Eleventh Month, Eleventh Day, Eleventh Hour...
“If one were to stand on a street corner at 9 A.M. and watch the spirits of the British dead march by four abreast, the column would be 97 miles long and would take twenty hours, or until five the next morning, to pass. The French dead would take an additional fifty-one hours and the Germans another fifty-nine hours. Considering all the dead on the western front, this parade would last from 9 A.M. Monday to 4 P.M. Saturday and stretch 386 miles, roughly the distance from Paris halfway through Switzerland or from New York to Cleveland.”
~Joseph E. Persico, Eleventh Month, Eleventh Day, Eleventh Hour: Armistice Day, 1918.
“The living owe it to those who no longer can speak to tell their story for them.”
~ Czesław Miłosz, The Issa Valley.
"As we express our gratitude, we must never forget that the highest appreciation is not to utter words, but to live by them."
~ Joseph Campbell.
I wonder are all the civilians ("collateral damage") included in these numbers, I did post those graphs on FB today. So many children and babies and women.
ReplyDeleteAlso the other victims of war: the raped women. France was particularly vulnerable as the US military declared open season on them. Many suicides resulted. I did not know this until someone posted an account today.
More than soldier victims.
XO
WWW
Wisewebwoman ~ I suspect not, WWW. Those figures were dated 1918, I dread to think what they'd be, when added to figures dated 1945! And later!
ReplyDeleteWhat a bloody waste! And the stuffed shirts descended from those who sent them to their deaths still stand stiffly by their cenotaphs and pretend to mourn.
ReplyDeleteRJ Adams ~ No lessons learned, nor likely ever will be. :-(
ReplyDelete