Misery in the Mud
Life in the trenches was far from luxurious, there was disease and extremely limited space. One prevalent thing many soldiers got due to the uncleanliness of the trenches was "trench foot". The constant, heavy rainfall would flood the trenches causing it to either be very hard to get place to place or, the mud would be so thick and deep that the soldiers would get trapped and drown. Because the soldiers had to stand in the water for long hours, they would acquire trench foot, similar to frost bite, in which the foot would get infected and sometimes even have to be amputated. The men also suffered from exposure and frostbite. Besides trench foot, the rain also caused walls to collapse and rifles to jam. Living in the trenches, and dying, it is obvious there would be uncleanliness, but this was unthinkable. There was filth and terrible odor of human waste and decaying bodies; those things contributed to the spread of disease, but also attracted rats and other vermin (lice, mites, scabies, flies). On top of all this, there was an almost constant deafening noise of heavy shelling. Dozens of shells per minute could land in the trenches causing deafening explosions and this caused many emotional breakdowns. The many high health risks of living in trenches included constrained space, dirt, living half underground, unable to wash or change for days or even weeks, and vermin.