Both in Germany, Olga Kolhberg and Ima Hogg witnessed initial mobilization before making the difficult journey home. Julia Ideson left Liege, Beligum, only a few hours before Germany laid siege to the city in the war’s first battle.

Texans who were in Europe at the start of the war immediately made preparations to return home. Maintaining neutrality meant they could continue exporting cotton, cattle, oil, and other commodities to nations on both sides of the conflict and make use of the newly-opened Houston Ship Channel. Most Texans agreed with the decision of the United States to remain neutral and not intervene in European affairs. Texans were interested in the events of World War I from the beginning of the conflict.

involvement on the front lines was relatively short, events and conditions of the war created long-lasting changes in Texas militarily, socially, economically, and politically.īefore U.S.

Texas and Texans made significant contributions to what was then called the Great War on the front lines, on the home front, and from positions within the federal government. The United States, determined to stay out of European affairs, formally remained neutral until declaring war against Germany and its allies on April 6, 1917, and stayed engaged militarily until fighting ceased on November 11, 1918. The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of the Austro-Hungarian Empire on June 28, 1914, set off a series of events that quickly led to a global war, called the Great War and later World War I, between the Central Powers of Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire, and their allies against the Entente or Allied Powers of Great Britain, France, Russia, and later joined by Japan and Italy.

Men of war mondays