Wednesday, November 14, 2018
The Soldier who died one Minute before the end of World War I
As World War One came to an end. Germany sued for peace and an armistace was signed on November 11. It would take affect at exactly 11 Am. This is the story of how one man gave his life one minute before the waer was over.
Henry Gunther, was a German American who was born in Baltimore. He was a zeolous catholic and was a patriot to his country. He however did not enlist when the war began. He would soon be drafted and shipped off to france. This led to him writting a letter to his friend telling him to avoid being drafted. This letter was interecepted by military police and he was demoted from seargent to private.
This demotion deeply aggected Henry Gunther. He became extremely depressed and obbessed over getting his rank back. When he realized that the very last day of the war was coming he panicked. Beliving it to be his last chance to obtain his rank. He charged at a german machinegun with his bayonet. The Germans and Americans screamed and tried to wave him away. Yet he continued to charge. Then finally he was killed by a burst of machine gun fire. The time of his death was 10:59. The ceaefire would take affect at 11. He lost his life over nothing.
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Wow. This is a very interesting but somewhat upsetting tell of just how badly the war affected certain soldiers. For Gunther to die over this all, especially just that one minute before the war ended, is unnecessary but it also shows that the war's damaging effects on the mental states probably lasted long after the cease fire became effective.
ReplyDeleteAlready off the bat, your title was really attention grabbing and made me want to read your blog. I feel like this story shows the extremity fo the impact of the world war and with little good effects. It was sad that he was killed for nothing.
ReplyDeleteI think the story behind Gunther was extremely compelling, as he got drafted, tried to save his friend, was demoted, and became depressed and obsessed with his title. The reason he died being his need to get his title back is a very sad end to his story. It would be interesting to learn even more about Gunther and his mental state, as that led to his downfall.
ReplyDeleteI think that this story is very interesting. It is kind of depressing that he got demoted for telling his friend not to join the arm. It is also sad that him being demoted made him so depressed and angry that he was determined to get his rank back in a way that lead to march to his death.
ReplyDeleteWow, I was very interested at this story because at this point most of the soldiers were really tired from the fighting. France had large scale deserting and mutiny, Russia had an entire revolution, Italians often refused to attack, and Germany had similar problems. Nobody really wanted to fight anymore and the 4 years of trench warfare had drained them. Even Henry Gunther talked about the horrible conditions at the front lines which promptly caused his demotion. So I was really surprised that he willingly got up to attack knowing that the armistice would be put into place at 11. Maybe this was because he was an American and we entered the war rather late with Henry only seeing a year of combat at this time. Nevertheless, it's sad to find out that he died just minutes before the end of the war. Also, in the end the US army posthumously promoted him back to sergeant so arguably it wasn't for nothing in his eyes.
ReplyDeleteThis was post was both incredibly interesting as well as saddening. It's intriguing to me that his was less of a matter of a man still trying to fight for his country but rather fighting for himself. He ran towards death and made a foolish choice because he wanted so desperately to promote himself and his rank and that's very interesting.
ReplyDeleteIt is amazing how this happened and how people will be willing to charge a machine gun operator for a title. But I also found it really interesting how the people during this time had the idea that war is only about the honor and the rank in which you receive after.
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