tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-64256149505112418772023-11-16T08:39:07.126-08:00Peter Chasseaud: Landscape, Air Photos, Trench MapsThis blog covers those aspects of my landscape work which deal with the relationship between aerial photography, landscape in its various manifestations, and mapping (particularly 1914-18 trench mapping).peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.comBlogger14125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-48325443294205472782012-05-13T15:20:00.002-07:002012-05-13T15:31:20.688-07:00ARTILLERY'S ASTROLOGERS: Maps, Survey, Sound Ranging, Flash Spotting in WW1<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgT6GdLWD1cXsxvDFKc-LxDvBlPGvNDf2Mp6gUNFFaKzqcCX90uDaSVPB4-fjVmIRn2cEVaS6IoFgkHgVh-NqO88FJfjG-qPkLq3bjt29tfFBhnq7PHcZVxelIP2hlxlmeiwWLhNmk-eP-c/s1600/Press+May+2012+004.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgT6GdLWD1cXsxvDFKc-LxDvBlPGvNDf2Mp6gUNFFaKzqcCX90uDaSVPB4-fjVmIRn2cEVaS6IoFgkHgVh-NqO88FJfjG-qPkLq3bjt29tfFBhnq7PHcZVxelIP2hlxlmeiwWLhNmk-eP-c/s320/Press+May+2012+004.JPG" width="230" /></a></div>
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<i>Artillery's Astrologers - A History of British Survey and Mapping on the Western Front 1914-1918</i></h2>
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by</h2>
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Peter Chasseaud <i><br /></i></h2>
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This book, which took Dr Chasseaud over twenty years to research and write, is the definitive operational history of British field survey
organisation, units and personnel on the Western Front. It covers Royal
Engineers and Royal Artillery Survey, and also the aerial photography
for survey and intelligence purposes by the Royal Flying Corps/Royal Air
Force. It examines all aspects of map production for the British
Expeditionary Force, the use of maps, and technological progress in
cartography and artillery survey in 1914-1918. It also includes comparisons with French, German and American military survey and mapping.</div>
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It is available from Mapbooks, c/o The Tom Paine Printing Press, 151 High Street, Lewes, East Sussex, BN7 1XU, UK. Price £50 plus £5 post & packing in UK. Please enquire about postal charges to overseas destinations.</div>
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The book is a large hardback quarto (A4) format, comprising 558 pages of text and illustrations. It includes coverage of the following :<br />
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Pre-war military maps and survey (engineer survey, artillery survey, air survey)<br />
Geographical Section of the General Staff<br />
Ordnance Survey<br />
1st Printing Company RE<br />
The growth of the wartime military mapping and survey organisation on the Western Front<br />
1st Ranging Section RE<br />
1st Ranging & Survey Section RE<br />
Trench Maps, Intelligence Maps, Hostile Battery Maps, etc.<br />
1st Topographical Section<br />
2nd Topographical Section<br />
3rd Topographical Section<br />
1st Field Survey Company/Battalion <br />
2nd Field Survey Company/Battalion<br />
3rd Field Survey Company/Battalion<br />
4th Field Survey Company/Battalion<br />
5th Field Survey Company/Battalion<br />
Depot Field Survey Company/Battalion<br />
Overseas Branch of the Ordnance Survey (OBOS)<br />
Artillery Survey: fixing British battery positions<br />
Indirect fire<br />
Enemy battery location (sound ranging, flash spotting, air photos)<br />
Observation Groups (Flash Spotting)<br />
Sound Ranging Sections; Experimental Sound Ranging Sections; Wind Sections <br />
Calibration Sections<br />
Aerial Photography and Air Survey; Mapping from Aerial Photographs<br />
Compilation Sections (enemy battery location results)<br />
Corps Topographical Sections<br />
Map Printing Technology <br />
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The treatment of all the above is primarily in terms of the chronological and operational development of the survey organisation and units, but personnel and scientific developments (e.g. sound ranging theory and apparatus) are also regarded as important.</div>
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British survey work in the First World War was mainly carried out by the sappers, though with a significant gunner contribution; this made possible the remarkable British triumphs of Cambrai in 1917 and the Battles of the Hundred Days in 1918. Far-sighted sappers like Winterbotham, and gunners like Tudor and Lecky, understood the principles of war and the necessity of using the latest technology to achieve surprise. They knew that their task was to destroy or neutralise the enemy machine guns and artillery while the infantry and tanks crossed no man's land and captured and consolidated the enmey position, or fought through to exploit success and manoeuvre to threaten the enemy's flanks and rear organisation.</div>
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<br />peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-12133449751911924452011-04-06T14:07:00.000-07:002011-04-06T14:12:57.855-07:00The Third Battle of the Somme. Australian Corps, 1918<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:view>Normal</w:View> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:snaptogridincell/> <w:wraptextwithpunct/> <w:useasianbreakrules/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:browserlevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:latentstyles deflockedstate="false" latentstylecount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} </style> <![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:shapedefaults ext="edit" spidmax="1026"> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:shapelayout ext="edit"> <o:idmap ext="edit" data="1"> </o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: -18pt;" align="left"><span style="font-family: Symbol;"><span style=""><span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span>The album below is not a manual as such, but contains a large number of aerial photographs of the terrain fought over by the Australian Corps in 1918:<i style=""><br /></i></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: 0cm;" align="left"><i style="">The Third Battle of the Somme. Australian Corps (Intelligence) </i>[Nov-Dec 1918].<i style=""> AP&SS. Press “A”.</i> Large landscape-format album containing about 90 vertical and oblique air photos covering the operations of the Australian Corps from April 1918 (Villers-Bretonneux), through Hamel and Amiens in July and August, the Hindenburg Line and subsequent operations. No explanatory text except for brief captions. Possible printed as a matter of record, but with distinct emphasis on interpretation, as for example wire, artillery positions, ammunition dumps, railways, hospitals, etc. However, an accompanying printed insert in one copy gives a commemorative/propaganda context:<span style="font-size: 8pt;"><br /></span></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: 0cm;" align="left"><b style=""><span style="font-size: 11pt;">Herewith a Pictorial History of the Australian Corps in the 3<sup>rd</sup> Battle of the Somme, from March 27<sup>th</sup> to October 6<sup>th</sup>, 1918.</span></b><span style="font-size: 11pt;"> </span></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: 0cm;" align="left"><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><span style=""> </span>The Photographs studied with a map are in themselves an index to the extent and character of the series of brilliant operations carried out by the troops of the [Australian] Corps. During the period under review a total of 29,144 prisoners and 388 guns, thousands of machine guns, and a large number of trench mortars were captured, beside much R.E. material and other booty.</span></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: 0cm;" align="left"><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><span style=""> </span>The advance of the Corps was pursued for a total distance of over 40 miles. Over 120 towns and villages besides a large number of farms, mills, woods and copses were captured, and during the latter stages of the operations many French inhabitants were released from captivity.</span></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: 0cm;" align="left"><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><span style=""> </span>39 enemy divisions were engaged and defeated, of which 12 were engaged twice, 6 – 3 times, 1 – 4 times, and 6 have been since disbanded.</span></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: 0cm;" align="left"><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><span style=""> </span><b style="">The Book is forwarded with best wishes for Xmas and the New Year.</b></span></p> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: 0cm;" align="left"><i style=""><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><span style=""> </span>General Staff (Intelligence), Australian Corps.</span></i></p><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: 0cm;" align="left"><span style="font-size: 11pt;">I am indebted to the Australian War Memorial for the information about this printed insert, which contextualises the publication.</span><i style=""><span style="font-size: 11pt;"><br /></span></i></p>peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-89780168368144932172011-04-06T13:49:00.000-07:002011-04-06T14:07:01.361-07:00Das Taktische Lichtbilderbuch. Juni 1917. II Teil.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:view>Normal</w:View> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:snaptogridincell/> <w:wraptextwithpunct/> <w:useasianbreakrules/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:browserlevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:latentstyles deflockedstate="false" latentstylecount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} </style> <![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:shapedefaults ext="edit" spidmax="1026"> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:shapelayout ext="edit"> <o:idmap ext="edit" data="1"> </o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-indent: -18pt; text-align: justify;font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="letter-spacing: -0.15pt;font-size:12pt;" ><span style=""><span style="font-style: normal; font-variant: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: normal; font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal;font-size:7pt;" ></span></span></span></span><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="letter-spacing: -0.15pt;font-size:12pt;" >This German aerial photography handbook from the First World War contains many aerial photographs of tactical features, with captions relating to camouflage and concealment. It is particularly informative about trench mortar and machine gun emplacements, and battery positions. Many of the illustrations are from the Russian front.<br /></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-indent: -18pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="letter-spacing: -0.15pt;font-family:Symbol;font-size:12pt;" ><span style=""><span style="font: 7pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><span style="font-size:130%;"><i><span style="letter-spacing: -0.15pt;font-size:12pt;" >Das Taktische Lichtbilderbuch. Der Kommandierende General der Luftstreitkräfte. Nr. 2500/17 Lb. Juni 1917. Nur für Dienstgebrauch. II Teil. Die Deckung gegen Fliegersicht. Hergestellt in der Tiefdruckanstalt Charleville.</span></i><span style="letter-spacing: -0.15pt;font-size:12pt;" > 67pp, 32.5 x 21.5 cm, portrait format. Many aerial photographs of tactical features, with captions relating to camouflage and concealment, reproduced by photogravure.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-indent: -18pt;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="letter-spacing: -0.15pt;font-size:12pt;" >I will post some of the images shortly, once I have scanned them.<br /></span></span></p>peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-36202430254633352502010-12-20T13:47:00.000-08:002010-12-23T15:47:52.411-08:00Unidentified airfield - Western Front?<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFmkMZA6jsJgo2ao6oqj7Y_1UuFfQQe4ryirejBe4CjLbqKZedu_PnTSKMTGeLq6D4vN4oz2BFXDpobHBXIoSiw5t4GCyxt9OSErR7mjbVR6Y9gDprF9vklK6w58gNYL7coN9ohCTyaBhR/s1600/Unknown+airfield+1914-18+low+res.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 306px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFmkMZA6jsJgo2ao6oqj7Y_1UuFfQQe4ryirejBe4CjLbqKZedu_PnTSKMTGeLq6D4vN4oz2BFXDpobHBXIoSiw5t4GCyxt9OSErR7mjbVR6Y9gDprF9vklK6w58gNYL7coN9ohCTyaBhR/s400/Unknown+airfield+1914-18+low+res.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552885594510587314" border="0" /></a><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcnNbyJy0OeXS27-eJTjSUY01_G-WGn5xJpHjrSasHQC6rcF4r0CCxTC3CNfYjcKiLbbUVdq-IG398El6Q4gV8DLDy15qlsTcfpbf0HiTpMNtrTpysOwv3zfjJ4RcXKYaETDpwAsFPgJSV/s1600/Unknown+airfield+1914-18+b+low+res.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 348px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcnNbyJy0OeXS27-eJTjSUY01_G-WGn5xJpHjrSasHQC6rcF4r0CCxTC3CNfYjcKiLbbUVdq-IG398El6Q4gV8DLDy15qlsTcfpbf0HiTpMNtrTpysOwv3zfjJ4RcXKYaETDpwAsFPgJSV/s400/Unknown+airfield+1914-18+b+low+res.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5552885114106624242" border="0" /></a><br />Can anyone identify the town and airfield shown in these two air photos of the First World War period which I've just found in a local flea-market? Look to me like they might be German photos, possibly of a German airfield in northern France or Belgium. Both photos show fiducial marks, which is not normally the case for RFC/RAF photos (though RNAS photos do sometimes show them). The top one is approx. 163 x 217 mm (about 6.5 x 8.5 inches), while the bottom one is approx. 163 x 188 mm (about 6.5 x 7.5 inches).<br /><br />Added 23 Dec 2010: Ha! I've beaten you to it. I have identified the village and airfield as Abscon, just to the west of Denain (SSW of Valenciennes) in northern France. I thought I'd look at some First World War maps (British 1:40,000 series) to seee if I could spot the street plan with the distinctive feature of the church on the road-bend. I lloked at Sheets 51 and 51A, and sure enough, within a minute or two I found the village of Abscon. Google Earth seemed to confirm it, and when I searched Google images for Abscon I found photos of the church and the Mairie next to it.<br /><br />So there we are; they're German photos of a German airfield. It now remains to pin down the year. It's clearly the summer, and, given the type of German aeroplanes shown (Steve Suddaby gives his opinion that 'it might be a Hannover CL II or III. It looks to be the size of a two-seater based on comparing it with the wagon and team of oxen/horses pulling it. If my eyes are not deceiving me, it seems to have a double horizontal stabilizer which greatly narrows the number of aircraft types of any country that it might be. The wing configuration seems to match a Hannover. If I'm right about the aircraft type, it would date the photo to late 1917 or later'), may be 1917-1918.peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-65834566274138351232010-12-19T14:59:00.000-08:002011-04-06T14:05:08.756-07:00Notes on the Interpretation of Air Photographs, 1924<div style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><rel="file-list" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CDELLPC%7E1%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml"><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:view>Normal</w:View> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:snaptogridincell/> <w:wraptextwithpunct/> <w:useasianbreakrules/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:browserlevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:latentstyles deflockedstate="false" latentstylecount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><style> <!-- /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} p.MsoBodyTextIndent, li.MsoBodyTextIndent, div.MsoBodyTextIndent {margin-top:0cm; margin-right:0cm; margin-bottom:0cm; margin-left:92.15pt; margin-bottom:.0001pt; text-align:justify; text-indent:15.85pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; mso-hyphenate:none; tab-stops:-36.0pt; font-size:12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} @page Section1 {size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 90.0pt 72.0pt 90.0pt; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} /* List Definitions */ @list l0 {mso-list-id:2113892595; mso-list-type:simple; mso-list-template-ids:134807553;} @list l0:level1 {mso-level-number-format:bullet; mso-level-text:; mso-level-tab-stop:18.0pt; mso-level-number-position:left; margin-left:18.0pt; text-indent:-18.0pt; font-family:Symbol;} ol {margin-bottom:0cm;} ul {margin-bottom:0cm;} --> </style><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} </style> <![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:shapedefaults ext="edit" spidmax="1026"> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:shapelayout ext="edit"> <o:idmap ext="edit" data="1"> </o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--> <p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: -18pt;font-family:times new roman;" align="left"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span style=""><span style=""><span style="font-size:100%;">The following volume is a fascinating link between the air photo (AP) interpretation manuals produced during the First World War and the later developments in the inter-war period and the Second World War. I believe there is a copy in The National Archives at Kew. I'll post some images in due course.</span></span></span></p></rel="file-list"></div><br /><rel="file-list" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CDELLPC%7E1%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml"></rel="file-list"></div><rel="file-list" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CDELLPC%7E1%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml"><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: -18pt;" align="left"><equiv="content-type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"><name="progid" content="Word.Document"><name="generator" content="Microsoft Word 11"><name="originator" content="Microsoft Word 11"><br /><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:view>Normal</w:View> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:snaptogridincell/> <w:wraptextwithpunct/> <w:useasianbreakrules/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> </w:Compatibility> <w:browserlevel>MicrosoftInternetExplorer4</w:BrowserLevel> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:latentstyles deflockedstate="false" latentstylecount="156"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><style> <!-- /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} p.MsoBodyTextIndent, li.MsoBodyTextIndent, div.MsoBodyTextIndent {margin-top:0cm; margin-right:0cm; margin-bottom:0cm; margin-left:92.15pt; margin-bottom:.0001pt; text-align:justify; text-indent:15.85pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; mso-hyphenate:none; tab-stops:-36.0pt; font-size:12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";} @page Section1 {size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 90.0pt 72.0pt 90.0pt; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} /* List Definitions */ @list l0 {mso-list-id:2113892595; mso-list-type:simple; mso-list-template-ids:134807553;} @list l0:level1 {mso-level-number-format:bullet; mso-level-text:; mso-level-tab-stop:18.0pt; mso-level-number-position:left; margin-left:18.0pt; text-indent:-18.0pt; font-family:Symbol;} ol {margin-bottom:0cm;} ul {margin-bottom:0cm;} --> </style><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ansi-language:#0400; mso-fareast-language:#0400; mso-bidi-language:#0400;} </style> <![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:shapedefaults ext="edit" spidmax="1026"> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:shapelayout ext="edit"> <o:idmap ext="edit" data="1"> </o:shapelayout></xml><![endif]--> </name="originator"></name="generator"></name="progid"></equiv="content-type"></p></rel="file-list"><div style="text-align: justify;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><rel="file-list" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CDELLPC%7E1%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml"><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: -18pt;" align="left"><span style="font-family:Symbol;"><span style=""><span style=";font-family:";font-size:7;" > </span></span></span><!--[endif]--><i style="">Notes on the Interpretation of Air Photographs, War Office, May 1924. For Official Use Only. Air Min. 2235. ((40/Misc./2235). </i>[HMSO]<i style=""> </i>Print code:<i style=""> (C4357) Wt.W1149/PP2982 6/24 250 Harrow.</i> 1 page <i style="">Contents</i>. 1 page <i style="">List of Plates</i>. Text pages 5-15. 143 plates: <i style="">Photographs Reproduced by Advanced Photographic Section, AP&SS, British Army of the Rhine</i>, covering Western Front, Rhine, Italy, Palestine, Macedonia and Gallipoli fronts. ‘<i style="">This manual embodies the experience gained in the interpretation of air photographs during the stabilised periods of warfare on the various fronts between 1915 and 1918. The photographs reproduced in the plates exemplify types of work which may, or may not, be met with in the future</i>.’ Large portrait-format album, 14” x 12”, thick buff covers, with black cloth spine. All plates are real photographs, not half-tone reproductions, except for one for guidance in interpretation of certain features (gunpits, trench mortar emplacements, etc.) which is based on wartime drawings.</p></rel="file-list"><br /><rel="file-list" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CDELLPC%7E1%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml"><p class="MsoBodyTextIndent" style="margin-left: 18pt; text-align: left; text-indent: -18pt;" align="left">I'm currently working on a book exploring the relationship between air photos and tactical maps such as artillery maps and trench maps. This will examine the developing sophistication of interpretation, and the exploitation of its fruits in the proliferation of tactical (and topographical) signs on the maps.</p></rel="file-list"></div><br /><rel="file-list" href="file:///C:%5CUsers%5CDELLPC%7E1%5CAppData%5CLocal%5CTemp%5Cmsohtml1%5C01%5Cclip_filelist.xml"></rel="file-list"></div>peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-42991809967361413412009-05-15T09:36:00.000-07:002009-05-15T09:39:44.272-07:00Willows PoemsHere are some poems I wrote while writing my book Willow / Wilg / Weide / Saule (Ypres Willows):<br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Willows Poems</span><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Shock of Recognition, Pilckem Ridge</span><br /><br />Blood-dark, stark against the sky<br />are war’s images we carry from photograph’s still grain, <br />the film’s foolery of the eye, a painting’s pigment,<br />the landscape sweep of panoramas . . . <br />Their shapes jolt vision, shake sense, dislocate;<br />these fields were, are.<br /><br />Tree-fans of high explosive smoke erupt from fields<br />where willow rods now claim the sky.<br />Spring’s lanyard jerks at the breech,<br />a green fuze triggers spurting sap’s gaine; <br />willow fingers start their splaying trajectory.<br /><br />We are in the killing zone, once quick with death’s dawn timetable,<br />its tide marks of cartographic plots:<br />the field guns’ creeping and standing barrages, <br />the machine gun barrage,<br />the bombardment by trench mortars, <br />by medium and heavy artillery.<br /><br />Here men flounder over fractured earth, <br />through nets of wire, <br />through air roaringly reticulated; <br />flayed by a burning sleet of lead, <br />scouring shrapnel balls’ fiery hail,<br />a steel scourge of splinters.<br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Napoleon’s Fifth Element, Passchendaele</span><br /><br />Earth, rooted;<br />Air, breathing and dancing;<br />Fire, all around; <br />Water, the life blood;<br />Mud.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">The Line of March, Messines</span><br /><br />Static sentinels, <br />or stalking figures, up the track, along the hedge;<br />then in open order,<br />shaking out into line<br />or artillery formation.<br /><br />Unharvested, <br />their rods<br />explode into the sky.<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Ancient Pollards, Ploegsteert</span><br />(‘Old willow boles, rarely sound and falling about untidily,<br />continue to shoot vigorously’)<br /><br />Spiky, hoary polls - <br />shock-headed,<br />gnarl-faced,<br />whorled,<br />limbless;<br />the old sweats, who once fired<br />fifteen rounds rapid.<br /><br />Rotting, raddled corpses, <br />And survivors, old wounds healed <br />around shell splinters, steel rods, concrete,<br />screw pickets, wire barbs.<br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">White Willows, Cross Roads Farm</span><br /><br />Some white willows are weeping,<br />their lashes stroking the moat’s breast,<br />dropping tears.<br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Bat and Ball; drawing a blank</span><br /><br />The backs of the leaves flicker white in the wind<br />as a ghost, or an angel, passes;<br />the felled tree’s flesh glimmers with the pallor of a shroud. <br />Sawn straight from it, the undressed white willow slab, square cut,<br />like the round which will not kill<br />is called a blank (not ball).<br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Reading the Runes, St Yvon</span><br /><br />How to read the brown hare,<br />lored with wicca and moon,<br />breaking in February’s sunshine over the plough,<br />along no man’s land, from the trees around the flooded mine crater, <br />from the wired brushwood by the concrete pillbox sherds?<br /><br />Trees as text<br />or as signs, symbols;<br />conventional signs on the map – <br />the dots penning the flowing beke,<br />shoring the still dyke or pool?<br /><br />Read their linearity, their punctuation,<br />their studding, their scatter in the landscape.<br />What information do they yield, these willow patterns?<br />Some deep, ancient pattern of cultivation, of mulch and tilth,<br />of gabion, wattle and revetment against the rushing water, <br />the drilling rain, crumbling bank.<br /><br />That here Flemish farmers fought the rheumy clay<br />to work their root crops and pastures,<br />seed their land,<br />plant their rods, harvest the osier crop <br />along the ditch, around the teeming pool and moat.<br /><br />They line the cultivation, mark the gutter,<br />form field boundaries, divide lush pasture from clay plough. <br /><br />Or that here was a battle<br />leaving a hecatomb of corpses?<br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">The Quick and the Dead</span><br />(with acknowledgements to Robert Graves)<br /><br />A tree of enchantment,<br />the moon’s willow is the fifth tree, <br />one of the seven wise pillars, with their planets, days and letters,<br />one of the seven noble, sacred, trees of the grove.<br />Its branches waving at the fifth month<br />start May Day’s orgiastic revels, spring magic dew,<br />urge the season of the renewed sun.<br /><br />Helicë, the willow sacred to poets,<br />names Helicon, home of the Nine Muses, <br />wanton priestesses of the Moon-goddess.<br />Mount Helicon’s willow fairy, Heliconian the Muse (the White Goddess),<br />waves her willow-wand, <br />starts the wind whispering inspiration in the willows,<br />puts poets’ minds under a strange and potent influence.<br />Mystically eloquent, Orpheus received his gift <br />by touching willows in Persephone’s grove;<br />outside the Dictean Cave the Orphic willow grew.<br /><br />Water-loving willow, goddess of wells and springs;<br />witches went to sea in willow basket-sieves, sailed in riddles,<br />the liknos, used for winnowing corn, telling the future. <br />Poseidon, to whom a Helicean Grove was sacred, <br />led the Muses, guarded the Delphic Oracle, before Apollo.<br /><br />Belili, Sumerian White Goddess, was a willow-goddess of wells and springs. <br />Beli, her divinatory son, a Sea-god, tutelary deity of Britain - his ‘honey-isle’. <br />A god must commands its waters –<br />the grey Narrow Seas, green Western Approaches, blue High Seas – <br />before he can rule an island.<br /><br />Weep, willow, for your lost lover;<br />wear green willows in your hat as a sign; <br />and as a charm against the jealousy<br />of the Moon-goddess.<br /><br />White Moon-wood, dove, barn owl; <br />Willow’s landscape is the terrain of death, of the White Goddess,<br />whose prime orgiastic bird – the wryneck, snake-bird, cuckoo’s mate, <br />spring migrant hissing like a snake, <br />nests in willows.<br /><br />Europë on coins from Cretan Gortyna, <br />sits in a willow tree, osier basket in hand, made love to by an eagle; <br />is Eur-ope, of the broad face, the Full Moon,<br />and Eu-rope, of the flourishing withies, Helice, sister of Amalthea.<br /><br />The ancient word for willow <br />yields witch, wicked, wicca, wicker;<br />at Fricourt, by no strange transposition, <br />Wicket Corner became Wicked Corner.<br /><br />Druids offer human sacrifice <br />in wicker baskets<br />at the full moon.<br />Rods sprout from willows’ polls, make baskets ensnaring the moon.<br />Flints knapped to willow-leaves,<br />inscribed with crescent moons, <br />are funery.<br /><br />Willow is sacred to Hecate, Circe, Hera and Persephone, <br />the Triple Moon-goddess’s witch-worshipped death faces; <br />so you haven’t got a chance, boys, in the willow landscape. <br /><br /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight:bold;">Willow service</span><br /><br />Trussed with rust-barbed wire,<br />they stand <br />as fence posts, <br />supports for notice boards,<br />field boundaries;<br />revet the stream banks,<br />yield rods, poles, firewood, <br />nests for birds, <br />lashed cross-branches skied crows’ nests, <br />cross-trees for storks, kites;<br />hiding places for children in their crowns,<br />for owls in their hollow skulls,<br />a little shelter against rain’s lashing,<br />shade for picnics and lovers.peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-77840397026316146332009-05-15T09:21:00.000-07:002009-05-15T09:27:37.403-07:00Secauspion RoadI'm posting this here because my web search for Secauspion Road turned up zero web pages - a most unusual event these days! Secauspion Road was a plank road constructed across the shell-wrecked swampland of the Ypres Salient during the Third Battle of Ypres (1917). I believe the name is a composite, derived from <span style="font-weight: bold;">SEC</span>ond <span style="font-weight: bold;">AUS</span>tralian <span style="font-weight: bold;">PION</span>eers. Does anyone have any confirmation, or any alternative ideas?<br /><br />This was one of the fascinating trench and topographical names I discovered while scouring trench maps, divisional and regimental histories, war diaries and other sources, for my book <span style="font-style: italic;">Rats Alley</span> - <span style="font-style: italic;">Trench Names of the Western Front </span>(2006).peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-65879056282720351102009-05-07T15:05:00.000-07:002009-05-07T15:08:01.368-07:001914-1918 Photogrammetry and Aerial PhotographyA recent book, in which I have a paper on British, French and German photogrammetry in the First World War, resulting from the University of Ghent Ghent air photo conference is: <br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Images of Conflict: Military Aerial Photography & Archaeology</span>, Edited by <br />Birger Stichelbaut, Jean Bourgeois, Nicholas Saunders, Piet Chielens. <br />Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2009. ISBN (10): 1-4438-0171-2, ISBN (13): <br />978-1-4438-0171-3.peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-89376790726546799582009-05-02T10:34:00.000-07:002009-05-15T09:33:18.655-07:00Trench Names in A S Byatt's new novel The Children's BookAntonia (A.S.) Byatt has not only read my <span style="font-style: italic;">Rats Alley</span> book about trench names, but has used it (and acknowledged it) in her research for her new novel <span style="font-style: italic;">The Children's Book</span>, published by Chatto & Windus. She also has one of her characters write a poem about these names - this poem was also published recently in the <span style="font-style: italic;">New Yorker</span>. Her book will be launched in London in mid-May, and she will be speaking at the Charleston Festival on Sunday 17th May at 2.30pm.peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-47127800864754164452009-04-01T14:10:00.000-07:002009-04-01T14:18:18.377-07:00Imaging Golgotha; Oxford 28th February 2009Oxford 28-2-09: additional note.<br /><br />Imaging Golgotha – Aerial Photos and Trench Maps of the Western Front. Dr Peter Chasseaud<br />Why do we need the Western Front landscape? A mythical landscape.<br /><br />We must recognise that we are all involved in the process of creating a new mythology. As Nietzsche said, history is all about interpretation. There is, of course, a myriad of interpretations.<br />I am today looking at the creation, during the First World War, of a conceptual and representational paper landscape which has now, for us, become a simulacrum of the ‘real’ conflict landscape of 1914-18. We recognise that landscape is a human construction, the result of thousands of years of cultivation and industry. The war landscape has the humans all mixed up in it (literally), and walking all over it. Those of us who today walk the same geographical landscape, in the full knowledge that the 14-18 war, and the intervening years, have changed that landscape, also have to acknowledge that the past is a foreign country which we do not want to let go – indeed in some way we need to hang on to it, reclaim it or redefine it, as a way of defining our own identity. It also represents, as something we did not do, a continual challenge, a sort of perpetual St Crispin’s Day: ‘What did you do in the Great War, Daddy?’ becomes for us ‘What would you have done in the Great War . . . ?, or as one speaker I recently heard put I, ‘I hope I would cut the mustard’. There is here also an element of ancestor worship, a quasi religious element. For some it has become a dubious emotional catalyst – notably on the ‘big days’ such as 1st July, 31st July, 11th November.<br /><br />We are creating this myth as part of the continuum of myth-making that was going on since August 1914, and which we can recognise in the memoirs of Graves, Sassoon, Blunden and many others, and especially in the works of David Jones. It was Jones above all who, in the period 1932-7, during the creation of In Parenthesis, consciously and explicitly designated the Western Front (and, more locally, Plugstreet) as Broceliande – the enchanted forest or mythical landscape. Across no man’s land was the strange, alien territory of the enemy, where things look and smell different, where shadows flit and ghosts and vampires lurk.<br /><br />We need that mythology in a way that France or Germany do not. They were fighting for national survival, and their predominantly peasant populations were not (until briefly with Hitler and Pétain) that interested in the creation of a new mythical landscape; in any case they had their heads and hands full of the old one. But for Britain it was foreign and strange, and especially for the mainly urban, industrial civilian soldiers it was a revelation, indeed an epiphany of a sort. And from the 1960s, as we lost an empire, we needed something new to believe in, and that was some defining myth which touched every family more deeply that the more recent war of 1939-45 (around which myths were also created – Dunkirk, the Battle of Britain, the Blitz, etc., but because it more directly impacted the civilian population at home somehow diffused the experience).peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-9780401212824157042008-08-12T06:58:00.000-07:002008-08-18T13:16:42.668-07:00Factory Farm (Ultra Trench) and Ultimo Crater (Ultimo Trench) 1915<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-TAnUizzk2ezK95bIWC2ZRJJvKzeJEPK_Jv94TaXDcDVyIjtAi6BU58zdby_V834sgkxfMWkz_jPF7YBEXR7F-kB1lowRKrEoJGhy3YZ2ufLeRQmUPNMKeRKQURvLvh27XPOrKvLqCHRk/s1600-h/Factory+and+Ultimo+Tr+1915+small.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5233630736388911666" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-TAnUizzk2ezK95bIWC2ZRJJvKzeJEPK_Jv94TaXDcDVyIjtAi6BU58zdby_V834sgkxfMWkz_jPF7YBEXR7F-kB1lowRKrEoJGhy3YZ2ufLeRQmUPNMKeRKQURvLvh27XPOrKvLqCHRk/s400/Factory+and+Ultimo+Tr+1915+small.jpg" border="0" /></a> This British summer 1915 air photo shows the German front position east of St Yvon (St Yves) at Factory Farm (bottom) and a few hundred yards to the north. This position was known to the British from late 1916 as Ultra Trench (south of the road) and Ultimo Trench (north of the road). British mines were blown on 7 June 1917 under Factory Farm, a medieval moated farm known to the French and Belgians as <em>Reebrouck </em>('<em>brouck</em>' meaning marsh), and to the Germans as <em>Wasser-Gut </em>(meaning water estate), and at Ultimo Trench just north of the road.<br /><br /><strong><em>Static and dynamic interpretation</em></strong>.<br /><em>Static interpretation</em> reads the image as a single text - it draws out what is there, looking for characteristic signatures. In the photo above we can see a medieval and early modern cultivation system, roads and farm tracks, and a typical medieval moated farm, overlain by a relatively simple German trench and breastwork front system, with communication trenches running to the rear. The direction of light and season are given by the shadows of the trees, which are in full leaf. This photo was taken in the evening, with the low sunlight coming from the north-west. The light striking the front edge of the parapets and paradoses of trenches and breastworks, and catching the smooth, reflecting surfaces of bare earth and sandbags, contrasted with the deep shadows thrown by these features, throws them into strong relief.<br /><br />Note the bulging and thickened sections of breastwork where the Germans have started building concrete shelters for their front-line garrison (particularly machine-gun crews) into and under the parapet. These were at roughly 50-metre intervals. Machine-gun positions were sited to fire along no-man's land, to take an attack in enfilade. They were not generally sited to fire to the front; this would have made their loopholes too conspicuous, and in any case was less effective in terms of a deadly field of fire.<br /><br />Possible trench mortar positions can also be seen behind the German front line. We can also make out the dark band of barbed wire to the west of the German front breastwork.<br /><br />A small sandbag redoubt has been built in the front line where it crosses the road.<br /><br />The fall away of the ground south of the road is indicated by the shadow thrown; the level of Factory Farm is significantly below that of the St Yvon Ridge north of the road. This may explain the old name of Factory Farm - <em>Reebrouck</em> - 'brouck' meaning marsh.<br /><br />At Factory Farm the German breastworks have been integrated with the ruins of the old farm buildings, giving a typical rectangular pattern. Tree shadows in the farm area show that it has, as yet, been relatively little bombarded, an indicator of the lack of British heavy artillery, mortars and ammunition at this stage of the war. Note how few shell holes can be seen in the whole area covered by the photo.<br /><br />At the extreme left (west) of the photo is the British front line (Trench 123), a much less considerable example of field engineering, where it runs east road running northward from Le Gheer and Le Pelerin (the Birdcage). The British front line cuts back to the west (north end of Trench 123) at the highest point of the St Yvon ridge, which runs downhill from west to east towards Warneton and the River Lys.<br /><br /><em>Dynamic interpretation</em> is much more fruitful, as it interrogates a series of images covering the same site taken at intervals of time, and draws its conclusions from the changes, or developments, between each of the series of images.<br /><br />With hindsight we know that, from mid-1915, the Germans were building concrete machine-gun positions and personnel shelters (MEBUs) into their front line; these were often called pill-boxes by the British, and more recently called bunkers (a word not much used by the British in the First World War). German practice in an Allied attack was for the machine gun crews, with their machine guns and ammunition, to shelter from the preliminary artillery bombardment in these shelters (or in deep dugouts where the geology permitted), only to emerge when the bombardment had lifted. Sentries left out in the front line trench would give warning of this, and the crews would rush out and set up their machine guns in nearby shell-holes or remaining sections of trench.<br /><br />1914-18 aerial photographs of the Factory Farm area reveal a rural landscape undergoing transformation under the impact of war. On the earliest surviving British (June-July 1915) air photos can be seen the pattern of roads, woods, farms, drainage ditches, cultivation boundaries, etc., and the lush vegetation of the season. The bare surfaces of roads and tracks, usually meeting at distinct angles or right-angles, show up white. Railways form long straights and gentle curves, punctuated by level crossings and/or bridges. Knowledge of the direction of light is important for differentiating between mounds and hollows; this can be deduced from shadows thrown by trees, etc. The length of shadows, related to the time of day and the season of the year, can give the height of objects. Low sunlight catches the rims of craters and shell-holes facing the sun, and casts shadows on their far side. Long, full shadows reveal hedges and the types of trees around farms and along roads and ditches – pollard willows, poplars, etc. Ground forms and features such as ditches, breastworks, banks and sunken roads are thrown into sharp relief by the raking early morning, late afternoon or evening light. Stereoscopic pairs (stereograms) make the detail stand out even more clearly, and are a great aid to interpretation.<br /><br />Trenches are clearly shown as zig-zagging dark lines where they are in deep shadow, while the bare earth or sandbags forming parapet and parados, reflecting more light, show up as a pale tone or even as white. Great breastworks, built up above ground level to keep the floor of the trench above the water table, are thrown into relief by raking light and their massive dimensions made apparent (6-8 feet high, parapet some 20 feet thick, parados less thick. A thin line indicates an elbow rest, a broader line the firestep, of a fire-trench. Support and reserve trenches, splinter-proof dugouts, mortar positions and latrines can also be made out, though the last three are difficult to interpret. Machine gun positions, low in the German parapet, can be identified by the thin dark slit of their firing aperture at the foot of the parapet, by a V-shaped depression in the parapet, and by their tactically-sited position to obtain the best, usually oblique or enfilade, field of fire. Typically they were sited to fire along no man’s land, particularly where small salients or re-entrants made this possible. Where the front lines changed direction, or formed a distinct bend or dog’s leg, the machine guns were again sited to take advantage of the possibilities of enfilade fire. Barbed wire obstacles and entanglements show as dark bands in front of the fire-trenches.<br /><br />Farm building and houses are easy to identify by their shape and context. Roofs catch the light. If the roofs have disappeared, the internal wall structure shows them subdivided into rectangular cells. Moated farms (hence the German name for Factory Farm: <em>Wasser-Gut</em>) show up clearly as a building or cluster of buildings inside a circular or rectangular water feature. Depending on the angle of light, the water in moat, pond or shell-hole can appear dark or light. After much rain, water-filled depressions can appear darker than the surrounding ground. When the snow is on the ground, the features show up black against the white ground; much more can be seen on snow photos, particularly occupied shell-holes, tracks, blast-marks, wire.<br /><br />NB:<br />Dynamic interpretation is vital; a sequencve of images of the same site over time.<br />Inter-relationship of sources and images.<br />The air photo and terrestrial panorama photo inform the reading of the map.<br />The map informs the reading of the photos.<br />The reading of the landscape on the ground informs the reading of the map and the photos.<br />The map and photos inform the reading of the landscape on the ground<br />Everything informs everything else; symbiosis and serendipity.peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-9951413481481809662008-07-21T14:25:00.000-07:002008-07-21T14:35:07.626-07:00New Project; Landscape, Aerial Photography and Mapping 1914-1918<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikKQI9hnRvF4NXUHtD8j0KXYC6ZwJGHqwMlrW0I7ns0UvNc5EXjiTcq8oN_pXD6dOaLErMlK9aJmPmI3glZhH9iTA2lniZB4zziAabnBbzkyFwapQmOvMS7HJ1oRGGPhS1vCn2VZIFNrdf/s1600-h/OGS+Crawford+16+May+08+009.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5225582364147477986" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikKQI9hnRvF4NXUHtD8j0KXYC6ZwJGHqwMlrW0I7ns0UvNc5EXjiTcq8oN_pXD6dOaLErMlK9aJmPmI3glZhH9iTA2lniZB4zziAabnBbzkyFwapQmOvMS7HJ1oRGGPhS1vCn2VZIFNrdf/s400/OGS+Crawford+16+May+08+009.jpg" border="0" /></a>One of my landscape projects at present is working on the relationship between landscape, aerial photography and mapping in the First World War, and will be posting some of the results on this blog. My earlier books (<em>Topography of Armageddon</em>, <em>Artillery's Astrologers</em>, <em>Rats Alley</em>) have looked at this relationship, but my new study is taking a deeper look at aspects such as phenomenology and photogrammetry.<br /><div></div>peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-61465652965982890012008-07-21T14:04:00.000-07:002008-07-21T14:23:19.069-07:00Topography of Armageddon - A British Trench Map Atlas of the Western Front 1914-1918<div align="center"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhR0JuWt5iGJl4oFO7OnSeys87J4Z79Le-bVf-AKPCqSaDm6u29yGx0ei9t2OEI3K6U_Iz0rFYY_2bC-DnYws7hScgY1W1Lzv1rUfsXsXtJ1g-VODYeEyQ-fgELP93OWc73MmhxKvfY0DeD/s1600-h/Plugstreet+02+07+046+small+inv.JPG"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5225579068421272834" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhR0JuWt5iGJl4oFO7OnSeys87J4Z79Le-bVf-AKPCqSaDm6u29yGx0ei9t2OEI3K6U_Iz0rFYY_2bC-DnYws7hScgY1W1Lzv1rUfsXsXtJ1g-VODYeEyQ-fgELP93OWc73MmhxKvfY0DeD/s400/Plugstreet+02+07+046+small+inv.JPG" border="0" /></a>The White Goddess?: Willow at Langemarck<br /><br /><div align="justify"><span style="font-family:arial;">This was the introduction I wrote for my <em><strong>Topography of Armageddon</strong></em> trench map atlas, in 1991:</span></div><div align="justify"><span style="font-family:Arial;"></span> </div><div align="justify"><span style="font-family:Arial;"></span></div><div align="justify"><span style="font-family:arial;"></span></div><div align="justify"><span style="font-family:arial;">When I first read Edmund Blunden's <em>Undertones of War</em> in the early 1960s, I was entranced by his arcadian vision, and intrigued by the obvious difficulty of reconciling the magical and pastoral view of the landscape with the realities of violent and industrialised warfare. A different insight into the same problem was offered by David Jones in his <em>In Parenthesis</em>, and a strange and dramatic, if ghastly, landscape, was also recorded and interpreted by many of the painters of the period, notably Paul and John Nash. The cartographers of the field survey companies provided an altogether more objective, but not unpoetic, map of the same landscape. Many years ago it occurred to me that an atlas of facsimiles of original 1914-18 trench maps might be much appreciated by those interested in the First World War, and I determined to conduct the research necessary to write fairly authoritatively about such maps, and also to build up a collection from which illustrations could be drawn. In 1986 I published my first book, on the Regular Series 1:10,000 trench maps (GSGS 3062), and also began to write articles for journals on the subject of maps and survey in that war.<br /><br />For the present book I decided to keep the written text to a minimum and concentrate on the visual or graphic elements - the maps themselves. I have endeavoured to give 1:10,000 scale coverage of most of the British sector of the Western Front, in particular the "Old Front Line" of 1914-1916. Of course the 1917 and 1918 battles on this frontage are well represented, but due to limitations of space there is little coverage of the later extensions of the British line down to La Fere. I have used the occasional 1:20,000 scale map to cover areas of lower activity or interest. In some cases of high activity or intense interest I have provided 1:5,000 scale plans, the better to show the intricate trench detail. A few French maps, some used by the British, are included for comparison. The overall selection of maps inevitably reflects my own interests in the development of survey and mapping techniques, but I trust that this will not override my general intention to provide good coverage of the areas in which there seems to be the most interest, particularly the Ypres Salient and the Somme.<br /><br />The basic topographical survey and map was used as a background for the overprinting of tactical and administrative information, and I have included many examples of these different forms of maps. The most obvious type of tactical overprint is that of the trenches themselves, both British and German. For the years 1915-1917 it was British practice, for security reasons, to show only the German trenches; the British trenches only appeared on "secret" editions, of which very small numbers were printed, mostly for staff use. Most front line troops never saw a secret edition of the sheet covering their front. Thus most of the maps here displayed are the ordinary editions as used by the front soldiers. Print runs for the regular series 1:10,000 sheets ranged from perhaps 3,000 in 1915 to 6-8,000 in 1916-18, and for 1:20,000 sheets were normally 10,000. Other significant overprints were the "hostile battery positions" , "barrage" , "situation" , "target" and "enemy organisation" maps. It was important to show all aspects of the enemy defensive and offensive preparations, so that plans could be worked out, barrages and neutralising fire could be planned, and the tanks and infantry would know the exact position and nature of the enemy dispositions. On a scale as large as 1:10,000, which was the most common for infantry and field artillery, these tactical features, down to individual machine gun and trench mortar emplacements, could be indicated with precision. Techniques were developed for plotting topographical and tactical detail with great accuracy from air photos, and this detail was then transferred to the base map. This map itself was the result of the refinement of survey techniques over the four years of the war, the most important parts of the process being the harmonisation (not seriously undertaken until 1918) of the pre-war trigonometrical systems of France and Belgium by the British survey staff at armies and GHQ, the compilation of cadastral and other large-scale plans onto this trig framework, the plotting of additional detail from air photos, and the development of a reliable system of utilising existing levelling data and depicting ground forms.<br /><br />I have not attempted to give a campaign history for each sheet, nor do I think this is desirable. There are many published sources for such histories, and most readers will know in advance to which sheets they wish to refer. I have, however, made the occasional comment on actions or battles, but these remarks are in no way definitive. Campaign and battle histories need to be illustrated by maps showing the situation at successive stages of the action, and such quantities of maps and text are too great to contemplate fitting into a general atlas of this sort. For such detailed treatment, readers are referred to the "Official History".<br /><br />This book is concerned with the land, the landscape, and with people in the landscape. People created the landscape of Belgium and France through thousands of years of intensive cultivation since neolithic times. Clues as to the nature of early society remain in the form of the various lynchets, buttes and other earthworks on the chalk downland, and to a lesser extent in other places. In the twentieth century it remains primarily a rural landscape, studded with many villages, some towns, and fewer cities. The agriculture of the early twentieth century was dominated by human labour and the horse; it was largely unmechanised, particularly so on the small, peasant farms of France and Belgium. The arrival of the opposing armies on this landscape superimposed a new structure of trenches, battery positions and other military works on the pastoral organisation. On the maps, much as a modern motorway cuts its swathe through the countryside, disregarding old field boundaries and ancient roads and trackways, we see these trench systems carving through the land with a wanton disregard for the rural fabric. It was ever thus in war, but the war of l9l4-l8 was on such a scale as to scar the whole country for those years, and for many years after. Not that previous conflicts had not left their mark on the landscape; the many fortified towns and moated farms testified to this, and on the maps the star-shaped ramparts and ditches of Vauban's citadels, themselves often reconstructions of earlier fortifications, stand out as symbols of centuries of conflict in the "cockpit of Europe". Now we see the topographical evidence of the Great War in much the same way - earthworks, mine craters, cemeteries and pill boxes are the archaeological remains which draw the pilgrims and the curious to the Western Front.<br /><br />Field Fortifications are as old as war itself, and there was little new about the trench systems of 1914-18. The difference between this and previous wars was largely one of scale and technology, and it does not require a massive leap of the imagination to perceive the similarities between, say, Marlborough's sieges in the Low Countries, the stalemate in the trenches of the Crimea, the extensive field-works of the American Civil War, and the shambles of the Somme.<br /><br />And yet the experience of 1914-18 is peculiarly with us, in the form of the vast quantities of histories, autobiographies, literary and artistic works which were generated by this, the first of the modern wars of whole populations which affected Europe. We feel for the men and women, and for the land, of the Great War as for no previous war. We feel an intimacy with the human experience and with the transformed landscape of the Western Front.<br /><br />The "Old Front Line" was created in the closing months of 1914. Shallow muddy trenches, at first disconnected, and ragged sandbag breastworks straggled across sodden meadows and plough around Ypres and Armentières, and southwards past Richebourg and Festubert. Rat-gnawed corpses huddled no-man's-land, hung on the rusting wire, slowly dissolved into the stinking mud. The ground changed at Givenchy. South of the La Bassée Canal the clay-covered chalk downland ran past Loos, Notre Dame de Lorette and Vimy Ridge. It continued around Arras to Gommecourt, Beaumont Hamel, the Ancre, Thiepval, La Boisselle and Fricourt to the Somme. These were battlefields like no others before. The pattern was set by the great French attacks of 1915 in Artois and Champagne, and by the German assault on Verdun which started in February 1916. The White Goddess stalked the lunar landscape of Verdun, the Somme, Passchendaele. I am tired and sick of war. Its glory is all moonshine . . . .<br /><br />I am greatly indebted to many people and institutions for their help, advice and encouragement in my research and publication effort over the past ten years. Chief among these are Peter Clark (Map Research & Library Group, MCE, RE, Royal Geographical Society, and Charles Close Society), Ian Mumford (MRLG, MCE, RE, and CCS) , Francis Herbert (RGS), Yoland Hodson, Tim Nicholson, Roger Hellyer, Richard Oliver (CCS), Peter Scott and Trevor Pidgeon (Western Front Association), David Nash and Colin Bruce (Imperial War Museum), Tony Campbell and Bob MacIntosh (British Library Map Library), Georges Rachaine, Colonel Mike Nolan, the staff of the Public Record Office, Kew, Cambridge University Library, the Royal Engineers Institution Library, the Intelligence Corps Museum, the Royal Artillery Institution and many others to whom I extend my thanks even if I cannot mention them all here. Particular thanks go to Alan Sillitoe, whose strong interest in trench maps echoes my own, for his fascinating and engaging preface, and to Ian Mumford for his erudite note on trench maps in the public domain, which should help to make those maps more accessible to the general public. In conclusion I should like to record my gratitude to the Headmaster and Governors of Brighton College, who in 1990 awarded me a sabbatical term so that I could bring my researches to some sort of completion and prepare some of the material for publication. Like my earlier book on the 1:10,000 Series (GSGS 3062), this volume is more in the nature of an interim offering, and I hope at some date in the future to be able to publish my full History of Field Survey on the Western Front 1914-18. </span><span style="font-family:arial;">[This was duly published by Mapbooks under the title <em>Artillery’s Astrologers – A History of British Survey and Mapping on the Western Front 1914-1918</em>, in 1999. Both this book, and Topography of Armageddon, are still in print and can be obtained from Naval & Military Press].<br /></div></span></div>peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6425614950511241877.post-35293662413111101402008-07-10T09:25:00.000-07:002008-07-10T09:42:45.005-07:00Trench Map publicationsThe following publications by Peter Chasseaud about British First World War trench maps, and other aspects of engineer survey (Maps and Printing Sections, Topographical Sections, Field Survey Companies, Field Survey Battalions), artillery survey, aerial photography, topographical intelligence, artillery intelligence (including sound ranging, flash spotting, air photos, etc.), etc., are at present available, several of them from Naval & Military Press.<br /><br /><strong><em>Topopgraphy of Armaggedon - A British Trench Map Atlas of the Western Front, 1914-1918</em></strong> (Mapbooks, 1991 & 1998).<br /><br /><strong><em>Artillery's Astrologers - A History of British Survey and Mapping on the Western Front, 1914-1918</em></strong> (Mapbooks, 1999).<br /><br /><strong><em>Grasping Gallipoli - Terrain, Maps and Failure at the Dardanelles</em></strong> (with Peter Doyle) (Spellmount, 2005).<br /><br /><strong><em>Rats Alley - Trench Names of the Western Front, 1914-1918</em></strong> (Spellmount 2006).peter chasseaudhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05076289127662441267noreply@blogger.com0