The WORST Jobs of WW1

whether it's those awful early morning alarms that painfully slow commute or that painstaking water cooler chat that you got to have with your boss you may think that you have the toughest job in the world but bad as your job may be it doesn't even come close to some of the gut-wrenching occupations that soldiers took up back in World War I from going into battle with nothing more than a bicycle to catching rats with their bare hands buckle up as we uncover some of the worst jobs you could have been assigned in World War I

wiring parties some of the most recognizable images from World War I depict the barbed wire covered grounds of No Man's Land but that sharp stuff didn't just get there by itself instead laying down barbed wire was the job of wiring parties and despite the name this role was nothing to celebrate group group of soldiers would venture into no man's land at night repairing their damaged barbed wire obstacles as well as cutting the enemy defenses for starters these sharp coiling wires could have no trouble slicing through a soldier's skin which are twice as hard to spot

in the pitch black with minimal light to see by painful as that would be they couldn't make a sound as the slightest noise could trigger a swarm of machine gun fire and artillery to descend upon a wiring party but it wasn't just a fear of being heard wiring parties also ran the risk of being illuminated by an enemy flare exposing their position right under the noses of the opposition men caught by flares would either throw themselves down onto the barbed wire or freeze until the flare light dimmed the toils of a wiring party didn't end

there though if these guys were lucky enough to survive their mission they also had the terrifying task of finding their way back to the trench in the dead of night given the pitch black conditions it wasn't uncommon for these guys to end up far away from their base man and I thought my commute home from work was bad artillery Observer you'd presume anyone 6,000 ft up in the air would be a lot safer than anyone stuck in the middle of No Man's Land but I'm not so sure an artillery Observer would agree with that these

men were stationed in an observation balloon hovering at a high altitude to monitor the enemy troop movements flying more than a mile over the battle field meant enemies on the ground had little chance of accurately shooting down artillery observers it's just as well that'd be a nasty way to go however they faced another threat aircraft by 1915 aircraft began attacking artillery observers or roasting sausages as they called it due to the balloon strange shape commonly Rockets were shot out of the planes before colliding with the hydrogen powered balloons triggering a giant explosion that had most

likely take down anyone inside with it Willie coppins a particularly accomplished roster was so prolific he shot down a whopping 34 artillery Observer balloons in the event of disaster observation balloons contained parachutes allowing anyone inside to safely descend down to the ground now that all sounds well and good but there was always the threat of strong winds blowing the parachuters into enemy territory and considering This Is War we're talking about I don't think enemy troops would mind taking down a foreign parachuter descending towards their lines all things considered I'd say the work of those in

an observation balloon certainly wasn't popping you know what is popping all the videos on my channel hit those like And subscribe buttons down below to make sure you're kept in the loop y all done great what's next Air Force pilot speaking of High Flyers that brings us to the job of airplane pilots by the time World War I came around a planes were still very much in their infancy with the first aircraft Taking Flight just over 10 years before the outbreak of War as a result airplane designs during this time were basic to say the

least the wood andmade aircraft had an exposed pit leaving Pilots vulnerable to cold conditions and low oxygen at altitude on top of that there were no designed navigational AIDS instead Pilots had to do with whatever Maps they could find and would even hover close close to railway lines hoping to read station names in the early days of the War aircraft were being used to monitor movement of enemy troops but as the benefits of these eyes in the sky became evident both sides knew they had to take steps to prevent the opposition from Gaining the upper

hand being the brutal conflict it was World War I aircraft Pilots sometimes faced the danger of being gunned down by enemy troops and tanks on the ground however these guys encountered an even more frequent threat Pilots often flew with a pistol rifle and even bricks yes bricks to attack the Enemy At Close Range can you imagine getting smacked in the face with a brick while you were trying to drive some creaky airplane thousands of feet in the air terrified isn't the word so hazardous was this job that 8,000 men in Britain's royal flying Corps perished

during their 15 hours of pilot training alone if that wasn't harrowing enough the average life expectancy of a royal flying Corp pilot was a measly 18 Airborne hours safe to say the job of pilots in World War I was just plain dangerous senty Duty as we've already seen World War I became Infamous for No Man's Land with soldiers quickly discovering that Crossing this stretch was essentially a Death Wish part of the reason for this was centuries these were troops charged with standing on the raised step of the trench to keep an eyee out for the

enemy alerting their superiors if they saw any suspicious activity it was for this reason that sentries were a high value Target for opposition troops but surprising as it sounds sentries had a greater threat than the enemy their own commanders this job was limited to 2hour shifts meaning a soldier could be stationed on Sentry Duty in the middle of the night despite the dark cold and lonely work they needed to stay alert and Vigilant in case of an enemy attack as falling asleep on station was a crime punishable by execution and you thought your boss was

mean in 1915 New Zealand soldier Jack Dunn came down with pneumonia while on the front after 2 weeks of treatment he returned to his unit where he was discovered by an officer to have fallen asleep while on Sentry Duty despite his bout with illness Dunn was sentenced to death though his crime was later remitted to 10 years of hard labor I'd argue that's still pretty harsh for a quick 40 Wings trench Raiders as we now know with centuries barbed wire and observation artillery overhead Crossing no man's land was a nogo not that trench Raiders cared

about any of that if you didn't know trench Raiders were teams of courageous men tasked with infiltrating the enemy line in order to kill Defenders destroy weapons gain intelligence or return prisoners small groups of lightly equipped trench Raiders would care carefully creep towards their targets under the cover of night typically the Raiders would approach the sentries guarding the Frontline trench before taking them out as quietly as possible then the real Mission started once they gained access to the trench the Raiders would complete whatever mission objectives they set out as quickly as possible if they did

happen to run into the enemy that's when the bayonet trench knives knuckled dusters and spiked clubs came out because gunshots would draw attenion so brutal face face combat ensued Yep this certainly wasn't no picnic when any of the surviving Raiders had achieved their objective they let off their grenades hoping the chaos could buy them enough time to make it back to their trench before being shot down man I'm getting sweaty just thinking about how much effort this took tank crewman what could be safer than roaming the battlefield in a near 30 ton heavily armored Mega

machine well it turns out a lot for starters their enormous size and weight meant that tanks were incredibly slow moving at best achieving a measly top speed of just 5 mph that made tanks very easy targets for enemy troops who could shoot them or Worse plant landmines under the tanks tracks sending the vehicle and everyone inside flying though you'd presume tanks would at least offer some protection to its crew they were poorly armored during World War I that meant a single bullet could penetrate the exterior and and send sharp shrapnel flying around inside another rudimentary

feature of early tanks was their engine design they were large and inefficient which meant they got very hot very quickly even worse engines were often placed in the center of the tank meaning any crew that fell into the engine's exhaust could be fatally scalded and unfortunately for the crew falling onto the engine was a very real risk these colossal machines had to travel over boggy battlefields filled with ditch and trenches and with no suspension or seat belts the crew inside were thrown around like pinballs I think we can assume anyone that got assigned this job

wouldn't be very tankful bicycle Brigade despite all the drawbacks of Manning a tank there's one vehicle that offered even less protection to anyone that used it can you imagine moving through the battlefields of World War I on a bicycle crazy as it sounds bicycles were common place in the more in fact some entire battalions only had cyclists in their ranks whereas horses required food and Motor Vehicles needed fuel bicycles were human-powered and easy to maintain leading to their use in transporting troops and supplies as well as that some bike battalions even fought on the front

line take the 100 day offensive in 1918 for instance here Canadian cyclists fought alongside the Infantry Noble as it sounds I can't imagine a bicycle Cavalry would stand much chance against artillery fire and tanks I mean those handlebars aren't going to offer much protection from incoming bullets on the bright side at least they could ring their Bell when they inevitably run into trouble tin openers while World War I is known for its brutal trench warfare there were also some perilous professions out at Sea opposing submarines battled it out to take charge of Europe seas and

The Surge of sunken submarines opened up an opportunity you see each direct sub was a potential Treasure Chest full of the latest Cipher Keys code books and other high intelligence material the question is how could they gain access to a sunken submarine well that's where the tin openers come in the secret unit of five divers were responsible for diving down and cutting their way into recently sunken submarine wrecks to obtain any useful information exciting as these missions sound they were extremely dangerous in fact the work was so hazardous each Man's family was promised 500 lb

that $60,000 today were the worst to happen the reason being tin openers tended to dive where active Mine Fields were though the divers would steer clear of Mines at all costs even those that exploded several miles away could rupture divers ears damage their internal organs and kill them when it came to accessing sunken Subs tin openers would use an underwater explosive to open the wreck it was efficient but it was also dangerous with some detonations setting off secondary explosions that could kill the divers if the diver survived the initial explosion they'd enter the wreck but

this presented another problem tin openers were connected to the surface by a lifeline and air hose if these got tangled up in the wreckage or Worse cut completely they'd have little hope of ever returning to the surface and the cherry on top of this cursed cake tin openers also had the gruesome task of clamoring through the corpses on board as they looked for any valuable information man I really hope you're not eating miraculously all five of the men in the tin openers unit survived the war although I'm not sure they'd ever be able to look

at a tin of soup ever again tunnelers speaking of the risky World under the surface that brings us to tunnelers for years both sides were camped in trenches on the Western Front so in an attempt to break the stalemate specialist miners were employed on both sides to dig tunnels under no man's land the objective was to place mines beneath enemy defensive positions when detonated the explosion would destroy a section of the enemy trench giving the Infantry a chance to advance amidst the confusion the tricky bit was digging these tunnels in the first place with some

plummeting down well over 100 ft and stretching as far as 2,000 ft across it could take up to a year to carve these tunnels out so that mean a whole year of tunnelers digging day and night and to rub salt in the wounds the tunnels were dark cold and tight with tunnelers either hunched over or crawling on their hands and knees through the thick clay even worse was the threat of the enemy when two opposing tunnels met a brutal face-to-face combat would follow with miners using shovels daggers and anything else they could get their hands

on to bludge in the enemy terrifyingly each side would also use counter mines in an attempt to blow up rival tunnels and in the process in too many tunnelers beneath piles of Earth yet the biggest threat to the tunnelers was something they couldn't see carbon monoxide a colorless odorless poisonous gas after an explosive action like detonating a countermine or even firing a bullet carbon monoxide would fill the air with the tunnels being poorly ventilated and tight this Sinister stuff could spread quickly and considering that air concentrated with over 1% carbon monoxide leads to death in

less than 3 minutes those don't sound like ideal working conditions fortunately some tunnelers had a savior is it a bird is it a plane no it's protoman yep these Heroes who dawned special breathing equipment to allow them to inhale pure oxygen were sent on underground rescue missions to retrieve any ailing miners life-saving as they may have been I can't think of many things more nightmarish than waking up 100 ft underground to the sight of Proto man right in front of me man even getting rescued as a World War I tunneler was terrifying munition NS heroic

as the tunneler work was none of it would have been possible without the help of women hundreds of miles away more specifically women back in Britain who worked in Munitions factories where they produced bullets shells and explosives while working in a Munitions Factory doesn't sound like a walk in the park you'd think it'd be a lot safer than what soldiers on the front lines had to go through well think again for starters female workers nicknamed munition ETS would work grueling 12-hour shifts yet the long hours were the least of their concerns these women often worked

with TNT or TR nitr tuline prolonged exposure to the nitric acid used in this process turned workers skin yellow aside from the Curious coloration habitually handling the stuff can also lead to skin irritation liver failure and kidney damage on several occasions the explosives that women were working with ignited blowing entire factories to pieces in 1918 one such incident occurred at a shelling Factory in Nottingham England tragically killing more than 130 workers in fact working conditions were so brutal many Factory workers wore tags so their bodies could be identified in the event of any unfortunate accidents

jeez that sounds like one unsa isfactory job rat catcher whether it was the muddy water log terrain that led to trench foot the poor hygiene or the cold cramped conditions The Trenches weren't any place you wanted to hang about in yet arguably the worst aspect of trench life was the sheer amount of rats that ran riot here millions of oversized rats bloated and bolded by the food and waste of stationary armies were major pest reportedly the rats grew so big and bold that they'd even chew a wounded soldier to the end these Terror would also

gnaw through wiring and food as well as spread diseases like typhus and trench fever Now The Simple Solution would be to shoot Rats on site however ammunition was limited so firing at these rodents was prohibited so rat catching dogs were used to hunt down the pests as well as some unlucky soldiers using bayonets and sometimes even their own hands troops on the front line did all they could to reduce the rat problem I can't imagine there are too many things more sobering than clamoring through mud to get your hands on a rat that's been keeping

you up for weeks undesirable as rat catching sounds men were at least paid for every rat they killed one particular Soldier disposed of a whopping 8,000 rats in a fortnite anded a half penny a rat he earned 16 lb which is about $33,000 today regard regardless of how much cash rat catchers pocketed I'd bet those thoughts of clamoring after rodents through the mud would fuel their nightmares for years to come stretcher Bearer on the battlefield troops weren't permitted to stop and care for any of their fallen comrades instead that job fell to stretcher bearers these

tended to be non-combatant soldiers who were prepared to enlist for their country but couldn't face shooting the enemy while stretcher bearers may have adopted a peaceful position their job was anything but typically they were only four stretcher bearers for every 200 men and considering that some 6,000 soldiers perished and a further 18,000 were injured per day during the war these men had their work cut out for them in good conditions two men could carry a wounded man to safety but considering that World War I is known for its swampy muddy fields and giant craters that

was a rarity after periods of heavy rain it took as many as six men to carry a stretcher across muddy Fields I mean can you imagine lugging a soldier across a swampy bog all while your boots are getting dragged into the squelch But Not only was the work exhausting it was also treacherous as stretcher bearers were responsible for immediately removing wounded soldiers they were caught in the thick of the action so unsurprisingly plenty of these guys were caught under enemy fire as they were trying to carry their comrades to safety things got so perilous that

one unit of 48 stretcher bear suffered a staggering 42 casualties yeah I don't think it's a stretch to say that this was one of the war's worst jobs Runner but stretcher bearers weren't the only ones with a physically exhausting workload during the war armies needed to communicate messages between units but by the early 20th century wireless communication was still pretty primitive the most reliable means of communication were humans to be more spefic specific Runners Runners were low ranking Corporal officers chosen for their Fitness stamina and map reading ability but it wasn't just long distances that

Runners had to travel they also had to pass through barbed wire Dodge through water-filled craters and of course avoid being blown up by enemy fire in 1917 one Runner was responsible for delivering a message to a British machine gun position in no man's land yet traveling in the dark he lost his way even worse German forces spotted him in Scent of a flare Illuminating his position before they started shelling him after being bombarded the runner was buried alive with just his head sticking out of the mud when the runner was eventually pulled out of the

earth he was in a State of Shock remembering nothing for the next day turns out that guy was one of the lucky ones World War veteran Lieutenant Alan Dexter said with a runner it was merely a question of how long he would last yikes fair to say I'd run far far away from taking up that job flamethrower operator ah flamethrowers incendiary devices designed to blast out a jet stream of fire sound pretty badass don't they you'd think any flamethrower operators from World War I would be well equipped to burn their way through whatever stood in

their way however these guys had one of the least desirable jobs of the war you see around 1914 when the war first broke out modern flamethrowers were a new adventure mention as a result these models were pretty clunky and clumsy due to the flamethrower chunky size operators were slow moving making them Prime targets for enemy snipers and artillery and as you can imagine a bullet hitting a flammable tank of liquid didn't end too well but don't just take my word for it British officer Philip Christen saw it happen with his own eyes the round hit

the flamethrower and with a scream the man collapsed in a sheet of flame well there's a job that fire you literally Naval M sweepers woo after all that fire talk I need to cool off a bit and we're better to do that than the sea as we've already seen with the work of tin openers Europe Seas during World War I were full of Naval mines in the North Sea alone there were some 235,000 of them and it was Naval M sweepers who had the unenviable job of clearing up these ticking time bombs large trollers would

head out to sea and sweep mines using wired Nets before bringing them to the surface when it came to diffusing the mines you'd think these guys would be as delicate as possible nope World War I was a lot more metal than that instead mine sweepers would detonate any discovered mines by shooting at them now let's just hope anyone shooting at these mines gave themselves enough room to avoid being blasted into fish food predictably these mind sweeping trollers couldn't always avoid bumping into them in 1915 HMS tler Agamemnon was one of the Unlucky ones as the

vessel collided with a submerged German mine sending down nine of her crew jeez really gives you a Sinking Feeling human torpedo so we've now figured out that working at Sea during World War I was essentially a Death Wish yet there was one particular posting out on the waters that was even more perilous than the rest throughout the war both sides use Torpedoes to fire at enemy ships and submarines well that sounds like standard practice there was one particular torpedo out there that did things a little different in 1915 Italian Naval engineer Raphael Rosetti designed a

human torpedo yep you heard that right so how did it work well the torpedo was first towed within range of its Target from there the device was then launched with two crewmen having the regrettable role of being saddled on top of the craft now before your mind runs off with ideas of the crew zooming through the water at the speed of light things weren't quite that Swift fitted with a 17-in propeller the Torpedoes compressed air engine would Propel the weapon forward at a sluggish speed of 4 knots less than 5 mph allowing the crew to

maintain their balance on the vessel let's just hope they didn't run into any Hungry Sharks because that's not exactly the speediest getaway vehicle interestingly although the crew wore diving suits they didn't have a breathing apparatus instead the torpedo had to float just below the water's surface allowing the crew to keep their heads above water as the torpedo chugged towards its Target one plus for the crewmen was that the human torpedo was no kamakazi Mission instead two 375lb charges were carried at the front of the vessel which could be removed and clamped onto the enemy's Keel

when in range in October of 1918 the human torpedo and its two crewmen finally met their date with Destiny despite encountering difficulties with strong currents the device in Cru successfully survived the journey reaching the whole of the ostroh Hungarian Battleship SMS verbus unitis not everything went so swimmingly for the crewman however just moments after placing the explosives on the battleships hole they were discovered and taken prisoner still beats getting plunged into the dark depths of the sea or going down with the torpedo I guess and that rounds up the worst jobs in World War I

which profession did you think was the most perilous let me know down in the comments below and thanks for watching [Music]