On Tuesday the West Flemish municipalities of Ieper and Langemark-Poelkapelle commemorated the first gas attack during WWI It happened exactly 110 years ago in the hamlet of Steenstrate the Germans unleashed chlorine gas for the first time Many relatives of victims attended the commemoration including Dominique This 78-year-old Frenchman is the grandson of one of the soldiers killed Grandson donates letters to In Flanders Fields Dominique donated dozens of letters to the In Flanders Fields Museum in Ieper The museum previously had the digital versions of the letters Angèle and Georges,’ explains Annick Vandenbilcke 'A couple who clearly loved each other The husband signed up for the army and went off to war It is mainly Angèle's letters to her husband that have been preserved.' 'There are fewer letters from her husband But then communication falls silent and Angèle's long search follows she writes to several different agencies hoping to get some news of her husband You sense in her letters that against her better judgement she keeps hoping he will turn up." The museum tries to respond to people's personal stories as much as it can The gas attack was commemorated at several places including at the Cross of Reconciliation in Steenstrate and the Brooding Soldier war memorial in Langemark-Poelkapelle The Last Post at the Menin Gate was also dedicated to this darkest of anniversaries Scammers are targeting previous fraud victims by posing as helpers who offer to recover lost money for a fee It's often the same fraudsters using new identities or websites to appear legitimate sometimes pretending to be official authorities Moa Langemark from the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority says victims may feel ashamed for being tricked and therefore don't report these crimes to the police Gustav Holmberggustav.holmberg@sverigesradio.se Radio Swedenenglish@sverigesradio.se plus weekly summary on Fridays at 4.30pm on P2 (P6 89.6FM in Stockholm) Kontakta gärna Sveriges Radios forum för teknisk support där vi besvarar dina frågor vardagar kl Having a beer dedicated to you is about the highest honour that can be bestowed in Flanders and Wales now has three from a brewery in a village world famous for the quality of its ales The Deca Brewery in Westvleteren has allowed a trio of its best-selling beers to be given a Welsh rebrand to help fund the maintenance of the Welsh National Memorial Park in nearby Langemark Its popular 5% blonde has been renamed Hedd Wyn the nom-de-plume of pacifist poet Ellis Evans who won the bardic chair at the 1917 National Eisteddfod six weeks after he was killed in World War One the name of the crossroads in Langemark near the first aid point at which Evans died after being injured on the first day of the battle of Passchendaele The third and strongest beer is an 8% dark called “de Drake” Its label includes an image of the red dragon statue that sits at the centre of the memorial park in Langemark “This is a wonderfully innovative and personal example of the local community pulling together to help preserve the legacy of one of our nation’s icons,” said Gareth Lawrence “The people of Langemark feel a deep sense of connection to the place where Hedd Wyn fell along with so many other Welsh soldiers “The magnificent dragon memorial was inaugurated a decade ago through their vision and drive and it’s maintained mainly thanks to their continuing energy.” which was made of bronze by a foundry in Powys and raised on a cromlech of stone from Pontypridd was unveiled in 2014 in Langemark to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of World War One The Welsh Government recently paid for the renovation of the statue the tight budget of the local town council and initial reticence of the Flemish government to designate a relatively new sculpture a sight of cultural heritage means the day-to-day maintenance of the site depends on a group of local volunteers “What happened after the unveiling ceremony is that officially the memorial has been handed over to the town council but this is quite a poor town,” explained Erwin Ureel the local history enthusiast who first had the idea for the memorial and began raising funds for it who live in the farm house at T’Hagebos with their two children had the idea to create some liquid assets for the campaign at the end of last year After the closure of the village’s Sportsman café which had a huge red ‘Croeso’ on its frontage and counted Gareth Bale among its many Welsh visitors the couple began operating a makeshift Welsh-themed bar in a barn attached to their house they also wanted to serve some Welsh-themed beers “We were thinking about how to do some fundraising and so Patrick went to the brewery and asked what they could do for us,” added Ureel “It was too expensive to have our own beers made for us but the brewery gave us permission to choose three of their existing beers to rebrand.” “My daughter and son then created the new Welsh labels,” added Sophie “which we were initially sticking on using milk.” “It’s good beer and we usually sell around 50 bottles every month which helps with the upkeep of the memorial.” which are provided at wholesale price from the Deca Brewery are then sold for between €2.50 and €3.50 a bottle The special editions are even more exclusive than the Westvleteren Trappist ale which is regularly voted the world’s best beer and is usually only available from the Saint Sixtus Abbey where it has been brewed by monks since 1839 De Drake and T’Hagebos branded beers are currently only available in the Deniere’s barn after the remembrance ceremony for Welsh soldiers held at the memorial park on the first Monday of every month They were served once outside the village when former First Minister Mark Drakeford visited Brussels for a St David’s Day event earlier this year But the chair of the Brussels Welsh Society hopes the new beers might soon be made available in the home of Wales’ oldest lager “Ellis Evans arrived in this part of Flanders in 1917 with the Royal Welsh Fusiliers who were garrisoned in Wrexham at the time,” he said “With the Eisteddfod returning to Wrexham next summer wouldn’t it be fitting if these beers could somehow find their way onto the Maes so that Eisteddfotwyr can enjoy a bit of Flanders?” Δdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value" Δdocument.getElementById( "ak_js_2" ).setAttribute( "value" Is there a link where we can buy these beers It’s incredibly generous of the Flemish to help preserve this piece for us It’s a shame the Welsh Government hasn’t been able to support the upkeep of Dave Petersen’s masterpiece—a true work by a greatly underrated artist But can we truly call Hedd Wyn a pacifist if he died fighting on the front lines Connect with Nation.Cymru on Facebook and Twitter If you would like to donate to help keep Nation.Cymru running then you just need to click on the box below it will open a pop up window that will allow you to pay using your credit / debit card or paypal Enter your email address to receive instant 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The memorial in Belgium to Welsh troops who fell in the First World War has been fully renovated – but the Flemish government says it is too soon to give it protected status was unveiled in 2014 at the Welsh National Memorial Park in Flanders to mark the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the conflict A group of local volunteers has taken care of the memorial ever since and perform the last post every month at the site to remember the 40,000 Welsh soldiers who lost their lives in the war the condition of the statue has deteriorated over the last decade “It looked very good for the unveiling in 2014 but the colour rapidly faded,” said Erwin Ureel the local resident who first had the idea for the memorial and began raising funds for it “Initially we were not too worried because we weren’t concerned about having a shiny dragon After trying different DIY measures to maintain the sculpture the group asked the Welsh Government office in Brussels for support That led to the Welsh Government to put forward the 4,000 Euros needed for the sculpture to be professionally restored by local expert Febe Demeester The local council also provided free labour and materials for the renovation of the park in which the memorial stands “This memorial is hugely important in recognising the sacrifices of all Welsh men and women who served their country during the First World War,” Lesley Griffiths the Cabinet Secretary for Culture and Social Justice “I am pleased the Welsh Government is able to provide funding to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission for the maintenance and renovation of the war memorials and surrounding gardens at the Welsh Memorial Park in Langemark Jean-les-Ypres in Belgium and Mametz Wood in France “We appreciate the dedication of the War Graves Commission local authorities and other partners assisting in the monuments’ upkeep and historical standing.” The site of the memorial in the village of Langemark was selected due to its proximity to the area in which the 38th Welsh Division launched the battle of Passchendaele on 31 July 1917 Poet Hedd Wyn was killed on the first day of the battle close to where the memorial now stands spoke this week of his visits to Langemark in the wake of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s decision to leave D-Day commemorations early “It was a profoundly emotional and moving series of events to go to places like Langemark and see the numbers of graves there of young men who had lost their lives,” Jones told BBC Radio Wales’ Sunday Supplement programme You can’t imagine how these young men climbed out of deep trenches to flat land Local volunteers now aim to secure the future of the memorial by having it designated as a site of cultural heritage by the Flemish government “What happened after the unveiling ceremony is that officially the memorial has been handed over to the town council but this is quite a poor town,” explained Ureel “[Having the memorial listed] would probably help in the long term At the moment we still have our volunteer group but the average age is somewhere around 60 so that won’t last forever “That’s the reason I would be keen to give it monument protection so that there is some guarantee in the long term as well.” Ureel said he raised the idea with former Mark Drakeford during the former First Minister’s visit to Brussels in March and received a positive response The Welsh Government said it would be happy to discuss the idea as part of its cooperation with the Flemish government with which it renewed its memorandum of understanding last year The Flemish government has in the past designated similar memorials as cultural heritage such as The Brooding Soldier statue built in remembrance of Canadian troops But a spokesperson for the Flanders’ culture ministry said: “For the Welsh National Memorial we need to look at the regulations on immovable heritage The monument is much too young to be protected as immovable heritage because the monument and the park are cherished and well maintained Read more: Hedd Wyn: how the life of one of Wales’ most promising poets was cut short by the first world war Then and Now…Flanders and Ukraine…there’s real for you…proof of a Maxim is a Maxim says Hiram Maxim The Masters of War…curse them to hell… Global defence companies are recruiting at their fastest rate since the end of the Cold War… There are a handful of individuals endangering the lives of billions… How can a long article like this be written about that wonderful work of art without ONE word of mention be given to the great patriot & artistic giant that created Dave Petersen Like many from “ Cymru Fach “ i visited this monument to honour my own families links to the Ipres area connrction Very moving and a lesson to all generations of the futility of War and the price we pay for defending our freedom My taid was with the “ Welch Regiment “ and based close to this site for 18 months – Ymlaen at Heddwch dros ein wlad annwyl 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 This intriguing book begins with a tragedy when the author’s cousin dies from injuries caused from playing with an unexploded shell Losing the lad in such a way clearly had an impact on Peter Dekens a photographic essay; delves into the profound sadness of a Flanders landscape beset by the unwanted legacy of a century ago While other photographic books tend to seek out positive aspects of the battlefields – sunsets over war cemeteries the beauty of nature overcoming man’s inhumanity to man and all that; Mr Dekens goes straight for the jugular by giving us images of a wounded landscape and the detritus of a conflict that will never go away There isn’t much colour to start with and it all seems immensely gloomy I could give you a selection of easy words from a thesaurus – stark There is another message ringing through the whole project and that is about the frailty of European unity the emphasis is strong – Brexit and other examples of insularity are things to beware Shaky Ground offers a dual meaning from front to back I don’t want to get too heavily into this stuff because it doesn’t really fit into what I see as my remit for this gig and Brexit is too raw a subject to bandy about when the saga is far from finished Mainland Europeans inevitably have a perception that differs to those held by many people living on my island But the wider point about how European disunity caused the Great War and World War II is entirely fair I don’t think it will be the road to a nationalist fervour hastening in conflicts with our continental neighbours as seen a century ago A further essay on the legacy of the war and modern attitudes by the historian Guido van Hengel is included but it comes as an insert rather than being integral to the book I’ll be honest and say I found this a strange decision but the book is such a personal thing to Mr Dekens I can appreciate how it works The author is mindful of the poison chalice heaped on Flanders as a convenient battlefield for it’s neighbours There is an old bon mot that says Belgium is where the British Army plays it’s home games Haig and Montgomery might raise a rueful smile at this and they would not be alone Thousands of lost soldiers are buried under Flanders fields awaiting planned or accidental discovery A number of aerial reconnaissance photos illustrate how the landscape was obliterated underlining the cost of warfare on such a relatively small area After the gloom Mr Dekens brings us into the light by looking at the people who do so much to record the history of the Ypres Salient – professional and amateur archaeologists munitions disposal experts – they all play a part  I found this element to be entirely positive – almost optimistic The people shown really care about their battlefield and it’s legacy The Ypres Salient will always have a special meaning for me My great uncle Leslie was a 20 year-old volunteer soldier when he was killed at Hooge in August 1915 I have been into the field where he died and walked the path of the communications trench along which his body was taken out of the line for burial graves registration cards and copies of the letters his comrades wrote to my great grandmother saying what a brilliant bloke he was  – a soldier steaks and beers in the shadow of the Cloth Hall Peter Dekens’ book presents a different Flanders with a deeper message while also offering something artistic and profoundly personal This is the most unusual book I have seen this year I cannot say how well it will travel but I do find it commendable and quite beautiful and am really pleased to have received it Reviewed by Mark Barnes for War History Online Traces of the Great War at the Ypres Salient Mark Barnes is a longstanding friend of WHO He has contributed to The Times of London and other publications He is the author of The Liberation of Europe (pub 2016) and If War Should Come due later in 2020 facebook.com/mark.barnes.90281 FI notes four areas where consumer protection needs to be strengthened that firms sometimes offer consumers savings products that are not suitable such as complex savings products that require the buyer to be knowledgeable and have plenty of time to monitor their investment The risk of losing their money can be high firms have an obligation to find out if a certain product is suitable for the consumer We have been highlighting for many years that consumers are being offered products that are unsuitable for them and have low value-for-money," says Moa Langemark Distributors can receive high commissions for selling a certain product which can result in a conflict of interest where the needs of the consumer can be disregarded When a customer chooses one product over another the distributor can receive as much as ten times more in compensation Advisors also tend to favour products from their own corporate group even though more suitable products might be available elsewhere takes the position that firms need to put consumers' interests first "The big question is also how to achieve a distribution system that to a large extent recommends inexpensive and simple products," says Daniel Barr FI has previously called for the Government to appoint a national inquiry to analyse conflicts of interest on the savings market We would like to see the Government present measures that combat conflicts of interest.Meanwhile we are continuing our work to strengthen consumer protection we are planning to look at how banks and other investment firms make their digital suitability assessments A suitability assessment consists of a number of questions that should show if the offered product is suitable for the consumer FI's Consumer Protection Report is published annually under mandate from the Government We present in the report our work with consumer protection during 2023 and describe the work we have planned for the year We also account for our observed need for amended regulations FI is prioritising the following risks on the financial market: there is a good chance you will be able to admire Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-Atlas with the naked eye The comet’s visit to Earth should be quite an exceptional experience The next time the comet passes by Earth may not be for another 80,000 years or possibly never again Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-Atlas is already being called the ‘Comet of the Century’ the comet was visible during the past few weeks; since this week it has been getting more visible in the northern hemisphere The comet is expected to become brighter than any other comet that has passed Earth this century It has already been observed with the naked eye the comet reached its closest point to the sun the comet will be at its most visible here in Belgium Philippe Mollet of the Mira observatory estimates that the comet will be most visible next weekend ‘You always need to search for the right balance the comet will already be a bit further away from the sun there will be less interference light and it will be a bit higher in the sky C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-Atlas will be visible in the west and southwest for the next few days and weeks until about an hour after sunset but the comet will appear a little higher in the sky every day the comet may no longer be visible to the naked eye and its comet tail will also disappear you can see the comet and its tail even better A new report by the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority shows Swedish banks' margins are growing on the mortgage rates they offer to their customers The report also said that bank customers with mortgages or that save should negotiate their rates more often and be open to changing banks pay too much for the mortgages and get too little for the savings accounts” a consumer protection economist at the authority and gives tips to mortgage takers ahead of negotiating with the banks Mitchell Cordnermitchell.cordner@sverigesradio.se Set to Music by Friedrich Silcher in 1825  Today ist Volkstrauertag and germany remembers the ones killed in the wars The day was proposed in 1919 by the German War Graves Commission (Volksbund Deutsche Kriegsgräberfürsorge) as a commemoration for German soldiers killed in the First World War It was first held in 1922 in the Reichstag and in 1926 it was decided to observe Volkstrauertag regularly on Reminiscere (the second Sunday of Lent.) Volkstrauertag was not a legal holiday for several reasons: the National Socialists introduced national holiday legislation to create Heldengedenktag (Day of Commemoration of Heroes) they completely changed the character of the holiday: the emphasis shifted to hero worship rather than remembering the dead issued guidelines on content and implementation instructing that flags no longer be flown at half-mast The last Heldengedenktag was celebrated in 1945 Volkstrauertag was observed in its original form in West Germany The first central meeting of the German War Graves Commission took place in 1950 in the Bundestag in Bonn in an effort to distinguish Volkstrauertag from Heldengedenktag its date was changed to the end of the ecclesiastical year a time traditionally devoted to thoughts of death Its scope was also broadened to include those who died due to the violence of anoppressive government An official observation of Volkstrauertag takes place in the German Bundestag The President of Germany traditionally gives a speech with the Chancellor the cabinet and the diplomatic corps present The national anthem and the song “Ich hatt’ einen Kameraden” are then played Most provinces also hold their own ceremonies; veterans usually organize ceremonies that include a procession from the respective Church service to a war memorial speeches by the mayor and the veterans’ chairmen and “Ich hatt’ einen Kameraden”; where available also with the attendance of a Bundeswehr officer as official representative Rob Schaefer is one of the authors writing for WAR HISTORY ONLINE Unfortunately you are viewing this website on an outdated browser which does not support the necessary features for us to provide an adequate experience Please switch to a modern browser such as latest version of Google Chrome whose burial location was only discovered a century after his death has had his final resting place acknowledged during a rededication ceremony in Belgium was killed on 6 October 1917 as he and another soldier withdrew from the Battle of Broodseinde Mystery surrounded his death and final resting place until tireless efforts by retired Belgian Navy Lieutenant Commander and Honorary Navy Captain for the Royal New Zealand Navy Freddy Declerk MNZM OAM, now of the New Zealand Pilgrimage Trust and New Zealand Defence Force (NZDF) historian Matthew Buck who provided the catalyst for follow-up investigations determined Captain Parry’s final resting location Royal New Zealand Air Force (RNZAF) Wing Commander Gareth Russell said he was deeply moved as master of ceremonies at Captain Parry’s rededication service which took place at Dochy Farm New British Cemetery “For more than 100 years Captain Parry lay as one of the myriad of unknown soldiers of WWI and on 12 October 2022 it was my duty to officially unveil Captain Parry’s named headstone.” Rededication ceremony for Captain Ernest Charles Parry at Dochy Farm New British Cemetery The service was attended by New Zealand Ambassador to Belgium as well as representatives from the Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) and Belgian locals who attended as a mark of respect Mr  Buck said it was a rare and special thing to discover where a missing WWI soldier was buried but that it was not the only reason he found this case to be so moving “As I got to know Captain Ernie Parry a little better it was the profound effect that his death had on his family which really began to stand out had to carry the heavy burden of bringing up their two young sons on her own,” he said “We were devastated to learn that one of those boys was declared missing believed killed while serving with the RNZAF during World War II It brought home to us the scale of the loss which was experienced by so many New Zealand families during those two terrible conflicts.” CWGC representative Geert Bekaert said it was an “absolute privilege” to formally recognise the grave of Captain Parry “The CWGC ensures all those who served and fell are commemorated by name and we will care for his grave There are 6290 members of the New Zealand Armed Forces who served during WWI listed on memorials erected to those with no known graves Given the considerable uncertainty typically surrounding such cases a positive identification based purely on archival research is extremely rare The CWGC said at the time of the discovery that Captain Parry’s was the first successful identification case for a New Zealand casualty that it was aware of Shell craters and trenches mark the countryside (Image: SWNS) Aerial photographs reveal First World War mass graves trenches and bomb craters that have been covered over by grass The images from 125ft up show the scale of the destruction - with ranks of white grave marking the Belgian countryside Lochnagar Crater marks the site of an explosion from a British mine beneath the German lines signalling the start of the Battle of the Somme who took the photos on a tour of First World War cemeteries “Especially seeing some of the trenches up close and being among the graves really brings home the scale of it.” The ring of memory south-east of Calais bears the names of 576,606 soldiers of 40 nationalities who died in the front's battles Beaumont-Hamel Newfoundland Memorial has preserved the trenches in memory of the Newfoundland Regiment which was almost completely wiped out on the first day of the Somme Please select at least one newsletter to subscribe to: The Local Europe ABVästmannagatan 43113 25 StockholmSweden “The bank’s margins are increasing and there’s room for negotiation,” FI consumer protection economist Moa Langemark said in a statement lowered the key interest rate by 0.75 percentage points to 2.5 percent lowering mortgage financing costs for Swedish banks and All this means that banks made more money on mortgages “Call your bank and renegotiate your interest rate if you’re not happy with it,” Langemark said “Sometimes asking for an amorteringsunderlag [foundation of amortisation] is enough for your bank to offer you a better deal.” An amorteringsunderlag is necessary if you want to move your mortgage to another bank so ordering one can send a message to your current bank that you’re thinking of switching The document details the amortisation requirements of the mortgage you want to move This includes information on how much you already amortise the estimated value of your property and the date when that value was set You can usually order these online through your bank is to compare your interest rate with the average rate or genomsnittsräntan rather than the list rate – the listränta – which is usually higher Banks legally have to provide the average interest rate on their websites but they may not be as prominent as the listed rate According to financial market statistics from Statistics Sweden the average variable rate for new mortgages was 3.45 percent at the end of the fourth quarter of 2024 compared to 4.21 percent at the end of the previous quarter Please log in here to leave a comment. The images of man and beast floundering in suffocating mud would define not only the Battle of Passchendaele, but the first World War in the popular imagination. Tens of thousands of men died because British generals lacked the moral courage to call the whole doomed enterprise off. As military historian John Keegan observed of the British commander-in-chief Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig, the principal architect of this disaster: "In his public manner and private diaries no concern for human suffering was or is discernible. At the Somme he had sent the flower of British youth to death or mutilation; at Passchendaele he had tipped the survivors into the slough of despond." The Irish who fought at Passchendaele were not spared. Since the unveiling of the Island of Ireland Peace Park at Messines in 1998, much attention has been given to the Battle of the Messines Ridge in June 1917. Here the two Irish divisions, the 16th (Irish) Division and the 36th (Ulster) Division, fought together and won an incontestable victory at relatively little cost by the standards of the first World War. The symbolism of Catholics and Protestants united against a common enemy was easy to grasp, but that battle has obscured the fact that the two divisions fought together for a second and final time at Passchendaele and it was a complete disaster. "It has been a truly terrible day," Maj Gen Oliver Nugent, the general commanding the 36th, wrote to his wife on the evening of August 16th, 1917. “Worse than the 1st July [1916, first day of the Battle of the Somme] I am afraid. Our losses have been very heavy indeed and we have failed all along the line and the whole division has been driven back with terrible losses.” Nugent was wrong in his belief that the events of Frezenberg Ridge on August 16th were worse than the first day of the Battle of the Somme, but in the immediate aftermath of a terrible and fruitless assault, his sentiments were understandable. After their triumph at Messines Ridge, the two Irish divisions, the 16th (Irish) Division and 36th (Ulster) Division, moved across the border to the French town of St Omer. Away from the cramped, unsanitary trenches and the constant deafening din of artillery, the troops took their respite. These were days remembered with fondness by the men in both divisions. The weather was beautiful, the training for the coming offensive not too taxing. Both divisions were part of XIX Corps, which consisted of four divisions: the 15th (Scottish) Division, the 55th Division, the 16th and the 36th. After Messines Ridge, the Irish divisions left the Second Army for the Fifth Army commanded by Gen Hubert Gough. He would not be a success and his command would have tragic consequences for both Irish divisions. The Battle of Passchendaele began on July 31st as did the rain. During the month of August 1917, 127mm of rain fell in Flanders. All the preparations for Passchendaele were confounded by the one thing no general could legislate for. The rain was rotten luck for the poor British infantry and their German adversaries. Each of the millions of shells burrowing into the cloying earth sent up fountains of mud and left huge craters. The rain made it impossible for tanks to traverse the ruined waterlogged bog, negating a potentially important advantage for the British. Shell holes filled with water. Men fell into them and drowned. The two Irish divisions moved to the left of the British attack near Langemarck. In the territory held by XIX Corps, the assault was carried out by the 55th and the 15th (Scottish) Division on the first day of Passchendaele. Both divisions had initial successes. The village of Frezenberg was captured, but, typically, and this would become a pattern throughout the battle, they reached their initial objectives only to be subjected to counter-battery fire by the Germans followed by a devastating counter-attack. On August 4th 1917, the Irish divisions relieved them and moved into these trenches. They would not leave them for nearly two weeks. Even in reserve the men were not spared the horrors of Passchendaele. They were pressed into the battlefield to evacuate the wounded, dig forward trenches and bury communication cables, which were, as often as not, destroyed a short time afterwards by shellfire. Years of shelling had reduced the whole landscape to a dun-coloured wasteland of bombed-out buildings and trees reduced to withered stumps. There were no discernible landmarks left, nothing to relieve this pitiless vista. The next phase of the attack was scheduled for August 14th, but the rain was unrelenting and it was postponed for two days. This phase would become known as the Battle of Langemarck. Gough’s Fifth Army was tasked with the assault assisted by the French on the left. By the time the 16th and 36th were readied to go over the top, they were down a third on their strength and even those men available to go over the top were so weakened by their ordeal that they were not fit for combat. Most had not slept except in stolen moments between the incessant shelling. The portents were not good. An inch of rain fell on the battlefield on August 14th and 15th. Maj Noel Holmes, the deputy assistant adjutant general of the 16th (Irish) Division, went to take a look for himself at the terrain the men were supposed to attack. He was aghast and told Maj Gen William Hickie, the man commanding the 16th, that the men could not be expected to advance in such conditions. Hickie responded knowingly. "I'm not going to mention your name, else they'll say, 'What does this young pup know?' " This was exceedingly dangerous territory. The two divisions between them held a front of 2,700 yards from the Ypres-Roulers railway line to outside the village of St Julien. The German frontline opposing them was a series of blockhouses, pillboxes and ruined farms turned into fortifications on the slopes of Frezenberg Ridge, a gentle rise that overlooked the Irish trenches. In order to have any chance of success, the British artillery had to accurately target the German strong points, there had to be an element of surprise – preferably with poison gas to stun the defenders – and the attackers had to have overwhelming force. None of these conditions was present for the Irish at Passchendaele. At zero hour, the divisions went over the top but in reality most of them were only at half-strength. The men from the 16th were hit before many of them had even left the trenches. Lieut Arthur Glanville of the 2nd Royal Dublin Fusiliers recalled that, to his horror, the battalion's advanced companies were almost "completely wiped out" in the initial attack. “Under hellish fire I collect as many of the company as possible and give the signal to advance, but one after another is shot down. It is death to move – to raise oneself an inch out of the mud.” In his otherwise exhaustive account of the 36th during the first World War, Cyril Falls, the historian of the division, deals with Langemarck succinctly: “The story of the attack, alas! is not a long one. Enemy machine guns all along the front opened fire almost simultaneously with our barrage. There were assuredly not 2,000 infantrymen in the force who went over the top. The foremost wave must have consisted of less than 300 men, probably reduced to a third within half a minute.” About 9am waves of German infantry came over the crest of the Zonnebeke-St Julien ridge and drove the men back to the start. The battle was over. After Langemarck, the British press were full of tales of doomed Irish heroism. Percival Phillips, of the Daily Express, concluded that the men's sacrifice had not been in vain. "There are incidents of courage and devotion that will live as long as there are men of Ulster and men of Clare. The battalions of the North and South are proud of each other." But they had died in vain. August 16th, 1917 was an unmitigated disaster. There was no glory, only death, misery and mud. Nugent knew who to blame for the failure of the attack. He wrote to his wife shortly afterwards: “I went to see Gough this afternoon. He was very pleasant and is a charming man as he always is, but my dearest, no one can talk to him and come away thinking that he is mentally or intellectually fit to command a big army.” Philip Gibbs, of the Daily Chronicle, chafed under the restrictions of wartime censorship. He waited until after the war to deliver his withering verdict on Langemarck: "The two Irish divisions were broken to bits and their brigadiers called it murder. They were violent in their denunciation of the Fifth Army for having put their men into the attack after those 13 days of heavy shelling." It had been a terrible time for both divisions, who had nothing to show for the horrors they endured and for the almost 8,000 casualties they had suffered in less than two weeks. The Battle of Frezenberg Ridge was not a success like Messines Ridge, Guillemont or Ginchy. It was not a disaster to be analysed and commemorated like the first day of the Battle of the Somme or the landings at Gallipoli. It was not remembered for good or ill. It was simply forgotten. It was just a terrible incident in a terrible stage (the Battle of Langemarck) of a terrible battle (Passchendaele). The Irish debacle at Langemarck, though, was remembered by a retired Belgian army officer, Erwin Ureel. In 2014 he assisted the Royal Welsh Fusiliers Association in the creation of the Welsh National Memorial Park in Langemarck. Ureel had the foresight to order an extra memorial stone with a view to erecting a memorial to remember the Irish who died on August 16th, 1917. He recalled: “For 10 years I tried to promote the story, but to no avail. Nobody seemed to be interested in Langemarck. It is a story of triumph and disaster. The triumph was Messines; the disaster was Langemarck.” The memorial stone is now in place at a site opposite what was once the Pommern Redoubt. Affixed to it will be a bronze plaque commissioned by the Royal Dublin Fusiliers’ Association. From this vantage point, the high ground that cost the blood of so many brave Irish sons is barely discernible against the broad horizon. Somewhere beyond lie the bodies of men who were every bit as much victims of British military obduracy as they were of German bullets and bombs. The most famous Irish casualty of August 16th was Fr Willie Doyle SJ. Before he was killed, he wrote of those lost men shortly before he would join them, all of them asleep forever somewhere in Flanders fields. “My poor brave boys. They are lying now out on the battlefield: some in a little grave dug and blessed by their chaplain, who love them all as if they were his own children; others stiff and stark with staring eyes, hidden in a shell-hole where they had crept to die; while perhaps in some far-off thatched cabin an anxious mother sits listening for the well-known step and voice which will never gladden her heart again.” The updated paperback version of Ronan McGreevy's book Wherever the Firing Line Extends: Ireland and the Western Front will be published by The History Press in May. It contains a new foreword by Mary McAleese Facebook pageTwitter feed© 2025 The Irish Times DAC You don't have permission to access the page you requested What is this page?The website you are visiting is protected.For security reasons this page cannot be displayed The imagery of First World War remembrance is familiar to all of us Radio and Newspaper programmes and articles relating to Remembrance Day and the serried ranks of BBC presenters and personalities wearing poppies The format and language of the ceremonies is very similar throughout most of the United Kingdom essentially celebrations of common unity beneath God This ‘Rememberance’ has become the accepted way to note the First World War on November 11th it is pertinent to ask whether it was the most relevant to the Welsh experience of the Great War The true figure of Welsh servicemen who lost their lives either in the Great War – or as a result of it – can only be estimated an extraordinary and unparalleled period of time It was made even more traumatic among Welsh-language communities such as Bryn Du as all official War notices and more particularly those communities where Welsh was the prime language in the immediate post-War years The memorial shown stands in the Anglesey village of Bryn Du part of Llanfaelog Parish south of Holyhead depicting the Old Testament parable of the broken column The inscribed include poetry from the local Reverend It speaks of the servicemen who give their blood for it was all they had to offer due to their poverty In contrast to England and the mostly English-speaking areas of Wales but also the ages and home addresses of the eleven casualties are all inscribed The focus of the memorial is very much on the men or rather ‘bechgyn’ (the boys) who lost their lives The Bryn Du memorial can be said to more accurately reflect the notion of ‘Forgetting’ than ‘Remembrance’ It stands for ridding memories of battlefields guns and dead bodies and more for actively engaging with ‘the boys’ rather than the symbolism of war It brings them spiritually home to where they belong by virtue of substitute Similar memorials can be found throughout Anglesey and a broad sweep of country extending down to the Preseli Hills and the banks of the Severn Examples exist in Welsh-speaking enclaves as far south as Llancarfan in the Vale of Glamorgan from a parish at the time partly in England is possibly unique as it begins ‘Arwydd o Serch’ (A sign of love) and includes ‘Mamau wives and sisters) again emphasising the way that those named on the memorials were rooted in their communities The most pointed example of ‘Forgetting’ can be located Here the community made the stark decision not to erect any form of public memorial to their dead They wished for no further remembering of the War The decision of Anglesey Council to place a memorial stone in the church graveyard in 2014 was not universally popular given the seemingly compliant official acceptance of ‘Remembrance’ with all its adjacent motifs the almost monotonous message of November 11 is less problematical and perhaps best understood by a further example from Anglesey the most well-known of the preachers whose sermons were little short of recruiting rallies He became known as Lloyd George’s Chaplain following his elevation to the rank of Hon It is perhaps fitting that the simple inscription outside the Memorial Hall translates as ‘Who can say the value of your sacrifice?’ The file could not be found for a number of reasons such as the file being moved or deleted. Please check your spelling and if you still can't get to the right page try heading to the homepage for a look around If you still have problems, try contacting us and we'll do what we can to help you. Click here to get back to where you came from A hacker has helped police expose a network suspected of scamming more than a thousand mostly elderly people through bank fraud, SVT's investigative programme Uppdrag Gränskning reports. The hacker is said to have infiltrated the network's computers and in real time tracked and secured material – which was handed over to the police Three people have been in custody since last Friday A fourth suspect is to be extradited from Portugal