Why was it difficult to get rid of lice in the trenches ww1?

Why was it difficult to get rid of lice in the trenches ww1?

Lice were impossible to get rid of in the trenches. Lice, like the rats also carried disease which “proved to continually and heavily drain on manpower. With the stench and abundance of rotting bodies, not only did the rats and lice have a utopia, but flies also swarmed the battlefields.

How did soldiers bathe in ww1?

Soldiers Used Either Buckets Or Deeper Holes Within The Trenches As Latrines. In order to go to the bathroom in the trenches, soldiers designated specific areas to serve as the latrines.

How did rats and lice affect the soldiers in ww1?

Lice caused Trench Fever, a nasty and painful disease that began suddenly with severe pain followed by high fever. Although not usually life threatening, Trench Fever was debilitating, requiring a recovery period of two-three months.

How did soldiers get rid of lice?

Various methods were used to remove the lice. A lighted candle was fairly effective but the skill of burning the lice without burning your clothes was only learnt with practice. And the uniforms they took off, they burned them – to get rid of the lice.”

How would soldiers get rid of lice?

Men in the trenches killed lice by ‘chatting’ – crushing them between finger nails – or burning them out with cigarette ends and candles.

Where did soldiers in ww1 go to the toilet?

These latrines were trench toilets. They were usually pits dug into the ground between 1.2 metres and 1.5 metres deep. Two people who were called sanitary personnel had the job of keeping the latrines in good condition for each company.

How did soldiers avoid lice in ww1?

Various methods were used to remove the lice. And the uniforms they took off, they burned them – to get rid of the lice.” Where possible the army arranged for the men to have baths in huge vats of hot water while their clothes were being put through delousing machines.

How did lice get in trenches?

Many men killed in the trenches were buried almost where they fell. If a trench subsided, or new trenches or dugouts were needed, large numbers of decomposing bodies would be found just below the surface. These corpses, as well as the food scraps that littered the trenches, attracted rats.

What did lice look like in WW1?

Men in the trenches suffered from lice. One soldier writing after the war described them as “pale fawn in colour, and they left blotchy red bite marks all over the body.”. They also created a sour; stale smell. Various methods were used to remove the lice.

How did they get rid of lice in the war?

One soldier writing after the war described them as “pale fawn in colour, and they left blotchy red bite marks all over the body.”. They also created a sour; stale smell. Various methods were used to remove the lice. A lighted candle was fairly effective but the skill of burning the lice without burning your clothes was only learnt with practice.

What diseases did lice carry in the trenches?

Two diseases carried by lice are typhus and trench fever. Curiously, the more serious problem of typhus didn’t arise too much in the trenches, but trench fever reached epidemic levels. Some estimates put the number of British troops affected at around one million.

What was life like in the trenches in WWI?

(1) Henry Gregory of 119th Machine Gun company was interviewed after the war about life in the trenches. When we arrived in the trenches we got a shock when the other soldiers in the hut took their shirts off after tea. They were catching lice. We had never seen a louse before, but they were here in droves.