Horses & the War

Read our amazing selection of images and articles on horses during the First World War, from their role at the front to their welfare on active service. Plus, download a selection of extra wartime articles from our archive for free.

Millions of horses, mules and other beasts of burden were silent unsung casualties of the First World War.

ARCHIVE ARTICLES

HORSES IN THE WAR I: BASE REMOUNT DEPOTS IN FRANCE

HORSES IN THE WAR II: THEIR WELFARE ON ACTIVE SERVICE

HORSES IN THE WAR III: THEIR WORK AT THE FRONT

OUR HORSES IN FRANCE I: TRIUMPHS OF THE ARMY VETERINARY SERVICE

OUR HORSES IN FRANCE II: THEIR WELFARE IN SICKNESS

OUR HORSES IN FRANCE III: TREATMENT IN THE VETERINARY HOSPITALS


The Lesboeufs Road outside Flers, November 1916.

In such conditions, disease and sheer exhaustion accounted for a great number of war-related equine casualties.

England as an armed camp: Country Life charted the militarisation of the countryside in 1914. Here a troop of the Territorial Army return after a day of exercises.

Destination Unknown by Lionel Edwards, published in 1914.

Horses remained crucial to the war effort and were transported in huge numbers to the front. 

Fresh horses skirt a huge shell crater on the way to the front in 1918. Almost half a million horses and mules were then serving in the British forces in France. 

An operation in a veterinary hospital to extract shrapnel, published in 1918.

A 1915 advertisement for the Blue Cross Fund, first set up in 1912 during the Balkan War. 


RETURN TO THE WWI HOMEPAGE

THE WORLD AT WAR

WOMEN & THE WAR

THE WAR AT SEA

CHILDREN & THE WAR

THE WAR IN THE TRENCHES

ADVERTISING & THE WAR

THE WAR IN THE AIR

THE WOUNDED & PRISONERS

WAR MEMORIALS

OFFICIAL WAR ARTIST: SIR MUIRHEAD BONE

Agnes Stamp