Siege of Ypres (1678)

The siege of Ypres (1–18 June 1794) saw a Republican French army commanded by Jean-Charles Pichegru invest the fortress of Ypres and its 7,000-man garrison composed of Habsburg Austrians under Paul von Salis and Hessians led by Heinrich von Borcke and Georg von Lengerke. French troops under Joseph Souham fended off three relief attempts by the corps of François Sébastien Charles Joseph de Croix, Count of Clerfayt. Meanwhile, the French besiegers led by Jean Victor Marie Moreau compelled the Coalition defenders to surrender the city. The fighting occurred during the War of the First Coalition, part of the Wars of the French Revolution. In 1794 Ypres was part of the Austrian Netherlands, but today it is a municipality in Belgium, located about 120 kilometres (75 mi) west of Brussels. In the Flanders Campaign of 1794, the Coalition army made its main drive against the French center while the French attacked on the two flanks. The Coalition was successful at first but the French soon seized the initiative with persistent attacks. When the Coalition forces shifted east to defend the line of the Sambre River at the end of May, the left wing of Pichegru's Army of the North laid siege to Ypres. Clerfayt's outnumbered corps found itself unable to defend the western flank. A week after Ypres fell, the French won a critical victory on the eastern flank at the Battle of Fleurus.

Ypres ( EE-prə, French: [ipʁ]; Dutch: Ieper [ˈipər] (listen); West Flemish: Yper; German: Ypern [ˈyːpɐn] (listen)) is a Belgian city and municipality in the province of West Flanders. Though the Dutch name Ieper is the official one, the city's French name Ypres is most commonly used in English. The municipality comprises the city of Ypres/Ieper and the villages of Boezinge, Brielen, Dikkebus, Elverdinge, Hollebeke, Sint-Jan, Vlamertinge, Voormezele, Zillebeke, and Zuidschote. Together, they are home to about 34,900 inhabitants. During the First World War, Ypres (or "Wipers" as it was commonly known by the British troops) was the centre of the Battles of Ypres between German and Allied forces.

St Martin's Church (Dutch: Sint-Maartenskerk), also called St Martin's Cathedral (Dutch: Sint-Maartenskathedraal), is a church and former cathedral in the Belgian city of Ypres. It was a cathedral and the seat of the former diocese of Ypres from 1561 to 1801, and is still commonly referred to as such. At 102 metres (335 ft) tall, it is among the tallest buildings in Belgium.

The In Flanders Fields Museum is a museum in Ypres (Ieper), Belgium, dedicated to the study of the First World War. It occupies the second floor of the Cloth Hall (Lakenhalle) on the market square in the city centre. The building was largely destroyed by artillery during the war, but was afterwards reconstructed. In 1998 the original Ypres Salient Memorial Museum was refurbished and renamed In Flanders Fields Museum after the famous poem by Canadian John McCrae. Following a period of closure, the museum reopened on 11 June 2012. The curator, Piet Chielens, is a World War I historian. The museum does not set out to glorify war, but to suggest its futility, particularly as seen in the West Flanders front region in World War I.

The Cloth Hall (Dutch: Lakenhal/Lakenhalle) is a large cloth hall, a medieval commercial building, in Ypres, Belgium. It was one of the largest commercial buildings of the Middle Ages, when it served as the main market and warehouse for the Flemish city's prosperous cloth industry. The original structure, erected mainly in the 13th century and completed 1304, lay in ruins after artillery fire devastated Ypres in World War I. Between 1933 and 1967, the hall was meticulously reconstructed to its prewar condition, under the guidance of architects J. Coomans and P. A. Pauwels. At 125 metres (410 ft) in breadth, with a 70 metres (230 ft)-high belfry tower, the Cloth Hall recalls the importance and wealth of the medieval trade city. The building now houses the In Flanders Fields Museum. In 1999, it was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List as part of the Belfries of Belgium and France site, in recognition of their unique architecture, role in the advancement of civil liberties, and their civic, not religious, influence.

The Museum Godshuis Belle is a small museum in Ypres. Located in the chapel of an old almshouse, it houses the art collection of the Ypres Public Centre for Social Welfare (OCMW in Dutch).

The Abbey of Onze-Lieve-Vrouw ter Nieuwe Plant ("Our Lady of the New Plantation"; Latin: Nova Plantatio Beatae Mariae Virginis), formerly also Roesbrugge Abbey (Dutch: Abdij van Roesbrugge) is a community of Augustinian canonesses belonging to the Congregation of Windesheim. The sisters are informally known as the Roesbrugge Dames - the Roesbrugge Ladies. Located in Roesbrugge from 1239 to the late 16th century, the community then moved into Ypres, West Flanders, Belgium, where it exists today. Its adjacent school is the Lyceum Onze Lieve Vrouw ter Nieuwe Plant.

Ieper railway station is located in Ypres (Dutch: Ieper) in West Flanders, Belgium. The station was opened in 1854 during the reign of Leopold I of Belgium. It is located on the line from Kortrijk to Poperinge run by NMBS, Belgian railway line 69.

The Battle of Broodseinde was fought on 4 October 1917 near Ypres in Belgium, at the east end of the Gheluvelt plateau, by the British Second and Fifth armies against the German 4th Army. The battle was the most successful Allied attack of the Third Battle of Ypres. Using bite-and-hold tactics, with objectives limited to what could be held against German counter-attacks, the British devastated the German defence, which prompted a crisis among the German commanders and caused a severe loss of morale in the 4th Army. Preparations were made by the Germans for local withdrawals and planning began for a greater withdrawal, which would entail the abandonment by the Germans of the Belgian coast, one of the strategic aims of the Flanders offensive. After the period of unsettled but drier weather in September, heavy rain began again on 4 October and affected the remainder of the campaign, working more to the advantage of the German defenders, being pushed back on to far less damaged ground. The British had to move their artillery forward into the area devastated by shellfire and soaked by the autumn rains, restricting the routes on which guns and ammunition could be moved, presenting German artillery with easier targets. At the Battle of Poelcappelle on 9 October, after several more days of rain, the German defence achieved a costly success, holding the approaches to Passchendaele village, the most tactically vital ground on the battlefield.

The Menin Gate (Dutch: Menenpoort), officially the Menin Gate Memorial to the Missing, is a war memorial in Ypres, Belgium, dedicated to the British and Commonwealth soldiers who were killed in the Ypres Salient of World War I and whose graves are unknown. The memorial is located at the eastern exit of the town and marks the starting point for one of the main roads that led Allied soldiers to the front line. Designed by Sir Reginald Blomfield and built by the Imperial War Graves Commission (since renamed the Commonwealth War Graves Commission), the Menin Gate Memorial was unveiled on 24 July 1927. In early 2023, the monument will close for extensive restoration works in time for the memorial's centenary in 2027.

Lernout & Hauspie Speech Products, or L&H, was a Belgium-based speech recognition technology company, founded by Jo Lernout and Pol Hauspie, that went bankrupt in 2001 because of a fraud engineered by the management. The company was based in Ypres, Flanders, in what was later called Flanders Language Valley (mimicking the Silicon Valley).

Francis Nathaniel Tarr (14 August 1887 – 18 July 1915) was an English international rugby union player. He played centre for the Leicester Tigers and, between 1909 and 1913, won four caps for England, scoring two tries. He also earned three Blues while reading law at Oxford. He later became a solicitor in Leicester before volunteering for overseas service during the First World War. He was killed in July 1915 near Ypres on the Western Front, after being hit by a shell splinter while serving as a lieutenant in the 1/4th Battalion, Leicestershire Regiment. Tarr was one of 27 former England internationals killed in the war.