DIY History | Transcribe | World War I Diaries and Letters | Conger Reynolds newspaper clippings, 1916-1919 | 1916-12-10 Des Moines Sunday Register Clipping: "Register correspondent rescues French war trench newspapers"

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Conger Reynolds newspaper clippings, 1916-1919

1916-12-10 Des Moines Sunday Register Clipping: "Register correspondent rescues French war trench newspapers"

    Paris, Oct. 19.- The present war has brought into being many new things, but perhaps the most interesting is the trench newspaper, or rather trench magazine, for they publish very little news.
    The indications are that the French soldiers invented the trench magazine, but recently several of the British battalions have turned their hand to journalism in spare moments and through Switzerland it has become known that German soldiers are now publishing magazines.
   At first thought it would seem that the life of the modern soldier must not be so terrible after all if he is able to devote his time to such frivolities as the publication of magazines when his country`s existence is at stake. But on the contrary his life is so filled with horrors and constant menace of death that he finds need of distraction and the trench magazine supplies that need.
   The soldier in the trenches does a great deal of thinking and these publications enable him to express his ideas, his desires and his hopes. During a lull in the bombardment he seizes a scrap of paper and his pencil or fountain pen and writes his impressions or notes some amusing incident of the day, or, if he is an artist in civil life, he may draw a cartoon or an illustration. Then when his regiment is sent to the rear for a few days` rest he hunts out the editor of his trench magazine and offers his contribution.
    It is not journalism de luxe. Circumstances do not permit it. Some of the magazines are crude affairs, but others are more pretentious and attain almost the proportions of daily newspapers. They range in size from a single sheet of two pages about the form of our monthly magazines to a four page paper nearly as large as The Register.

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Paris, Oct. 19.- The present war has brought into being many new things, but perhaps the most interesting is the trench newspaper, or rather trench magazine, for they publish very little news. The indications are that the French soldiers invented the trench magazine, but recently several of the British battalions have turned their hand to journalism in spare moments and through Switzerland it has become known that German soldiers are now publishing magazines. At first thought it would seem that the life of the modern soldier must not be so terrible after all if he is able to devote his time to such frivolities as the publication of magazines when his country`s existence is at stake. But on the contrary his life is so filled with horrors and constant menace of death that he finds need of distraction and the trench magazine supplies that need. The soldier in the trenches does a great deal of thinking and these publications enable him to express his ideas, his desires and his hopes. During a lull in the bombardment he seizes a scrap of paper and his pencil or fountain pen and writes his impressions or notes some amusing incident of the day, or, if he is an artist in civil life, he may draw a cartoon or an illustration. Then when his regiment is sent to the rear for a few days` rest he hunts out the editor of his trench magazine and offers his contribution. It is not journalism de luxe. Circumstances do not permit it. Some of the magazines are crude affairs, but others are more pretentious and attain almost the proportions of daily newspapers. They range in size from a single sheet of two pages about the form of our monthly magazines to a four page paper nearly as large as The Register.