A Tour of the Messines Ridge Part One – Wytschaete Military Cemetery & 16th (Irish) Division & 36th (Ulster) Division Memorials

Our tour begins on the western fringes of the village of Wytschaete (now Wijtschate) at the cemetery that bears the village’s name (if you haven’t read the prologue to this tour, which includes a tour map and a brief background to the Battle of Messines, you might like to click here before you continue).  To get your bearings, Messines (now Mesen) itself sits at the southern end of the ridge, about a mile and a half south of Wytschaete, if you continue north you will pass through the village of St. Eloi and eventually find yourself entering the Lille Gate at Ypres (Ieper), and the view above looks west towards, not much more than half a mile away, the positions of the front line trenches as they were in June 1917.

Wytschaete Military Cemetery is a post-war burial ground, the men buried here having been brought in from isolated battlefield graves in the Wytschaete area, or from a number of smaller cemeteries…

…which explains why 673 men of the 1002 who lie or are commemorated here are unidentified.

As always, many thanks to the CWGC for allowing me to use their cemetery plans on this site: Wytschaete Military Cemetery Plan

Looking west across the headstones of Plot IIA towards the memorial to the 16th Irish Division (see below); you will note Mont Kemmel on the horizon away to the west.

The inscription says “In commemoration of the victory at Wyschaete June 7th 1917. In memory of those who fell therein and of all Irishmen who gave their lives in the Great War, R.I.P.”.

Along the eastern cemetery boundary, behind the Stone of Remembrance, a number of special memorial headstones remember soldiers buried elsewhere but whose graves were later lost (see following photos).

Memorials to two British soldiers, buried originally at Rest and Be Thankful Farm, Kemmel, in 1915 & 1917, whose graves were destroyed in later battles.

PRIVATE F. C. BROOKS	SUFFOLK REGIMENT	23	04/05/1915	R B T F MEM. 1
GUNNER C. W. WEIDNER	ROYAL FIELD ARTILLERY	u/k	05/06/1917	R B T F MEM. 3

More special memorial headstones to three Royal Engineers, two of whom were recipients of the D.C.M., killed on 12th March 1915 and buried at R. E. (Beaver) Farm, but whose graves were subsequently lost.

SERJEANT C. J. AMPHLETT D.C.M.	ROYAL ENGINEERS	29	12/03/1915	R E B F MEM. 1
SAPPER H. S. REGAN	ROYAL ENGINEERS	25	12/03/1915	R E B F MEM. 2
SAPPER A. W. KAY D.C.M.	ROYAL ENGINEERS	20	12/03/1915	R E B F MEM. 4

Special memorials to four men killed in 1915 & 1916 and buried at The Cemetery Near Rossignol Estaminet, Kimmel (sic), which was destroyed in later fighting.

PRIVATE J. TEMPERLEY	NORTHUMBERLAND FUSLIERS	u/k	26/01/1915	C R E K MEM. 1
PRIVATE F. EVANS	WILTSHIRE REGIMENT	19	16/01/1915	C R E K MEM. 2
PRIVATE G. GILL	WILTSHIRE REGIMENT	u/k	23/01/1915	C R E K MEM. 4
LANCE CORPORAL B. GALVIN	ROYAL IRISH RIFLES	u/k	26/09/1916	C R E K MEM. 5

View from the northern corner of the cemetery looking south, along the eastern cemetery boundary to the left, back towards the cemetery entrance, which you can just make out on the horizon to the left of the Cross of Sacrifice.  All the headstones to the right this side of the Stone of Remembrance are in Plot VI.  You can also spot the 16th Irish Division Memorial in the background.

This view, from the same position, looks roughly south west, across Plot VI, the unidentified burials of Row A nearest the camera, towards Plot V in the background.  The houses on the horizon follow the course of the road down which we shall be travelling when we leave the cemetery.

Of the eighteen burials in the first two rows pictured here in Plot V, all but one are unidentified.  You will note that the two rows in the background do not appear on the cemetery plan, and although not recent burials, were clearly not there when the plan was made in the 1920s.

PRIVATE W. H. KIBBLER

LEICESTERSHIRE REGIMENT

u/k

25/04/1918

V A 7

Again, just one of all these headstones in Plot III bears a name.  Along with Hooge Crater Cemetery, which also has a very large number of unidentified burials, standing among the headstones at Wyschaete Military Cemetery, surrounded by so many that bear no name, is a salutory experience, I assure you.

SAPPER G. HOBLEY

ROYAL ENGINEERS

u/k

19/07/1917

III D 27

Burials in Plot II, Row A nearest the camera, all from June 1917.

The Cross of Sacrifice, Plots IV (left), and III (right) directly behind.

Final view, looking back at the cemetery with the 16th Irish Division memorial in the foreground…

…before it’s time we take the road west, past two more Irish memorials that commemorate the actions of 7th June 1917.

On our right…

…overlooked by the bulk of Mont Kemmel…

…is another memorial to the men of the 16th (Irish) Division (above & below, taken at different times).  At Maedelestede Farm, just north of the road in the fields behind this small memorial, the crater made when one of the nineteen mines erupted under the German lines on that morning of 7th June 1917 still exists.

Above & below, again taken at different times: On our left, the 36th (Ulster) Division memorial; behind the two pollarded trees in the photo above you can see the slope of the Messines Ridge with Messines Church on the far left horizon.

Update 2024: If you were to travel to this exact spot today, you would find both these memorials gone.  But never fear, because they have been repositioned close to the 16th Irish Regiment memorial next to Wytschaete Military Cemetery.

Across the fields to the south we get a glimpse of the tiny Spanbroekmolen British Cemetery, where we will find ourselves shortly, but before we do there is another small cemetery, slightly out of our way to the north west of here, where we ought to pay our respects first.

Next: Irish House Cemetery