World War One (Part 2)
World War One: Battle on the Somme
Historical Events
- 1918-07-18 World War I: US and French forces launch Aisne-Marne offensive
- 1918-07-19 World War I: German armies retreat across Marne River in France
- 1918-08-02 Japan announces that it is deploying troops to Siberia in the aftermath of World War I
Event of Interest
1918-08-05 World War I: the last German air raid on England occurs, with four Zeppelin airships dropping bombs in the Midlands and North East England
Ferdinand von Zeppelin
- 1918-08-06 Ferdinand Foch becomes Marshal of France during WWI
- 1918-08-06 World War I: Second Battle of the Marne ends
- 1918-08-08 World War I: The Allies launch the Hundred Days Offensive, beginning with the Battle of Amiens where 500 tanks and 10 Allied divisions attacked German lines
- 1918-08-12 WWI: Allies defeat Germans at the Battle of Amiens - the last great battle on the Western Front
- 1918-08-20 WWI: Britain opens offensive on Western front
- 1918-09-12 WWI: US forces launch an attack on German-occupied St Mihiel
- 1918-09-14 WWI: Austria-Hungary sends a note to the Allies requesting peace discussions, but the Allies reject the offer
- 1918-09-26 Beginning of the Meuse-Argonne Offensive, more than 1 million American soldiers in the largest and most costly offensive of WWI
- 1918-09-29 WWI: Allied forces scored a decisive breakthrough of Hindenburg Line
Event of Interest
1918-10-01 World War I: Arab forces under T. E. Lawrence ("Lawrence of Arabia") capture Damascus
T. E. Lawrence
End of World War I
1918-10-20 In order to secure a WWI armistice, Germany agrees to further concessions
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- 1918-10-30 WWI: Turkey signs an armistice with the Allies, agreeing to end hostilities at noon on 31 October
- 1918-11-06 WWI: On the Western Front, Germany is now retreating as French and American troops cross the Meuse and move to take Sedan
- 1918-11-07 United Press erroneously reports WWI armistice had been signed
Event of Interest
1918-11-09 Emperor Wilhelm II abdicates after German defeat in World War I
Wilhelm II
- 1918-11-09 Following the collapse of Germany in World War I, the Weimar Republic of Germany is proclaimed
The War's Over, But Don't Get Too Excited
1918-11-11 WWI Armistice signed by the Allies and Germany comes into effect and World War I hostilities end at 11am, "the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month"
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- 1919-01-18 The Paris peace conference (aka the Versailles peace conference) opens to draw up the treaties formally ending the Great War (WWI)
- 1919-04-05 Antwerp is officially declared the host city for the Games of the 7th Olympiad to be conducted in 1920; first post WWI Olympics
- 1919-05-08 Edward George Honey first proposes the idea of a moment of silence to commemorate The Armistice of World War I, leads to the creation of Remembrance Day
- 1919-06-28 Treaty of Versailles, ending WWI and establishing the League of Nations, is signed in France
- 1919-07-19 Following Peace Day celebrations marking the end of World War I, ex-servicemen rioted and burnt down Luton Town Hall.
- 1922-03-15 France, which up until now has insisted on currency for all WWI reparation payments from Germany, now accepts raw materials as payment
- 1922-10-06 The great powers of the first world war withdraw from Istanbul
- 1924-08-29 Germany's Reichstag approves the Dawes Plan, which sought to solve the WWI reparations problem
Event of Interest
1929-06-27 President Paul von Hindenburg refuses to pay German debt of WWI
Paul von Hindenburg
- 1929-08-06 Young Plan, which sought to settle German reparations debts after World War I, is agreed
Event of Interest
1929-08-31 Committee chaired by Owen D. Young finalizes the "Young Plan" to reduce German reparations from World War I to 112 billion Gold Marks ($US8 billion) paid over 59 years
Owen D. Young
- 1932-05-29 The Bonus Army of World War I veterans begins to assemble in Washington, D.C. to request cash bonuses promised to them to be paid in 1945.
- 1932-06-17 Bonus Army: around a thousand World War I veterans amass at the United States Capitol as the US Senate considers a bill that would give them certain benefits
- 1932-07-20 In Washington, D.C., police fire tear gas on World War I veterans part of the Bonus Expeditionary Force who attempt to march to the White House
Event of Interest
1932-07-28 US President Herbert Hoover uses federal troops to evict the Bonus Army (WWI veterans and their families) from their encampment, 4 die
Herbert Hoover
- 1932-07-29 Great Depression: in Washington, D.C., U.S. troops disperse the last of the "Bonus Army" of World War I veterans
Event of Interest
1933-01-30 After Paul von Hindenburg appoints Adolf Hitler as Chancellor of Germany, his former WWI colleague General Erich Ludendorff sends a letter to him stating "this accursed man will cast our Reich into the abyss and bring our nation to inconceivable misery"
Erich Ludendorff
Adolf Hitler
Paul von Hindenburg
Event of Interest
1940-07-11 Marshall Philippe Pétain, French hero of World War I, becomes head of the Vichy collaborationist government of France
Philippe Pétain
- 2015-04-25 100 year anniversary of the Gallipoli Peninsula landings in Turkey by ANZAC forces during WWI
- 2017-07-30 1st centenary of WWI Battle of Passchendaele marked at ceremony at Menin Gate in Ypres, Belgium
- 2018-11-11 On centenary of WWI Armistice Day French President Macron urges world to reject Nationalism in speech to under Arc de Triomphe in Paris