The First World War In 100 Objects

From the iconic to the intimate, each object is illustrated and accompanied by the story of its role within the war and its significance today

Objects allow us to reach out and touch the past and they play a living role in history today. Through them we can understand the experience of men and women during World War I. They bear witness to the stories of men whose only morning comfort in the trenches was the rum ration, children who grew up with only one photograph of the father that they would never get to know, and women who would sacrifice their girlhood in hospitals yards from the frontline, pinning a brooch on to remind themselves of a past life. Weapons like the machine gun and vehicles like the tank transformed the battlefield; planes with pilots that had just learned to fly them entangled in dogfights far above the barbed wire of the frontline; and German submarines stalked the seas. These incredible artifacts tell the story of the World War I in a whole new light, as do the Football of Loos, the Mk I tank, the German Pickelhaube, Canadian cap badges, the "Butcher" bayonet, a trench coat, a soldier's Christmas gift, a death card, and many more.

Peter Doyle is a military historian and geologist specializing in battlefield terrain. He is the author of The British Soldier of the Second World War and World War II in Numbers.