The Great War at Home with Martha Hanna

On War & Society

For a long time historians studying the First World War had to rely on the memoirs of soldiers, but over the last several decades, more and more letters have made their way into the archives as family members inherit and donate the written material of their relatives. These sources have initiated a new wave of scholarship devoted to identifying how civilian relationships were maintained, nurtured and interrupted by the war. But much remains to be learned. While we have long wondered about the psychological effects that war had on fighting men, what about their loved ones at home? After all, a significant number of soldiers left behind a spouse. In Canada alone, over 80,000 women were married to soldiers serving overseas. In this episode of On War & Society, Martha Hanna author of Anxious Days and Tearful Nights: Canadian War Wives during the Great War, discusses the challenges and ethics of working with private correspondence as well as the differences between how Canadian and European wives experienced the Great War at home.