The Immortal Salient

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Events that took place in World War 1, on the day they happened can be posted here.

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Looking down onto the Ypres Salient from the air you will see it is shaped like a saucer, with the town of Ypres in the centre and at the bottom, surrounded by low ridges, in Flanders what height there was was all important, and the Germans held it to the north, east and south, looking down watching what the British were up to. The salient became a great british charnel house, a place soacked in British blood, the last small piece of free Belguim. Ground so dearly bought would not be given up! Names that echo through British military history, The Bluff, hill 60, hooge, Menin road, sanctuary wood,hill 62, railway cuttings, tyneside cottages, plugstreet wood,mount sorrel,broodsinde,ghelevult,st julien,langamark,pilckem ridge, PASHENDARLE.

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These were places that for over 4 years non-stop men, british and her commonwealth and German shot, bombed,stabbed,burnt,soufercated,gassed,throttled,, were every bayoneted and clubbed each other, and every human ingunuity and how to kill people was given free rein, the fought in the air, on the ground and beneath it, places once taken were at once counter attacked and retaken over and over and over, in the salient the guns were never silent. It was a place were the living lived with the dead, built there walls, roofs and bridges with the dead, were your mates were buried and the next bombardment blew the graves back open, and they were lost for ever, visit the menin gate and look up at the missing, (they are not lost....they are here) on the walls on the ceilings, the landscape of this part of flanders is rich in plant growth! 1st Ypres were the Germans stopped and the western front was completed from switzerland to the sea, and the salient was created.

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1st Ypres oct-nov 1914. Enter gas and the flame thrower 2nd Ypres march-may1915, no major actions in the saliant for the rest of 1915 and 1916, but the killeng and fighting never stopped, here an advance was measured in yards, a trench line taken here, a small rise there, a trench raid, it never stopped as Plumbers 2nd Army was given the unenviable task of holding the saliant, no one wanted to go the there, in the saliant the guns were never silent, the killing never stopped, in the air on the ground and deep deep beneath her! In march 1917, at last a success, using great mines deep under the ground the German defenses on the messenes ridge were destroyed and the ridge captured, but this was just the opening of a great and terrable event, 3rd Ypres, PASHENDARLE, july-nov 1917 the British in a great offensive would attempt to smash there way through the German defenses, but the weather would drown the British army in the mud

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1918 following the surrender of Russia the germans transferd 80 divisions from the western front, one last attempt would be made to win the war before the americans could get enough men over. The kaiserslact, the kaisers war. The threat was now clear to the Germans, they had to destroy the British, on the 21st March 1918, in front of the old somme battle field a great bombardment swept Goughs exhausted 5th Army away (moved from the salient to a quite part to recover from 3rd Ypres) and for the first time since 1914 a great army was in open country, the Germans had smashed clean through and the road the Amiens was open, BUT the german army was exhausetd as well, short of food and medical supplys, the advancing troops couldnt believe there eyes on seeing the great stock piles of food supplies of every description, the German army slowed then stopped, as her troops ate and drank and looted, the british and french rushed troops in front of Amiens and they were held, in desparation the Germans again attacked the British, another great bombardment followed by a massive attack, this time in the salient, ground so dealy bought would not be given up, the British were slowly pushed back all the ground captured in 1917 again lost, but this time it was the Germans who were advancing over this devistated landscape, against the machine gun, 1400yards from the gates of Ypres the Germans were stopped, the salient was held.

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4th Ypres now the British were ready, the y smashed there way through the German defenses , and the Germans were in retreat, the end was in sight, the salient was left behind, THE IMMORTAL SALIENT, slowly being forgtten by new genarations, as the last 3 WW1 vetrens come close to the end of there lives, if you only do it once visit the Menin Gate and look up at the names, listen to the last post played each night at 20:00hrs, visit the cemetary at Tyne Cott, see the names of the missing and look back towards Ypres down the slope and think what went on there for over 4 years, but one thing never forget the Men and Women of 1914-18, the world was never the same again!

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Above the fully realised hell that has become associated in our collective folk memory with Passchendaele flew the Royal Flying Corps. Skimming just above the waves of mud they sought to disrupt the German infantry by directly attacking them from the air. The highly trained scouts of the RFC were exposed to terrific dangers in there desparite efforts to assist the infantry in thier advance "Our task was to fly into that tunnel below the flight of the field gun shells, look for any target we could see, and Germans in trenches, enemy machine gun posts, anything at all, shoot it up, fly through the tunnel and come out at the other end. We were warned not to fly out sideways, if we did we would most certainly meet our shells in flight and be brought down by them. Once we entered the tunnel there was nothing for it but to carry on and go through to the very end.

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We flew in pairs I led, being flight commander. I and my companion flew to the south of the tunnel, turned left and entered it. Instantly we were in an inferno. The air was boiling with the turmoil of the shells flying through it. We were thrown about in the aircraft, rocking from side to side, being thrown up and down. Below was mud, filth, smashed trenches, broken wire, limbers, rubbish, wreckage of aeroplanes, bits of men - and then in the midst of it all when we were flying at 400ft I spotted a German machine gun post and went down. My companion came behind me and as we dived, we fired our 4 machine guns straight into the post. We saw the Germans throw themselves to the floor, we dived at them and sprayed them, wether we hit any we didnt know. There was no time to see, only dive and fire, climb and zoom onto the next target. We saw a number of grey green German troops lieing in holes batterd trenches that were now shell holes, we dived on them and fired, again we were firing on a target we could not assess

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We were being thrown about. A third time we dived on another target and then our ammunition was gone. We flew on rocking about in that inferno, then out of the tunnel and escaped. I felt never at any time had I passed through such an extraordinary experience when we our selves were shut in by a cloud of shells above and real d**nation on the ground.
Captain Norman macmillan 46 SQN RFC

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Great read Sir. Thank you.

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At 03:10hrs on 7/6/1917, as a prelude to the 3rd battle of Ypres, nineteen mines charged with over a million lbs of explosives, exploded under the German positions along the Messines ridge and a triffic bombardment began to stop any german reinforcements reaching these positions (2 mines failed to go off, 1 did a few years ago destoying a farmers feild another awaits!) from hill 60 in the south of the saliant to trench 127 in front of plugstreet, the german defensive positions along with there defenders were vaporised, with the british X corp, in the north IX in the centre and the Anzacs in the south the infantry raced up the hill, by mid morning all objectives had been captured.

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It was so successfull, and the casualtys so light(something the british were not use to) that so many men reached the top that they all started milling around wondering what to do, to the germans below and on the next ridge they made brill targets on the skylight, and soon the old story began as the germans opened up with all they got, and the men on the ridge started digging for all they were worth. But at long last here was a victory and nothing would change that and plumbers bite and hold tactics started again as the next objeative was attacked and captured, and then again, untill the whole ridge was in british hands, next in site was the pilkem ridge and the gelivelt platau, these had to be captured, but here Haig made a grave mistake and would doom the great british offensive that was coming! Plumber asked for 2 weeks to move and reposition his artillery, Haig ditherd and then gave the job to Goughs 5th Army, Gough was a thruster, had no time for plumbers bite and hold, he was going to capture the lot in a day, no stoppin, he wanted 5 WEEKs to get ready!!

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1917-2007 90 years Battle of Passchendaele. For information of events go to
www.greatwar.be

discover more about Flanders go to www.visitflanders.co.uk

I will be there on the 5/10/07 - 9/10/07

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A very good link with photographs of the WW1 battlefields today, lots of where the yanks eventualy started fighting is www.westernfrontphotography.com the link then is
FIELDS of Battle 1914-1918 some amazing picks, Ive only ever realy stuck to the british sector, but must go further south to the haumptmanbeerskorph, to think its all still there, 90years on! up in the mountains see.

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Ignore the spelling above HA HA hartmannswillerkopf, Fritz (from a tommy so no insult intended if ur German same as Yank fer Americans) words are sure tongue twisters lol