918
Typing the key-word horses it is possible to access over 1,000 photographs
and prints. Nine images were chosen for this e-Book (see Ch. III, A Multime
dia Guide) to highlight the phases of mobilisation and training, the activities
carried out by the horses in transport and supplies, injured horses being res
cued and treated by the veterinary services on the field, as well as other
episodes regarding their death and burial.
1418 documenti e immagini della grande guerra
Following the link fotografie, album fotografici, one only has to type the word
cavalleria in the line parola da cercare to see more than 800 documents, in
cluding photographs and printed postcards, all of which are dedicated to
war horses, and not just those that fought on the Italian front.
BBC Schools World War One
It has both a special space for war horses on the pageAnimals during the
war, and for the in-depth study by Matt Baker, “Who were the real war
horses of WW1?”.
Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals eBlue Cross Society
These are the websites of the two biggest British organisations, which helped
organise the veterinary sanitary service during the war.
British pathé
77
By doing a search for animals in war, one can access a period film clip about
a Blue Cross hospital (see: Ch. III. A Multimedia Guide).
Warrior. A Real War Horse
A website dedicated to the war horse “that the Germans were unable to
kill”.
Articles online
Keith Perry, Heroic First World War horse Warrior receives ‘animal Victoria
Cross’, The Telegraph, 2 Sept 2014, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/
world-war-one/11069681/Heroic-First-World-War-horse-Warrior-receives-
animal-Victoria-Cross.html
Macri Puricelli, Eroe dimenticato: il cavallo nella Prima Guerra Mondiale, D La
Repubblica Blog, 30 aprile 2015, http://zoelagatta-
d.blogautore.repubblica.it/2015/04/30/eroe-dimenticato-il-cavallo-nella-
prima-guerra-mondiale/
Jill Reilly, Warrior, the Real ‘War Horse’ the Germans couldn’t kill - who braved
the bullets, barbed wire and shell fire of World War I, http://
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2080962/Warrior-REAL-War-Horse-
braved-bullets-barbed-wire-shell-World-War-I.html
Emily Upton, The Horses of World War I, Today I Found Out, 7 Mar 2014,
http://www.todayifoundout.com/index.php/2014/03/horses-world-war/
New Zealand’s First World War Horses, Ministry for Culture and Heritage, 8
Nov. 2016, https://nzhistory.govt.nz/war/nz-first-world-war-horses
Matthew Shaw, Animals and War, British Library, http://www.bl.uk/
world-war-one/articles/animals-and-war
C. N. Trueman, Horses In World War One, The History Learning Site, 16 Apr
2015, http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/world-war-one/the-western-
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19. A Multimedia Guide
Inspired by the principles of new historical ethology as outlined in the stud
ies by Éric Baratay, the aim of this multimedia guide is to contribute to the
historical accounts of the Great War from the perspective of the animals that
took part, in the belief that they, as the subjects of narratable biographies,
can enable a more comprehensive reconstruction of the events. Information
regarding the physiological and behavioural reactions of the animals in a
given situation can be traced, as explained in the first chapter, in the papers
and images produced by the men who had the opportunity to observe and
describe them. To overcome any inadequacies, multiple sources need to be
crosschecked, for example photographs, period film clips, articles and es
says, websites, documentaries and films, with the objective of bringing back
to the fore what has remained in the background for far too long.
Photographic resources
The following iconographic selection derives fromEuropeana 1914-1918.
The selected images are copyright free.
Homing pigeons
Gas protection box for 15 carrier pigeons in Trento
Pilot receives carrier pigeons
Carrier pigeons inside the pigeon wagon
Carrier pigeon station on the Italian front
Attaching a dispatch on a carrier pigeon
Postcard from Commandant Raynal, 1916
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Military dogs
View of war-dogs pulling a cart for electric hand-lamps, Dornberk
Column of dogs with sledge, probably Dolomite front, Trentino
Column of dogs on the Isonzo front
Hauling dogs at work in Krupy, Russia
Dog-drawn cart, probably Kimplong, on the border to Romania
Horses
Operation on a Cossack horse, East Galizia
Operation on a horse, Equestrian Clinic 102, Klagenfurt
Captured Italians bury the horses lying on the street, probably in the area
between Pontebba and Tolmezzo
Pack animals, probably near Podhajce, Galicia
In loyal service, probably near Oporzec, Galicia
Arabian stallion from the stud-farm; Galicia
On the road to Gorizia
Austrian troops in Görz
Mobilization and requisition of horses, Multilingual Manifesto, Bruxelles
Period film clips
The following period film clips selection derives from the cross-media
siteBritish Pathé.
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Real dogs of war - French army dogs
French army dogs find wounded
French listening patrols take dogs along the front
Oldest flying corps - Army pigeons
Blue Cross Hospital
Army Veterinary Corps
Horse breaking by american cowboy soldiers
Online articles and essays
This selection is useful to contextualise the sources.
Archives départementales du Cher, Les animaux pendant la Première Guerre
mondiale, http://www.archives18.fr/arkotheque/client/ad_cher/
_depot_arko/articles/1016/les-animaux-pendant-la-premiere-guerre-
mondiale_doc.pdf
Didier Arnold, Le chien et l’artilleur, Pataud et Louis Bedu, Archives départe
mentales et patrimoine du Cher, http://www.archives18.fr/article.php?
laref=825&titre=le-chien-et-l-artilleur-pataud-et-louis-bedu
Éric Baratay, La Grande Guerre des animaux, “CNRS Le journal”, 27.05.2014,
https://lejournal.cnrs.fr/billets/la-grande-guerre-des-animaux
Éric Baratay, Pour une histoire éthologique et une éthologie historique, in “Études
rurales, n. 189/1, 2012, pp. 91-106, https://etudesrurales.revues.org/9596
Florance Calvet, Jean-Paul Demonchaux, Régis Lamand, Gilles Bornert,
Une brève histoire de la colombophilie, in “Revue Historique des Armées”, n.
248, 2007, pp. 93-105,http://journals.openedition.org/rha/1403
82
CECOM Historical Office - U.S. Army Live Blog, Mocker - Distiguished Pigeon,
http://cecomhistorian.armylive.dodlive.mil/2013/04/25/mocker-distin
guished-pigeon/
Cher Ami, http://americanhistory.si.edu/collections/search/object/
nmah_425415
Fabiola Collabolletta, L’impiego degli animali sui teatri di guerra, in “Euno
mia”, IV, n. 2, 2015, pp. 607-612, http://siba-ese.unisalento.it/index.php/
eunomia/article/viewFile/15751/13654
Walter A. Dyer, Bally Shannon - Dog of War, in “Country Life”, November
1918, http://www.irishwolfhounds.org/ballyshannon.htm
Rebecca Frankel, Dogs at War: Three-Legged Dog Delivers Crucial Message in
WWI, http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/05/140516-dogs-
war-canines-soldiers-troops-army-military/
Oscar Grazioli, Quegli eroi bestiali che si fecero onore nella Grande Guerra, “Il
Giornale.it”, 06 settembre 2014, http://www.ilgiornale.it/news/politica/
quegli-eroi-bestiali-che-si-fecero-onore-nella-grande-guerra-1049512.html
Kate Kelly, World War I and a Remarkable Messenger Dog,https://
americacomesalive.com/2013/07/31/national-mutts-day-july-31-a-brave-
and-remarkable-messenger-dog/
Warren Manger, Satan the messenger dog who helped Allies turn tide of Great
War remembered 100 years on,http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/
satan-messenger-dog-who-helped-7404457
Mario Marchisio, Giovanni Morei, L’impiego dei piccioni viaggiatori durante
la Prima guerra mondiale, in “Veterinaria Militare”, n. 12, 2007, pp. 541-542,
http://www.ordiniveterinaripiemonte.it/rivista/07n12/pdf/09.pdf
Museo Civico del Risorgimento di Bologna, Animali al fronte. Protagonisti os
curi della Grande Guerra, http://www.storiaememoriadibologna.it/files/
vecchio_archivio/prima-guerra/a/Animali.pdf
83
Museo Roccavilla, Gli animali nella Prima Guerra Mondiale, http://
www.museoroccavilla.it/wp/wp-content/uploads/2015/03/GLI-ANI
MALI-NELLA-PRIMA-GUERRA-MONDIALE-.pdf
Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations and Plans - U.S. Army CE
COM Life Cycle Management Command, A history of Army communications
and electronics at Fort Monmmouth, New Jersey, 1917-2007, chapter 1: The Begin
ning and World War I,https://openlibrary.org/books/OL22977787M/
A_history_of_Army_communications_and_electronics_at_Fort_Monmouth_New_Jersey_1917-2007
Maryvonne Ollivry, Bêtes de tranchées, héros silencieux, http://
www.parismatch.com/Actu/Societe/Guerre-de-14-Betes-de-tranchees-
heros-silencieux-557970
Frédéric Plancard, Vaillant, pigeon de combat,http://verdun-meuse.fr/im
ages/files/VaillantpigeondecombatER30072014.pdf
Keith Perry, Heroic First World War horse Warrior receives ‘animal Victoria
Cross’, The Telegraph, 2 Sept 2014, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/
world-war-one/11069681/Heroic-First-World-War-horse-Warrior-receives-
animal-Victoria-Cross.html
Pigeons militaires et premiere guerre mondiale, Musée du pigeon voyager,
http://www.museedupigeon.com/pages/pigeons-militaires-et-premiere-
guerre-mondiale.html
Macri Puricelli, Eroe dimenticato: il cavallo nella Prima Guerra Mondiale, “D La
Repubblica Blog”, 30 aprile 2015, http://zoelagatta-
d.blogautore.repubblica.it/2015/04/30/eroe-dimenticato-il-cavallo-nella-
prima-guerra-mondiale/
Jill Reilly, Warrior, the Real ‘War Horse’ the Germans couldn’t kill - who braved
the bullets, barbed wire and shell fire of World War I, http://
www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2080962/Warrior-REAL-War-Horse-
braved-bullets-barbed-wire-shell-World-War-I.html
84
Alexander Robertson, Revealed: How a messenger dog called Satan dodged Ger
man fire in a gas mask to help Aliied forces turn the tide in one of the Great war's
bloodiest battles,http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3456252/How-
messenger-dog-called-Satan-dodged-German-fire-gas-mask-help-Allied-
forces-turn-tide-one-Great-War-s-bloodiest-battles.html
Matteo Rubboli, Cher Ami: il piccione che salvò 194 soldati volando senza una
gamba e un occhio nella battaglia delle Argonne,http://
www.vanillamagazine.it/cher-ami-il-piccione-che-salvo-194-uomini-volan
do-senza-una-gamba-e-un-occhio-nella-battaglia-delle-argonne/
Matthew Shaw, Animals and War, British Library, http://www.bl.uk/
world-war-one/articles/animals-and-war
Joe Shute, Dogs of war: the unsung heroes of the trenches, The Telegraph, 29
Oct. 2014, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/history/world-war-one/11195378/
Dogs-of-war-the-unsung-heroes-of-the-trenches.html
Mark Strauss, These Are the Brave and Fluffy Cats Who Served in World War I,
“GizMondo”, 22 August 2014, http://io9.gizmodo.com/a-gallery-of-cats-
who-served-in-world-war-i-1624713212
Maria Grazia Suriano, “Will this terrible possibility become a fact?”. Il progresso
scientifico applicato alla guerra nella riflessione di Gertrude Woker e Kathleen Lons
dale , in "Dep. Deportate, Esuli, Profughe", n. 35, 2017, pp. 26-41,http://
www.unive.it/media/allegato/dep/n35/02_Suriano_modello.pdf
Maria Grazia Suriano, Annalisa Zabonati, Animali di trincea e di guerra, in
“Dep. Deportate, esuli, profughe”, n. 31, 2016, pp. 293-300, http://
www.unive.it/media/allegato/dep/
n31_2016/020_Animali_di_trincea_modello.pdf
Nick Tarver, World War One: The circus animals that helped Britain, BBC News,
11 November 2013, http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-24745705