Measures: 11 inches

Inscriptions: ‘Verdun’ ‘1914-1919’

History of Trench Art:

During leisure hours at the front, skilled soldiers created trench art from the remnants of war such as discarded bullets and artillery shell casings. Many of these remnant of war were done with their own equipment and leftover items, but also by items captured and left by enemy soldiers. Trench art objects are holders of soldiers’ memories and reminders of the conflict they faced. Made out of recycled war refuse such as shell casings, spent bullets or whatever came to hand, they open a window to the past. They tell us things like where soldiers went and what their surroundings were like. They also give hints about soldiers’ thoughts and actions. Something as simple and functional as a matchbox cover can provide a map of a soldier’s movements while other, more decorative examples, show a desire to find and create beauty, to camouflage war in art. Trench art can be made of any number of things. Many objects were made out of the scraps created by war. This included ammunition shell cases, bullet casings, shrapnel, and pieces of destroyed buildings or downed planes. These materials would all have been readily available in the war zones to soldiers, their prisoners of war and to civilians still in the area.

Canon de 75 modèle 1897:

The French 75 was designed as an anti-personnel weapon system for delivering large volumes of time-fused shrapnel shells on enemy troops advancing in the open. After 1915 and the onset of trench warfare, other types of battlefield missions demanding impact-detonated high-explosive shells prevailed. By 1918 the 75s became the main agents of delivery for toxic gas shells. The 75s also became widely used as truck mounted anti-aircraft artillery. They were also the main armament of the Saint-Chamond tank in 1918.

Battle of Verdun:

Battle of Verdun, (February 21–December 18, 1916), World War I engagement in which the French repulsed a major German offensive. It was one of the longest, bloodiest, and most-ferocious battles of the war; French casualties amounted to about 400,000, German ones to about 350,000. Some 300,000 were killed. On February 21, 1916, more than 1,220 guns around an eight-mile perimeter opened fire. It was the sort of drenching shellstorm that would distinguish the battle. Verdun did act as a “suction cup”: three fourths of the French Western Front divisions would eventually serve there. But even from the start, the “Meuse Mill” did not achieve the five-to-two kill ratio Falkenhayn had predicted. The attackers soon forgot this object. Orders went out to take French positions “without regard to casualties.” At the end of the first week, the Germans had advanced six miles; a few men walked into an almost undefended Fort Douaumont and took possession. For the French, that marked the low point. Fighting degenerated into isolated struggles for shellholes, forcing the French into an impromptu but successful defense-in-depth. At the beginning of June, the Germans took another key stronghold, Fort Vaux, after hideous subterranean melees.