Jackson Feldman, Class of 2025, Urban & Regional Studies

This blogpost was written as part of the 2022 First-Year Writing Seminar, “The Lure of Leisure: A Global History of Modern Tourism,” taught by History graduate student Aimée Plukker. 

Paris, long paradigmatic as a mecca for touristic pursuits, witnessed a peculiar happening in 1919: its arriving tourists wore khaki uniforms. Published in the immediate aftermath of WWI by the British Army & Navy Leave Club, The Story of the Bridges or Paris seen from the River is a guidebook developed to instruct British and Dominion soldiers on how and what to view during their limited time in the City of Light.

Wartime leave, the formal respite afforded to soldiers along the Front, was a rare occurrence for army personnel; the typical British or Dominion serviceman could expect only ten days every fifteen months. While some returned home, many found it logistically impossible in the short timeframe. Therefore, the Great War offered many working-class soldiers their first opportunity to marvel at the sights of Europe. Although the Armistice had formally ended fighting on November 11, 1918, millions of troops remained on the Western Front well into 1919, awaiting a demobilization process that would last into the following decade. Consequently, the servicemen set out to view Paris.

The guidebook’s structure reflects the brief nature of the soldiers’ stay and their novel understanding of their own mortality. Organized to mimic a boat tour down the Seine, the handbook presents Paris solely from this angle, reassuring that “practically all the public buildings… lie on or near the river banks” (8). Despite the limited scope, the guide describes in detail the sights to be seen along the journey, highlighting architectural beauty, such as “the splendid Cathedral of Notre-Dame… standing out majestically on the horizon” (26), and its boundless history, outlining events such as Voltaire’s death (63) and the storming of the Bastille (21). Notably absent is the mention of modern Parisians, perhaps reflecting the ambiguous relationship between French citizens and British personnel created by the strains of wartime occupation and Edwardian fears of sexual encounters between these groups. Hence, Paris is presented as a place without people, a visual spectacle, an ephemeral sail along the Seine.

Source

“The Story of the Bridges or Paris seen from the River,” 1919, Gregory E. Montes urban history and travel collection, #8035, box 11, folder 10, Division of Rare and Manuscript Collections, Cornell University Library.

Additional Sources

Barry, Gearóid. “Demobilization.” In 1914-1918-Online: International Encyclopedia of the First World War. Berlin, Germany: Freie Universität Berlin, 2018. DOI:10.15463/ie1418.11323.

Fuller, J.G. Troop Morale and Popular Culture in the British and Dominion Armies, 1914-1918. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990. DOI:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198201786.001.0001.

Gibson, Craig. Behind the Front: British Soldiers and French Civilians, 1914-1918. Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2014.

Imperial War Museums. “Voices of the First World War: Homecoming.” Accessed August 16, 2022. https://www.iwm.org.uk/history/voices-of-the-first-world-war-homecoming.

Maguire, Anna. Contact Zones of the First World War: Cultural Encounters across the British Empire. Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 2021. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108983082.