First visit to Ypres Salient

[WilliamRev]

My brother and I went for a short trip to Ypres Salient - part holiday, part research, part pilgrimage. The trip was a 46th birthday present to me from my brother and his family.

Thursday 17th June

From West Sussex to Dover, Eurotunnel to Calais, drove to Ieper using the Holt's longer route that uses 1917 roads (suddenly realise from photos in book that Major and Mrs Holt used to be our next-door neighbours in Camberley when my Dad was at Staff College!) - we stop at Cassel after reading that officers used to ride from Ypres to have supper at hotel, because they considered it a cut above Poperinghe.

Arrived at Old Tom hotel - room 18 on top (3rd) floor up steep and tatty staircase, but staff charming and happy to speak English, and food wonderful.

Looked in bookshops then Last Post at Menin Gate - 15 mins of GB schoolchildren laying wreaths: WW1 is now part of National Curriculum, and they seem understand about it and are taking this very seriously.

Friday 18th June

We drive to Zonnebeke and walk the route of the 8th Brigade's assault on Zonnebeke Station and Hill 40 (aka Windmill Hill) on 26th September 1917. It takes us 15 mins to walk from front line (just south of where railway line meets road) where on the day 1st Royal Scots Fusiliers took 7 hours to get this far, losing over half their men because the ground was so boggy that they couldn't keep close behind the creeping barrage. My grandfather, Captain Revels (shown on my avatar), was one of four officers out of twenty not killed or wounded. This was some of the bravest and bloodiest fighting in the Battle of Polygon Wood (the attack was led by Captain W. Orr, who won the MC on this day), but most books on the battle seem to be obsessed by the Anzacs action two miles south, and rather ignore the 3rd Division's capture of Zonnebeke.

Zonnebeke Museum - includes a really good time-line of 3rd Ypres showing the weather, and what each division is doing on each day. The recreated dug-out is excellent, not least because one of the figures is a Royal Scots Fusiliers officer - hurrah!

Lunch at a local cafe which offers "Tommy Tucker" - a slightly odd bully-beef and vegetable pie. I had this but rather envied my brother's fish and chips. But he was driving so only I was able to have a pint of lager - ha ha!

Tyne Cot Cemetery. Vast and beautiful and very sad - we find and pay our respects to several dozen Royal Scots Fusiliers graves dated 26/9/17. We also spot graves of Durham Light Infantry and Sherwood Forresters (the other family regiments).

Sanctuary Wood Museum - a vast, odd and sometimes rusty accumulation of WW1 stuff, including fascinating 3D photos of Western Front, especially maimed bodies. The preserved trenches, authentic or not, are spooky - it is late afternoon, overcast, and we have them to ourselves.

Last Post at Menin Gate - RAF cadets and a local brass band - completely different from last night.

Saturday 19th June

In Flanders Field Museum - there is a temporary exhibition about Chinese workers on the Western Front. They were very fond of fireworks, and first coming under fire from German shells which wizzed over and exploded very close, they laughed and clapped enthusiastically. The No Mans Land audiovisual is shocking, as is the Medical one - we learn thaI my grandfather's experience of shell-shock was very common: he was blown up by a howitzer shell on Bezantin Ridge 14/7/16 and buried-alive. Dug up and returned to Scotland, he continually wet himself and couldn't stop shaking for a month. Nine months later he was promoted to Lieutenant, and returned to the front.

Walked Ieper ramparts - the Ramparts Cemetery is very peaceful, and we spot more RSF graves. We walk to the Menin Gate - we love the small brass model of the Menin Gate that blind people can feel and so understand what the gate looks like. Seeing 53,000 names of soldiers with no graves is just extraordinary.

The Last Post is different again - a choir sing, prayers are said. There is a 20-ish year old young man in front of us who stinks - a really unwashed smell. When we get chatting to him it turns out that he is a soldier on his way back from Afghanistan on leave. I feel humbled and a bit ashamed for even noticing the odour.

Sunday 20th June

Check out of hotel, then to French cemetery (St Charles P.) - sadly neglected compared to Commonwealth ones; then Scottish Monument where we pay our respects and admire, and photograph, the beautiful beds of poppies.

Back to Zonnebeke again where we once more walk the short route of the 26/9/17 assault pinpointing all the landmarks - the low-lying field next to the railway which was "an impassible swamp" where a number of soldiers drowned, and others were forced right onto the railway embankment where they were mown down by machine guns from the railway station, 300 yards away. The place on Hill 40 (a gentle mound, 40 metres above sea-level), just next to the site of Zonnebeke Railway Station where the RSF dug-in under heavy machine-gun fire, is still there, but is clearly a vacant plot of land between some houses and a factory, and next time we come we fear that it will be built-on: so we spend a while there and take lots of photos.

The Hooge Crater Museum (there is no crater, which could confuse a stupid person - it certainly did me) has some fascinating photos and small items, as well as the obligatory uniformed dummies in glass cases - it also has a nice cafe.

In search of an actual crater we go to the Pool of Peace on the Messine Ridge and its two cemeteries - Lone Tree Cemetery has cows peering at us over the wall - it is being re-landscaped so is a bit scruffy at the moment. Pool of Peace Cemetery is immaculate, but I have seen a photo when this was a small patch of Mud with bodies hurriedly buried and marked by wooden crosses.

Back to Calais, Dover, then West Sussex by supper-time,

William Revels East Preston, West Sussex, South Coast

[Nigel Marshall]

It certainly sounds like a rewarding trip.

Well done, you obviously did your homework before setting off and it looks like it paid dividends. I also think that because you'd done your preparation before you set off, you didn't make the mistake many do of trying to cram in too much and taking none of it in.

Seeing some of your photos would be great.

Cheers,

Nigel

[ianw]

Sounds like a great trip William.

I am sure you will want to repeat it.

[ulsterlad2]

Sounds brilliant William. Any photos?

[1690philip]

A very rewarding journey of remembrance WilliamRev.

Phil

[squirrel]

Sounds like an interesting and fulfilling trip. Hooge crater is just up the road from the museum.

Would love to see your photographs.

[KevinBattle]

Excellent account and one that many would do well to read before planning their own.

[WilliamRev]

I will post lots of photos in the next day or so as soon as I work out the best way to do this - probably be a link to an album somewhere because there are quite a few of them.

Hooge Crater - ah yes, I have just found a photo of it in Rose Coombes book.

Forgot to mention in my post that on the Sunday morning after our secound vist to Hill 40 in Zonnebeke we went to the New English Buttes Cemetery, and there was a piper playing laments at the Canadian Memorial, which was almost heart-breakingly poignant.

[WilliamRev]

Here are a few photos from our recent rip to Ypres Salient:

!. View of Ieper main square from room 18 Old Tom Hotel

2-4. Menin Gate - I was shocked and moved by what 53,000 names looks like - and these were just two thirds of the men who have no known graves.

[WilliamRev]

The Scottish Monument, erected in 2007 - the celtic cross is made of Scottish pink granite, and it comemorates all the Scots who fought in Ypres Salient, including Canadians. My brother Nick and I really liked it, not only because of our Scottish grandfather, but also for the fantastic planting of poppies, which I hope these two photos show.

[WilliamRev]

Tyne Cot Cemetery - so vast and so beautiful. Such acontrast from the photos of how it looked in November 1917 - wooden crosses in a muddy mess. The roses were at their best last week, and I photographed a grave of a soldier from 1st Royal Scots Fusiliers who died 26th Sept 1917 when the 3rd Division took Zonnebeke.

[WilliamRev]

The main reason for our visit was to see Hill 40 in Zonnebeke, which 8th Brigade took and held on 26/9/17 (or to be more precise, they took then rapidly retired from when the Germans counter-attacked, apart from 2 companies of Royal Scots Fusiliers, commanded by Captain W. Orr, later joined by Captain S. Revels (our grandfather), who held on for 24 hours until support arrived.

Here is Hill 40, (looking rather like a vacant plot waiting to be built on, so we are glad we got there when we did; a photo of my brother Nick roughly on the spot where 1st RSF dug in under heavy machine-gun fire, and a photo 200 yards down the slope on the spproach to the hill - Nick insisted that I climb into a muddy drainage-ditch to take this shot, so that I got the full muddy-trench experience.

[WilliamRev]

The Pool of Peace on the Messine Ridge - a lovely spot now, but the very last place on earth that you wanted to be on 7th June 1917 when the crater was made by the biggest of the British mines.

I have read endlessly about 3rd Ypres, but it was only when I saw the actual lanscape itself that I started to understand why the battle progressed as it did, and in particular why it was so important that the Messine Ridge be taken before an assault on the Ypres Salient could take place.

In the second photo, my brother Nick is examining a rusty coil of barbed-wire: we left it where we found it. Now, I'm not advocating that people remove battle artifacts from the fields - no, no, no - possibly dangerous and probably theft etc. etc. but... if rusty little WW1 metal remnants in fields are what floats your boat, then there are simply loads in this area.

[Roger H]

Thanks for taking the time and trouble to post these. Any more?

Roger

[Neil Mackenzie]

William.

Great account.

I have stayed at Old Tom before but personally found it a bit noisy. As you say the food is great though (some of the best in Ieper IMHO) and the staff are very nice.

Neil

[squirrel]

Excellent photographs - thanks for sharing them.

[WilliamRev]

Yes, I have plenty more photos - I just didn't want to bore you all

So here, by popular request, are a few more:

Sanctuary Wood - what a weird museum! (But what great foresight of the family to keep the wood preserved with the trenches: their newly-built house next door, large and with a nice swimming pool, attests to the popularity of this tourist attraction!)

It was late afternoon and very overcast, which is which these photos are not of the best quality. We had the whole wood to ourselves after all the school-children had left, and it had a very odd and unsettling atmosphere. A pair of wellies and a torch would have enabled us to explore the trenches even better.

Here are the preserved trenches, and a photo of my brother Nick in a shell-hole (I keep putting Nick in my photos to give a sense of scale, as well as brotherly affection of course).

[ulsterlad2]

Great photos William. Thanks for posting them.

[WilliamRev]

More about last week's trip:

We had nearly three full days in the Ypres Salient, so we were able to spend a whole day in Ieper (leaving the car on the outskirts, so parking was free; car didn't have to be moved overnight, and we could launch into the lager at a respectable 4pm on Saturday afternoon).

The morning was spent in the In Flanders Field Museum - in fact we were in there for three and a half hours. I can imagine that this museum isn't to all tastes: there are interactive features, sulptures and audiovisual displays. Every 90 mins an ear-splitting heavy artillery shell seems to wizz over like a train passing overhead, and there is an massive explosion. This comes as nasty surprise, even for those of us without heart conditions, and I can't believe that UK health-and-safety would stand for it.

The No Mans Land audiovisual display was far more of a shock than I expected - I slept very badly that night and several times woke up with nightmares that I was stuck in No Mans Land in a mass of uncut barbed-wire.

I was also very moved by the casualty/field hospital audiovisual display, especially the account of a nurse who was treating men with shell-shock. As I have mentioned before on the GW Forum, our grandfather Stuart Revels (see avatar) when he was a 2nd Lieut on the Somme, was blown up by a 5.9 inch howitzer shell (the battalion war diary is quite specific about this) on Bezantin Ridge 14th July 1916 and buried alive, then dug up by some of his men. The medical reports in his war record show that he was shaking, and constantly wetting himself, for a month or so.

We then walked around the ramparts of Ieper, from the Lille Gate to the Menin Gate - I would highly recommend this to anyone. The Ramparts Cemetery is the most beautiful cemetery of all of those we visited, and Rose Coombs' ashes were buried under a rose-bush hre (there is no plaque or gravestone). Below is a photo of this beautiful place, although one is aware, as always, that originally this was just a muddy open space where bodies could conveniently be buried with as much dignity as they could manage at the time.

We walked along the ramparts to the Menin Gate; the second photo shows Nick with the brass model of the Menin Gate, complete with brail inscriptions in various languages, that blind people can feel so that they understand what the Menin Gate is like. We really liked this, and would recommend people to seek it out (it is up the steps at rampart-level on the south side of the Menin Gate).

[WilliamRev]

Just a few final photos from aour trip last week:

RAF cadets at the Menin Gate, after the Last Post has been sounded. Each of the three evenings we attended was quite different - one evening there were school children laying poppy-wreaths; another prayers and a short service; yet another cadets. below is a photo of the RAF cadets marching away after ceremony. There were loads of people, me included who were wiping tears from their eyes, and pretending that they were suffering from hay-fever....

Then here are two photos of the sadly neglected French Cemetery, St Charles Potyze, just outside Ieper: in need of a mow and lots of tlc (the grass was full of weeds and the flower beds were just full of weeds), it make you realise how well-kept the Commonwealth cemeteries are.

[Nigel Marshall]

There were loads of people, me included who were wiping tears from their eyes, and pretending that they were suffering from hay-fever....

The Menin Gate can be a dusty old place at the best of times! I've fallen victim to it many times.

William, I think the account of your first visit and the images you've used to illustrate it are both marvellous. They capture very well what a visit to the area can mean to many people. It will stay with you, I'm sure, through any subsequent visits you may make.

Thanks for the time and effort taken to put this thread together. It is appreciated.

Cheers,

Nigel

[Michelle Young]

William, many thanks for sharing your thoughts and photos with us. As you know Hill 40 has a special place in my heart too!

Michelle

[WilliamRev]

I am pleasantly surprised that so many people have read my thread, and am grateful for all the comments, private and on the forum. I am now torn between starting to plan a visit to the Somme region, especially Bezantin Ridge, or planning a second visit to Ieper!

And whilst I am posting, I want to say how very grateful I am to the members of the Great War Forum. In the 9 months in which I have been a member, I have received valuable help in tracing my grandfather's service record, and had so many members go out of their way to help me with advice, information and photos etc. This really is an extraordinarily wonderful corner of the internet. A big THANK YOU!

William

[peterhogg]

I've just reviewed this thread this evening. Thank you very much for posting.

peter

[Mick D]

Great account and photos.

Mick