JF Ptak Science Books Quick Post
A bit of calm, or at least a bit of a place that could not be reached by shells or bullets, was found bellow ground in the cellars of Douaumont Fort, in Verdun. These images were made at the very end of 1916, and published in The Illustrated London News for 13 January 1917. These images show another side of that battle, of soldiers meeting for religious services and for medical attention in the cellars ("...the subterranean, vaulted, stone-built casements, deep underground beyond possibility of penetration by the heaviest bomb") of one of the barrier-forts surrounding Verdun, Douaumont.
The Battle of Verdun was an enormous maelstrom, a meatgrinder of a battle that lasted 9 months, 3 weeks and 6 days from 21 February to 18 December 1916. In the end, after 30 million rounds of shells had been fired, the French found a victory, at the cost of 336,000 killed in action (with the Germans losing 362,000 KIA).
And its detail:
And a religious service:
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