History and Harry Potter, two of my favorite subjects! I've been teaching the WWI and Great Depression unit the past couple of weeks and I kept thinking about how the Harry Potter world might have been affected by it. I highly doubt that events as big as WWI & WWII could have not affected Wizarding England, so I decided to write perspectives from different people in the Wizarding community...some we may know and some I've made up. I hope you enjoy it!

Summary: Peter Haverworth, a half-blood fresh from his last year at Hogwarts comes home to talks of a war coming to the muggle world. Set during World War I.

Chapter 1:

Assassinations and Beginnings of War

June 30th, 1914, Peter Haverworth had finally finished his last year at Hogwarts. He would soon enjoy a short English summer before he was to start his training with the Aurors department.

He said goodbye to his school chums and met his awaiting parents at the 9 3/4 platform of Kings Cross.

As they exited into the muggle section, he could notice the apprehension in the muggles. His mum had not kept him apprised of the muggle world despite the fact they lived in a muggle neighborhood. He heard men discussing the tensions in the east and how they were on the precipice of war.

War frightened Peter. His father was a muggle and had been to war. He remembered the nightmares his father often suffered, the memories of war marring his brain. If a war were to happen, Peter wasn't sure if he wanted to submit himself to such horrors. However, he still saw himself as a loyal British subject, and it was his duty to fight for his country.

July 28th, 1914 arrived and the inevitable happened. Peter was listening to the radio when the news that the assassination of the Austrian Archduke came on. The East had launched into war invading into Serbia, and while England was still remaining as neutral in the conflict, the violence and anger was boiling deep within Europe and soon, Great Britain would be pulled into the conflict.

The days wore on, Peter's resolve was changing. He was beginning to find that he wasn't as keen to start training as an Auror, but instead he wanted to be a soldier like his father, and his grandfather before him. His father's family had a long military legacy which dated back to the American Revolution and part of him wanted to continue that legacy. When August 4th finally arrived, and Britain had entered the war, Peter apparated to the London recruitment office and enlisted in the Royal Army.

His mother had cried when he announced his plans to join. She cried and begged him to stay away from the silly muggle wars. To his surprise, his father wasn't thrilled at the ide either; war had changed so much since he had fought and he was worried about his son's welfare in this modern war. Still, Peter wanted to join the fight.

Three days after enlisting, he was giving his mother a hug goodbye and was off to train.

He was in the trenches two months later, firing heavy machine guns and throwing hand grenades at the enemy. To his surprise, he'd met one other wizard in his battalion; he'd graduated the year before him and had been a Gryffindor. There was word that there were several other men from the wizarding community, who had joined the Allies in the fight against Germany and Austro-Hungary.

War was not the boys game he used to play as a child, that had been very clear when he fired his gun at an enemy for the first time. When shots were fired, they hit someone and killed them, with no way of bringing them back.

The nights and days passed, each day bringing destruction, death, and disease. Private Anderson, his friend since the first day of training, succumbed to gangrene after being hit by shrapnel. The smell of the rot stayed in his nostrils, and Anderson's moans of pain were ingrained into his memory.

One luxury he cherished was letters. They were able to receive letters occasionally, and he cherished those moments dearly. He looked forward to the letters his mother and father sent him, the only reminders of peace he had remaining. His mother spoke often of the war effort from the wizarding community. Many sons had enlisted to prove their duty and loyalty to the British crown, and many mothers like herself had taken up volunteer work in factories or fundraising for the war effort

The Great War had brought two different worlds together; the wizarding and muggle community had never come close to meeting, there were always differences in each life that previously made it impossible. Despite the stark differences in the worlds, they were all subjects of the Royal crown and each mother with a son on the battlefront, had that in common.

When Christmas had arrived, it was a blessing. A ceasefire had been called in the trenches and both sides experienced a little bit of peace. They played football and shared stories and meals in no man's land, and while the stories and the peaceful moment was nice, both sides knew that it wouldn't last. They were enemies with different perspectives that could only be solved in this fashion.

November 11th, 1919 was the day peace finally came. By the time it came, Peter was emotionally and mentally fragile. He'd seen so many of his friends die, sometimes so close he saw the life drain from their eyes. Miraculously, he come away physically unscathed unlike many others. The wizard in his battalion had taken shrapnel to his leg and had to have the infected and rotting limb amputated. Many other men in his battalion had either perished or had lost limbs, eyes, any body part that was able to be destroyed by war.

While he slept on the train on his way home, the flashes of memories jolted him awake. He kept seeing the faces of his dead friends, and the noises of the locomotive mimicked the guns he had fired.

He returned home to the open arms of his mother and father, both happy to see their son alive and safe once again. The Great War, the war to end all wars had finally ended. Peter only wished that nothing else of this nature would ever occur.