Vosges mountain warfare - German video

[egbert]

http://www.filmportal.de/video/vogesenwacht

[Dragon]

Fantastic. It looks thoroughly miserable, bitterly cold and slippery. You can almost feel the tension in the section where the mules and men are skidding around along the track. Thanks for the link.

Gwyn

[keithjk]

Fantastic link Egbert. Lots of the footage tied in nicely with your excellent threads on the Vosges battlefields. The scene from 30seconds to 50 seconds looks to me very much like the Swisse Lipique.

Keith

[egbert]

Meanwhile, Louis and I could definitely identify some locations of which I have written here on GWF (My walk up Buchenkopf and My climb up HWK).

At 00.30: Tête des Faux (Buchenkopf)

At 02.00 and 04.38: Aerial tramway to Petit-Ballon (Kleiner Belchen; I think Gwyn wrote soemthing of the Gr.B. here on GWF)

At 05.30: Bischofshut (HWK=Hartmannsweilerkopf), fortress on top of HWK, Eastern slope

[Dragon]

I picked up the later HWK scene and the one said to be la Tête des Faux looked vaguely familiar. (I'm not certain.) I'm going to view it again on a clearer screen. The clarity of the footage is astonishing, especially given that even modern cameras can struggle in the extreme cold (eg condensation, damage to glass).

Gwyn

[gbillington]

Hi Egbert

Thanks for posting this video. This coupled with your thread show how difficult the conflict must have been there. The 65mm guns on Mule back must have been the only way of getting artillery into action given the terrain and size of trenches. This highlights the need for the trench mortars you gave detail on in your thread.

The strength and fitness of the troops given their circumstance is amazing. The way they run up the hills loaded with equipment or leading the mules just adds to the respect and sorrow for those that lost their lives in their prime.

Thanks

Guy