British Tank of the earliest type, as used at Cambrai.
German land battleship captured in 1918 on the western front.
Improved French Tank first used in Champagne in 1918.
TYPES OF LAND BATTLESHIPS DEVELOPED BY ALLIES AND GERMANS
Included in the heavy artillery are guns and howitzers of larger caliber than the 75 millimeter. Three distinct and terrifying noises accompany explosions of these guns. First, there is the explosion when the shell leaves the gun; then there is the peculiar rattling noise like the passing of a railway train when the shells pass overhead; then there is the explosion at point of contact, a terrific concussion which produces the human condition called “shell shock,” a derangement of body and brain, paralyzing nerve and muscle centers and frequently producing insanity.
The railroad artillery comprises huge guns pulled on railways by locomotives, each gun having a number of cars as part of its equipment. These are slow-firing guns of great power and hurling the largest projectiles known to warfare. The largest guns of this class were produced by American inventive genius as a reply to the German gun of St. Gobain Forest. This was a weapon which hurled a nine-inch shell from a distance of 62 miles into the heart of Paris. The damage done by it was comparatively slight and it had no appreciable effect upon the morale of the Parisians.
Its greatest damage was when it struck the Roman Catholic Church of St. Gervais on Good Friday, March 29, 1918, killing seventy-five persons and wounding ninety. Fifty-four of those killed were women, five being Americans. The total effect of the bombardment by this big gun was to arouse France, England and America to a fiercer fighting pitch. The late Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York, expressed this sentiment, when he sent the following message to the Archbishop of Paris:
Shocked by the brutal killing of innocent victims gathered at religious services to commemorate the passing of our blessed Saviour on Good Friday, the Catholics of New York join your noble protest against this outrage of the sanctuary on such a day and at such an hour and, expressing their sympathy to the bereaved relatives of the dead and injured, pledge their unfaltering allegiance in support of the common cause that unites our two great republics. May God bless the brave officers and men of the allied armies in their splendid defense of liberty and justice!
Trench artillery are Stokes guns and other mortars hurling aerial torpedoes containing great quantities of high explosives. These have curved trajectories and are effective not only against trenches but also against deep dugouts, wire entanglements and listening posts.
One of the most important details of modern warfare is that of communication or liaison on the battlefield. This is accomplished by runners recruited from the trenches, by dogs, pigeons, telephone, radio, signalling lamps, rockets, but above all by airplanes using radio. These communications between air and earth are of course not as exact nor as general by night as they are by day, but even at night the airplane plays its important part in liaison.