The Great War August 1914 - November 1918 Saint John, NB - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

The Great War August 1914 - November 1918

Saint John, NB • Recruiting of soldiers was not difficult in the Summer and Fall of 1914

Canada’s Answer

The Volunteer - Robert Service Sez I: My Country calls? Well, let it call. I grins perlitely and declines wiv thanks. Go, let 'em plaster every blighted wall, 'Ere's ONE they don't stampede into the ranks. Them politicians with their greasy ways; Them empire-grabbers -- fight for 'em? No fear! I've seen this mess a-comin' from the days Of Algyserious and Aggydear: I've felt me passion rise and swell, But . . . wot the 'ell, Bill? Wot the 'ell?

The Volunteer - Robert Service Sez I: If they would do the decent thing, And shield the missis and the little 'uns, Why, even _I_ might shout "God save the King", And face the chances of them 'ungry guns. But we've got three, another on the way; It's that wot makes me snarl and set me jor: The wife and nippers, wot of 'em, I say, If I gets knocked out in this blasted war? Gets proper busted by a shell, But . . . wot the 'ell, Bill? Wot the 'ell?

The Volunteer - Robert Service Ay, wot the 'ell's the use of all this talk? To-day some boys in blue was passin' me, And some of 'em they 'ad no legs to walk, And some of 'em they 'ad no eyes to see. And -- well, I couldn't look 'em in the face, And so I'm goin', goin' to declare I'm under forty-one and take me place To face the music with the bunch out there. A fool, you say! Maybe you're right. I'll 'ave no peace unless I fight. I've ceased to think; I only know I've gotta go, Bill, gotta go.

What is the recruitment strategy?

The Soldier, Rupert Brooke, 1914 If I should die, think only this of And think, this heart, all evil shed • me: 
 away, 
 That there's some corner of a A pulse in the eternal mind, no less 
 foreign field 
 Gives somewhere back the That is for ever England. There thoughts by England given; 
 shall be 
 Her sights and sounds; dreams In that rich earth a richer dust happy as her day; 
 concealed; 
 And laughter, learnt of friends; and A dust whom England bore, gentleness, 
 shaped, made aware, 
 In hearts at peace, under an Gave, once, her flowers to love, English heaven. her ways to roam, 
 A body of England's, breathing English air, 
 Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.


 
 Dulce Et Decorum Est B ent double, like old beggars under sacks, 
 As under a green sea, I saw him drowning. 
 Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed In all my dreams, before my helpless sight, 
 through sludge, 
 He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning. Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs 
 And towards our distant rest began to trudge. 
 If in some smothering dreams you too could Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots 
 pace 
 But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all Behind the wagon that we flung him in, 
 blind; 
 And watch the white eyes writhing in his face, 
 Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots 
 His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin; 
 Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood 
 behind. Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs, 
 Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud 
 Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, 
 fumbling, 
 My friend, you would not tell with such high Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time; 
 zest 
 But someone still was yelling out and stumbling, 
 To children ardent for some desperate glory, 
 The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est 
 And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime . . . 
 Pro patria mori . Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,