Published in Windlesora 32 (2010)
© WLHG
On 21 February 1916, a misguided shell was fired into the cathedral of Verdun, it had been aimed at the railway station. This was the signal for ihe start of the longest battle in the history of warfare, and the largest ever artillery battle. It lasted until 18 December 1916.
General von Falkenhayn was hoping to achieve a breakthrough by employing three army corps against the French at Verdun, in his own words ‘to bleed the French white on the anvil of Verdun’.
he French poured thousands of troops into Verdun to stem the onslaught, at a huge cost. It was to alleviate the pressure on the French army and draw German troops away from Verdun, that the Battle of the Somme was brought forward to 1 July 1916.
One of the German soldiers sent from Verdun to the Somme was my father Adolf Breitenstein; he was wounded in both battles.
