What was the average life expectancy of a soldier in WW1? (2023)

What was the average life expectancy of an officer in WW1?

The extraordinary story of British junior officers in the First World War, who led their men out of the trenches and faced a life expectancy of six weeks.

If you were a new guy, your life expectancy was 3 weeks. If you survived the 3 weeks, your life expectancy was to survive the war. The #1 contributor to casualties were the green troops who lacked the experience that the veterans would give them.

The mortality rate ranged between 6% and 30%, with the highest in the armies of Serbia, Montenegro and the Turkish Empire, mainly due to large epidemics of cholera, typhoid and smallpox, against which the armies of other countries vaccinated their troops.

2. A soldier's average life expectancy while in the trenches was six weeks. Some of the people who were mostly at risk of early death were the junior officers and the stretcher bearers.

The oldest soldier to enlist in WWI is quartermaster sergeant Robert Frederick Robertson (UK, b. 12 September 1842), who was 71 years of age when he enlisted in late 1914.

Today in 1916 Lt Henry Webber was killed at the Somme. At 67 he was the oldest soldier to lose his life during WW1.

The greatest number of casualties and wounds were inflicted by artillery, followed by small arms, and then by poison gas. The bayonet, which was relied on by the prewar French Army as the decisive weapon, actually produced few casualties.

Henry William Allingham (6 June 1896 – 18 July 2009) was an English supercentenarian. He is the longest-lived man ever recorded from the United Kingdom, a First World War veteran, and, for one month, the verified oldest living man in the world.

The last combat veteran was Claude Choules, who served in the British Royal Navy (and later the Royal Australian Navy) and died 5 May 2011, aged 110. The last veteran who served in the trenches was Harry Patch (British Army), who died on 25 July 2009, aged 111.

Momčilo Gavrić (Serbian Cyrillic: Момчило Гаврић; 1 May 1906 – 28 April 1993) was the youngest Serbian soldier, he became a soldier at the age of eight. Momčilo Gavrić in Loznica, 1914.

How did soldiers go to the toilet in ww1?

Use the latrines

Toilets – known as latrines – were positioned as far away as possible from fighting and living spaces. The best latrines came in the form of buckets which were emptied and disinfected regularly by designated orderlies. Some latrines were very basic pit or 'cut and cover' systems.

In retirement, he eventually settled in County Cork, spending his time fishing. Having proved indestructible on the battlefield, he died peacefully in 1963, aged 83.

He was in fact, only 13 years old. SAN ANTONIO — On this Veteran's Day we are honoring the youngest living World War II veteran. Like many Americans, Bob Kelso signed up to fight in World War Two.

Their average age is 96.

Calvin Leon Graham (April 3, 1930 – November 6, 1992) was the youngest U.S. serviceman to serve and fight during World War II. Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, he enlisted in the United States Navy from Houston, Texas on August 15, 1942, at the age of 12. His case was similar to that of Jack W.

Among all the children that fought and lost their lives, history recalls a name among the countless, Gavrić Momčilo. At the young age of eight, Momčilo joined the Serbian fighting lines to become WWI's youngest soldier. The brave soul was born on May 1, 1906 in a village in Loznica west of Serbia.

In the First World War, those who refused to fight in the conflict – known as conscientious objectors (COs) – were often treated harshly and vilified. These attitudes softened, however, over the course of the 20th century.

John Condon (5 October 1900 – 24 May 1915) was an Irish soldier born in Waterford. He was believed to have been the youngest Allied soldier killed during the First World War, at the age of 14 years; he lied about his age and he claimed to be 18 years old when he signed up to join the army in 1913.

When was the last soldier killed in ww1?

The time was 10:59 a.m. General John Pershing, chief of the American Expeditionary Forces, officially recorded Gunther as the last American soldier to die in World War I, although the death toll would climb as it took several days for the news to reach remote battlefronts around the globe.

Most of the casualties during WWI are due to war related famine and disease. Civilian deaths due to the Spanish flu have been excluded from these figures, whenever possible.

Artillery. Artillery was the most destructive weapon on the Western Front. Guns could rain down high explosive shells, shrapnel and poison gas on the enemy and heavy fire could destroy troop concentrations, wire, and fortified positions. Artillery was often the key to successful operations.

The German army suffered the highest number of military losses, totaling at more than two million men. Turkey had the highest civilian death count, largely due to the mass extermination of Armenians, as well as Greeks and Assyrians.

Nabi Tajima, the last surviving person known to have been born in the 19th century, died in 2018. The final remaining veteran to have served in World War I in any capacity was Florence Green, who died in 2012, while Claude Choules, the last veteran to have been involved in combat, had died the previous year.

About 70 million people fought in World War II and, as of 2022, there are still approximately 167,000 surviving veterans in the United States alone. Only people who are (or were) the last surviving member of a notable group of veterans are listed.

A few of these places are private or public sites with original or reconstructed trenches preserved as a museum or memorial. Nevertheless, there are still remains of trenches to be found in remote parts of the battlefields such as the woods of the Argonne, Verdun and the mountains of the Vosges.

Frank Woodruff Buckles, the last known living American veteran of World War I, died on Sunday, February 27, three weeks after celebrating his 110th birthday.

Around midnight on June 6, 1944, paratrooper Bradford C. Freeman parachuted into Normandy, France, with an 18-pound mortar base plate strapped to his chest. Landing in a pasture filled with cows, he helped hide a fellow soldier who had broken his leg during the jump before meeting up with the rest of his mortar squad.

Who was the oldest soldier?

Jean Thurel finally died in 1807, following a short illness. He was 108. After nine full decades as a soldier, he remained a private throughout, never dropping off the regiment's active duty list.

By the First World War (1914-18), Army food was basic, but filling. Each soldier could expect around 4,000 calories a day, with tinned rations and hard biscuits staples once again. But their diet also included vegetables, bread and jam, and boiled plum puddings. This was all washed down by copious amounts of tea.

About once every week to ten days, Soldiers would go to the rear for their shower. Upon entering the shower area they turned in their dirty clothing. After showering they received new cloths.

Daily life. Most activity in front line trenches took place at night under cover of darkness. During daytime soldiers would try to get some rest, but were usually only able to sleep for a few hours at a time.

The stink of war

Stinking mud mingled with rotting corpses, lingering gas, open latrines, wet clothes and unwashed bodies to produce an overpowering stench. The main latrines were located behind the lines, but front-line soldiers had to dig small waste pits in their own trenches.

Many thousands of soldiers, from all belligerent countries, fought in both world wars. An 18 year old private or subaltern in 1918 would have been in his early 40s at the beginning of the war; those who had stayed in the military would be senior NCOs or senior field grade officers if not generals/admirals.

Of all the jobs in the infantry, “the runner's job was the hardest and most dangerous,” World War I veteran Lt. Allan L. Dexter observed in a 1931 newspaper article. “With a runner, it was merely a question of how long he would last before being wounded or killed.”

The average life expectancy was just six weeks. In the first year one in seven of them were killed and one in five were wounded - by far the highest casualty rate in the war. About 33,000 officers were left disabled at the war's end.

Who had the highest death rate in WW1?

The German army suffered the highest number of military losses, totaling at more than two million men. Turkey had the highest civilian death count, largely due to the mass extermination of Armenians, as well as Greeks and Assyrians.

The last surviving veteran was Claude Choules (on the photo), who served Royal Navy during WW1.

Fear about loved ones at the front, fear of air raids, fear associated with war-related migration, hunger, and violence all made it onto the pages of ego-documents.

In their spare time, soldiers wrote letters and diaries, drew sketches, read books and magazines, pursued hobbies, played cards or gambled. There were also opportunities for more-organised social activities.

In January 1916 the Military Service Act was passed. This imposed conscription on all single men aged between 18 and 41, but exempted the medically unfit, clergymen, teachers and certain classes of industrial worker.

Momčilo Gavrić, in Serbian military from age eight; youngest soldier in World War I in any of the nations which fought in World War I. John Condon, from Waterford, Ireland: incorrectly believed to have been the youngest Allied soldier killed (age 14), but later found to have been age 18 at his death.

Henry Nicholas John Gunther (June 6, 1895 – November 11, 1918) was an American soldier and possibly the last soldier of any of the belligerents to be killed during World War I. He was killed at 10:59 a.m., about one minute before the Armistice was to take effect at 11:00 a.m.

Historian Martin Gilbert details the loss of life: More than nine million soldiers, sailors and airmen were killed in the First World War. A further five million civilians are estimated to have perished under occupation, bombardment, hunger and disease.

The Treaty of Versailles, which was officially signed on 28 June 1919, took effect on 10 January 1920. Fighting continued up until 11 a.m. CET on 11 November 1918, with 2,738 men dying on the last day of the war.

Florence Green, a British citizen who served in the Allied armed forces as a Royal Air Force (WRAF) service member, is generally considered to have been the last verified veteran of the war at her death on 4 February 2012, aged 110.

Who is the youngest WWII vet still alive?

He was in fact, only 13 years old. SAN ANTONIO — On this Veteran's Day we are honoring the youngest living World War II veteran. Like many Americans, Bob Kelso signed up to fight in World War Two.

Carton de Wiart served in the Boer War, World War One and World War Two. In the process he was shot in the face, losing his left eye, and was also shot through the skull, hip, leg, ankle and ear.