Germany and the First World War 1914–1918

Mark scheme — 2 marks per inference (inference + supporting detail):

Inference 1: I can infer that food shortages on the German home front were extremely severe by 1917. Details in the source that tell me this: The poster encourages Germans to eat turnips — normally animal feed — and frames this as a patriotic act, which suggests that proper food was unavailable and the government needed propaganda to make people accept this deprivation.

Inference 2: I can infer that the German government was concerned about civilian morale and the risk of unrest. Details in the source that tell me this: The poster uses patriotic language ("Every turnip eaten is a victory for Germany") to frame hardship as noble sacrifice — this kind of emotional appeal suggests the government feared that without such messaging, civilians might resist or rebel against rationing.

Mark scheme (L1–L4):

L4 (7–8 marks): Evaluates the utility of BOTH sources, using NOP, with supported judgement about which is more useful / overall utility.
L3 (5–6 marks): Evaluates utility of one or both sources using NOP but less fully developed.
L2 (3–4 marks): Identifies what the sources show but does not fully evaluate provenance/purpose.
L1 (1–2 marks): Describes sources without evaluation.

Indicative Grade 9 answer:

Source A is useful for studying the home front's role in Germany's defeat because it provides evidence — from the German government itself — that food shortages were severe enough to require propaganda management. The War Food Office produced it in 1917 specifically to maintain civilian morale during the Turnip Winter, when the British blockade had reduced Germans to eating animal feed. Its purpose to encourage compliance reveals how serious the government considered the risk of civilian unrest. However, its propaganda nature limits its usefulness: it presents an idealised, patriotic image of sacrifice and deliberately conceals actual civilian suffering, so it cannot tell us directly about the scale of strikes or deaths from malnutrition.

Source B is highly useful for understanding the political context of Germany's defeat — specifically, how the stab-in-the-back myth was constructed. Written by Hindenburg in November 1919, it directly states that the army was "stabbed in the back" by the home front. Crucially, this was written after the defeat, by a man who himself had demanded the armistice, which makes it valuable evidence of deliberate myth-making rather than honest military analysis. For a historian studying long-term reasons for German defeat — including the delegitimisation of Weimar democracy — Source B is perhaps the more significant document. Overall, both sources are useful but for different aspects of defeat: A for the reality of the home front crisis, B for the political manipulation of that crisis.

Mark scheme: L1 (1–2): basic description; L2 (3–5): analysis of some events with links; L3 (6–8): sustained analysis showing how events link and develop, with precise detail throughout.

Indicative Grade 9 answer:

The November Revolution grew directly from Germany's military crisis. By late October 1918, Ludendorff had already demanded the armistice, effectively admitting defeat. On 28–29 October, naval officers ordered the fleet to sea for a final battle against Britain — a desperate, arguably suicidal, gesture. Sailors at Wilhelmshaven refused. The mutiny spread to Kiel by 3–4 November, where Workers' and Soldiers' Councils were formed — modelled on the Russian soviets of 1917 — indicating the depth of revolutionary sentiment.

The revolution then spread rapidly across Germany. On 7 November, Kurt Eisner led a revolution in Munich, declaring Bavaria a republic. The pace accelerated: on 9 November, Kaiser Wilhelm II abdicated under pressure from the army's own leadership, recognising that his position was untenable. Within hours, two competing proclamations were made: SPD leader Philipp Scheidemann proclaimed a democratic republic from a Reichstag window, while Karl Liebknecht declared a Soviet-style republic from the Berlin Palace. These competing visions — reformist social democracy versus revolutionary communism — would tear Germany apart in the months ahead.

The armistice was signed on 11 November at 11am by civilian politicians, not military commanders — a decision that Hindenburg and others would later weaponise in the stab-in-the-back myth. The November Revolution thus not only ended the war and the Kaisserreich but created the fault lines — between left and right, between military and civilian — that would define and ultimately destroy Weimar Germany.

Mark scheme: L1 (1–4): simple agreement/disagreement; L2 (5–8): describes multiple consequences; L3 (9–12): explains and compares consequences; L4 (13–16): sustained analysis, fully supported judgement on relative significance with counter-argument addressed.

Indicative Grade 9 essay plan:

Agree — Case FOR the stab-in-the-back myth as most significant:
• It was the foundational lie of Weimar's political dysfunction — every right-wing attack on democracy used it
• Hitler's entire early career was built on attacking the "November criminals" — without the myth, Nazism lacks its central grievance
• It specifically targeted Jews, intensifying antisemitism into a mass political phenomenon
• It prevented honest reckoning with military failure, making future militarism more politically acceptable
• The Reichswehr retained its prestige and remained a permanent anti-democratic threat to Weimar governments

Disagree — Other significant consequences to consider:
• The November Revolution and birth of Weimar Republic — the immediate political transformation was the most direct consequence; without it, the myth would have had no context to thrive in
• 750,000 civilian deaths from the blockade — immediate human cost; demonstrates scale of suffering that shaped post-war attitudes
• The armistice and Treaty of Versailles — the "humiliation" of 1919 created the political rage that the stab-in-the-back myth then channelled; arguably Versailles was more significant as a long-term consequence
• Economic devastation — the war left Germany financially ruined, laying groundwork for the hyperinflation crisis of 1923

Conclusion (judgement):
The stab-in-the-back myth was arguably the most politically significant consequence because it provided the ideological weaponry that ultimately destroyed Weimar democracy and enabled Nazism. However, it did not operate in isolation: it only became so powerful because other consequences — the humiliation of Versailles, the economic chaos, and the weak foundations of Weimar — created the conditions for it to thrive. The myth was the poison; the other consequences were the wounds through which it entered. A fully balanced answer would therefore argue that while the myth was ultimately the most significant single factor, its significance was entirely dependent on and amplified by Germany's other post-war crises.

(SPaG: ensure accurate spelling, punctuation, and grammar throughout — especially of German terms like Dolchstoßlegende, Burgfrieden, Weimar.)