Single Coin Pack - World War I (Trench Warfare)

Product History

George V - Halfpenny:  (obverse) old head of George V; (reverse) Britannia

Trench warfare was a form of fighting conducted from long, narrow ditches in which troops stood and were hidden from enemy's fire. At the beginning of World War I (1914) it was believed that the war would be won by mass infantry charges but the introduction of rapid firing machine guns and artillery proved this to be wrong.

After the first Battle of the Marne (5-12 September, 1914) thousands of miles of parallel trenches were dug along the Western Front, linked by intricate systems of communication trenches and protected by barbed wire. The area between the allied armies trenches and the enemy trenches was called 'no mans land'. New weapons were introduced which greatly increased the casualty rate on the battlefields. They included hand-grenades, poison gas, trench mortars, and artillery barrages. It was not until 1918, with an improved version of the tank (invented in 1915), that it was possible to advance across trenches with fewer casualties. Another sight seen over the trenches was the use of aeroplanes flying reconnaissance missions and directing artillery. This was followed, later in the war, by fighter planes duelling in air to air combat and planes dropping bombs on enemy targets.

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