Seite - 834 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918
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834 Camps
data was used not only to quantify suffering but also to express particularly inhumane
conduct, victories, defeats, bravery and cowardice in figures.
Scarcely any of the members of the Imperial and Royal Army will have given serious
thought in July 1914 to what would happen if they were taken prisoner. There were
hardly any codes of conduct for such an eventuality. When the predominantly Czech
Imperial and Royal Infantry Regiment No. 75 in Salzburg was mobilised, the possibil-
ity of captivity was broached during an officers’ discussion. The regimental commander,
Colonel Wiedstruck, argued that, since nothing good could be expected of the Serbs,
every officer should carry a dose of poison with him. Hardly anyone took this seriously,
however, and thus went to war without any thoughts of being taken prisoner, and
without poison.1984 Depending on the course of the fighting, the leadership and the de-
votedness of the officers and the troops, a greater or smaller number of soldiers fell into
enemy hands. None of the regiments deployed escaped such losses. What then took
place in countless variations was described by Wenzel Ruzicka of the aforementioned
Infantry Regiment No. 75 : if one fell unwounded into the hands of the Serbs, a march
away from the direction of the front began that lasted for hours. Frequently, one was
‘relieved’ of one’s cash and, to a greater of lesser extent, one’s valuables : watches, money,
gaiters. Then the march continued for days. The men slept in the open air and the of-
ficers on the floor of some form of accommodation. Occasionally, it was possible – for
those with money – to buy something. The food was very poor. Whilst en route, the
respective paths crossed of the prisoners of war and Serbian refugees fleeing from the
Imperial and Royal troops, who had been advancing since November 1914. The fail-
ure of the third offensive against Serbia in December allowed most of the refugees to
return home. For the prisoners of war, the march continued southwards to the labour
camps, since the prisoners of war were to be put to work as soon as possible, primarily
in the construction of roads. On 21 December, Ruzicka learned the fate of the mem-
bers of his company and ‘how badly off our men are. The accommodation is so crowded
that there are scuffles over the places on an evening ! The night is passed on some straw,
without blankets. The vermin is out of control. The mortality rate is high : twice a week
the men receive some meat, and otherwise half a portion of bread and 15 grams of
bacon.’ Then the division according to nationalities took place. Hungarian- and Ger-
man-speaking soldiers were deployed in the construction of roads and railways. Czechs
and Serbs were given preferential treatment. The officers of the Slav nationalities were
also treated better. Regardless of which ethnic group the prisoners belonged to, how-
ever, their treatment by the Serbs – aside from cases of caprice – remained relatively
correct, and occasionally downright lax. Officers and enlisted men were given a little
money, not quite the sums they should receive according to the Convention on Land
Warfare, but enough to be able to buy something ; newspapers, for example. Officers –
regardless of their nationality – also had a certain freedom of movement. Many of
THE FIRST WORLD WAR
and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918
- Titel
- THE FIRST WORLD WAR
- Untertitel
- and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918
- Autor
- Manfried Rauchensteiner
- Verlag
- Böhlau Verlag
- Ort
- Wien
- Datum
- 2014
- Sprache
- englisch
- Lizenz
- CC BY-NC-ND 4.0
- ISBN
- 978-3-205-79588-9
- Abmessungen
- 17.0 x 24.0 cm
- Seiten
- 1192
- Kategorien
- Geschichte Vor 1918
Inhaltsverzeichnis
- 1 On the Eve 11
- 2 Two Million Men for the War 49
- 3 Bloody Sundays 81
- 4 Unleashing the War 117
- 5 ‘Thank God, this is the Great War!’ 157
- 6 Adjusting to a Longer War 197
- 7 The End of the Euphoria 239
- 8 The First Winter of the War 283
- 9 Under Surveillance 317
- 10 ‘The King of Italy has declared war on Me’ 355
- 11 The Third Front 383
- 12 Factory War and Domestic Front, 1915 413
- 13 Summer Battle and ‘Autumn Swine’ 441
- 14 War Aims and Central Europe 469
- 15 South Tyrol : The End of an Illusion (I) 497
- 16 Lutsk :The End of an Illusion (II) 521
- 17 How is a War Financed ? 555
- 18 The Nameless 583
- 19 The Death of the Old Emperor 607
- 20 Emperor Karl 641
- 21 The Writing on the Wall 657
- 22 The Consequences of the Russian February Revolution 691
- 23 Summer 1917 713
- 24 Kerensky Offensive and Peace Efforts 743
- 25 The Pyrrhic Victory : The Breakthrough Battle of Flitsch-Tolmein 769
- 26 Camps 803
- 27 Peace Feelers in the Shadow of Brest-Litovsk 845
- 28 The Inner Front 869
- 29 The June Battle in Veneto 895
- 30 An Empire Resigns 927
- 31 The Twilight Empire 955
- 32 The War becomes History 983
- Epilogue 1011
- Afterword 1013
- Acknowledgements and Dedication 1019
- Notes 1023
- Selected Printed Sources and Literature 1115
- Index of People and Places 1155