First World War
The 5th Division was a permanently established Regular Army division that was amongst the first to be sent to France at the outbreak of the First World War. It served on the Western Front for most of the war except for a brief period in Italy.
The 5th Division, as a regular army formation (one of the Old Contemptibles) fought in many of the major battles of the Western Front from The Battle of Mons in 1914, the later stages of the Somme offensive, including the first battle using tanks, up to the Battle of the Selle in 1918. They were in almost continuous action throughout the war and suffered a tremendous amount of casualties as can be seen from the way the battalions that made up the division changed during the war. By 1918 the 5th Division, like most other regular divisions, contained very few of those regulars who went to France in 1914.
Read more about this topic: 5th Infantry Division (United Kingdom)
Famous quotes containing the words world war, world and/or war:
“I date the end of the old republic and the birth of the empire to the invention, in the late thirties, of air conditioning. Before air conditioning, Washington was deserted from mid-June to September.... But after air conditioning and the Second World War arrived, more or less at the same time, Congress sits and sits while the presidents—or at least their staffs—never stop making mischief.”
—Gore Vidal (b. 1925)
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—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“War ...
What is it good for?
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—Edwin Starr, U.S. soul singer. War (song)