Source: Louis Henry, Perturbations de la nuptialité résultant de la guerre 1914-1918, Population 21-2, 1966
Tools: Excel
With young French men dying in great proportion (the highest being French men born in 1894, 22% of whom died during WW1), a major gender imbalance happened in France after WW1. This had an impact on women because there were suddenly no longer enough men for them to get married with after the war.
However, the final celibacy rate observed for French women born during the impacted years was much lower than what it should have been in theory.
對比一下法國一戰後的情況。其實男的死多點對人口影響不大
French women deployed several strategies to counteract this sudden demographic imbalance:
First, they got married with men of the same age or younger men in much greater number. This shifted the impact further down age groups.
Second, women married a higher number of men who theoretically would have stayed single had WW1 not killed so many other men, in a word, they settled.
Third, women married a greater number of divorcees and widowers.
And fourth, French women married a greater number of foreigners (Poles, Italians, etc.).
