A grim 100th anniversary falls on 1st July of the Battle of the Somme, the biggest battle of World War 1 between the British and French against the Germans. It was the bloodiest in human history with one million killed or wounded. It started 1 July 1916 and ran until 18 November.
The transiting Saturn Pluto conjunction in Cancer which made its first exact aspect two months after the start of WW1 in 1914, stayed in orb through 1915/16 and Saturn exited Cancer in mid 1917. When the Battle of the Somme started the Cancer Sun was sitting exactly on the Saturn/Pluto midpoint; Uranus was exactly opposition the Mars/Saturn midpoint with Pluto semi-square Mars/Saturn. Ebertin describes these two as ‘ brutality, the rage and fury of destruction, death of a great many people, test of nervous strength.’ And Saturn was conjunct Neptune/Pluto which Ebertin describes as ‘grievous emotional suffering.’
There was also a Yod in July 1916 of Mars sextile Saturn inconjunct Uranus – so obviously a time of high stress, disruptive and catalytic. German forces were demoralised by their losses which were marginally higher than the allied casualties, and it led to their collapse in 1918 when the war ended with their defeat.