09 August 2014

Start of the Great War: British troops in France

A century ago on this date, 9 August 1914, the first Britain troops landed in France, at Boulogue and Le Havre. It's sometimes forgotten that over 33,000 UK servicemen were killed in 1914, before any Canadian troops landed in France.

2 comments:

M. Diane Rogers said...

Not sure what prompts your comment, John. It was not Canada's war, but having been pressed in, we surely got there as fast as we could. And many (most?) decisions about timing, training, deployment, strategy, etc. were not ours to make.
Back to the beginnnings - here is an article about 'the first shot' of 1914: http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwone/firstshot_01.shtml

JDR said...

Diane - I was not aware there was such a large loss of life in the early months of the war before Canada's troops arrived in France. Perhaps that's my ignorance!
As to it not being Canada's war - that was not the attitude of Canada's government of the day nor the tens of thousands who joined up for the CEF.