Armistice Day

At the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month of 1918 the guns fell silent and the Great War, the war to end all wars, ended. Well, technically, an armistice was arranged – a kind of truce – an agreement to cease hostilities was signed. The war officially ended with the signing of the Treaty of Versailles some months later.

The armistice was signed in the early hours of the morning on November 11 but it was not until 11 o’clock in the morning that the agreement took effect. What existed between the signing and the moment the fighting ended was a strange period of transition. Essentially the war was over and yet thousands of men died on that last morning. Why?

Common sense would say, just keep your head down, stay out of the way and you’ll get to go home to your family – wouldn’t it? It’s hard to imagine any other way to think of it - but what if your superiors order you to attack?

The Canadians were ordered to take the town of Mons on November 9 – the scene of the first engagement between the Germans and the British in 1914. As the Germans withdrew from Mons on the morning of the 11th the Canadians maintained pursuit to the east even after they knew of the armistice. Fourteen were killed and seventy wounded during the morning and at 10:58 – two minutes before the end of the war – Private George Price was shot and killed by a sniper’s bullet.

Miles away to the south near Meuse in Lorraine and one minute later American Henry Gunther, against the orders of his close friend and sergeant, mounted a one-man bayonet charge against a roadblock manned by two German machine guns. Knowing the war was about to end the German gunners waved Gunther to stop but he rushed the post regardless. A short burst from one of the machine guns ended Private Gunther’s life at 10:59.

A plaque commemorating Henry N. Gunther

It seems unconscionable that men were sent on the attack even after their commanders had been made aware of the armistice - but that’s what happened. Across the front nearly three thousand soldiers lost their lives on November 11, 1918 – like an exclamation point marking four years of tragic loss.

Private Gunther had been demoted from sergeant and did what he did reportedly because he wanted to redeem himself before the war ended.

So much for common sense but I suppose the lack of what we, with the benefit of hindsight, might consider common sense is part of the fascination.