Wepons Of World War 1

1. Weapons of World War I
By Austin Dooley

2. sources
•http://www.revision-
notes.co.uk/revision/927.html

3. These were the alliances formed that fought against each other in World
War I.

4. Backround
•The war started with the assassination of the Arch Duke Franz
Ferdinand of Austria-Hungary. The countries Germany, Italy, and
Austria-Hungary formed the Triple Alliance to fight against France,
Russia, and Great Britain who formed the Triple Entente and war
erupted. Then Germany started unrestricted warfare where if there
is a ship inside the sea area that belonged to another country or not
one of there allies they would shoot torpedo's at the ship and blow it
up. And on 1915 Germany shot at a passenger ship called the
Lusitanian and sunk it and killed about 1200 people and 128 of them
were Americans. Then we asked Germany to stop practicing
unrestricted warfare and they did for a little while. After a while
Germany wasn’t doing so well in the war and so they sent a
telegram to Mexico asking them to join the war and if they did and
won then Germany would help Mexico get there land back from
United States that they lost long ago. We intercepted this message
and our president at the time Woodrow Wilson took the idea of
going to war to Congress and they said that we should. So in 1917
we declared war on the Triple Alliance

5. Bayonets
•According to the tradition the bayonet was developed in Bayonne,
France, in the early 17
th
century. The German army developed more
types of the bayonet than all other countries combined. They
produced special adaptors so that captured enemy bayonets could
be fitted to the common Gewehr 98 rifle. The bayonet is simply a
blade that attaches to the barrel of a gun. The bayonet was used for
close combat incase someone got to close you could stab them with
the front of your gun where the bayonet was attached.

6. Flamethrowers
•The flamethrower, brought terror to French and British soldiers when used
by the German army in the early phases of the First World War in 1914 and
1915. The basic idea of a flamethrower is to spread fire by launching
burning fuel. The German army tested two models of flamethrower-or
Flammenwerfer in German- in the early 1900’s, one large one small, both
developed by Richard Fiedler. The smaller lighter flamethrower was
designed for portable use carried by a single man. Using pressurized air and
carbon dioxide or nitrogen it spewed forth a stream of burning oil for as
much as 18 meters.6

7. The rifle
•The main weapon used by British soldiers in the trenches
was the bolt-action rifle. 15 rounds could be fired in a
minute and a person 1,400 meters away could be killed.

8. Machine guns
•Machine guns needed 4-6 men to work them and had to be on a flat
surface. They had the fire-power of 100 guns.
•Large field guns or artillery had a long range and could deliver
devastating blows to the enemy but needed up to 12 men to work
them. The shells they fired were designed to explode on impact.

9. Poison Gas
•The German army were the first to use chlorine gas at battle of
Ypres in 1915. Chlorine gas causes a burning sensation in the
throat and chest pains. And your death is painful the gas will
eventually suffocate you. The problem with chlorine gas is that the
weather must be right.
•Mustard gas another type of poison gas was the most deadly
weapon used. It was fired into the trenches in shells. It is colorless
and takes 12 hours to take effect. Effects include-blistering skin,
vomiting, sore eyes, internal and external bleeding. Death can take
up to 5 weeks.

10. Blimps
•The blimps were used during the early part of the war in
bombing raids by the Germans. They carried machine
guns and bombs. However, they were abandoned
because they were easy to shoot out of the sky. One of
the good known blimps built and operated by the
Germans was the Zeppelin.

11. Tanks
•Tanks were used for the first time in the First World War.
They were developed to cope with the conditions on the
Western Front. The first tank was called “Little Willie” and
needed a crew of 3. Its maximum speed was 3mph and it
could not cross trenches. The modern tank was not
developed until just before the end of the war. It could
carry 10 men, had a revolving turret and could reach
4mph.

12. Planes
•Planes were also used for the first time. At first they were
used to deliver bombs and for spying work but became
fighter aircraft armed with machine guns, bombs and
some times canons. Fights between two planes would
break out in the sky and became known as “dogfights”.

13. Submarines
•Submarines were underwater ships that could
attack other ships without knowing. They used
an underwater bomb called a torpedo that would
swim through the water and blowup on impact.
They were mainly used for ships.

14. Timeline
In 1915 Germany
sunk a passenger
ship and killed 1200
people 128 of them
were American.
In 1917 United
States entered World
War 1 with the Triple
Entente fighting
against the Triple
Alliance.
Battle of Hulluch in
1916 47
th
Brigade
16
th
Irish Decimated
on one of the most
deadliest gas attacks
of World War 1.
The Archduke of
Serbia
assassinated by
black hands in
1914