In Flanders Fields the Poppies Blow

People tend to agree that the tipping point for the outbreak of the First World War was the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914. Over the next month or so, a tangled web of alliances was pulled tight, bringing most of Europe into the Great War. The Schlieffen Plan was a German strategy to quickly invade France and capture Paris before Russia, an ally to France, had an opportunity to mobilize its forces—in order to do so, however, German forces needed to pass through Belgium. The demand for passage was made on August 1, 1914—Belgium refused, opting to maintain its neutrality. The result was a German invasion and occupation of the country, but with the effect that Britain, bound to protect Belgium by the terms of the 1839 Treaty of London, declared war on Germany on August 4, 1914.

The drive from Amsterdam to Brussels took just over two hours on the Flixbus, moving through gentle lowlands and making a graceful transition between the Netherlands and Belgium (thanks to the Schenden Agreement, you don’t even need to get your passport checked moving between these two countries). Hard to believe that this divide was once marked by an electric fence to prevent Belgians from fleeing to the Netherlands during German occupation—the so-called Wire of Death claimed several thousand lives during the Great War.

On Thursday morning, we made our way out of the heart of Brussels on a tour bus with Brussels City Tours, bound for the sparsely populated farming country outside the city, in the Dutch-speaking region of Belgium known as Flanders. The sky had a brooding demeanor, as though rain was never far off—a fitting sort of day for visiting some significant sites remaining from the First World War. Our guide aptly termed the day—a long day, getting back to Brussels some 13 hours after leaving—a pilgrimage rather than a sightseeing tour, visiting otherwise nondescript countryside whose names hold an ominous place in the Western psyche: Ypres, Passchendaele, the Yser.

Our stops throughout Flanders Fields

This whole geographic region in Flanders marks the historic Ypres Salient—a battlefield projected into enemy-held territory, such that British, French, Canadian, and Belgian troops were surrounded by German forces on three sides. From 1914 to 1918, there were half a dozen major battles in this relatively small geographic area, each establishing their own narratives of the First World War. Over the course of the entire war, the frontlines changed—significantly if you take a microscopic view, but the overall shift represented mere kilometres, at the cost of several hundred thousand human lives. entire generation slaughtered on the fields around Ypres, a region still scarred from the catastrophe.

Where once there stood a hospital, you can almost guarantee there will now be a cemetery. Few junctions in the road lack a monument or memorial to the lost generation. Every year, a farmer ploughing his or her field in Flanders inevitably finds a landmine and occasionally sets it off.

This was the backdrop to our tour through Flanders Fields, a livable, simple region that looks much as it did prior to the outbreak of the War, despite the fact that Ypres was leveled and reconstructed after 1918. The countryside at once reminded me of the fields around the Somme Valley, in France, which most Newfoundlanders mark on their First World War pilgrimage because of Beaumont-Hamel—and the similarities shouldn’t be particularly surprising, given that there’s just over an hour drive from Ypres to the Caribou memorial.

The Trench of Death

Our first official stop, after picking up a handful of passengers in Bruges, was to the site of the Trench of Death, just outside Dikemuide and along the banks of the Yser. German troops were in this area in an attempt to get to the North Sea and capture the French ports of Calais and Dunkirk, but the Belgians resisted, flooding the low river valley and forcing both sides to resort to trench warfare, built up with sandbags rather than dug into the waterlogged earth.

Most of the warfare around this region revolved around oil tanks that had been captured by Germans, and the strategic position they afforded. The Belgian strategy was to dig towards the oil tanks, approaching the enemy lines at a rate of six metres a day, while Germans dug back to the south, making a deadly confrontation inevitable.

It was not until 1992 that this portion of land was recognized for its historical value, and a reconstruction of the Trench of Death was started that included an interpretation centre and pathways through cement-sandbagged trenches.

Langemark German Military Cemetery

Oak trees surround the German military cemetery at Langemark, the trees with their deep roots and outreaching branches the supposed link between the earth and Heaven. Some 44,000 German soldiers are buried in Langemark, one of the most-visited war cemeteries in Belgium. The former German trench line from which chlorine gas was released on April 22, 1915 runs through the cemetery.

In a war situation, there are good guys and bad guys, but the designation depends on what side you happen to be on. Being a 26-year-old Canadian, I have no point of reference to understand what the relationship between Germany and the Allied countries must have been like, after the First and Second World Wars, or even now in 2015. What I do understand, however, is that whatever the political situation that brought Europe to the Great War, each side of No Man’s Land was populated by human beings—most of whom, at their core, had no real interest in murdering other human beings. The Christmas Truce, where opposing forces met in the middle of the battlefield to sing carols and exchange small gifts (cigarettes, lapels, and the like), and the football matches between regiments, are historic reminders, but the fact that a German war cemetery stands in Belgium (and is currently undergoing a major renovation project) is a more contemporary testament to that fact. Reassurance that even the worst war the world had ever encountered can end in some semblance of peace and understanding.

The Brooding Solider (Saint Julien Memorial)

Poison gas was outlawed by international law, which was why no one was prepared for 168 tonnes of chlorine gas—that’s close to 6,000 canisters—released by the Germans near Langemark. Borne on the wind, the gas was fatal, and the Canadians were manning the position near the village of Saint Julien where the damage was the greatest. The gas created a break in the Allied lines; however, the Germans were slow to seize the opportunity (somewhat naturally—they had no interest in charging into territory where a deadly gas potentially still lingered), giving the Canadians time to reinforce the line and prevent a German breakthrough.

The Canadians were reinforced on April 24, 1915, but by that time there had been some 6,000 casualties. Now, the 11-metre tall statue of a solider, head hanging in contemplation and hands resting on his rifle butt, stands at the spot dubbed “Vancouver Corner,” surrounded by Canadian trees. There had been a national contest in 1920 to design a single monument style for the eight Canadian battlesites overseas (five in France, three in Belgium), but the winner was instead constructed at Vimy Ridge (less than an hour from Ypres), and the runner-up contructed here in Saint Julien, Belgium.

Despite the fact that Newfoundland and Labrador was not a part of Canada in 1915 (were, in fact, preparing for their own infamous destiny at the Somme when the poison gas was unleashed in the Ypres Salient), it was still something to stand beneath the watchful eyes of the Canadian memorial, at the foot of which waves a Canadian flag and the air is now laden instead with the fresh scent of Canadian fir trees.

Ypres

After a ploughman’s lunch of bread, cheese, ham, and salad at a restaurant opposite a vast cobbled square, we ventured through the thick sheets of rain to the Ypres Cloth Hall. As I mentioned, Ypres was devastated in the war, with next to nothing left standing.

That includes this massive, beautiful building from the 13th century—however, it was reconstructed in the exact design as the original building, and now hosts the In Flanders Field Museum.

Upon entering the building, you’re given a poppy bracelet, a ticket that opens doors and activates displays throughout the museum. We had an hour to spend amongst the displays, none of which glorify the First World War but instead bring it back to the crudest, basest, most accurate presentation of human suffering that happened here in Belgium one hundred years ago. An hour was not long enough, but it was enough for a glimpse—particularly poignant were the photographs of dead soldiers on the battlefields, exploited during the War and sent as postcards, and the images of soldiers with physical deformities, attempting to reintegrate into society after an unimaginable war. The mental deformities were less easy to capture in black and white images, but those of the lost generation who were not killed inevitably carried a casualty around in their hearts for the rest of their lives.

At the end of the display hangs banners, upon which are written the names and dates of other conflicts that have claimed lives in all corners of the globe. The First World War was the war to end all wars—except it really wasn’t. And there is plenty of space on these banners for more writing.

Essex Farm Cemetery

A Stone of Remembrance—a horizontal tomb of white, emblazoned with “THEIR NAME LIVETH FOR EVERMORE” as suggested by Rudyard Kipling, who lost his only son in the First World War—sits at all commonwealth graves with more than 1,000 buried. The Cross of Sacrifice, its size dependent on the size of the cemetery, likewise is a common feature of commonwealth grave sites, standing prominently at gravesites with more than 40 buried.

These gravesites were, by and large, not planned, and occurred where people died. Most often, this was a major battle site, or a hospital. At the Essex Farm Cemetery, there was a dressing station during the war years, and now the gentle land, skirted by wild poppies, is home to some 1,200 fallen soldiers.

It was here that Lieutenant-Colonel John McCrae of the Canadian Army Medical Corps was stationed in May 1915 when his friend, Alexis Helmer, was killed. Dealing with death everyday and prompted by this personal lost, the Canadian doctor wrote what has become the most iconic verse of the First World War, here at Essex Farm:

Tyne Cot Cemetery

Imagine 12,000 people in one place. Imagine what that many people, with youth and perspective, would be able to accomplish. That’s Tyne Cot, the largest commonwealth cemetery in the world, containing some 8,000 unknown graves in concentric circles and the walls emblazoned with the names of the missing in endless scrawls. It’s at once a numbing representation of what the First World War meant in terms of human life, and the impact it continues to have, long after the ringing gunfire around this area went silent.

Fresh flowers still grow on the gravesites, those with names and countries identified, as well as on those with a young man who is simply “Known Unto God.” A single petal had fallen from one of the graves we walked by, and we picked it up and stuck it between a book, a link between living and death that is all too clear in a graveyard of this enormity.

The site of Tyne Cot is especially significant, in that it sits on the “high ground” (a loose term in low-lying Belgium—however, it was clear that even the slight elevation afforded an expansive view of the area, and therefore made it a strategic location) that was contested in the Third Battles of Ypres, in 1917. You’ll remember that offensive from history class as the Battle of Passchendaele, a controversial campaign that ultimately resulted in the recapture of Passchendaele from German control in August 1917, but that took much longer and cost many more lives than had been anticipated. Images of war machinery and soldiers stuck in the thick mud around this difficult area are iconic and persistent reminders of the futility of war, and even though the rain had abated by this time in the day and the landscape could be regarded as pleasant, it would have been outright impossible to strike that thought from your mind, standing in between so many rows of headstones.

Hill 60

During the First Battle of Ypres, the Germans captured Hill 60, just south of the township. It remained in German control until 1917, during the Battle of Messines. Given that the Germans occupied the high ground, the logic made sense—the only way to get them out was to go under them. The digging had commenced in 1915 by British miners, and by June 1917, the explosions were simultaneous and created 19 large craters in the area. Apparently the tea-cups shook in London, in what was the largest non-nuclear explosion of all human history.

We started this part of the tour at the Caterpillar, a ridge in the area that represents the end result of 32,000 kg of explosives. Sitting right in the middle of the crater is a tranquil lake.

Meanwhile, at Hill 60 itself, bunkers sit almost buried beneath the earth that erupted in what must have been a terrifying onslaught.

The Menin Gate and the Last Post

Back to Ypres for dinner, we passed under the massive arch of the Menin Gate on the border of the community. Inside are written all the names of the commonwealth soldiers missing in the Ypres Salient—at least, that was the intention, until even this huge archway failed to fit all the names. As a result, the arbitrary cutoff date of August 15, 1917 was selected—all missing since then are at Tyne Cot, where the walls are just as burdened with writing as Ypres.

Since 1928, the Last Post is sounded here every night at 8:00 pm. The only exception is when German forces occupied Ypres again in the Second World War (when Poland liberated Ypres, the Last Post resumed, despite the fighting still going on in parts of the town). To put that into perspective, the 30,000th Last Post was sounded by the fire brigade last month in Ypres, each night complete with the trumpets, the laying of wreaths, and a recitation of the “Ode of Remembrance.” You would think that after nearly one hundred years, the town would be tired of hearkening to the First World War, night after night, but several hundred people ushered beneath the Menin Gate for the short but poignant ceremony.

In truth, it was impossible to travel far in Flanders Fields without being reminded of the First World War. The countryside has rebuilt itself, but some things are deeper than the façade, and can never truly be eradicated.

*          *          *

If all of this jumping around, through the different campaigns of Ypres, the shifting frontlines, and the spread-out geography, is a little bit confusing, I think you can take some solace in the fact that maybe that’s intentional. There were no outright victories around Ypres, but it seems that each side was continually losing, even when they captured some slice of land. Tracing the movement of the frontlines across this part of Belgium would soon turn into a mess—the only time your position was good and secured was when there was a poppy six feet above your head. If that part of your body was intact, that is.  

We made our way back to Brussels as the sun went down over the Belgian countryside, napping or lost in something else. To get to visit so many significant locations, each one isolated and spread out in unassuming pockets of farm country, guided by someone with a keen interest in First World War history was a rare opportunity that we were lucky to stumble upon during our short visit to Belgium, and I can only recommend a guided tour if you happen to have a day in Brussels to walk the footsteps of the soldiers long gone but not forgotten.

You can break the First World War down into maps or politics or figures, and in doing so create a picture of what these four years meant for Europe, and the rest of the world. But I think you’re better off to spend time amongst the gravestones, reading the names and the dates and trying to picture the men. The human beings, the ones with wives and sons and daughters and mothers and fathers and friends and interests and dreams and fears. Who they were, and who they might—should—have become.

In doing so, however, it’s important to remember that flowers still grow amongst the graves. And that even though recorded history has only 200 or so years without a war, people time and time again come up with reasons for wanting to live in this place just the same. 

Cheers,

rb