I know most of you won't read this. But here goes
I'd like to share my recent trip to France and Belgium with you guys
I'm a huge WW1/WW2 nerd, and it is of massive interest to me. Last week I went across to Belgium to see some of the more interesting sites, I took my camera and had an amazing time.
We went across on the channel tunnel, and made our way through France into Belgium.
First stop was Lijssenthoek Commonwealth war graves, during the First World War, the village of Lijssenthoek was situated on the main communication line between the Allied military bases in the rear and the Ypres battlefields. Close to the Front, but out of the extreme range of most German field artillery, it became a natural place to establish casualty clearing stations. The cemetery was first used by the French 15th Hopital D'Evacuation and in June 1915, it began to be used by casualty clearing stations of the Commonwealth forces.
From April to August 1918, the casualty clearing stations fell back before the German advance and field ambulances (including a French ambulance) took their places.
The cemetery contains 9,901 Commonwealth burials of the First World War, 24 being unidentified. There are 883 war graves of other nationalities, mostly French and German, 11 of these are unidentified. There is 1 Non World War burial here.
This picture shows a third of the cemetery, a shocking introduction to my tour.
As with almost all WW1 Commonwealth cemeteries there is a section of the site dedicated to the German burials.
Despite Germany only making one payment towards the Commonwealth maintenence towards their WW1 war graves in 1921 these sites have been beautifully maintained by the Commonwealth, with GB making over 90% of the pro-rata contributions to these graves. Enough respect cannot ever be paid to the skilled Belgian workers who look after these historic sites.
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Next stop was to pay respect at the resting place of Captain Noel Chavasse, the only double Victoria Cross winner of WW1 and quite frankly one of the most honerable characters of the war.
The original entry by the war office for Captain Chavasse's efforts -
Victoria Cross Chavasse was first awarded the VC for his actions on 9 August 1916, at Guillemont, France when he attended to the wounded all day under heavy fire. The full citation was published on 24 October 1916 and read:[6] Captain Noel Godfrey Chavasse, M.C., M.B., Royal Army Medical Corps. For most conspicuous bravery and devotion to duty. During an attack he tended the wounded in the open all day, under heavy fire, frequently in view of the enemy. During the ensuing night he searched for wounded on the ground in front of the enemy’s lines for four hours. Next day he took one stretcher-bearer to the advanced trenches, and under heavy shell fire carried an urgent case for 500 yards into safety, being wounded in the side by a shell splinter during the journey. The same night he took up a party of twenty volunteers, rescued three wounded men from a shell hole twenty-five yards from the enemy’s trench, buried the bodies of two Officers, and collected many identity discs, although fired on by bombs and machine guns. Altogether he saved the lives of some twenty badly wounded men, besides the ordinary cases which passed through his hands. His courage and self-sacrifice, were beyond praise.
His second VC was officially recorded with this entry -
Chavasse’s second award was made during the period 31 July to 2 August 1917, at Wieltje, Belgium; the full citation was published on 14 September 1917 and read:[7] War Office, September, 1917. His Majesty the KING has been graciously pleased to approve of the award of a Bar to the Victoria Cross to Capt. Noel Godfrey Chavasse, V.C., M.C., late K.A.M.C., attd. L’pool R. For most conspicuous bravery and devotion to duty when in action. Though severely wounded early in the action whilst carrying a wounded soldier to the Dressing Station, Capt. Chavasse refused to leave his post, and for two days not only continued to perform his duties, but in addition went out repeatedly under heavy fire to search for and attend to the wounded who were lying out. During these searches, although practically without food during this period, worn with fatigue and faint with his wound, he assisted to carry in a number of badly wounded men, over heavy and difficult ground. By his extraordinary energy and inspiring example, he was instrumental in rescuing many wounded who would have otherwise undoubtedly succumbed under the bad weather conditions. This devoted and gallant officer subsequently died of his wounds.
Brandhoek Commonwealth cemetry is the location, this is the information board which greets you upon entry -
All Commonwealth cemeteries have a safe which holds the historical burial records of the men who lay there, a handy tool for identifying any personal connection or graves of specific interest.
Brandhoek is located between to houses, and backs onto the back gardens. As with most "small" Commonwealth sites.
During the First World War, Brandhoek was within the area comparatively safe from shell fire which extended beyond Vlamertinghe Church. Field ambulances were posted there continuously.
Until July 1917 burials had been made in the Military Cemetery, but the arrival of the 32nd, 3rd Australian and 44th Casualty Clearing Stations, in preparation for the new Allied offensive launched that month, made it necessary to open the New Military Cemetery. The New Military Cemetery No 3 opened in August and continued in use until May 1918.
Brandhoek New Military Cemetery No 3 contains 975 First World War burials.
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Next stop was Essex Farm, a very well established site which holds one of the youngest official burials of the Great War. A 14 year old child who lied about his age. A chilling tale.
The land south of Essex Farm was used as a dressing station cemetery from April 1915 to August 1917. The burials were made without definite plan and some of the divisions which occupied this sector may be traced in almost every part of the cemetery, but the 49th (West Riding) Division buried their dead of 1915 in Plot I, and the 38th (Welsh) Division used Plot III in the autumn of 1916.
There are 1,200 servicemen of the First World War buried or commemorated in this cemetery. 103 of the burials are unidentified but special memorials commemorate 19 casualties known or believed to be buried among them.
The cemetery was designed by Sir Reginald Blomfield.
It was in Essex Farm Cemetery that Lieutenant-Colonel John McCrae of the Canadian Army Medical Corps wrote the poem ' In Flanders Fields' in May 1915.
The 49th Division Memorial is immediately behind the cemetery, on the canal bank.
Essex farm features preserved bunkers, which go a very small way to showing the shocking conditions of the Great War. Can you imagine being treated for your wounds in these areas, with costant mortar fire, little to no pain killers or drugs, mud, dirt, disease and death all around. Unimaginable in todays society, again the sacrifices and suffering must never be forgotten.
This is a large bunker...
And a standard size bunker -
This walk shows the German front lines, and as far as the Germans got into Ypres. If they crossed the canal 20 yards to the right of this picture the war would have been all but lost.
The Essex regiment memorial -
The information boards at the site -
We then made our way to Yorkshire Trench, a site which was only recently uncovered in the development of a trading estate. This site has given up many of its treasures to the In Flanders museum within the Cloth Hall of Ypres.
The position of the 1915 trench is shown at ground level by a wooden slatted path, but the 1917 section has been recreated. The 1915 trench location was around two yards behind that of 1917. An excellent addition to the sites available on the Ypres salient; there are not too many sites with preserved or recreated trenches, and this one based on the careful excavation of a site threatened with destruction, and the eventual saving of at least a portion of it for public view is laudable.
To me this looks like a gateway to hell -
The original parapet as it was placed during 1915 -
A second dugout entrance -
Due to the incredibly high water table in Belgium exploration of this site is limited, nobody knows what is honestly down there.
This is a recreation of the duckboard structure which would have lined the base of the man dug trenches.
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We took a change of direction now and headed toward the German cemetery of Langemarck. A VERY different experience to the British and Commonwealth sites.
A very bold, proud and solemn site. Typical of the historic Germanic people.
This mass grave contains 24,917 soldiers of whom 7,977 remain unknown. The names of those known are on the surrounding basalt blocks.
These are the German head stones -
The bronze statue of the four figures in this cemetery was created by the Munich sculptor Professor Emil Krieger.
His inspiration was a photograph of soldiers from the Reserve-Infantry-Regiment 238. The photograph was taken in 1918 as the soldiers mourned at the grave of a comrade. This became a well-known photograph which appeared in the German press during 1918.
The second soldier from the right was killed two days after the photograph was taken.
The original picture -
Oak trees were planted in this cemetery as the national symbol of Germany, signifying strength and pride. They have grown tall and now drown the site with a sombre atmosphere.
Oak leaves decorate the interior of the memorial building.
TBC...
So a little more of the Menin Gate.
The Menin Gate is one of four memorials to the missing in Belgian Flanders which cover the area known as the Ypres Salient. Broadly speaking, the Salient stretched from Langemarck in the north to the northern edge in Ploegsteert Wood in the south, but it varied in area and shape throughout the war.
The Salient was formed during the First Battle of Ypres in October and November 1914, when a small British Expeditionary Force succeeded in securing the town before the onset of winter, pushing the German forces back to the Passchendaele Ridge. The Second Battle of Ypres began in April 1915 when the Germans released poison gas into the Allied lines north of Ypres. This was the first time gas had been used by either side and the violence of the attack forced an Allied withdrawal and a shortening of the line of defence.
There was little more significant activity on this front until 1917, when in the Third Battle of Ypres an offensive was mounted by Commonwealth forces to divert German attention from a weakened French front further south. The initial attempt in June to dislodge the Germans from the Messines Ridge was a complete success, but the main assault north-eastward, which began at the end of July, quickly became a dogged struggle against determined opposition and the rapidly deteriorating weather. The campaign finally came to a close in November with the capture of Passchendaele.
The German offensive of March 1918 met with some initial success, but was eventually checked and repulsed in a combined effort by the Allies in September.
The battles of the Ypres Salient claimed many lives on both sides and it quickly became clear that the commemoration of members of the Commonwealth forces with no known grave would have to be divided between several different sites.
The site of the Menin Gate was chosen because of the hundreds of thousands of men who passed through it on their way to the battlefields. It commemorates casualties from the forces of Australia, Canada, India, South Africa and United Kingdom who died in the Salient. In the case of United Kingdom casualties, only those prior 16 August 1917 (with some exceptions). United Kingdom and New Zealand servicemen who died after that date are named on the memorial at Tyne Cot, a site which marks the furthest point reached by Commonwealth forces in Belgium until nearly the end of the war. New Zealand casualties that died prior to 16 August 1917 are commemorated on memorials at Buttes New British Cemetery and Messines Ridge British Cemetery.
Can you see in these pictures how IMMACULATE Ypres is...No fag buts, no wrappers, no beer cans. The entire place is amazing, really something to be proud of.
The "Last Post" plaque.
The view of the bar
Menin Gates memorial safe.
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Next on the tour was Hill 60.
Hill 60 is an amazing site, and is one of the most fought over pieces of territory in the entire front.
And they were all fighting over this view -
Hill 60 suffered an extremely turbulent history throughout the war. Heavily shelled and mined by both sides, the ground forming Hill 60 - literally 60 metres above sea-level - today remains the final resting place for countless soldiers buried somewhere beneath its grassy foundations.
Even with such a slight incline - the man-made result of spoil from a nearby railway cutting in the nineteenth century (no longer present) - the hill proved an invaluable vantage point from which to view the wider battlefield and so was much sought and fought after by the allied and German forces.
The Germans captured Hill 60 from the French forces in December 1914.
When the British relieved the French in the region following the race to the sea it was determined that it must be retaken at all costs. A great deal of the fighting around Hill 60 was underground and it is believed that the first British mine of the war was detonated underneath Hill 60; and Hill 60 was primed with two mines along with 17 others to signal the start of the Messines battle on 7 June 1917.
Hill 60 is a man made mound from the spoil of the railway which runs through the "hill".
After the war Hill 60 was acquired by the Queen Victoria's Rifles and the area fenced in.
Even today the hill is a mass of hillocks and small craters. Hill 60 was the subject of many post-war pilgrimages by returning veterans.
Today the area is owned by the CWGC and is little changed since 1918. A plaque at the site is inscribed with details of Hill 60's chequered history.
It records that it was taken from the French by the German forces on 10 December 1914, recaptured by the British on 17 April 1915, retaken by the Germans on 5 May 1916, ceded back to the British on 7 June 1917 (the first day of the Messines offensive), taken once again by the Germans in April 1918 (during the great Spring push) and its final capture by the British on 28 September 1918.
This is the memorial to the QVR.
This shows the area, and the amount of destruction and movement that has been through the earth. This was flat 100 years ago!
Hill 60 is the site of one of the most incredible combat stories of the Great War, Geoffrey Harold Woolley.
A VC winner, he basically single handedly held an entire company by being an excellent cricket player. His aim with a Mills Bomb was so good he managed to throw an estimated 300 bombs at the German trenches which were less than 20 yards away.
The Queen Victoria's Rifles were posted to the Ypres Salient. On 17 April 1915, the British Army captured Hill 60, a low rise to the south-east of Ypres. In the midst of fierce German efforts to retake the hill, Second Lieutenant Woolley's company were sent up on the afternoon of 20 April to take ammunition supplies to the defenders. The situation quickly deteriorated, with many men and all the other officers on the hill being killed. Woolley refused verbal and written orders to withdraw, saying he and his company would remain until properly relieved. They repelled numerous attacks through the night. When they were relieved the next morning, he returned with 14 men remaining from the 150-strong company. The citation for the Victoria Cross he was awarded for this action reads;
“For most conspicuous bravery on "Hill 60" during the night of 20th–21st April, 1915. Although the only officer on the hill at the time, and with very few men, he successfully resisted all attacks on his trench, and continued throwing bombs and encouraging his men until relieved. His trench during all this time was being heavily shelled and bombed and was subjected to heavy machine gun fire by the enemy.”.
There are accounts of him having his men load a stream of rifles so he could run from his parapet, unload his clip and then discard the rifle back to his men, catch a loaded rifle and go back for more. I guess he was a Holywood hero before it was cool!
This picture shows the area which would have been occupied by the QVR and G Woolley.
The german trenches were located in the row of trees in the foreground.
There are remnants of blockhouses/strongholds on the site which are fascinating to imagine in action.
An interesting story of Hill 60; the Germans had stored all of their gas shells here ready for their first mustard gas attack on the Messines ridge. Hence the importance of holding Hill 60 to the Germans.
During the second world war this monument was partially torn down by the passing German forces who came across it, because it basically said "This is where the QVR stopped those dastardly Germans and captured their Gas supplies!"
Bullet holes and damage still in tact
This shows the distance between the German and English trenches.
Hill 60 Cafe, a good place for a brew
More to come...
Here's an interesting one, and certainly a site to look out for in the future. The Passchendaele Memorial Park.
Currently in progress, this chateaux was totally flattened during the war. And has since been rebuilt in exactly the same fashion and is now the site of a memorial garden, museum and library and information centre.
From the back -
The library -
The front -
There are MANY exhibits in this museum, and their collection on gas weaponry is astounding. What I enjoyed about this collection is that it is very much biased on the French and Belgian forces, which are more often than not forgotten.
A few displays from the collection -
The museum has a unique feature; a dugout experience!
The memorial gardens are stunning -
Next up is the big one...Tyne Cot.
Bah, won't let me reply again with the other half?
