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From: (Taff Gillingham)
Subject: [WW1] Re: from Janice @ mshx@optonline.net
Date: Tue, 2 Oct 2001 01:09:51 +0100
Hi Janice,
Thank you for all the gory details. The treatment notes may well come in
useful.
I already have some personal experience: I suffered a minor form of trench
foot after Christmas 1999 when I led The Khaki Chums to Plugstreet to
commemorate the Christmas Truce of 1914. After 5 days of having our feet
continually submerged in freezing cold mud and water (and despite
thoroughly drying our feet and changing our socks every day) several of us
lost all sensation in our toes. I did not recover all the sensation in mine
until mid-February.
For an overview of the Christmas Truce commemoration see:
http://www.hellfire-corner.demon.co.uk/chums.htm
>From a historical point of view, the Standing Orders regarding Trench Foot
changed throughout the war (and of course depended on the time of year
too). Regulations tend to vary from Division to Division too. Whale Oil was
a 'Trench Store' and was administered daily in the presence of an Officer
by some unfortunate whos job it was to rub the oil in to the men's feet.
Feet were inspected once a day and every man's kit was checked to make sure
he had two spare pairs of socks as well as the ones he was wearing.
The Standing Orders for 41st Division, December 1916 say:
"Section IV Standing Orders for Trenches.
13. TRENCH FEET. -
It should be a point of honour and pride for a platoon commander to be able
to say no member of his platoon developed "Trench Feet" during the
brigade's tour of duty in the front line.
Once daily the platoon commander will see that each NCO and man has 3 pairs
of socks (1 in wear and 2 in kit), that boots are loosely laced, and when
not actually on duty removed for a period; that puttees are not too tight,
that when wet socks are taken off the feet are cleaned, dried, and rubbed
thoroughly with whale oil before dry socks are put on, that circulation is
kept up by a few moments' occasional exercise, particularly after the men
have been stationary while on duty, and that wet socks are collected and
sent to company headquarters."
Thank you once again for your help - and the photographs and website details.
With best wishes,
Taff
>trench foot, 1914-18, ww1
> TRENCH FOOT
>
> Trench foot was one of the most widespread and debilitating that affected
>men from both sides of the lines, it is linked with WW1 hence the name "Trench
>foot". The disease's origin isn't in WW1 but was first noted in Napoleons army
>in 1812. It was on the retreat from Russia that it became prevalent, and was
>first described by Larrey. He observed that this condition didn't occur during
>the freezing cold of the campaign but when the temperature was near to zero
>degrees with the presence of moisture. Here lies the clue. During the First
>war men were exposed to Cold but not freezing conditions often up to their
>ankles in water that was permanently in the bottom of the trenches. The feet
>would swell, appear red and blood blistered, the pain would be severe, until
>the sensory nerves had been damaged and would then be numb causing the man to
>be evacuated hopefully. The treatment would be basically to elevate the limb,
>some modest warmth and wait. After a few weeks the limb would return to normal
>in most cases, but some severe ones that became gangrenous could result in
>amputation, with all the complications that went with that, some of those that
>did recover would have nerve damage. . As for the battalion pride in having
>low trench foot rates, some cases could be prevented with care. Some
>situations made trench foot more likely, such as poor fitting boots
>restriciting the circulation, immobility, amount of water and temperature of
>water in the base of the trench. Some of the preventative measures used were
>the issuing of gumboots where possible, but keeping feet dry was impossible. I
>have read accounts of men being forced to apply whale grease to the feet i
>presume to impart some waterproofness to them. Either way I believe some cases
>were practically unavoidable, and must have been the devil itself if you got
>it. The army went to great lengths to find out how to prevent it, employing
>hygienists, doctors all sorts and the general conclusion was military
>discipline and good hygiene. That meant where possible boots off and foot
>inspections carried out, greasing, and charging men who appeared to be
>neglecting these instructions, remember that there would be individuals who
>would deliberately contract this illness to get out of the line. Nowadays this
>illness is still known as trench foot or immersion foot, on the Falklands
>campaign it amounted to 14% of casualties. It is now mainly seen in the
>homeless street dwellers.
>
>For those interested there is a good article in the Western Front Association
>Journal "Stand to" 30 page9 which went into detail about the effect of Trench
>foot on the Australian 5th Division on the Somme in 1916 where the Division
>suffered 37% of it's casualties inflicted upon it were classified as Trench
>foot, as opposed to an average of 25%. it was thought that these figures were
>on the low side as Trench foot rates were monitored and many Trench foot cases
>were called something else and missed the stats.
>
>return to disease page
>
>return to main
>
>
><!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
><HTML><HEAD><TITLE>trench foot, 1914-18, ww1</TITLE>
><META content="text/html; charset=windows-1252" http-equiv=Content-Type><BASE
>href=http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/kylet1/tfoot.htm><;!-- Created by
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><BODY background=green.gif bgColor=#80ffff link=#0000ff text=#000000>
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><P align=center> <BIG><BIG><BIG><BIG><U>TRENCH
> FOOT</U></BIG></BIG></BIG></BIG>
><P align=left><IMG align=left height=306 src="foot.jpg" width=253>
> <BIG>Trench foot was one of the most widespread and debilitating that
>affected men from both sides of the lines, it is linked with WW1 hence the
>name
>"Trench foot". The disease's origin isn't in WW1 but was first noted in
>Napoleons army in 1812. It was on the retreat from Russia that it became
>prevalent, and was first described by Larrey. He observed that this condition
>didn't occur during the freezing cold of the campaign but when the temperature
>was near to zero degrees with the presence of moisture. Here lies the clue.
>During the First war men were exposed to Cold but not freezing conditions
>often
>up to their ankles in water that was permanently in the bottom of the
>trenches.
>The feet would swell, appear red and blood blistered, the pain would be
>severe,
>until the sensory nerves had been damaged and would then be numb causing
>the man to be evacuated hopefully. The treatment would be basically to elevate
>the limb, some modest warmth and wait. After a few weeks the limb would return
>to normal in most cases, but some severe ones that became gangrenous could
>result in amputation, with all the complications that went with that, some of
>those that did recover would have nerve damage. . As for the battalion pride
>in
>having low trench foot rates, some cases could be prevented with care. Some
>situations made trench foot more likely, such as poor fitting boots
>restriciting
>the circulation, immobility, amount of water and temperature of water in the
>base of the trench. Some of the preventative measures used were the issuing of
>gumboots where possible, but keeping feet dry was impossible. I have read
>accounts of men being forced to apply whale grease to the feet i presume to
>impart some waterproofness to them. Either way I believe some cases were
>practically unavoidable, and must have been the devil itself if you got it.
>The
>army went to great lengths to find out how to prevent it, employing
>hygienists,
>doctors all sorts and the general conclusion was military discipline and good
>hygiene. That meant where possible boots off and foot inspections carried out,
>greasing, and charging men who appeared to be neglecting these instructions,
>remember that there would be individuals who would deliberately contract this
>illness to get out of the line. Nowadays this illness is still known as trench
>foot or immersion foot, on the Falklands campaign it amounted to 14% of
>casualties. It is now mainly seen in the homeless street dwellers.</BIG>
><P align=left><B>For those interested there is a good article in the Western
>Front Association Journal "Stand to" 30 page9 which went into detail about the
>effect of Trench foot on the Australian 5th Division on the Somme in 1916
>where
>the Division suffered 37% of it's casualties inflicted upon it were classified
>as Trench foot, as opposed to an average of 25%. it was thought that these
>figures were on the low side as Trench foot rates were monitored and many
>Trench
>foot cases were called something else and missed the stats. </B>
><P align=left><BIG><A href="trench.htm">return to disease page</A></BIG>
><P align=left><BIG><A href="kthp.htm">return to main</A></BIG>
></P></BODY></HTML>
>
>Content-type: image/jpeg; name=foot.jpg
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>
>Attachment converted: Taffs Own Mac:foot.jpg (JPEG/JVWR) (0001E8E4)
>Content-type: image/gif; name=green.gif
>Content-disposition: attachment; filename=green.gif
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>
>Attachment converted: Taffs Own Mac:green.gif (GIFf/JVWR) (0001E8E5)
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