S4 History Practice Paper: World War One And The Treaty Of Versailles (12 Questions, 100 Marks, 75 Minutes)

S4 History Practice Paper: World War One and the Treaty of Versailles (12 questions, 100 marks, 75 minutes)

2026-11-09

S4 History: World War One and the Treaty of Versailles

History practice paper on the causes of World War One, the 1914-1918 campaigns and the Treaty of Versailles. 12 questions, 100 marks, 75 minutes with answers.

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Section A: Chronology and Calculation (28 marks)

Answer all four questions in Section A.

#	Question	Answer and marking notes
1	1. Four events are linked to the First World War: the Sarajevo assassination, Austria-Hungary’s declaration of war on Serbia, the German invasion of Belgium, and the armistice signed between the Allies and Germany. (a) Arrange the four events in chronological order and give the year, month and day of each. (b) Identify the trigger event and explain briefly how it turned a local dispute into a European war. (7 marks)	1. (a) Sarajevo assassination (28 June 1914), Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia (28 July 1914), German invasion of Belgium (4 August 1914), armistice takes effect (11 a.m., 11 November 1918). (b) The trigger was the Sarajevo assassination: Archduke Franz Ferdinand was killed by a Serbian nationalist, Austria-Hungary declared war with German backing, Russia mobilised for Serbia, Germany opened the Schlieffen Plan by invading Belgium, and Britain entered the war over Belgian neutrality. Marking: order and dates 4 marks (1 each); trigger 1 mark; alliance obligations and mobilisation 2 marks.
2	2. Britain entered the war on 4 August 1914 and the armistice took effect on 11 November 1918. (a) Calculate the number of days between these two dates (exclude the first day, include the last). (b) Convert the total into years, to one decimal place. (c) Explain why a war of more than four years forced belligerents to move from a short-war plan to total war. (7 marks)	2. (a) From 4 August 1914 to 11 November 1918 is 1,560 days (1916 was a leap year). (b) 1,560 days divided by 365 is about 4.3 years. (c) The war of movement ended at the Marne and became trench deadlock; ammunition use exceeded all budgets, so states introduced conscription, rationing and control of industry and railways, turning the whole economy into an instrument of war. Marking: days 3 marks (year-by-year working, leap year); years 1 mark; total war explanation 3 marks.
3	3. Source 1: on the first day of the Somme, 1 July 1916, British casualties (dead, wounded and missing) totalled 57,470, of whom about 19,240 were killed. (a) Calculate the percentage of casualties who were killed, to one decimal place. (b) Using your answer, explain the problem with dense infantry assaults against machine guns and artillery. (c) Name one tactic or weapon the Allies adopted in 1917-1918. (7 marks)	3. (a) 19,240 divided by 57,470 times 100 is about 33.5%. (b) One casualty in three died, meaning many wounded could not be evacuated; dense waves of infantry had no cover against interlocking machine-gun fire and pre-registered artillery, so numbers simply increased the casualty list. (c) Examples: small-unit infiltration with a creeping barrage, the tank (first used 1916, massed at Cambrai 1917), or aircraft for reconnaissance and ground attack. Marking: working 2 marks; answer 2 marks; analysis 2 marks; tactic or weapon 1 mark.
4	4. Five peace treaties were signed after the First World War. Four of them are the Treaties of Saint-Germain, Trianon, Neuilly and Sevres. (a) Match each treaty with the defeated state: Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria, the Ottoman Empire. (b) State which treaty replaced the Treaty of Sevres. (c) Explain one political purpose of signing separate treaties with each defeated state. (7 marks)	4. (a) Saint-Germain: Austria; Trianon: Hungary; Neuilly: Bulgaria; Sevres: Ottoman Empire. (b) The Treaty of Lausanne (1923). (c) Separate treaties isolated each defeated state and prevented joint bargaining, and allowed the victors to settle different territorial claims, for example those of Italy and Japan. Marking: matching 4 marks (1 each); Lausanne 1 mark; political purpose 2 marks.

Section B: Source Analysis and Calculation (32 marks)

Use the sources in Section B and show all working.

Question

Answer and marking notes

5. Source 2: military terms imposed on Germany by the Treaty of Versailles (1919).

Item	Treaty provision
Army	100,000 men
Navy	15,000 men
Capital ships	6
Submarines and military aircraft	0
Demilitarised zone, left bank of the Rhine	50 km deep

In August 1914 Germany mobilised about 4,500,000 men. (a) Calculate the percentage reduction in army strength compared with 1914, to one decimal place. (b) Explain the effect of the demilitarised zone on German defence. (c) State one reaction of German society to these military terms. (8 marks)

5. (a) (4,500,000 minus 100,000) divided by 4,500,000 times 100 is about 97.8%, a cut of about 4,400,000 men. (b) The 50 km demilitarised zone left the western frontier open; Germany could not station troops or build fortifications there and had to rely on treaty guarantees, which undermined confidence in national defence. (c) Reaction: the army and right-wing groups denounced the terms as a dictated peace and demanded revenge; others argued that 100,000 men could not even keep internal order. Marking: working 3 marks; percentage 2 marks; zone explained 2 marks; reaction 1 mark.

6. Source 3: in 1921 the Allies fixed German reparations at 132 billion gold marks; Germany actually paid about 2 billion gold marks in 1921-1922. German national income in 1925 was about 60 billion gold marks. (a) Assuming Germany paid 2 billion a year, calculate how many years would be needed to clear the whole sum. (b) Calculate the total reparations as a multiple of one year of German national income, to one decimal place. (c) Using (a) and (b), explain why the reparations were economically unworkable. (8 marks)

6. (a) 132 billion divided by 2 billion is 66 years. (b) 132 billion divided by 60 billion is about 2.2 years of national income. (c) The total exceeded two years of national income, so payment required foreign currency, loans and cuts in imports; in 1923 Germany defaulted, France and Belgium occupied the Ruhr, and printing money to support strikes produced hyperinflation, showing the terms could not be enforced (later reorganised by the Dawes and Young Plans). Marking: 66 years 2 marks; 2.2 years 2 marks; unworkability 4 marks (currency, inflation, Ruhr).

7. Source 4: resources lost by Germany under the Treaty of Versailles.

Item	Share lost
Territory	13%
Population	10%
Coal	15%
Iron ore	75%

The German population in 1910 was about 64,900,000. (a) Calculate how many people were lost through territorial cession, to the nearest ten thousand. (b) Name two territories ceded to France or Poland. (c) Explain why losing 75% of iron ore but only 15% of coal hurt German heavy industry. (8 marks)

7. (a) 64,900,000 times 10% is 6,490,000 people, about 6.49 million. (b) Alsace-Lorraine to France; the Polish Corridor and Posen to Poland, with Danzig a free city. (c) Losing 75% of iron ore while keeping most coal meant Germany kept smelting capacity but lost its main raw material, so heavy industry had to import ore at higher cost, weakening the Ruhr and raising dependence and unemployment. Marking: calculation 3 marks (working 2, answer 1); two territories 2 marks; asymmetry explained 3 marks.

8. Source 5: in January 1918 President Wilson set out the Fourteen Points, including open diplomacy, freedom of navigation, removal of economic barriers, arms reduction, national self-determination and a league of nations. (a) Give three principles that were not applied in the Treaty of Versailles, each with one example. (b) State one reason why the United States Senate refused to ratify the treaty and the League Covenant. (c) Comment on the view that the treaty punished Germany more than it realised Wilson’s ideals. (8 marks)

8. (a) Examples: open diplomacy failed because the treaty was settled in closed sessions at Paris and Germany and Soviet Russia were excluded; self-determination failed because Austria was forbidden to unite with Germany and millions of Germans were placed inside the new Czechoslovakia; arms reduction was one-sided because only Germany was disarmed. (b) The Senate feared that the League’s collective security obligation would draw the United States into European conflicts and bypass Congress’s power to declare war. (c) Comment: the treaty used the language of the League and self-determination but combined it with a war-guilt clause, reparations and territorial loss, so ideals served as justification while French security and British balance-of-power interests shaped the settlement. Marking: three principles 4.5 marks; Senate reason 1.5 marks; comment 2 marks.

Section C: Essay Questions (40 marks)

Section C requires a clear stand, arguments and specific examples.

#	Question	Answer and marking notes
9	9. “Germany asked for an armistice in November 1918 mainly because of military collapse rather than revolution at home.” Discuss. (10 marks)	9. Sample stand: military collapse was the main cause; revolution accelerated it. Militarily, the 1918 spring offensives exhausted the army and the Hundred Days broke the Hindenburg Line; Bulgaria surrendered in September, the Ottoman Empire in October and Austria-Hungary disintegrated in early November. At home, sailors at Kiel mutinied on 3 November, workers’ and soldiers’ councils appeared in Hamburg and Munich, and a republic was proclaimed on 9 November; the Kaiser abdicated. Revolution prevented the government from using reserve units to restore order, yet it was itself produced by defeat and food shortage. Without military collapse the empire would not have dissolved in days; without revolution the armistice would have been a military retreat rather than a change of regime, and the “stab in the back” myth would not have taken root. Marking: stand 2 marks; military evidence 4 marks; revolutionary evidence 3 marks; judgement 1 mark.
10	10. To what extent did the Treaty of Versailles cause the outbreak of the Second World War? Discuss. (10 marks)	10. Sample stand: the treaty was an important long-term cause but not the only one. In favour: the war-guilt clause and reparations created humiliation and instability, inflation in 1923 and mass unemployment after 1929 boosted extremist parties; the settlement separated Germany and Austria and left German minorities in Poland and Czechoslovakia, giving pretexts for treaty revision; the League had no armed force. Against: the 1920s saw reconciliation, with Locarno (1925), the Dawes and Young Plans and German entry into the League in 1926; Hitler’s expansionist decisions, the Depression, appeasement and Soviet-German interaction were independent factors, and the ideological scale of the later war cannot be explained by the treaty alone. Conclusion: the treaty created a structure of grievance that could be exploited, but only with the Depression and leadership decisions did it lead to war. Marking: stand 2 marks; treaty and interwar diplomacy 4 marks; other factors 3 marks; judgement 1 mark.
11	11. “The terms imposed on Germany by the Treaty of Versailles were too harsh.” Assess this statement with reference to military, territorial and economic terms. (10 marks)	11. Military: an army of 100,000, no submarines or air force and a demilitarised Rhineland left Germany unable to defend itself, which was harsh. Territorial: about 13% of territory and 10% of population were lost, with 75% of iron ore and the Polish Corridor separating East Prussia from the rest, a heavy national and economic price. Economic: reparations of 132 billion gold marks, more than two years of national income, helped produce inflation and the Ruhr occupation. Against: compared with Brest-Litovsk, where Russia lost 34% of its population and 54% of industrial capacity, the German shares were smaller; Germany remained a single national state while Austria-Hungary broke up; and after 1924 the reparations were restructured so the real burden was far below the headline figure. Conclusion: the terms were harsh in symbolism and enforcement, but harshness must be judged against other treaties of the time and against actual implementation. Marking: three aspects 2 marks each; counter-arguments 3 marks; conclusion 1 mark.
12	12. Source 6: by the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (3 March 1918) Soviet Russia lost about 34% of its population, 32% of its farmland, 54% of its industrial capacity and 26% of its railways; under the Treaty of Versailles Germany lost about 13% of its territory and 10% of its population. (a) Calculate how many times larger the Russian population loss was than the German loss, to one decimal place. (b) Some historians use Brest-Litovsk to argue that Versailles was not too harsh. Comment on this argument. (c) State your own view on whether the harshness of a peace treaty should be measured by the share a defeated state loses. (10 marks)	12. (a) 34 divided by 10 is 3.4 times. (b) The argument has limited force: Brest-Litovsk shows that Germany imposed severe terms when victorious, so Versailles was not unprecedented; but the circumstances differ, because Brest-Litovsk lapsed when Germany was defeated while Versailles was enforced and placed war guilt on one state alone. Using another harsh treaty to show that Versailles was not harsh shifts the standard of comparison rather than answering the charge. (c) Sample view: shares are an important but not the only measure; capacity to pay, public perception and political consequences matter, and terms that exceed a state’s ability to pay while being enforced will destabilise it even if the shares are moderate. Marking: calculation 2 marks; comment 4 marks (concession 2, rebuttal 2); judgement and criteria 4 marks.

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