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The Somme March 2015 - The Butte & Le Sars


horrocks

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I stole a couple of days in the Somme last week, the intention being to add to the portfolio of B&W landscape photos of locations relating to the poets and prose writers who were there - I posted my initial efforts here a couple of years ago. However, not all scenes work in B&W, or the light may be wrong, so I have a number of more 'descriptive' as opposed to 'atmospheric' shots that translate better in colour and which I would like to share here. I hope that they are of interest.

I notice that my path almost crossed with that of Trenchtrotter - we have one or two shells in common!

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The Butte taken from roughly the point that The Gird crossed the track, Le Sars beyond.

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The sunken lane that runs up from the Roman road close to the CWGC Cemetery. It can easily be seen how the Germans may have used this to feed troops up from the concentration that Roland Bradford reported beyond the bank on the other side of the main road. The lane would surely also have made for an effective position from which to put fire onto the Butte itself from behind Gird Trench.

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The Quarry, which I believe housed two Coy command posts, and which was held strongly by the Durhams. This looks back towards Le Sars.

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Battered German memorial in Le Sars.

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Toby

Excellent photos of an area I don't know that well; much appreciated.

Pete.

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  • 2 weeks later...

The German 111th Regiment Memorial at Le Sars

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This is the most important German Memorial still surviving on the Somme. It stands in a farmyard and on the site of a German Cemetery in which approx 2.000 soldiers were buried. It was originally surmounted by a Griffin - the symbol of Baden where the regiment was raised. The best information is that the graves were concentrated sometime before 1926 to the German cemetery at Villers au Flos. The Memorial is inscribed with the battle honours of the Regiment as.

Fricourt, Mametz, Montauban, La Boiselle. & Serre

Image link

https://www.flickr.com/photos/glosters/4306564170

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Thank you Norman, I had often wondered. The position of the memorial is incongruous now, hidden as it is immediately behind the barn. I assume the cemetery would have been in front of the memorial, ie where the barn and farm buildings stand, and between the memorial and the main road.

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Toby there is much more info about this place on the GWF topic below together with a photo of the original memorial and cemetery from Jack Sheldon. Things may have changed a bit since I took my photo but I assume that the inscriptions are on the front of the memorial therefore the cemetery is located where my photo was taken.from.

Link

http://1914-1918.invisionzone.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=117957&st=0&p=1128908&hl=le%20sars&fromsearch=1entry1128908

See also

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=6xBMQKPXtq0C&pg=PA152&lpg=PA152&dq=le+sars+german+memorial&source=bl&ots=OOkBbIL91-&sig=cgkvkdh_qPqhuiMH6fy1V64KY4o&hl=en&sa=X&ei=NVk2VeGcN8GjsgG5v4HoDQ&ved=0CDcQ6AEwBTgK#v=onepage&q=le%20sars%20german%20memorial&f=false

Norman

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