The 1916 Somme offensive was one of the bloodiest battles of the First World War. But it provided the Army with a tough lesson in how to fight a large-scale modern war.
The Battle of Loos took place on the Western Front in September-October 1915. At the time, it was the largest British offensive of the First World War.
On 16 December 1914, the German Navy bombarded several towns on England’s north-eastern seaboard. This surprise raid brought the First World War to the British mainland for the first time and soon became the subject of a propaganda war.
In February 1916, the Allies finally completed the conquest of Germany’s West African colonies. One of the First World War’s forgotten sideshows, this campaign was fought in hostile terrain and disease-ridden jungles.
Throughout the First World War, British Empire soldiers fought against a small German force in East Africa. Led by Colonel Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck, the Germans inflicted many casualties and avoided defeat in the field.
1916 witnessed two of the longest and most notorious battles of the First World War. Both resulted in hundreds of thousands of casualties for both the Allies and Germans on the Western Front.
The grave of the Unknown Warrior contains the remains of an unidentified British serviceman, interred in 1920 to honour the fallen of the First World War. The secretive selection process remains shrouded in mystery.
In the First World War, the cavalry could no longer deliver the decisive charges it had performed in the past. But it continued to carry out a variety of useful roles that contributed to British success.
Fought in September 1918, this was the climactic battle of the Sinai and Palestine campaign of the First World War. Ottoman forces found themselves encircled by British Empire forces under General Edmund Allenby.
As the entire nation mobilised for the First World War, women took up new challenges. Many of these opportunities had previously been off limits, including military service.
