The year 1919 witnessed the global influenza outbreak and continued influx of hundreds of thousands of refugees from the Russian Revolution. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers struggled for basic survive and went from being heroes to unemployed. The struggle would continue for the next two decades.

The horrors of WWI shaped much of the interwar period. In 1920, ‘unknown soldiers’ were buried in London and Paris. Families wanted closure and local and national war memorials helped provide this. Memories of the war were so bitter in German that it took until 1931 for a national war memorial to be built.

Following World War One, several different Europeans existed or started to exist. A “democratic” Europe continued to exist, a rising anti-democratic “fascist” Europe started to emerge and “communist” Soviet Union existed.

Influenza

Immediately following the end of World War One, the world struggled with the deadly Spanish flu influenza outbreak that circled the globe. From the first outbreak in France, the disease traveled with soldiers returning home from the war. It infected 500 million people and led to the death of between 50 and 100 million people; which was about 3-5% of the world’s population then.  Pacific Islanders, such as Western Samoans, were especially hard hit with 90% of the population becoming inflected and 30% of the male population dying. However, as the outbreak was just one of many waves of disease going back to the previous century and occurring at the same time as the end of the war, its deadly consequences have largely been overlooked.

Figure 3: The Global Spread of Influenza