It’s a chilly, misty morning as we debus, or decoach, at the little crossroads beside this roadside calvary, Calvarie Van Kranenburgstraat, three quarters of a mile east of Klein-Zillebeke. The coach is parked on the main road between Zillebeke, two miles, and then Ieper (Ypres), a further mile and a half, away to the west, and Zandvoorde and eventually Wervik behind us to the east. Anyway, probably best if we get off the main road. Continue reading
View from the Point Battery at Fort George, looking out on to the Moray Firth. Continue reading
The rather grand entrance to Guillemont Road Cemetery on the Somme. Continue reading
A series of seven British maps, this first dating from February 1916, showing the known, or believed, distribution of German forces facing the Allies on the Western Front. Continue reading
Last year I paid a second, brief, visit to Pozières British Cemetery, where 2,760 British, Australian & Canadian Great War casualties are buried, surrounded by walls on which the names of a further 14,000 British & South Africans who have no known grave are inscribed. Continue reading
For a number of years now I have wanted to show you two particular photographs, and, now that both are in the public domain, I can do just that. Not that there is anything unusual or particularly special about them as photographs, but there is a story attached to the second one of which, it seems, most people are unaware. Both were taken by controversial Australian photographer Frank Hurley near Birr Cross Roads on the Menin Road (although I should point out that there is nothing contentious about these photos) in September 1917, the above picture showing British walking wounded and German prisoners as they trudge away from the battlefield, passing stretcher cases awaiting evacuation as they go. The ditched vehicle that looks remarkably like a camper van (it does!),… Continue reading
It’s been a good few years now. Continue reading
