In the 90 or so years since 1916 the battle of the Somme has been largely misrepresented. Winston Churchill’s hugely popular account of the war established a ‘Somme myth’ and subsequent metaphor for all that was ghastly and wrong with the First World War. Dr William Philpott using his AHRC Research Leave award grant hopes to dispel this myth and show the Somme as one of the world’s greatest battles, and one of the Twentieth century’s defining events.
Previous studies of Somme have tended to have an Anglo-centric focus using English-language studies and fixating on British military operations in 1916. Dr Philpott’s study encompasses events from 1914 to 1940 
enabling a better understanding on operational developments and their impact on military policy and doctrine. French archive sources and German published secondary works and translated documentary sources (owing to the destruction of the Prussian State Archives in the Second World War) were extensively used to allow a more balanced assessment of the battle for the first time.
This is also the first project that treats the battle of the Somme as an international event, rather than a purely British phenomenon. As such this is a hugely revised view of the battle’s military significance as well as a wider argument about its political, social and cultural impact. Dr Philpott has not only offered a new analysis of a major world event, but also suggests a methodology for analysing military events in their wider socio-cultural context. This new kind of military history brings together not only the battle, bombs and bullets study but also the memory, mourning and other societal aspects of battle which were only ever considered separately before.
Outcomes
As well as a book this project has provided a rich source of material for academic conference and seminar papers. Two journal articles and nine conference, seminar and public papers relating to the project have been or will be delivered with others to be presented or published later. Over the past few years, and coinciding with the 90th anniversary of the battle of the Somme, Dr Philpott has also given several public lectures at home and abroad including France, Australia and Newfoundland on his research.
The book 'Bloody Victory: the Sacrifice on the Somme and the Making of the Twentieth Century' won 2 academic prizes in 2009, the Tomlinson Prize and the Templer Medal Book Competition.
Award holder - Dr William Philpott, King’s College London, Research Leave
Image © istockphoto.com/trout55 and book cover © Little, Brown