Before GIS: Water Supplies and the Western Front in WWI

7 August, 1916: soldiers of the British Wiltshire Regiment charge into no-man's-land during the Battle of the Somme.

Prior to the outbreak of World War I, advances in cartographic and land-surveying methods had elevated the profession to a position of significant military importance. The British Army was especially innovative in this regard, as they included the use of two dedicated military geologists to create water supply maps for subsequent operations against the German Army in northern France. These maps would prove to be invaluable to the field commanders of the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) who would be responsible for the adequate supplying of some 1.5 million soldiers and 500,000 service animals.

Before World War I, most military forces traditionally obtained their water supplies from both civilian wells and surface water sources like creeks, streams, lakes, and rivers. However, the massive armies used by the Great Powers in World War I necessitated that other water sources needed to be found as the war progressed. The intense fighting between Allied and Central Powers not only disrupted the general use of civilian water reserves, but also polluted other natural reserves with munitions, bodies, and human waste. This article “is focused exclusively on maps known to have been developed by military geologists, and thus on maps that relate primarily to groundwater occurrence.”

Between June 1915 and November 1918, both Lieutenant (and later Captain) W. B. R. King and his commanding officer, Lieutenant-Colonel T. W. Edgeworth David, served in the General Headquarters of the BEF on the Western Front developing water supply maps that gave accurate estimations of potable water sources in both Belgium and France. These maps were created on scales of 1: 100,000 feet, 1: 250,000 feet, and 1:40,000 feet that were to be used for advances past No-Man’s Land and into enemy territory. Estimating that each soldier and/or service animal required at least 10 gallons of water per day; the maps guided engineers to dig some 470 boreholes to supply soldiers serving in the trenches. From 1915 onwards, water supply maps were plotted by using detailed information such as the location of springs and their daily yield, as well as the location of pipelines and reservoirs where pumping stations were to be constructed. Specifics like daily supply rate, borehole capacity, depth, and yield were also used in the construction of these maps that were later converted into topographical maps for civilians in the regions affected.

1 : 250,000 scale map of available water sources in Belgium and northern France during the dry summer months.

Key to the above map.

Detail of a 1 : 100,000 foot map with key available.

The German Army also used military geologists, but in far greater numbers. A total of 300 geologists served with the Army, and they too were widely used to create standardized water supply maps that were usually scaled on the medium size of 1: 25,000 meters. Because of their numbers, they were organized under the Director of Military Survey in 1916 and each survey unit was tasked with creating maps for their respective sectors. By the end of 1918, the German attempt to standardize their maps was completed and led to more accurate mapping in geological structures later in World War II.

1 : 250,000 meter map for the German 4th Army.

In late 1917, when the United States entered the war, geologists were also deployed with the American Expeditionary Force (AEF) and created two versions of their water supply maps for their sector on the Western Front. Initially there had only been two surveyors accompanying the AEF, however by the end of hostilities in November 1918 there were nine in total, with six compiling and charting most of their work. Nine “geologic engineering maps” were created with one at 1: 80,000 feet for the high command, and eleven at 1: 50,000 feet for regimental officers.

Not only were the maps created in this time period used by the Allies for their final offensive that led to the Armistice in November 1918, they also provided much of the basis for the Royal Engineers textbook that would be used for later generations. The later publications of these declassified maps were later used by civilians in the inter-war period, and proved to be a successful foundation for furthered advances in hydrogeology during World War II.

Soldiers of the British Yorkshire Regiment moving up to the front during the Battle of Broodseinde.

Rose, Edward P. F. "Water Supply Maps for the Western Front (Belgium and Northern France) Developed by British, German and American Military Geologists during World War I: Pioneering Studies in Hydrogeology from Trench Warfare."Cartography Journal 46.2 (2009): 77-103. Print.