- from 'The War Budget', January 9th, 1915
- War Dogs' Errand of Mercy
Man's Best Friend Goes to War
- left : a dog to the rescue
- right : a French dog baying at German invaders
The of the greatest difficulties experienced after a battle in hilly or wooded country is the finding of the wounded. This is especially the case when, fighting has taken place over ground on which there is an abundance of thick cover, and it is too often the case that wounded men of both the opposing forces may lie helpless for days before either they are discovered and brought in or death puts a merciful end to their agonies.
Along the undulating sand dunes of the Belgian coast this difficulty has been experienced to the full, and the French troops operating in this region have now called in the aid of trained dogs to assist them in their search. A couple of these dogs are shown in our photograph. Aided by their keen sense of smell these dogs scour the country over which fighting has taken place, and thus a wounded man's chance of being picked up is very greatly increased. The dogs have done splendid work, and their value has been proved repeatedly.
The use of .dogs in war is, of course, by no means new. They are very frequently employed merely for the purpose of giving alarm on the approach of the enemy and in this they are of special value to the sentry on a lonely outpost. A man protected by the presence of a trained dog runs very little risk of being swiftly and silently "rushed,", since the dog will detect the presence of the intruder at a very considerable distance and will give ample warning of his presence. In this manner the element of surprise attacks on outposts is enormously reduced. The enemy cannot venture to steal up within a short distance in the hope of taking the sentry unawares — a feat which is almost essential in the proper conduct of a successful night attack, home of the best work in the training of dogs for use in war has been done by Major Richardson, an English officer who has made a special study of the use of dogs not merely by soldiers, but also by the police in their ordinary nightly duties.
It has been found by experience that on a lonely beat a dog is an invaluable companion for a constable, not merely in protecting him from actual attack, but in detecting the presence of lurking marauders who are only awaiting the passing of the constable to perpetrate some crime. Dogs for this purpose are specially trained not to attack a man except in defence of the police, and they are usually such big, powerful animals that few men would venture to tackle a constable accompanied by one of them. The mere threat of an attack by one of them is usually sufficient to keep the would be burglar respectfully quiet: to attack the policeman would be merely to bring vigorous reprisals from this dog, while an attempt to run away would in all probability have the same result, and the criminal usually knows it.
from a 1917 German magazine : messenger dogs
the use of dogs in the Italian army
Italian army dogs being fed
a dog employed by the British as messenger
a German Red Cross squad with dogs
another German Red Cross detachment with dogs
