My knowledge of WWI was really limited to the Gallipoli campaign – so tonight my head is reeling with facts and places as we criss-crossed this very small area of Belgium where the front line hardly moved for the entire duration of the war. Imperial Germany's plan was to sweep across this northern part of Belgium into France to capture Dunkirk and the other Channel ports in 2 days. However they ran into unexpectedly stiff resistance outside of Ypres from Belgian and British forces; and soon both sides dug in for trench warfare that would last until the German surrender in 1918. The area is littered with cemeteries (Allied and German), and with still the remains of hundreds of trenches and concrete bunkers. Every Friday the military collect ordinance that farmers are still ploughing up nearly 100 years later, and blow it up at 4.15pm. We saw quiet a few shells left waiting against corner signposts. Bodies too are still being recovered every now and then.
The cemeteries are a reminder of the costs of this war. 185,000 Commonwealth lives were lost there. Most of the tombstones are marked A SOLDIER OF THE GREAT WAR, KNOWN UNTO GOD. Sometimes the unit he belonged to is all the identity that was left. Most died from artillery shelling on both sides, which left bodies mostly unidentifiable. We visited Tyne Cot cemetery, the largest Commonwealth cemetery in the world. 12000 dead are buried there, and on the memorial the names of 35,000 Commonwealth soldiers who died in the vicinity are engraved.
We walked through the remnants of both German and Allied trenches; peered down into concrete bunkers; identified the hundreds of shell craters that still litter the countryside; visited three different museums and 5 or 6 cemeteries that were associated with particular actions or units. And lastly visited the famous Hill 60 where the Australian miners had tunnelled under the German lines and wiped out almost the entire ridge. (My camera battery gave up the ghost just before we got there!) The craters left are now filled with water, making sizeable ponds.
Had a nice lunch in Ypres which was totally demolished in the war. It has been re-built (and of course now enlarged) faithfully to the original plans, and using much of the rubble masonry in the rebuilding – so it still has an age old look to it. The Menin Gate Memorial is notable. It is on the site of a gate in the old city walls where the Menin bridge crossed the city moat. Thousands of Allied soldiers crossed this bridge on their way to the front. After the war, Churchill wanted to buy Ypres sand turn it into a Commonwealth war memorial: but the Belgians weren’t too keen on that idea. So instead,the Brits built
The Menin Gate Memorial contains the names of 54000 Australian, Canadian, South African, Indian and British troops who died in the area before August 1917. Very impressive. Each night traffic stops at 8pm and the Last Post is played by a bugler from the fire brigade – an ongoing thanks you from the Belgians to the Commonwealth forces who came to their aid.
There are German cemeteries too. They used mass graves for burial, and frequently cremated the remains. So each tombstone contains several names. Their grave markers are all in dark stone: only the victors can use white. There is no German graves authority: these cemeteries are looked after by the local Belgian councils.
So a very informative, sobering, and, I must add, confusing day. Also quite tiring, in and out of the van, and trooping along behind Nathan as he led us into hidden relics of the battles. It will take me a lot more reading now to put it all together.
Tomorrow my plan is to walk around Brugge in the morning; then take a train to either Ghent or Oostende in the afternoon, to see a little more of this corner of Belgium. However my right foot/ankle is very swollen and painful tonight, so I’ll see how things are after a good night’s sleep.
I have chosen a sample of todays pics to put online for you to see. Check them here.
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