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Sanitation and Hygiene in the Trenches of World War 1
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Sanitation and Hygiene
in the Trenches
During World War 1
The trenches were small, and in the ground, so they were doomed for unsanitary conditions.
The corpses of soldiers stayed inside the trenches.With the lack of hygiene and piles of filth and bodily waste, the trenches were a treacherous place to live.
They did their best to provide as much sanitation as they could despite the circumstances...
Connection to Farewell to Arms:
Lieutenant Frederic Henry, the main character, is an Ambulance driver in WW1. Therefore it's his job to make sure all of the soldiers' wounds are sanitary, and clean. Since the trenches are so dirty though, it's difficult to clean all the wounds so they do not get worse.
In World War 1, trenches were created in various places of the war zone to serve as protection for the soldiers. They were used to live and fight in for long periods of time, and they were fairly small.
Latrines were a distance away from the dug-outs, but often times, they were only large buckets.
Food had to be kept from dust and flies, and was to be kept far from manure and corpses.
And when it came to baths...
Cresol solution and chloride of lime was used as a disinfectant.
Bathing was terribly infrequent, soldiers sometimes not showering for weeks to months on end. There was no running water, so often they would just "wipe" their feet. The stench in the trenches was often dried sweat, body odor, and blood.
Feet had to be washed or wiped at least once a day, nails, mouth, and hair required attention as well.
Carcasses of dead animals had to be removed from the ground, and away from eating areas.
Rats ran around the entire place, nibbling at the men’s wounded areas.
Clothing was disinfected by being plunged in boiling water, sometimes heated in an oven at 210 to 250 degrees farenheight.
Since the trenches were about six feet deep, they flooded relatively easily. This made for even less cleanliness.There couldn't be a set routine to clean the trenches because they never knew what the weather was going to do.