The War in the West

“I can see them standing in the sunshine, in the bright, light days. The mothers, brides and sisters; they come here to these hot fields and stand there motionless, crying quietly, still unable to comprehend that their loved ones are resting beneath this earth.”
At the beginning of WWI, Bernhard Kellermann visited the German trenches in France as a correspondent for the Berlin Daily Newspaper, the ‘Berliner Tageblatt’. He not only wrote about the fighting but also about the tragic cost to humanity in and behind the trenches, caused by the slaughter. He was patriotic, proud of his fellow countrymen and wanted Germany to win the war. Yet he did not shy away from expressing disbelief to his proud nation that war was being fought in the first place.
“ … two nations that gave birth to thoughts that govern the world! – Now they lie facing each other in holes in the earth, tense with the desire to kill.”
In his war reports, Kellermann reflects poignantly and often poetically on the appalling carnage and the attacks he witnessed, such as those in the Argonne Forest. He also highlights the cynicism of officers on both sides and the incredible courage of soldiers in a world laid waste by human stupidity.
Kellermann’s reports from the front lines present a witness’s insight into the shape of war on the German side of the trenches.
Kellerman was later vilified by the Nazi regime.