Broznitsky Posted 30 June , 2003 Share Posted 30 June , 2003 Preamble: Ralph Whitehead has been kind enough to forward to me a German account of the vicious fighting around Lens on August 21 1917. I have Canadian accounts of the fighting, which list a start time for a particular attack of 4:30 a.m. The German account lists a start time of 5:30 a.m. Question: Could there be a difference in reported times between German and British/Canadian descriptions of events? Was Berlin time different than Greenwich time? Was there "Daylight Savings" or "Summer" times that could affect timings? Peter, puzzled in Vancouver Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paul guthrie Posted 30 June , 2003 Share Posted 30 June , 2003 Peter my understanding is that you are correct, British on western front on French time and Germans an hour later but I do not know specifically why. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AOK4 Posted 30 June , 2003 Share Posted 30 June , 2003 As still today, British time and German time differed, that explains the difference of one hour (I don't know exactly how things were with summer time and winter time, but I guess this also was a bit the same as today, I know both sides used summer and winter time). Jan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
paul guthrie Posted 30 June , 2003 Share Posted 30 June , 2003 If British and French used different times that could have caused problems but I know today French, German are the same. I think I should not have tried this one I just do not know enough and await the pal who does! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
CROONAERT Posted 30 June , 2003 Share Posted 30 June , 2003 I read an account of New year 1915 being celebrated in the trenches. In this it mentions the British (Scots) and Germans celebrating midnight one hour apart. I always believed that the British operated in "Zulu" time ,ie. GMT wherever in the world when conducting ops.This seems to back up this arguement. I may be wrong. Dave. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Hussar Posted 30 June , 2003 Share Posted 30 June , 2003 I can confirm, at least on the Naval side of things, that operations are conducted in Zulu Time. Whilst exercising or on passage and in foreign ports, the time will be altered to 'Local' time but certain clocks ( i.e MCO and Ops Room) will remain at Zulu and all signal transmissions are recorded at Zulu time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mordac Posted 30 June , 2003 Share Posted 30 June , 2003 There was a one hour time difference in 1914-1918. In the occupied areas of France and Belgium, the Germans set their clocks to Berlin time, which was an hour ahead of the local time. During the unofficial Christmas truce that occurred in 1914, in some areas of the front there was some confusion as to the truce ending at 1:00 PM on December 26. Who's 1 o'clock were they going to honour? Garth Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bernard_Lewis Posted 1 July , 2003 Share Posted 1 July , 2003 Swansea Battalion War Diary records battalion adopting 'continental time' in September 1918 - 34 months after it arrived in F&F! Bernard Lewis Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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