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9781586487720

The Greatest Day in History: How, on the Eleventh Hour of the Eleventh Day of the Eleventh Month, the First World War Finally Came to an End

by
  • ISBN13:

    9781586487720

  • ISBN10:

    1586487728

  • Edition: 1st
  • Format: Paperback
  • Copyright: 2009-10-13
  • Publisher: Public Affairs
  • Purchase Benefits
List Price: $15.95

Summary

Unlike 1945, the First World War did not end neatly with the unconditional surrender of the Germans. After a dramatic week of negotiations, military offensives and the beginning of a Communist revolution, the German Imperial regime collapsed. The Allies eventually granted an armistice to a new German government, and at eleventh hour on the 11th of November, the guns officially ceased fire, but only after 11,000 casualties had been sustainedalmost as many as on D-Day.Nicholas Best tells the story in sweeping, cinematic style, revealing that events were far from pre-ordained. From the generals' headquarters to the frontline trenches, from the factories to the farms, he reveals the twists and turns that led to the end of the Great War.

Author Biography

Nicholas Best is the former fiction critic for the Financial Times and the author of a number of novels, travel and history books. He lives in Cambridge, England.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrationsp. x
Acknowledgementsp. xii
Monday, 4 November 1918p. 1
The New Zealanders capture Le Quesnoy
Wilfred Owen killed
a Californian in the RAF
Herbert Sulzbach of the German guns
General Ludendorff's nervous breakdown
General Gröner summoned to Berlin
mutiny at Kiel
the Kaiser strafed in Belgium
Lloyd George in Paris
General Pershing opposes the Armistice
Private Graham advances to the attack
Tuesday, 5 November 1918p. 23
General Rawlinson takes 10, 000 prisoners
Private Hulme sees the women's fear
Harry Truman picks a poppy
Douglas MacArthur shot through the sleeve
Captain de Gaulle in prison camp
General Gröner champions the monarchy
Prince Heinrich flees for his life
Hindenburg considers the Kaiser's death
Sulzbach shells a French village
the Scots Guards capture Bermeries
Captain Glubb sees a dead German
President Wilson celebrates the news from Europe
Wednesday, 6 November 1918p. 40
Prince Max discusses an Armistice
mutiny at Wilhelmshaven
Bolshevists behind the German lines
the French watch the Germans go
starving women cup up a mule
Flora Sandes fights for Serbia
General von Lettow-Vorbeck invades Rhodesia
President Wilson loses the election
Matthias Erzberger a poisoned chalice
the Armistice commission sets out from Berlin
Thursday, 7 November 1918p. 57
Hindenburg telegraphs Foch
the Armistice commission arrives at Spa
Brigadier MacArthur captured as a spy
Teilhard de Chardin marches towards Alsace
Captain Hitchcock approaches the Scheldt
Wilhelmshaven mutineers take up arms
Konrad Adenauer wants to shoot the Bolshevists
the king of Bavaria flees
Roy Howard gets a scoop
the United States celebrates prematurely
Darryl Zanuck fails to see action
J.B. Priestley captures a German teenager
Fen Noakes Doubts the news
the Armistice commission crosses the French lines
Friday, 8 November 1918p. 80
The Germans taken to Compiègne
Armistice terms spelled out
German troops fear castration
two Leinsters killed in friendly fire
Lord Curzon at Lille
Cecil Cox gives his enemy a biscuit
Ludwig Wittgenstein mourns his British friend
Thomas Mann fears for Munich
an Englishman in Bayreuth
Prince Max wants the Kaiser out
the Kaiser resists
Prince Max is adamant
Princess Blücher in Berlin
Richard Strauss at the opera House
Captain von Helldorf unable to cross the lines
General Gröner at Spa
Saturday, 9 November 1918p. 105
Hindenburg comes round
the Kaiser learns some home truths
revolution in Berlin
Admiral Wemyss visits the ruins of Soissons
HMS Britannia torpedoed off Cape Trafalgar
a Canadian Iroquois wins the Military Cross
an American officer reassures a chambermaid
the Kaiser proposes a partial abdication
Prince Max forestalls him
the Kaiser plans a last stand
Princess Blücher watches the revolution
Philipp Scheidemann declares a republic
Karl Liebknecht follows suit
the Kaiser contemplates suicide
Lloyd George exults
Princess Blücher tries to sleep
Ludendorff acquires a false beard
Marlene Dietrich loathes the mob
Kurt Will enjoys the excitement
General Gröner studies the Armistice terms
the Kaiser agrees to abdicate
Vladimir Lenin gloats
Sunday, 10 November 1918p. 133
Princess Blücher watches the fighting
the Kaiser steals away
the Armistice commission discovers its whereabouts
the Leinsters near Fontenoy
the Prince of Wales near Mons
Howard Vincent O'Brien passes Zeebrugge
Harry Truman hates the Hun
George Coles hears the guns in prison camp
the Germans strip the fat from human bodies
Princess Blücher flees
Wilhelmshaven celebrates the republic
Hindenburg addresses the army
Corporal Hitler weeps
Maude Onions plays the organ
Foch demands an answer
the Chancellor responds
the Kaiser seeks asylum
President Wilson decodes a cable
the Germans want to talk
Monday, 11 November 1918, the early hoursp. 162
The Armistice signed
the fighting continues
the Canadians take Mons
atrocity near Valenciennes
German troops raped
the RAF stands down
Captain Glubb misses the war already
Herbert Sulzbach hates to surrender
the Kaiser booed in Holland
harry Truman fires off his ammunition
George Coles in prison camp
an Australian woman in Leipzig
Erich Maria Remarque poses as an officer
Henry Asquith attends a funeral
President Wilson hears the news
Americans killed in the advance
the generals refuse to call it off
the British push on from Mons
Ernst Kielmayer longs for home
Georg Bucher in a gas attack
fighting continues right up to the wire
Monday, 11 November 1918, 11 a.m.p. 191
A Boer hears the news
the Grenadiers still have a score to settle
peace in Malplaquet
euphoria nearby
the Leinsters don't even cheer
Lessines stormed at two minutes to eleven
the last men to die
American troops still haven't heard
Eddie Rickenbacker watches from the air
Georg Bucher distrusts the Americans
Octave Delaluque blows his bugle
a machine gunner bows to the South Africans
General Pershing drinks from a German helmet
Paris goes wild
HMS Amazon still doesn't know
Dickie Dixon terrifies his mother
the crowd mob Buckingham Palace
Winston Churchill watches the excitement
Vera Brittain too sad to care
Olive Wells excused her homework
Virginia Woolf emotional
Bertrand Russell watches in wonder
Agatha Christie refuses to dance
an Austrian internee fears another war
the bells ring in Southwold
no tea in Liverpool
the Yanks march through Southampton
Etonians celebrate in Windsor
pacifists attacked in Cambridge
Napoleon III's widow exults
global party
Monday, 11 November 1918, afternoonp. 225
Stunned silence on the Western Front
Douglas Haig at Cambrai
the Germans loot Brussels
starvation in Berlin
Clemenceau in Paris
Dwight Eisenhower misses the action
a British officer in America
a lynch mob in Kansas
President Wilson addresses Congress
Chaim Weizmann at No. 10
King George goes for a drive
the Owens get a telegram
a German spy in Liverpool
Eamon de Valera in Lincoln Gaol
Lord French in Dublin
Allied Rape in Boulogne
the Austrian Emperor bows bout
Lady Susan Townley assaults the Kaiser
Monday, 11 November 1918, eveningp. 256
A British spy in Holland
a prisoner of war meets the Kaiser
British prisoners feed German children
a German girl fancies Private Bickerton
British nurses in Serbia
celebrations in Egypt
rejoicing in Palestine
mess games in India
Mahatma Gandhi almost volunteers
excitement in Australia
angry Boers in Cape Town
Manhattan lightens up
martin Niemöller raises his periscope
Ernest Hemingway counts his wounds
unearthly quiet in Belgium
pandemonium in France
bagpipes in Rouen
Pennsylvanian Quakers in Troyes
influenza in Lille
bereaved parents in Wimereux
André Maurois receives a gift
Maurice Chevalier sings in Paris
the Kaiser sits down to dinner
the Grand Fleet splices the mainbrace
Winston Churchill dines at No. 10
King George takes another bow
bitterness at the Ritz
Siegfried Sassoon picks a quarrel
Maynard Keynes fears the economic consequences
Noël Coward has a thrilling evening
bombed children fear the fireworks
President Wilson has a ball
Harry Truman can't sleep
Adolf Hitler decides to enter politics
Bibliographyp. 289
Indexp. 295
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.

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