Editing French Foreign Legion (section)

====World War I 1914–1918====
{{Main|1st Foreign Regiment|Marching Regiment of the Foreign Legion|Paul-Frédéric Rollet}}

[[File:Americans in French Foreign Legion 1916.jpg|thumb|left|Americans in the Foreign Legion, 1916]]
[[File:Alan seeger foreign legion.jpg|thumb|upright=0.55|American poet [[Alan Seeger]] (1888–1916),<br /> in his [[Marching Regiment of the Foreign Legion|Marching Regiment]] uniform]]
The annexation of [[Alsace]] and [[Lorraine]] by Germany in 1871 led to numerous volunteers from the two regions enlisting in the Foreign Legion, which gave them the option of French citizenship at the end of their service.<ref name="legion-etrangere.com">{{citation  |url=http://www.legion-etrangere.com/mdl/info_seul.php?id=413&block=17&titre=legio-patria-nostra |work= Official Website of General Command of Foreign Legion |title= (C.O.M.L.E), Editorial of C.O.M.L.E in ''Képi Blanc''}}</ref>

With the declaration of war on 29 July 1914, a call was made for foreigners residing in France to support their adopted country. While many would have preferred direct enlistment in the regular French Army, the only option immediately available was that of the Foreign Legion. On 3 August 1914 a reported 8,000 volunteers applied to enlist in the Paris recruiting office of the Legion.

In World War I, the Foreign Legion fought in many critical battles on the Western Front, including [[Second Battle of Artois|Artois]], [[Second Battle of Champagne|Champagne]], [[Battle of the Somme|Somme]], [[Second Battle of the Aisne|Aisne]], and [[Battle of Verdun|Verdun]] (in 1917), and also suffered heavy casualties during 1918. The Foreign Legion was also in the [[Gallipoli Campaign|Dardanelles]] and [[Macedonian front (World War I)|Macedonian front]], and was highly decorated for its efforts. Many young foreigners volunteered for the Foreign Legion when the war broke out in 1914. There were marked differences between the idealistic volunteers of 1914 and the hardened men of the old Legion, making assimilation difficult. Nevertheless, the old and the new men of the Foreign Legion fought and died in vicious battles on the Western front, including [[Belloy-en-Santerre]] during the [[Battle of the Somme]], where the poet [[Alan Seeger]], after being mortally wounded by machine-gun fire, cheered on the rest of his advancing battalion.<ref>Shortly before his death, Seeger wrote, "I have a rendez-vous with Death, at some disputed barricade. ... And I to my pledged word am true, I shall not fail that rendezvous."</ref>