What Did Soldiers Eat in the Trenches of World War One?

[Music] oh [Applause] [Music] I'm Dan snow and today I'm going to be eating and drinking like a long-suffering British Tommy in the trenches of the first World War let's get on with it [Music] World War one was one of the deadliest conflicts in history it saw an astonishing 65 million men take part in fighting across the globe the war which was known as The Great Wall because it was so devastating began in July 1914 and finally ended in November 1918. for the millions of British soldiers that served life would have been extremely tough imagine waking up to the sound of gunfire doing up your scratchy uniform that's been worn for weeks and heading into battle with only a few bites of stale bread and a sip of tepid tea in your stomach that's what life could be like for First World War soldiers it wasn't just the constant threat of danger that made their life difficult their diets were pretty bleak too [Music] trench stew or makanaki this was the staple for the British soldiers in the trenches of the first world war now cooking in those Trends is very difficult indeed so soldiers ate most of their Russians cold if they were lucky enough to get a stove going it was on a small folding solid fuel stove known as the Tommy cooker men carried them in their packs and if they were behind the lines a little bit further back they might cook in pots over charcoal or scavenged wood oh it's absolutely disgusting it's basically bully beef corned beef out of a tin with um a few vegetables chopped up in there things like turnips and carrots biscuits they were famously hardest rock foreign then you add them to the stew trying to make it slightly more palatable oh [Music] [Applause] [Music] it's like eating cardboard bits of stale cardboard if cardboard gets stale they would try and create the stew in a small group of men that would be dulled out into individual mess tins Instagram they say that warmed in a tin makanaki Stew was edible cold it was a man killer see why these biscuits so hard you could put down the front of your shirt they'd act a Kevlar vest stop bullets that one if you happen to be a biscuit manufacturer in 1914 then it was your lucky day the country's largest biscuit family was owned by some peace-loving Quakers Huntley and Palmers and it played a crucial role in the war it supplied vast amounts of biscuits less than a week after the outbreak of the war in 1914 the factory received the first of many gigantic orders from the war office for the manufacturer of biscuits this was basically like bread that didn't go stale you could ship it abroad the factory had to work night and day seven days a week to meet the demand these biscuits were about four inches Square they were made of whole wheat flour they had no sugar they were very very hard they could be transported in bulk and when they got to the trenches soldiers used to dip them in water or tea and try and break them up a bit there's a great quote from a private pressy of the royal artillery he said the biscuits are so hard that you had to put them on a firm surface and smash them with a stone look at that I've held one in my hand and hit the sharp corner on a brick wall and it only hurt my hand he's right you can use that as a weapon if your bullets run out no Brit is gonna do anything let alone fight a war without a cup of tea it was comforting it was warm gave a little reminder of home and the tea also helped disguise the flavor of the water which was often transported to the front in Jerry cans which had been used to contain petrol so it tasted disgusting tea was also very good at helping to well dissolve these extremely hard biscuits you just don't one of these in for about 24 hours [Music] still hard as rock shock Club vast amounts of chocolate was transported to the trenches to try and keep up morale in December 1914 the city of York sent a Christmas gift a tin of chocolate to all the men from York serving in the forces this was done you know giving people a sense of Home reminding them of their friends and loved ones oh I said Brew my morale we actually have a letter that Henry Bailey one of those York Lads sent home in January 1915 he said I feel like I ought to send my very best thanks for the nice box of chocolate I received so unexpectedly I'm proud to be able to say that I'm a York lad and I'm looking forward to a speedy termination of this cruel War I shall prize that box as long as God spares me the rum Russian in Brits after all rum was the lifeblood of those men in the trenches generally it would be doled out in the morning although some sources say it could be given out more frequently particularly when maybe attacks were imminent Soldier Charles William nightingall recorded that rum was issued with cheese every night during the Gallipoli campaign but often it was given out in the mornings so-called stand too that's when every Soldier grabbed their weapons still in the firing step peering over the edge of the trench in case the enemy attacked at dawn the writer Robert Graves noted that his soldiers looked forward to their tot of rum at dawn stand to as the brightest moment of their 24 hours one of the many myths about the first world war is that soldiers would end up stumbling across no man's land in blind drunk stupas as a matter of routine but in fact that isn't correct from what we know about the ration the British soldier was given only 1 16 of a pint every day although he would have made it his mission to find more French on the other hand drank wine obviously nearly a pint every day cigarettes were an essential part of army life nearly everyone smoked they were used as currency two cigarettes apparently was the price of a haircut in the trenches given what we now know about cigarettes seems a bit strange but it's what you sent your loved ones to help them thrive in a very tough environment you could buy them everywhere behind the lines and you're issued with two ounces of tobacco like this every single day people in Britain could also send their loved ones drugs heroin and particularly a cocaine-based med called Force March which helped deal with hunger and fatigue just living surviving in the trenches was so brutal so extreme and hard that some historians think that the only way that they managed to convince the troops to actually stay in there was by pushing enough booze tobacco sugar caffeine and drugs to the men's station there and having tried some of the food I've got a lot of sympathy for that point of view thanks for joining me folks if you've enjoyed watching please click on any of the videos on this screen for more delicious content [Music] friends foreign foreign

Channel: History Hit

Views: 635,586

Keywords: history hit, history hit youtube, world war one, world war 1, first world war, trench warfare, history documentaries, british soldiers, world war i, history hit tv, history hit dan snow, history hit documentary, world war one food, trench food ww1, trench food recipes, trench food world war 1, world war one food recipes, simple history ww1, first world war summary, world war one oversimplified, world history, wwii food, history hits youtube

Id: lPiXhcA1fmM

Length: 9min 46sec (586 seconds)

Published: Fri May 12 2023