Read Online World War One: History in an Hour by Rupert Colley - Free Book Online
Authors: Rupert Colley
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Vehemently opposed to the Weimar Republic, Ludendorff took part in the failed Kapp putsch of 1920, and Hitler’s Munich putsch three years later. Tried for his role in Munich, Ludendorff was acquitted.
In 1924, Ludendorff took a seat in the Reichstag representing the Nazi party. In 1925, he stood for president against his old ally, Hindenburg, but fared poorly. Keeping his seat in the Reichstag but increasingly senile and disapproving of Hitler, he became an embarrassment to the Nazis, and in 1928 obligingly retired.
Woodrow Wilson 1856–1924
Born in Virginia to a slave-owning Presbyterian minister, Woodrow Wilson became the first Southern US president since Andrew Johnson in 1869. He was elected the twenty-eighth US president in 1911, Wilson, a Democrat, was determined to maintain American neutrality during the war. He was re-elected in 1916 with the slogan ‘He kept us out of the war’. Germany’s policy of unrestricted submarine warfare, which cost American lives, together with the exposure of the Zimmermann Telegram, forced the President’s hand. In April 1917, he sought Congress’ mandate to declare war on Germany, a course necessary to make the ‘world safer for democracy’.
Woodrow Wilson, 1912
Library of Congress
In January 1918, Wilson, in another address to Congress, introduced his Fourteen Points, a blueprint for a post-war peace that would avoid overly punitive terms on a vanquished Germany and her allies. The establishment of a body to act as an international arbitrator, the League of Nations, was also core to Wilson’s philosophy.
By the time the Paris Peace Conference finished in January 1920, not much of the Fourteen Points remained and the terms imposed on Germany in the Treaty of Versailles were indeed punitive. The League of Nations however did become a reality, its inaugural assembly taking place on the last day of the conference. However, there was no representation from the US.
Despite receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 1919, Wilson returned to America to find much opposition to the treaty both from isolationists and Republicans. While touring the nation, trying to garner support, Wilson suffered the first of several strokes. Paralyzed on his left side and blind in one eye, Wilson effectively retired from his duties but remained in office until the election of November 1920.
Wilson’s successor in the White House, Republican Warren Harding, neither allowed the US to join the League of Nations or to ratify the Treaty of Versailles. Wilson died on 3 February 1924, aged sixty-seven.
Edith Cavell 1865–1915
When the Great War broke out, Edith Cavell had been working as a matron in a Brussels nursing school since 1907. Following the German occupation of the city, Cavell hid refugee British soldiers and provided over 200 of them the means to escape into neutral Netherlands. Arrested on 3 August 1915, Cavell readily admitted her guilt.
Her case became a cause célèbre . The British government, realizing the Germans were acting within their own legality, was unable to intervene. However, the US, as neutrals, pointed to Cavell’s nursing credentials and her saving of the lives of German soldiers, as well as British, but to no avail. The nurse was found guilty and sentenced to be shot.
Edith Cavell
On the evening before her execution, Cavell was visited by an army chaplain. She told him, ‘Patriotism is not enough. I must have no hatred or bitterness towards anyone.’ The words are inscribed on Cavell’s statue, near Trafalgar Square in London.
On 12 October 1915, facing the firing squad, Cavell said, ‘My soul, as I believe, is safe, and I am glad to die for my country’. The British made propaganda capital out of the nurse’s execution, stoking up anti-German feeling by exploiting the idea of a gentle nurse slaughtered by the German barbarian. The German foreign secretary, Alfred Zimmermann, expressed pity for Cavell but added that she had been ‘judged
In 1924, Ludendorff took a seat in the Reichstag representing the Nazi party. In 1925, he stood for president against his old ally, Hindenburg, but fared poorly. Keeping his seat in the Reichstag but increasingly senile and disapproving of Hitler, he became an embarrassment to the Nazis, and in 1928 obligingly retired.
Woodrow Wilson 1856–1924
Born in Virginia to a slave-owning Presbyterian minister, Woodrow Wilson became the first Southern US president since Andrew Johnson in 1869. He was elected the twenty-eighth US president in 1911, Wilson, a Democrat, was determined to maintain American neutrality during the war. He was re-elected in 1916 with the slogan ‘He kept us out of the war’. Germany’s policy of unrestricted submarine warfare, which cost American lives, together with the exposure of the Zimmermann Telegram, forced the President’s hand. In April 1917, he sought Congress’ mandate to declare war on Germany, a course necessary to make the ‘world safer for democracy’.
Woodrow Wilson, 1912
Library of Congress
In January 1918, Wilson, in another address to Congress, introduced his Fourteen Points, a blueprint for a post-war peace that would avoid overly punitive terms on a vanquished Germany and her allies. The establishment of a body to act as an international arbitrator, the League of Nations, was also core to Wilson’s philosophy.
By the time the Paris Peace Conference finished in January 1920, not much of the Fourteen Points remained and the terms imposed on Germany in the Treaty of Versailles were indeed punitive. The League of Nations however did become a reality, its inaugural assembly taking place on the last day of the conference. However, there was no representation from the US.
Despite receiving the Nobel Peace Prize in 1919, Wilson returned to America to find much opposition to the treaty both from isolationists and Republicans. While touring the nation, trying to garner support, Wilson suffered the first of several strokes. Paralyzed on his left side and blind in one eye, Wilson effectively retired from his duties but remained in office until the election of November 1920.
Wilson’s successor in the White House, Republican Warren Harding, neither allowed the US to join the League of Nations or to ratify the Treaty of Versailles. Wilson died on 3 February 1924, aged sixty-seven.
Edith Cavell 1865–1915
When the Great War broke out, Edith Cavell had been working as a matron in a Brussels nursing school since 1907. Following the German occupation of the city, Cavell hid refugee British soldiers and provided over 200 of them the means to escape into neutral Netherlands. Arrested on 3 August 1915, Cavell readily admitted her guilt.
Her case became a cause célèbre . The British government, realizing the Germans were acting within their own legality, was unable to intervene. However, the US, as neutrals, pointed to Cavell’s nursing credentials and her saving of the lives of German soldiers, as well as British, but to no avail. The nurse was found guilty and sentenced to be shot.
Edith Cavell
On the evening before her execution, Cavell was visited by an army chaplain. She told him, ‘Patriotism is not enough. I must have no hatred or bitterness towards anyone.’ The words are inscribed on Cavell’s statue, near Trafalgar Square in London.
On 12 October 1915, facing the firing squad, Cavell said, ‘My soul, as I believe, is safe, and I am glad to die for my country’. The British made propaganda capital out of the nurse’s execution, stoking up anti-German feeling by exploiting the idea of a gentle nurse slaughtered by the German barbarian. The German foreign secretary, Alfred Zimmermann, expressed pity for Cavell but added that she had been ‘judged
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