Tag Archives: Armistice

by | November 9, 2018 · 8:53 am

A Century Since the Armistice

Bowling Green's Times-Journal announces the Armistice

Bowling Green’s Times-Journal announces the Armistice

GREAT WAR IS BROUGHT TO AN END: Greatest Struggle in World’s History Ceases With Signing of Armistice Terms.

So declared the now century-old news clipping of November 11, 1918 that Bowling Green’s Martha Potter pasted into her scrapbook.  As we have previously blogged, the Armistice was met with worldwide joy and relief.  Finally, an end to “1,567 days of horror,” read the Associated Press story, “during which virtually the whole civilized world has been convulsed.”

Few Bowling Green newspapers from that period survive, but other clippings in Martha’s scrapbook tell us of the local celebrations.  The very afternoon of the Armistice, citizens took turns ringing a “Liberty Bell” in an improvised belfry in front of the Palace Confectionery on Park Row.  Even a bull terrier belonging to Martha’s son Douglass got involved, tugging on the end of the rope to the delight of onlookers.  The Chamber of Commerce summoned everyone to gather that evening in the public square, promising that “bedlam will be turned loose and a last farewell will be given ‘Kaiser Bill.'”  Officials warned, however, that NO drunkenness or celebratory firing of pistols would be tolerated.

A few days later, “one of the largest crowds ever seen in the city” made up a “peace parade” nearly a mile long, beginning at the Mansard Hotel at Main and Center streets and winding its way through town.  Prominent citizens, schoolchildren, Red Cross women, Canteen Girls on horseback, firefighters, police, and WKU’s Student Army Training Corps joined the parade, headed by a band and festooned with flags, banners and a bust of President Woodrow Wilson.  Those absent were not forgotten.  The day after the Armistice, the News-Democrat published the names of Bowling Green and Warren County men, both white and African-American, as well as nurses, serving overseas at the war’s end.  This, too, became part of Martha’s scrapbook, as her son John was currently “over there.”

Red Cross workers parading in Bowling Green during World War I

Red Cross workers parading in Bowling Green during World War I

Search TopSCHOLAR and KenCat for more collections in the Manuscripts & Folklife Archives of WKU’s Department of Library Special Collections relating to the Great War, or browse a list here.

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by | November 11, 2016 · 8:28 am

It’s Over at Last

John Potter's Armistice ribbon

John Potter’s Armistice ribbon

The world was overjoyed when hostilities in the Great War, after inflicting some 37 million casualties, ceased with the signing of the Armistice on November 11, 1918.

Simpson County native James Lambert would later share his memories of the event.  “In the evening of that day, I was in London,” he recalled.  No vehicles could move, as “rejoicing men, women and children” crammed the downtown streets.  He marveled at the democratic nature of the celebration.  Men carried women on their shoulders, and girls kissed soldiers “right on the streets.  They were not women of questionable character either,” observed Lambert, “but some of the best and fairest ladies of the realm.”  Indeed, citizens of every age, class and occupation had turned out “with uplifted hands, with upturned faces, and with tears running down their cheeks, thanking Almighty God for peace.”

Serving aboard the troop ship USS Powhatan, Thomas O. Helm reported to his mother in Bowling Green that his ship had docked at Brest, and he “certainly did enjoy being in a French port when they signed the Armistice.”  Like Lambert, he remarked on the inclusive nature of the festivities.  The streets were full of parading citizens, singing and linking arms “regardless of whom they were.”  At night, “the harbor was beautiful,” wrote Helm.  “There were 25 transports and at least that many destroyers playing their search lights over the harbor. . . it was like riding down Broadway.”

Back in St. Charles, Missouri, Annie Raus described the local celebrations to the family of her cousin, Private Clem Phillips, then recovering in France from wounds.  “Everybody is so happy we were all so excited we didn’t know if we should laugh or cry.”  The noisy parades passing by had interrupted her washing day and made it impossible to “stay at the tub.”

And in Bowling Green, Martha Potter took out her scrapbook of son John’s overseas Army service and carefully added the red, white and blue ribbon he had worn on his coat the night the Armistice was signed.

Click on the links to access finding aids for these collections, part of the Manuscripts & Folklife Archives holdings of WKU’s Department of Library Special Collections.  For more on the end of World War I, search TopSCHOLAR and KenCat.

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